Talk:Chrysostomos of Smyrna/Archive 1

Archive 1

Housepian

The Archbishop's murder was reported to the admiral of the French fleet off Smyrna. One editor appears to feel that this proves something, especially from a non-supporter of Turkish causes. What is it? What is the point here? Septentrionalis 19:26, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

Reverting to previus version

I am reverting the article to the previous version (20 August 2007by MaxSem). The recent edits have created an article based in no sources but in nationalist POW. The perfectly cited passages of Horton were deleted and incredible texts appeared!!! Further more the article already explains Horton’s view and does nto present him as authority! The supposed speeches were Chrisostomos requested to “drink Turkish blood” and asked for everyone “to drink Turkish blood” is so incredible that even a child can see that it is fake! If you wish to cite it try to find some historian who mentions it!!! Not an article from a Turkish newspaper which can not also be verified in any way!! If you have any different views in the matter try to use a history source to back it up and not nationalist POV. Seleukosa 16:33, 14 October 2007 (UTC)

I have stubbed the article back to a new, rewritten form. As long as neither side has any good sources, the article should remain a stub. Please rewrite it on the basis of reliable, modern secondary literature, i.e. work by neutral academic historians. Horton is most emphatically not a reliable source and should be used no more than that Turkish newspaper excerpt. Fut.Perf. ☼ 17:05, 14 October 2007 (UTC)

By the way, before anybody starts the WP:LAME games about placenames again: I've called him "bishop of Smyrna", because that's the name of his religious office. The city as such is called Izmir in Wikipedia, and Izmir, not Smyrna, is the article which should be linked to because it contains all the information relating to that time period. Fut.Perf. ☼ 17:08, 14 October 2007 (UTC)

I do agree with future Perfect and I prefer the stub version. Nevertheless the previus verion with the "blood drink" was way worst than the Horton cited one. Regards Seleukosa 17:12, 14 October 2007 (UTC) Further more Horton makes personal characterization and expresses his personal views, those are not reliable BUT he is a reliable source for his personal accounts especially meetings which he had with the Bishop of Smyrna. Those meetings are extremely valuable for understanding the Bishop and they should be used! Seleukosa 17:37, 14 October 2007 (UTC)

That's a primary source. We should not do our own interpretations of primary sources, but rely on secondary sources, as per WP:NOR. Fut.Perf. ☼ 17:57, 14 October 2007 (UTC)

Point understood! Seleukosa 19:05, 14 October 2007 (UTC)

Has been given Sainthood

Bishop Chrysostom of Smyrna has been sainted for his martyrdom by Turks. Therefore Saint should be added in front of his name.

Metropolitan Chrysostom of Smyrna was made a Saint by the Orthodox Church of Greece in 1992 for refusing to abandon his flock and subsequently being mutilated and murdered by the Turks. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Esparcadia (talk • contribs) 20:56, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

Drinking Turkish blood

OK, I'm having a lot of trouble with this assertion. If I thought there was any chance in the world that Greek bishops were indeed gleefully gulping down the blood of innocents in secret Christian orgies, I would NOT find the continued re-insertion of this note so outrageously funny.

Now are we sure this isn't ludicrous propaganda? Because really, it sounds a lot like ludicrous propaganda. Cannibalizing one's enemies, that would be... Well... Delectable! OK sorry, but I don't see a serious reference even after googling, and I don't want to make any more edits that I fear will be reverted. Legitimate reference? Cheers, DBaba 01:27, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

It seems to me that it is an idiom (for killing/slaughtering). Why should the reference be not legitimate? Deniz^T_C 08:28, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Is this an opinion piece? I see a picture of (presumably) the author at the top of the page? I think the right way to handle this would be to cite a neutral source, or to condition the statement. Certainly, I think it is completely unacceptable to quote that statement as though it is sustained by serious scholarship, when it does not appear to be serious.

I see also "they carried him to the Turkish neighborhoods, where they tore apart its [sic] body and fed the dogs with it..." What a mess. I mean, tearing him apart to feed the dogs. It would seem more intuitive to let the dogs tear him apart, you know, just so there's less clean up afterwards.

What dirty information there is on this. I guess it's important to say that Turkish sources suggest Chrysostomos was a bloodthirsty monster (implying that he deserved lynching, which seems suspiciously like an abhorrent attempt to justify his killing) whereas Greek sources suggest that he was just a bishop of unusual political vigor whose brutal murder was apparently the most elaborate and terrible in our rich human history of lynchings.

I trust your judgment.DBaba 14:08, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Özdil is quoting the bishop there. It is not his opinions on the bishop. The article is about the two Chrysostomos'es, not about Greeks or 'Rums' (Anatolian Greeks). After the quote, he mentions the places where the bishop is commemorated, and then this is what he writes at the end:

Şunun altını önemle çizeyim... İzmir'de yaşayan üç beş tane Rum vatandaşımız kaldı. Bu memleketi en az benim kadar severler. Biliyorum ki, birçok Türk ve Müslüman'dan daha hayırlı yurttaşlardır. Bu vatan ne kadar benimse, en az onların da, o kadardır. Bu bilgileri vermekteki amacım, onları rencide etmek değil

translation: Let me underline this... We have a few 'Rum' citizens living in İzmir remaining now. They love this country at least as much as I do. I know that they are better citizens than many Turks and Moslems. This country is theirs as much as it is mine, even more. The reason I gave these informations is not to hurt/offend them.

Demem o ki. Bu topraklarda gözü olanlar... Hrisostomos'u unutmuyorlar. Asla. Yaşatmaya çalışıyorlar. Hem ismini, hem ideallerini.

What I'm saying is. The ones who have their eyes on these soils... They don't forget Chrysostomos. Never. They want to keep alive. His name and his ideals. (direct translation)

Peki biz ne yapıyoruz? Unuttuk gitti bile. Liman açmaya çalışıyoruz. Liman uymadı, kapı...

And what are we doing? We forgot all about it. Now we are trying to open an harbor. If not an harbor, a door...

I am not a good translator. Anyway the guy was a leading journalist on Sabah (newspaper). When that newspaper became part of a semi-governmental council (as the owner, Dinç Bilgin, violated some commercial/anti-thrust rules I guess, I don't know the details, there were many protests though), he quit and moved to Hürriyet.

Here are the first sentences of The Blight of Asia:

"MOHAMMEDANISM has been propagated by the sword and by violence ever since it first appeared as the great enemy of Christianity, as I shall show in a later chapter of this book. It has been left to the Turk, however, in more recent years, to carry on the ferocious traditions of his creed, and to distinguish himself by excesses which have never been equaled by any of the tribes enrolled under the banner of the Prophet, either in ancient or in modern times."

Supposedly, George Horton witnessed the events, the burning of Smyrna/İzmir from the other side of the Aegean Sea. Nice eyes. Deniz^T_C 21:15, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

In Horton's own account he witnessed the fire on September 13, 1922 and was in Athens the following day on the 14th. The reference is "The Blight of Asia". Nipsonanomhmata (talk) 22:37, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

Liberation

On May 19, 1919 İzmir was a turkish city accoring to international law. And according to the same law its occupation my military violance by a foreign power is an INVASION. And repulsing this invasion back is a LIBERATION.

That's it. No more talk needed. Birisi 08:56, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

Someone deliberately wrote here "The liberation of Smyrna by the Greek Army" and "the re-occupation by the Turkish Army"... Now I am editing this for the last time, and also watching this page, and warn you to be extremely careful about your next edits; saying that I also do trust your primal abilities to situate on a World map where is Greece and where is Turkey, and who exactly liberated what from whom.

Cheers, Eae1983 09:00, 5 April 2007 (UTC)

"Liberation of İzmir by the Turkish army" is POV; "re-occupation" is more NPOV. Khoikhoi 21:10, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

No it is not, that's how it is referred - and the article is at Occupation of Izmir, not Liberation of Izmir. I can't believe we have to go over this, how is "re-occupation" not POV? The whole article is unreferenced anyway, and there is no reason to be reverting the mention of Izmir either. The other sentence is also streaking on thin POV ice, "lynching" already has a meaning in the English language.Baristarim 01:51, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Barış, here you changed "the Greek army liberates" (which I agree is POV) to "the Greek army occupies", but as soon as we're talking about the Turkish army, we get to use the word "liberation"? It doesn't work that way. Khoikhoi 03:51, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

The fact that the city was in the Ottoman Empire then before the Turkish beyliks for a millenia? I have yet to come across a serious modern history book which says the "French re-occupied Alsace-Lorraine in 1945".. Even in Germany they don't say that anymore. It is all a question of timeframe: I have never edited Cyprus articles saying "Turkey liberated Northern Cyprus". And anyways, why not trying to meditate the issue? When my 3RR expires I will simply change it to "re-capture" (a flexible word) - I don't want to do it now since I know that there are people watching my contributions list and don't want to give them an opportunity to report me for 3RR :) I will also try to work on the article later, but if you look into the article history, none of them were my additions or words. I only reverted it fully because the other version had bad unsourced POV. I will also try to clean the article up. The article has very bad prose and some POV.Baristarim 04:11, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Both of these are points of view. We're not here to endorse either of them. Play nice, guys. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 04:18, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Not quite: Wikipedia reflects info which is out there, right? So may I see this overwhelming concensus among the modern historians that "Turks re-occupied Izmir"? I suppose "liberation" wouldn't be universal either (but be more widespread than "Turks re-occupied Izmir"), so "re-capture" would be the most neutral word. Baristarim 04:28, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

"Capture back", perhaps; recapture tends to imply that the Turkish Republic is rhe Ottoman Empire, a large, and non-consensus, assertion. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 04:41, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Am I missing something? Turkey is the direct legal successor of the OE per the Treaty of Lausanne, many court cases and treaties. It would be like saying that Russia is not the Soivet Union. Yes it is not exactly the SU, but it is considered largely and by far that it is. Turks/Ottoman Empire/Turkey is used almost interchangeably in the English language. I am not saying that "Turkey" is used to refer to the OE, but if I had to enumerate the number of times I came across the expression "Ottoman Turkey", we would have to archive this page four times over! Are we seriously having this discussion? Is there any doubt out there that the Turkish Republic is not considered as the successor of the OE in a continous timeline, legally, morally and culturally? Is there such doubt out there? If so, may I see the sources which say that the Turkish Republic is not the continuation of the OE in a timeline? If so, who is the successor then? Syria? Just like Georgia is not considered anywhere as being the successor of the SU (even though the most notable SU president was from there), it is the same case here. It is an established academic and legal overwhelming concensus that it is so, and that the republican revolution of 1923 overthrew the regime of the OE (the proclamations of the TGNA clearly refer to its "succession" and "change of regime" - not "independence from the OE" - which was the case for all Balkan et al countries. This was later confirmed by every treaty out there as well as historians). Any legal specialist or historian will confirm this by a long shot. In fact, what is POV is the assumption of the opposite, and I really would like to see sources that attest that the Turkish Republic was a "breakaway state" from the OE - if not, it is OR. Baristarim 05:08, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Try "a successor state". Or better yet, find a chat group where you are encouraged to engage in this sort of thing. You're quite as unencyclopedic as Miskin, possibly less so. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 05:41, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

That's exactly what I meant: successor state. I didn't say Turkey=OE, obviously - the fourth dimension coordinates don't match for one thing :) Baristarim 06:01, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

By the same logic, we can also consider that the Revolutionary France was a "different state" - which would be downright false. Republican France is the same thing as Monarchist France: what happened was a régime change - not the creation of a new state. When modern historians talk about the wars of the Republican France with other countries (not internal wars maybe), they would never talk in a manner which implied as if there was some sort of discontinuity with the Monarchist France as far as the state is concerned. Baristarim 05:12, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Tell it to the Iraqis, who were loyal citizens, duly represented in the Ottoman parliament of 1908. (I will turn my attention to the Greek PoV when it is defended with equal vigour and silliness.) This is not a political forum; least of all for this sort of blague. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 05:39, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

The republican régime of 1923 is considered a new régime of the same state - not a "new state". What is wrong with "re-capture"? You know, you should be giving me more credit: most Turks wouldn't accept anything less than "liberation".. But I am trying to see things from a third-party and objective perspective. Baristarim 05:59, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Khoikhoi here. "Liberation" is right out, for either of the two events; as for Pmanderson's objections against "re-" I find them exaggerated. "Recapture" works fine for me. Fut.Perf. ☼ 06:01, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Now Thank you for all that, now that we have settled for the "occupation" of a Turkish city by both the Greek and the Turkish armies, could we get rid of those "Smyrna"s and "Constantinople"s? Since we are speaking English and not Greek in this Encyclopedia, and the name of the city in English is "Izmir" and not "Smyrna".

I'm also reverting back to the "Liberation" of Izmir, anyone finding this as a POV, please go and change the Alsace article first.

Thanks and Cheers. --Eae1983 05:10, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

• The English name of the present city is Izmir. The English name of the city of 500 BC (or for that matter 70 or 500 AD) is Smyrna. If Eae has evidence that the point of change is not 1922, when contemporary English usage did begin to shift, he should present it. See WP:NCGN.
• One bad article (even conceding, for the sake of argument, that the Alsace article is unreasonable) does not justify another. If it did, we would have no decent articles at all. The way to deal with Alsace is to edit Alsace; editing this article against consensus is WP:POINT. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 05:24, 18 April 2007 (UTC)
  • Neither "liberation" nor any word closely related to it occurs in Alsace; and I do not see any sweeping recent edits. What is Eae talking about? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:09, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

We can take a look at the Smyrna/Izmir thing later, but don't forget that we are not writing a Victorian poem either, it is simple common sense to use the contemporary name no matter the intricate details of name changes. Anyways, I modified "re-occupation" to "re-capture" per above talk. Baristarim 11:19, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

Just for the record. The Greek administration of Smyrna was appointed by the Allied Powers following Turkey's defeat in World War I and the seizure of Smyrna. Nipsonanomhmata (talk) 22:47, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

What was the real reason?

"His work in the region is notable: he encouraged the Greek population, built schools and churches, took back churches occupied by the Bulgarians and built athletic centres, hospitals and nursery schools. His actions led to his removal from the office on August 30, 1907 by the Turkish authorities."

Why would the Turkish authorities remove him from power for building hospitals and schools?ChristophMartel 08:42, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Don't know. Most likely b/c of his activities not mentioned there. Deniz^T_C 20:44, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

The real reason is that he was a Christian and that was reason enough. Nipsonanomhmata (talk) 02:47, 1 December 2010 (UTC)

The one and only reason is that he was a great provocateur and caused mass killings and rapings of Turkish and muslim population.--88.255.183.34 (talk) 07:26, 18 November 2014 (UTC)

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The Blight ("citation needed") of Asia

Find me a less racist citation for this article.88.230.231.243 (talk) 16:47, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

The citation itself is not racist although it does describe behaviour that might be considered as such. The author was the US consul-general. It is a fair source. Nipsonanomhmata (talk) 13:50, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

Horton is a piece of racist hate literature and absolutely not a reliable source for anything at all. Removed. Fut.Perf. ☼ 16:36, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

That is an extreme POV. Horton's book is a widely quoted reference of what happened at Smyrna and you have not provided an alternative that explains what happened to Chrysostomos in Smyrna. Horton is a useful contemporary source.Nipsonanomhmata (talk)

If you can't recognize ethnic hatemongering when you see it, that's your problem. Any work which, already in its title, equates a whole nation with an illness ("blight"), is quite obviously racist. Its tendentiousness is not even concealed or anything; it's quite overtly motivated by anti-Islamic religious fundamentalism. Just read the preface, for Pete's sake. Works like this are exactly the reason why we shouldn't be relying on "primary sources". If responsible academic historians can cite this text among their primary sources, that is because they, unlike us, are supposed to have the competence of judging and digesting primary sources. Cite the secondary sources. But find reliable ones first. Fut.Perf. ☼ 19:13, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

At that time Turkey was commonly referred to as "the sick man of Europe". Use of the word "blight" is tame in comparison and he clearly used "the sick man of Europe" phrase to draw from when he penned the title. Claiming that the book is racist because of the title is just an excuse to reject it. Would you have claimed it was racist if it was called "The Sick Man of Europe"? Claiming that the POV of the author is just skewed towards "anti-Islamic religious fundamentalism" just shows that you have not read the book. The author's tone is pretty consistent throughout in all that he was describing. He describes some christians in a crass way because he was being as honest as he could be in his work. He describes things that he did himself that he wished he had done differently because it might have saved some lives. He was a witness of disturbing events and he recorded them in the best way that he could at that time. He was an educated man and a US consul-general. Rejecting this primary source by claiming that it is racist ignores the context, his experiences, and the era that it was written in. Moreover, it ignores today's over-zealous political correctness. He was a witness to extreme racism. Ignoring his eye-witness reports by claiming that he was racist is a faux parry intended to hide events where extreme racism occurred. Horton cannot be ignored. Moreover, quoting his original writing through secondary sources is like playing "Chinese Whispers", and what exactly is the point of that?, other than an attempt to discredit Horton because the testimony is unbearable for the descendents of those that committed the crimes. Nipsonanomhmata (talk) 20:07, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

I'm tired of dealing with you. Feel free to ask at the reliable sources noticeboard. Until there is a clear, informed consensus to the contrary, Horton stays out. Fut.Perf. ☼ 22:00, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

Claiming exclusion on the grounds that Horton was a racist is a POV and not Wikipedia policy. The only valid grounds for excluding George Horton's "Blight of Asia" is that it is a primary source from someone who was not a historian. On those grounds I will gladly accept that Horton's "Blight of Asia" cannot be quoted. But we would have got there a whole lot faster if your argument above was not based on a POV, as are many of your arguments, when all you needed to say was "primary source from non-historian". Nipsonanomhmata (talk) 15:56, 19 January 2011 (UTC)

Consul George Horton was a witness of both the Armenian and the Greek Genocide. In his account "The blight of Asia" whenever he cannot provide evidence as an eye witness he uses testimonies of other people to support his positions. He was so disappointed of his own U.S government stance on the Turkish atrocities that he decided to publish his account as a citizen. Beickus (talk) 00:21, 6 September 2018 (UTC)

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