Haji Khalil Effendi

In 1814, the Greek secret revolutionary society Filiki Eteria was created in Odessa , the purpose of which was to free Greece from Turkish rule.

"Eteria", for 7 years of activity, managed to create a network of underground organizations and prepare an uprising on Greek lands. In January 1821, Eteria decided to send the éteri detachments to the semi-autonomous Danube principalities , starting hostilities there against the Turks, with the aim of moving south and organizing uprisings on Greek lands and possibly involving other peoples of the Balkans .

On February 22, the leader of Eteria, Russian General Alexander Ipsilanti , with the group of statues moved Prut and resigned from the Russian army.

On March 23, Ipsilanti entered Ploiesti , but on the same day was anathematized by the Patriarch of Constantinople Gregory V.

Sultan Mahmud II received information about the start of hostilities in the Danube principalities, along with information about the heterosexists preparing for an uprising in Greek lands and plans to burn the Ottoman fleet in Constantinople, and also to kill, if possible, the Sultan himself.

Believing that the Greek uprising could be stopped by terror and following the advice of the Great Vesier Khaled-effendi, the Sultan Mahmoud II , furious with the events, prepared a fatwa indicating that he would begin the massacre of the Orthodox Greek population throughout the Ottoman Empire .

To observe the letter of the Koran , the signature of Sheikh ul-Islam was needed. But Haji Khalil objected to the Sultan that the Koran does not allow the massacre of innocent people and asked for a respite for his final answer.

He immediately contacted Patriarch Gregory , who, according to the Ottoman Millet system, held a similar post to Sheikh ul-Islam, leading the Orthodox Christians of the empire. Gregory has already received instructions from the Sultan to anathema the rebels.

Haji Khalil rushed the patriarch to act immediately, informing him of the great danger that hung over his flock and the patriarch himself.

March 23, the rebels were anathematized by the Patriarch of Constantinople Gregory V. Haji Khalil asked the Sultan for the separation between the innocent and the guilty, as requested by the Qur'an , and refused to sign the fatwa. The Sultan became furious and deprived Haji Halil of the rank, exiling him to the island of Lemnos . But before leaving, Haji Khalil was tortured and died of wounds in Constantinople ^[1] . The uprising spread in many Greek lands, from the Peloponnese and Crete in the south, to Macedonia and Thrace in the north.

The Ottoman authorities launched a massacre without receiving the consent of Sheikh ul-Islam. On March 31 there was a massacre in Smyrna , on April 5, prominent persons from the Greek population of Constantinople were beheaded, on April 6 there was a new massacre in Smyrna.

The Sultan and his entourage continued to consider the patriarch the leader of the Orthodox millet and did not realize that he was not leading events.

April 10 , despite the fact that the patriarchy dissociated itself from the heterists, the Patriarch of Constantinople Gregory was hanged, along with 3 other hierarchs, and his corpse was given to the Jews for reproach ^[2] .

On the same day, in Adrianople , the previous Patriarch of Constantinople Cyril and 30 other priests and famous residents were hanged. Until April 22, during the massacre in Constantinople, more than 10 thousand Greeks were killed and dozens of churches were burned. A native of Constantinople and subsequently writer Ioannis Filimon wrote: “the chosen creation of the hands of the Most High, Constantinople , turned into a terrible meat grinder of people” ^[3] .

The massacre continued: May 3 on the island of Cyprus , May 19 in the Macedonian city of Thessaloniki , where 2 thousand Greeks were killed, including the bishop and 3 hierarchs, June 3 in Kidonies , on the Aegean coast of Asia Minor, June 4 again in Smyrna, July 9 again on Cyprus where Archbishop Cyprian of Cyprus was hanged and 3 more hierarchs and 470 noble Cypriots beheaded, on July 11 on the island of Kos , on September 1, the population of Samotraki Island was completely destroyed .

The Turkish massacre of the Greek population, including hierarchs, did not go unanswered. So on April 28, 1821 , when 2 ships of the island of Hydra , under the command of captains Georgy Sakhturis and Lazaros Pinotsis , captured the Turkish brig with pilgrims bound for Mecca, among which was Misir Mall (the spiritual head of Egypt), all the Turks on board, including the crew , the mall and the pilgrims were carved by idriots, they claimed, in revenge for the hanging by the Turks of the Patriarch of Constantinople Gregory ^[3] . September 23, 1821 , when the Greek rebels took the fortified city of Tripoli , they massacred all Muslims and Jews without exception.

Some Turkish historians, in particular Ahmed Jevdet Pasha , report that Haji Khalil did not die in Constantinople. According to their information, Haji Khalil was deported to Afyonkarahisar , and his wife to Bursa , where he was killed by the people of the vizier Khaled. After killing his wife, Haji Khalil died of a heart attack ^[4] .

The anathema of Patriarch Gregory against the Greek Revolution of 1821 to this day is shared by historians in their assessments.

The modern Greek historian Alexander Despotopoulos, in his work “Decision on the massacre and its prevention”, justifies the actions (anathema) of Patriarch Gregory.

He writes that for all its cruelty, the numerous facts of the massacre of 1821 were local in nature and limited in time, and if it had not been for the anathema of Patriarch Gregory and the refusal of Sheikh al-Islam Haji Khalil to subscribe to the Sultan’s fatwa, the massacre could take on the character and the extent of the total genocide of the Greeks throughout the Ottoman Empire ^[5] .

At the end of the 19th century, the Greek writer and historian, academician Dmitry Kamburoglu (1852-1942) proposed, in recognition of his philanthropic act, to give the name of Haji Halil to one of the streets of the Greek capital. Some of today's anti-church circles, expressing dissatisfaction with the veneration of Patriarch Gregory, who anathematized the Greek Revolution, consider that sheikh al-Islam Haji Khalil, who openly expressed his disagreement with the Sultan fatwa, should be honored in return. ^[6]

• Σπυρίδων Λουκάτος, "Και Τούρκοι στο πλευρό των Ελλήνων", Το άγνωστο 21, Ε 'Ιστορικά, τ / χ.23, (23 Μαρτίου