Loyal Turks or Fake Muslims? contemporary documents, one does not find any recognizable Dönme
names.^31 There was firm opposition to the Dönme on racial, biological,
and economic grounds.^32
If their racial or inherent difference could be proven, Dönme in Turkey
could not be assimilated and made into citizens. Racism could be used to
hinder their integration and exclude them from the body politic. What
strategies could a Dönme deploy to avoid the damning rhetoric of race?
Would an argument presenting the Dönme as longtime loyal servants
who were already secular be the more pragmatic path?
Ahmet Emin Yalman: Civic National Identity
People were thirsty for knowledge, and editors realized newspapers
were selling briskly. At a time when foreign writers such as Wladimer
Gordlevsky admitted that it was difficult for the researcher to rip away the
veil of reserve and suspicion within which the Dönme were wrapped,^33
many Turkish newspapers persisted, seeking to uncover their secrets. To
contribute to the discussion, the Islamist journal Mihrab (Prayer Niche)
translated three pages devoted to the Dönme in Jean Brunhes and Camille
Vallaux’s La géographie de l’histoire that claimed that these anti-Muslim se-
cret Jews had fomented the revolutions of 1908 and 1923.^34 Articles on the
subject appeared in Resimli Dünya (The World in Pictures), Resimli Gazete
(Photo News), and Son Saat (The Last Hour). The latter published a long
series entitled “How Did Sabbateanism Appear, How Did it Develop?”^35
Vakit, determined to get to the bottom of the story, had its Ankara corre-
spondent İhsan Arif write a report based on Dönme informers, including
Rüştü, about Dönme beliefs, customs, prayers, and holidays.^36
Many of the stories were sensationalist. Scholars and the public have
long been interested in claims that the Dönme engaged in what is popu-
larly known as “wife-swapping” in the West and “extinguishing (snuffing)
the candle” in the East, a phrase Major Sadık unfortunately used in his
treatise defending the Dönme.^37 Since ancient times, these phrases have
historically been used, not to express the actual practices of religious or
political dissenters, but to serve as metaphors emphasizing how antino-
mian or immoral they are, to strike fear into the hearts of other members
of society about the alleged threat the group poses to society, especially if
it should come to power. In Islamic history, allegations of “wife sharing”
usually were automatically added at the end of a laundry list of claims of