Monthly Archives: October 2024

Fethullah Gulen, the leader of the Hizmat movement, a modernist Sufi-inspired Islamic movement from Turkey died last week. In 2018, I was privileged to spend 2 days in his secluded compound, where he allowed me to sit in on his private classes with his students. I have had several graduate students from his movement since he encourages them to do degrees in interfaith. I wrote a long report on my visit, It was read by people in the movement and I hear they discussed it. Here is a link to my long blog post from 2018.

https://kavvanah.blog/2018/07/10/my-meeting-with-hocaefendi-fethullah-gulen/

(The picture is with Chief Rabbi Bakshi Doron on the Left)

Folks,

I will be back after the holiday of Simchat Torah, starting on Thursday, Oct 31st. I plan on starting to post weekly. Once again, I will keep you informed about what I am reading and writing. Stay tuned. I certainly have a significant backlog of ideas, topics, and interviews. I have been sent lots of books. I can be reached by email. (In my hiatus, they have installed AI in WordPress and it is making all sorts of suggestions for me to review.)

In addition, for those who have not heard, I edited a new volume of the homilies on Rabbi Shagar on the Jewish holidays. Living Time: Festival Discourses for the Present Age (August 2024). It was planned and translated 2017-2020, seven years ago. I wrote a significant introduction. The introduction and selection might have been very different if done in 2023-2024. It is available from Maggid-Koren Press and on Amazon.