A Way of Living
We are in the twenty-first century. And in Turkey. In times when we ponder whether it is us, the helpers, or those in need who are more in need of help, surrounded by aid activities, we thought to resist submitting to the side that keeps humanity in despair and captures it in this game of worldly life. The question was what our actions meant in the century we live in. Even if Atlas, who holds the world on his shoulders, supports it and its order, there were, above all, helpless joys here and thoughts cooling with patience. Because the world was made of pain. Atlas was holding the order that fanned the pain and looked at the order, because he had a face that deserved compassion.
We always desire the truth because we are ready to admit at any moment that “we too have served this ugly order.” Sometimes, when we extend our hand to give something, like Stratezt falling at the feet of Mitya (the truth), bowing our heads in great shame for shaming the person in front of us, is there a confession hidden in our discomfort of being part of the order? We do not know. What we do know is that the life of this world is short and what makes a person in need of help is not the lack of resources, but the lack of belief in Allah. Allah made resources and impossibilities a means for us to purify ourselves. We tried to help because we were in need of help, and they refused it because they were not in need of help.
The agricultural revolution was the worst thing that happened to the peasant. I wonder if the peasants knew this? A person who helps someone, if they have a thought, knows that they have destroyed that person, good or bad. Just like colonization. After all, colonies become prosperous. So, what are we going to do? This question is always there, isn’t it? That is, even when not trying to say to the counterpart, “I know you can’t give an answer, so there’s nothing better than what we’re doing now.” But if what we’re doing now is this, it’s not a good thing, and this thing is just something for you to convince yourself that you’re doing something good. It seems that once someone gets involved in this business, just as an artist focuses on their work because it will reflect the originality of their own soul, philanthropists try to bring some original forms to this act of help. But we do not know if it is right to take pleasure to this extent –to be addicted?– because it might be addictive since it cheaply satisfies the sense of meaning a person needs.
Above all, this task is a duty. And no matter what, for all individual cases, finding its most accurate form is always a subject of research. In this respect, a meticulousness that focuses solely on the problem of a single person, not aimed at quantitative superiority but seeking its duty in a single encounter, can only be worth mentioning for itself. Once this is stated, there is no need to mention all the rest. Because there is no need to talk about things that should already be done. What is worth mentioning is sharing a table. We looked at this task through the people we know, that is, in proportion to the beliefs we are familiar with, and we were astonished. Our astonishment was surprising. Having a friend was a saving grace for us.
A person’s superiority is not determined by the resources they possess. Superiority is tied to the power of belief. These – just like fasting – were another command upon us, again planned to be in our favor. This task emerges as an act that begins with executing the duty defined upon us, becoming a social emphasis that opens us to various troubles, new injustices, and new duties through the encounters it reveals, and in its best form, it represents a friendship, that is, a community, as if we were expressing a society. Therefore, the mentioned field of action is not an activity reserved for special times, not a part of life — it is a way of living.
We are sure that all of this is not original, even if it may seem original for city life. By saying that there is no need to mention these separately and that they are duties imposed on us with various repetitions in the Quran, we have indicated that we are not talking about anything new.
These duties continue as a way of life. And encounters always remind us of our deficiencies. That’s why we found it worthwhile to share only the images where we are the ones being helped.
