Esad Erbili

Esad Erbili or Mehmed Esad Efendi was a shaykh of the Naqshi-Khalidi sufi order and brought a branch of the Naqshbandiyyah with him to Istanbul at the beginning of World War I.

Biography

Esad Erbili was born in Arbil in Iraq in the year 1847 (1264), where he studied under Taha al-Hariri. After the death of Shaykh al-Hariri in 1875 he visited Istanbul for a short time. He was exiled to Arbil in 1900^[1]. Later returning in 1910 to established a Dergah (Tekke) in Üsküdar^[2]

Assembly of Shaykhs

In 1914, Esad Erbili was appointed the chairman of the Assembly of Shaykhs^[3] (The Council of Islamic Teachers, or Meclis-i Meşâyıh) in Istanbul and was so until its closure in 1915^[2]

Menemen Incident

As part of the Atatürk's Reforms, the tekke in Istanbul was closed. He was captured with his son Mehmed Efendi because they were thought to be involved in the 1930 Menemen Incident. Esad Efendi was initially sentenced to death, later his penalty was reduced to life in jail because of his age^[4][5] and he died shortly afterwards in a Military Hospital in Izmir.^[2]

Writings

• Kenzul-Irfan-Translation and Commentary of 100,000 Hadith
• Maktubat (Mektubat) ^[6] - a collection of letters to his students
• Divan - Turkish and Persian Poetry
• Risale-i Es'adiyye - Autobiography
• Tevhid Risalesi Tercümesi - A Commentary of Ibn Arabi's Kitab al-Tawhid
• Fatiha-i Şerife Tercümesi - A tafsir (commentary) of the first chapter of the Qur'an

Notes

1. ^ Türkiye Ekonomik ve Toplumsal Tarih Vakfı, Dünden Bugüne İstanbul Ansiklopedisi, Kültür Bakanlığı, 1994, ISBN 9789757306061, p. 37. (Turkish)
2. ^ ^{a b c} Yilmaz, H. Kamil:"Altin Silsile" ("Golden Chain"). Erkam Yayinlari (Istanbul). 1994.
3. ^ Brian Silverstain, "Sufism and Modernity in Turkey: From the Authenticity of Experience to the Practice of Discipline," in M. van Bruinessen and J. Day Howell, eds. Sufism and the Modern in Islam, I.B. Tauris, 2007, ISBN 9781850438540, p. 39.
4. ^ Mustafa Armağan, "Menemen olayında 10 büyük şüphe", official personal webcite of Mustafa Armağan. (Turkish)
5. ^ Touraj Atabaki, The State and the Subaltern: Modernization, Society and the State in Turkey and Iran, I.B.Tauris, 2007, ISBN 9781845113391,　p. 131.
6. ^ Muhammad Esat Erbili: "Mektubat" ("Letters"). Erkam Yayinlari (Istanbul)

Persondata
Name	Erbili, Esad
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	1847
Place of birth
Date of death	1931
Place of death