Şefik Can (June 22, 1909 – January 23, 2005) was a Turkish spiritual leader and the last

Sufi Sufism ( or ) is a mysticism, mystic body of religious practice found within Islam which is characterized by a focus on Islamic Tazkiyah, purification, spirituality, ritualism, and Asceticism#Islam, asceticism. Practitioners of Sufism are r ...

master in the

Mevlevi The Mevlevi Order or Mawlawiyya (; ) is a Sufi order that originated in Konya, Turkey (formerly capital of the Sultanate of Rum) and which was founded by the followers of Jalaluddin Muhammad Balkhi Rumi, a 13th-century Persian poet, Sufi ...

Sufi tradition in

Turkey Turkey, officially the Republic of Türkiye, is a country mainly located in Anatolia in West Asia, with a relatively small part called East Thrace in Southeast Europe. It borders the Black Sea to the north; Georgia (country), Georgia, Armen ...

Biography

Born in 1909 in Tebricik village of

Erzurum Erzurum (; ) is a List of cities in Turkey, city in eastern Anatolia, Turkey. It is the largest city and capital of Erzurum Province and is 1,900 meters (6,233 feet) above sea level. Erzurum had a population of 367,250 in 2010. It is the site of an ...

, Şefik Can completed his primary education in Yıldızeli,

Sivas Sivas is a city in central Turkey. It is the seat of Sivas Province and Sivas District.İl Beledi ...

. Can learned

Arabic Arabic (, , or , ) is a Central Semitic languages, Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) assigns lang ...

and

Persian Persian may refer to: * People and things from Iran, historically called ''Persia'' in the English language ** Persians, the majority ethnic group in Iran, not to be conflated with the Iranic peoples ** Persian language, an Iranian language of the ...

at an early age from his father, and graduated from the

Kuleli Military High School Kuleli Military High School was the oldest military high school in Turkey, located in Çengelköy, Istanbul, on the Asian shore of the Bosphorus strait. It was founded on 21 September 1845, by Ottoman Sultan Abdülmecid I. After the 2016 Turkish ...

in 1929 and the Military Academy in 1931. Then, with the permission of the Ministry of National Defense, he became a teacher at

Istanbul University Istanbul University, also known as University of Istanbul (), is a Public university, public research university located in Istanbul, Turkey. Founded by Mehmed II on May 30, 1453, a day after Fall of Constantinople, the conquest of Constantinop ...

, and in 1935, completed his internship under Tahirü l-Mevlevi at Kuleli Military High School. Until his retirement in 1965, he taught at various military schools, civilian colleges and high schools. He was initiated into the Mevlevi Sufi order by his spiritual teacher Tahir al-Mevlevi and had been the head of the tradition until his death on January 23, 2005. He was the spiritual teacher of Hayat Nur Artiran.

Works

* Fundamentals of Rumi's Thought: A Mevlevi Sufi Perspective (Tughra Books, Jan 1, 2006, Originally published in 1995)

References

{{Authority control 1909 births 2005 deaths People from Erzurum Sufi religious leaders Turkish Sufis