Years ago, when her sister was diagnosed with ovarian cancer, Mahire Turk sought intervention.
He walked to a hilltop shrine overlooking the Bosporus, sat under an ornate dome near the tomb of a Sufi master who died nearly 400 years ago and prayed fervently for his sister to defeat the pain
After chemotherapy, her sister was declared cancer-free – and is now expecting a baby, Ms. Turk, 40, who works in a pharmaceutical warehouse.
So until now, when her mind is filled with worries, Ms. Turk, like many of his countrymen in this ancient, sprawling city of 16 million, visits one of its many shrines to long-dead religious figures to seek spiritual help.
“These are the defenders of Istanbul,” said Ms. Turk on a return trip to the shrine of Aziz Mahmud Hudayi, where he prayed for his sister. “I’m sure if I visit them, they’ll protect me too.”
Centuries of civilization left Istanbul full of tombs. Beyond historical relics, there are many well-maintained and surviving sites that receive crowds of visitors looking for quiet places to pray, make wishes and remove themselves from the hassles of the modern metropolis.
The shrines combine Islamic devotion, Turkish history and Istanbul folklore. The city’s sailors, for example, traditionally view Aziz Mahmud Hudayi and three other men buried near the Bosporus, which flows through Istanbul, as protectors of the waterway.
Some of the shrines mark the resting places of documented historical figures. Others have a more dubious historicity, which does not diminish their role in the spiritual life of the city, a role unaffected by contemporary political and economic Turkey.
Turkey’s religious authorities have posted signs at several sites to remind visitors that Islam forbids praying to anyone but God. But many believers still ask for the intercession of the buried to help them get a job, buy cars, be healthy, find a spouse or have children. And some express a deep connection with the dead.
“I love him,” Fatma Akyol, a university theology student, said of Yahya Efendi, a 16th-century Sufi scholar and poet who now lives in a shrine on the southwest bank of the Bosphorus. “I visit him often.”
Yahya Efendi’s tomb sits under a pistachio-colored dome in a cozy room surrounded by the graves of 10 others, including his mother, wife and son. The complex has separate prayer facilities for men and women, both with beautiful views of the Bosphorus. Outside, stone paths wind through a cemetery shaded by towering trees to a terrace where visitors take photos.
On a recent afternoon, cats fell asleep in the mausoleum’s marble entryway while visitors drank from a stone fountain and removed their shoes before entering to pray. Parents brought their children. A preacher at the mosque with a long beard said he had brought his wife and his sister “to receive spiritual health.” A teenager in a Metallica T-shirt emerges from the mausoleum, grabs his shoes and disappears.
said Ms. Akyol often spends a lot of time praying and reading scriptures at the shrine. He shrugged off warnings about seeking help from the dead, comparing it to making a connection to get a job.
“When you ask for something from God, God’s loved ones can be an intermediary,” he said.
Aziz Mahmud Hudayi’s shrine sits opposite the waterway.
Visitors come to pray near his grave, often returning to hand out sweets after their prayers are answered, as they do at many shrines.
Outside, teachers told girls from an Islamic summer school to be quiet during their visit. A brother and sister from a Black Sea town in Turkey say they are each looking for “a good relationship,” meaning they hope to get married. And a retired man said that the buried mystic walked on water across the Bosporus, proving his spiritual strength.
Omer Arik, the vice president of the foundation that oversees the site, told another version of the mystic’s story, in which the mystic guided a boatman through the water during a storm, using a route still named for him. It did not bother Mr. Arik that some visitors believed in a more miraculous, water-walking version, he said, citing a Turkish proverb: “The sheikh does not fly. The follower makes him fly.”
Near the northern end of the western bank of the Bosporus lies the shrine of Telli Baba, or the Father of Threads, a figure whose story is filled with so much knowledge that even the retired sailor who oversees the shrine does not claim to know. his exact history, or even his full identity.
He may have served in the sultan’s army during the Ottoman army’s conquest of Constantinople in 1453. He may have carried in his turban a length of silver thread that brides traditionally braided in their hair as a sign of her devotion to the Almighty ( perhaps the origin of his nickname).
His tomb, in a small room with hanging lamps, was covered with silver threads. Guests cut a piece when they make a wish and must return it after it is fulfilled.
Hatice Aydin, a retired teacher who cleans the shrine and feeds local cats, said a minority of visitors wanted children and new jobs.
“Most of them are looking for husbands,” he said.
Sure enough, a preschool teacher came out of the shrine and revealed that she was asking for a groom. It was his third visit.
After a while, a young woman appeared at the entrance wearing a blue hoop dress too big to fit on the stairs leading to the tomb. Her uncle said that he prayed there that she would get married and thus brought her back to the day of her engagement. They took a picture near the entrance and left.
Fatma Yilmaz, a financial manager, came with a request for herself and several others, she said. She cut 13 pieces of yarn: four for herself, five for her sister, one each for her son and her ex-husband, and two for friends.
“Now it’s up to them,” he said. “If their wishes are to be accepted, they must come here.”
On top of the hill on the other bank stands the fourth of the defenders of the Bosporus, a shrine of Hazreti Yusa, or the prophet Joshua, revered by Christians, Jews and Muslims.
A sign from local religious authorities has stopped short of claiming that he was actually buried there, noting instead that the site has had religious significance for centuries. The site is centered on a tomb – a more than 50-foot-long raised flower bed. It may have taken that long because those who built it may not have known exactly where the body was buried and wanted to make sure it was covered.
One recent night, Rumeysa Koc, 35, stood by the grave, her palms up. He went to Istanbul with a colleague to buy goods for him women’s clothing line but woke up that morning after a terrible nightmare. The girls finished their work early and decided to go on a shrine visit.
As they drove to the shrine, he said, he received a call telling him that the very thing he had dreamed of – he declined to give details – had not happened.
“Without even setting foot on this hill, God solved the issue for me,” said Ms. Coc.
So at the graveside he gave thanks, he said, and left feeling like his day had been miraculous.
“I feel as free as a bird,” he said.