Sâlik Mehmed Efendi was a sheikh's son who inherited his father's pulpit. His father, Sheikh Hüsâmeddîn Hüseyin Efendi, was one of the most widely heard Halveti sheikhs of seventeenth-century Amasya; when he died at the beginning of Dhu al-Hijjah 1053 (February 1644), the post of preacher (hatip) at the Yâkût Paşa Mosque passed to Mehmed Efendi. He later became sheikh of the Mehmed Paşa İmaret and died on 26 Ramadan 1081 (5 February 1671). Hüseyin Hüsâmeddîn Yasar describes him as "âlim, şâir, natûk": a scholar, a poet and an eloquent speaker. None of his poems has come down to us.

Life

The entry Sâlik Mehmed Efendi-Şeyhzâde in the tenth volume of Amasya Tarihi runs to only a few lines:

Amasyalıdır. Hızır Paşa Zâviyesi şeyhi fâzıl-ı meşhûr eş-Şeyh Hüsâmeddîn Hüseyin Efendi'nin ikinci mahdûmudur. Pederinden tahsîl-i ilm ü irfân edib 1053 senesi zilhiccesinde pederinin irtihâli üzerine mahlûlünden Yâkût Paşa Câmii hatîbi ve ba'dehû Mehmed Paşa imâreti şeyhi olduğu hâlde 1081 senesi ramazânının yirmi altısında vefât etdi. Âlim, şâir, natûk idi.

Translated: An Amasya man, the second son of the famous scholar Sheikh Hüsâmeddîn Hüseyin Efendi, sheikh of the Hızır Paşa Lodge. He learned scholarship and spiritual knowledge from his father. When his father died in Dhu al-Hijjah 1053, he took over the vacant post and became preacher of the Yâkût Paşa Mosque, then sheikh of the Mehmed Paşa İmaret, and died in that position on the twenty-sixth of Ramadan 1081. He was learned, a poet and a fine speaker.

The entry names no teacher other than his father; it does not say that he went to another madrasa, to Istanbul or to a judgeship. As far as can be seen, Mehmed Efendi spent his whole life in Amasya, within the circle of the duties left to him by his father. The preacher delivered the Friday and festival sermons; the sheikh of an imaret directed the dhikr and the gatherings held in the lodge section of a mosque complex.

His Father and Brothers

Hüsameddin devotes a long entry in the eighth volume to the father. According to it, Hüsâmeddîn Hüseyin Efendi was the grandson of a brother of Sheikh Muhyiddîn Mehmed Efendi, known as "Memi Dede". He became preacher at the Yâkût Paşa Mosque in 1017 (1608-09), completed the Halveti path under Kutb Ahmed Efendi, and in 1044 (1634-35), on the death of his cousin Memi Dedezâde İbrâhim Efendi, became sheikh of the Hızır Paşa Lodge. He preached in the Sultan Bayezid Mosque and taught hadith and Qur'anic exegesis there; Hüsameddin writes that his lessons were "gâyet selîs ve fasîh", fluent and eloquent, and that the notables, the townspeople and the students all profited from them. The poet Zâhid İbrâhim Efendi, who grew up in the Hızır Paşa Lodge, was among his pupils.

That Mehmed Efendi received the Yâkût Paşa post "mahlûlünden", that is, as the place vacated by his father, shows that the office changed hands within the family: thirty-six years earlier the father had climbed the same pulpit. The entry in the eighth volume names two of the father's sons: Ahmed Zühdü, a clerk of the imperial council, and Mehmed Sâlik, preacher of the Yâkût Paşa Mosque. Further down the page "his other son Abdurrahîm Efendi" is also mentioned. The phrase "second son" in the tenth volume fits this order.

His elder brother Zühdü Ahmed Efendi took a different road. Through the chief court architect Kâsım Ağa, who had endowed a lectureship for their father in the Sultan Bayezid Mosque, he entered the chancery of the imperial council, became a memorandum clerk (tezkireci), an accountant of escheated revenues (mevkufatçı) under the grand vizierate of Köprülü Mehmed Paşa, deputy chief of the scribes in 1074 (1663-64), and died in 1077 (1666-67). One brother rising in the Istanbul bureaucracy, the other continuing his father's pulpit in Amasya: the two show two separate Ottoman careers issuing from the same house. Hüsameddin also names, as the father's nephew, the well-known scholar Nûh Efendi bin Mustafa, who in his works quotes "my uncle Sheikh Hüsâmeddîn Efendi"; he must have been Mehmed Efendi's cousin.

Name and Poetry

"Sâlik" in the heading of the entry looks like a pen name. In the eighth volume, however, the same man appears as "Mehmed Sâlik Efendi", with the word as part of his name. Sâlik means a disciple travelling the Sufi path and would suit the son of a Halveti sheikh both as a name and as a pen name; the source leaves the question open.

Sâlik Mehmed Efendi's poems have not reached us. Hüsameddin counts him among the poets in both entries; the sentence in the eighth volume ends with "ulemâ ve şu'arâdandır", he was among the scholars and poets. No couplet is quoted, and no anthology containing his poems is mentioned. Hüsameddin, who records having seen a copy of Muğni'l-Lebîb in the father's hand, evidently came across no written work by the son.

Chronology

1017 (1608-09): His father Hüsâmeddîn Hüseyin Efendi becomes preacher of the Yâkût Paşa Mosque.

1044 (1634-35): His father becomes sheikh of the Hızır Paşa Lodge.

Dhu al-Hijjah 1053 (February 1644): His father dies; Mehmed Efendi succeeds him as preacher of the Yâkût Paşa Mosque.

1077 (1666-67): His elder brother Zühdü Ahmed Efendi dies.

26 Ramadan 1081 (5 February 1671): He dies while sheikh of the Mehmed Paşa İmaret.

Bibliography

Primary sources

Online sources