Should the Hagia Sophia be converted back into a mosque?
The Hagia Sophia, completed in the year 537, was originally a Christian church. It became a mosque when Constantinople was conquered by the Turks (becoming Istanbul) in the 15th century. In the early 20th century, it was turned into a museum by post-Ottoman Turkey’s secular government.
Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Turkey’s current leader, often labeled an autocrat and an Islamist, plans to turn the Hagia Sophia back into a mosque. There’s been outcry from the rest of the world. Is this a “return to roots” or, as the Washington Post called it, “cultural cleansing”? Have you ever been to the Hagia Sophia? I visited it with my family in 2013.
Using Fluther
or