Fethullah Gulen's Teaching and Practice

This is the first book of its kind about the Turkish Muslim scholar, Fethullah Gülen, since the July 2016 events in Turkey and what followed. This includes the trauma experienced by Gülen and the disruption to initiatives inspired by his teaching and practice, known as Hizmet. This Open Access book explores Gülen's teaching and practice interactively with changing geographical and temporal contexts. Distinctively, it argues that just as Hizmet cannot be understood apart from Gülen, so Gülen and his teaching cannot be understood apart from Hizmet, and the religious roots of both. Drawing on primary interviews with Gülen and Hizmet participants and a review of relevant literature, it argues that both Gülen's teaching and Hizmet have clear origins in the Qur'an and Sunnah as dynamically developed through their geographical, temporal and existential reception, translation and onward communication. This includes how the life and teaching of Gülen has itself developed through engagement with questions and issues arising from Hizmet's practice, as well as what the future heritage of both might be. A more detailed and geographically focused case study of this process is set out in author Paul Weller's (2021) Hizmet in Transitions: European Developments of a Turkish Muslim-Inspired Movement, also published by Palgrave Macmillan.