Hagia Sophia: Erdogan nimmt an Freitagsgebet teil | DW News

Kirche, Moschee, Weltkulturerbe, Museum und jetzt wieder Moschee – die Hagia Sophia in Istanbul hat eine bewegte Geschichte. Und jetzt zum ersten Mal seit 86 Jahren wurde in dem Bau wieder ein muslimisches Freitagsgebet zelebriert. Mit dabei war türkischer Präsident Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Im Vorfeld hatte es international Kritik gegeben. Bundesaußenminister Heiko Maas sagte heute, er könne die Entscheidung nicht nachvollziehen, da der Weltkulturerbe-Status des einzigartigen Gebäudes eine Bedeutung weit über die Türkei hinaus habe.

Hagia Sophia: Jewel of the Byzantines

A documentary on the grandest Byzantine church of them all: the Hagia Sophia in Istanbul, Turkey.

Erdogan per Dekret: Hagia Sophia wird wieder Moschee | DW Nachrichten

Seit Tagen hatte der türkische Präsident Erdogan angekündigt, die weltberühmte Hagia Sophia in Istanbul wieder in eine Moschee umzuwandeln. Nun hat das Oberste Verwaltungs-Gericht seinen Wunsch bestätigt. Damit annulierte es eine Entscheidung von 1934. Damals war das Gebäude in ein Museum umgewandelt worden. Als neutrale kulturelle Stätte brachte es den Besuchern seitdem die wechselhafte Geschichte zwischen Christentum und Islam nahe. Wenige Minuten nach der Entscheidung unterzeichnete Erdogan das passende Dekret.

Turkish Court Rules Istanbul's Hagia Sophia Can Revert to a Mosque | DW News

Turkey's highest administrative court has issued a ruling that paves the way for the government to convert Istanbul's Hagia Sophia from a museum back into a mosque. The ruling annulled a 1934 government decree that turned the UNESCO Word Heritage Site, and Istanbul's most iconic landmark, into a museum. But Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan pushed to restore its status as a mosque. He said that international pressure to keep it a museum was a violation of Turkey's national sovereignty. The Russian Orthodox Church has called the move unacceptable.

Will Erdoğan Make the Hagia Sophia a Mosque Again?

Will Erdogan Make the Hagia Sophia a Mosque Again?

As Turkey Turns from the West, Islanbul's Most Iconic Building Is Claimed for Islam

NEWSWEEK: Empires have risen and fallen, but the dome of the great basilica remains, dominating the skyline of Istanbul for the past 14 centuries. Built by the Roman emperor Justinian in 532 as the Church of the Holy Wisdom, the Hagia Sophia served as the principal church of Eastern Christianity for 916 years. When the Turkish Sultan Mehmet II captured the city in 1453, he stopped at the monumental porch and stooped to scatter dust on his turban as a gesture of humility before Allah the Victory-Giver.

On Mehmet's order, the church became the mosque of Ayasofya (the Turkish spelling), a symbol of the triumph of the Ottoman Turks and of the supremacy of Islam. In 1935, the founder of modern Turkey, Kemal Atatürk, ordered Ayasofya opened as a museum, a symbol of the secular, modern republic he was forging from the ruins of the Ottoman Empire. "Atatürk made the Hagia Sophia a monument to what Turkey could become," said Anthony Eastmond, AG Leventis Reader in the history of Byzantine art at London's Courtauld Institute of Art. "By turning it from a mosque into a museum, he made it a place for all people."

Now the Hagia Sophia (the usual English spelling) has once again become a symbol – this time of the very contemporary battle for the soul of Turkey between Islamists and secularists. Vocal religious-conservative activists, some with links to the ruling Justice and Development (AK) Party, are pressuring the government to reconsecrate the site for Islam. … » | Owen Matthews, Sila Alici | Wednesday, June 03, 2015