Jon Pahl - Fethullah Gülen, a Life of Hizmet: Why a Muslim Scholar in Pennsylvania Matters to the World

As the most fascinating and influential Islamic leader alive today, Fethullah Glen has stirred controversy. Jon Pahl is keenly aware of the accusations that have dogged Glen, and in this remarkable biography he deals with them as scrupulously and convincingly as a self-confessed admirer of the man and his movement can. More than that, Pahl offers a provocative meditation on the part that religion can play in leading us to serve our fellows rather than setting us apart from one another. Most of all, he tells an inspiring story of a modern saint.

Michael Zuckerman, PhD

Professor of History, University of Pennsylvania

Jon Pahl has delivered an important gift to the English-speaking world. Often described in the U.S. media as the exiled cleric, Fethullah Glens life and Islamic teachings are relatively unknown. Pahl provides a comprehensive history of this one man and his movement of service.

David D. Grafton, PhD

Professor of Islamic Studies and Christian-Muslim Relations at Hartford Seminary

Jon Pahls new book makes a substantial, significant and distinctive contribution to the literature around Fethullah Glen and the Hizmet movement inspired by his teaching and person. As a biography written by someone with the skills of an historian of religion it differentiates itself clearly from a hagiography. At the same time, it seeks to deploy an appropriately spiritual understanding of a leading Muslim scholar whose life is revered by hundreds of thousands of Muslims and others, and whose teachings have inspired them. In the wake of the July 2016 and following events in Turkey, Fethullah Glen has become the focus of a campaign of defamation that seeks to justify the misappropriation of assets, summary dismissal from employment, and arbitrary imprisonment of many tens of thousands of people in Turkey, and to the practically enforced exile of many others. In contrast to this, while engaging with a number of the key charges made against Fethullah Glen, Pahls summative evaluation of his subjects life in terms of its essentially Quranic roots, Sufistic interiority, and consultative engagement with individuals and groups that has resulted in many hundreds of big and small positive initiatives in education, dialogue and the relief of poverty, makes what is a very a timely contribution to public debate. In underlining that, for Fethullah Glen, both his life and all these things take place within a divine and eternal horizon, Pahls book also fulfills what its author expresses as his hope for it namely that it is indeed both critically-sound and spiritually-inspiring.

Paul Weller, PhD

Emeritus Professor, University of Derby, UK

Jon Pahls biography of Fethullah Glen, A Life of Hizmet sheds light on the Hizmet Movement with an extraordinary openness, touching on curious and crucial issues, and responding them in a freely flowing and constructive manner. A must-read that clarifies our understanding on the Hizmet Movement of Islam through the biography of Glen towards universal values, peace, interfaith, empathy for the worlds problems, and altruism in service to community at a most needed time.

Zleyha olak , PhD

Lecturer and Coordinator of Turkish Language Program in the Middle Eastern, South Asian, and African Studies Department, Columbia University

Pahls book does a masterful job of rich description of the people, places and historical events that shaped the life and spirit of one of the outstanding religious scholars of the modern age and the movement he inspired. Unique and noteworthy in Pahls biography is the brilliant way in which he places the events in Mr. Glens life in the historical context of the swirling and complicated politics of modern day Turkey.

Helen Rose Ebaugh, PhD

Professor Emeritus, University of Houston

This readable and well-researched book is an appreciative biography by an outsider to the movement that Fethullah Glen has spawned, and helps us understand the form of Islamic modernism that he represents and why some political leaders find it challenging. If you want to understand Glen and his movement, this is the place to begin.

Mark Juergensmeyer, PhD

University of California, Santa Barbara

Author of Global Rebellion: Religious Challenges to the Secular State

Jon Pahls Fethullah Glen: A Life of Hizmet is the first scholarly study of the Turkish Islamic reformers emergence into a beloved and controversial global leader of values-based education, transformative business practices, and principled religious pluralism.

The genius of Pahls book is his lucid translation of Glens vision into a contemporary idiom that modern readers can relate to and understand. Akin to Alex Haleys The Autobiography of Malcolm X, Pahl effectively analyzes the tension in Glens life between creative fidelity to a revealed tradition and generous openness to present-day education, science, technology, business, and society.

Eminently readable, bracingly fast-paced, originally researched, and replete with Glens own inspirational speeches and writings this new book is a must read for anyone interested in the relevance of civic Islam in the clash between religion and politics in the world today.

Mark I. Wallace, PhD

Department of Religion, Environmental Studies Program, Swarthmore College, PA

With clear, interesting, and often moving prose, Jon Pahl narrates the story of Fethullah Glen, a fascinating person with qualities of Mahatma Gandhi and other great spiritual leaders. As one who has seen outstanding people in the Hizmet movement in a number of countries, this book helps me understand how a great role model can lead to human empowerment and social betterment. Glen has given women courage and opportunity to be educated and live up to their full potential. Like Martin Luther King, Jr., Glen has empowered people with education that has led them to civic engagement. This has been helping to transform societies. While dictatorial repression has caused challenges for the Hizmet movement at this time, truth, justice, and compassion will prevail. I am grateful for this important biography which has material that can enrich historical, interfaith, gender, sociological, and religious studies.

Martha Ann Kirk, Th.D.

Professor, University of the Incarnate Word

Fethullah Glen

A Life of Hizmet

Why a Muslim Scholar in Pennsylvania

Matters to the World

Jon Pahl

Blue Dome Press

New Jersey

Copyright 2019 by Blue Dome Press

22 21 20 19 1 2 3 4

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system without permission in writing from the Publisher.

Published by Blue Dome Press

335 Clifton Ave.

Clifton, NJ, 07011, USA

www.bluedomepress.com

978-1-68206-020-9

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Pahl, Jon, 1958- author.

Title: Fethullah Glen, a life of hizmet : why a Muslim scholar in

Pennsylvania matters to the world / Jon Pahl.

Description: Clifton, NJ : Blue Dome Press, [2019] | Includes bibliographical

references and index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2019004491 (print) | LCCN 2019004558 (ebook) | ISBN

9781682065259 (ebook) | ISBN 9781682060209 (hardcover)

Subjects: LCSH: Glen, Fethullah. | Muslim scholars--Turkey--Biography. |

Islam and culture--Turkey. | Islam--Turkey--20th century.

Classification: LCC BP80.G8 (ebook) | LCC BP80.G8 P34 2019 (print) | DDC

297.092 [B] --dc23