Bluestar

Sema Ceremony of the Whirling Dervishes Concert & Rituals 2011 in Canberra
Bluestar hosted the Whirling Dervishes all the way from Konya, Türkiye at the Canberra Theatre Centre on Tuesday, 22 November 2011.
In 2005, UNESCO proclaimed the "Sema Ceremony of the Whirling Dervishes" of Turkey as amongst the Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity.

The Whirling Dervishes, are a spiritual Sufi order founded in Turkey by the followers of Rumi, a 13th century poet, jurist, and theologian. They are actually known as the Whirling Dervishes due to their famous practice of whirling as a form of dhikr (remembrance of God). Dervish is a common term for an initiate of the Sufi path; the whirling is part of the formal Sema ceremony and the participants are properly known as semazen's.

Stepping through the doorway into the Canberra Theatre Centre in Canberra for the first time can be an overwhelming experience with 18 Semazens. To have to then sit through an ancient ritual passed down since the 13th century, the cumulative feeling that cut a line through the beginning to the end of my evening was one of awe.
Sufi concert began with a beautiful Instrument music in the first session. The audience then applauded as the participants of the main event of the evening took to the stage. The Sema ritual (or ceremony) of the Whirling Dervishes was about to commence.
As each of the eighteen semazens entered, their black cloaks (hırkas, symbolising the grave) and tall light brown hats (kûlah or sikke, symbolising the tomb stone) created an imposing effect that drowned out the applause from the audience. It was hard to ignore the fact that these men were dressed in over seven centuries of tradition, that they carried on their backs and in their hearts seven centuries of gravitas. It is an image I am not likely to forget.
Ten of the Semazens sat down to play music – this is a musical ceremony, after all – on an elevated platform, while those that remained sat in a praying position, their hands on their laps and their heads cocked to a side, as the sheikh among the group initiates the first of four parts of the ceremony: the Naat and Taksim. The next part, the Devr-i Veled, begins as the semazens (the ones not playing instruments) stand up to form a line for a circular procession that requires each to bow, one by one and in turn, to the performer behind him. The procession rotates slowly in a circle, the rotation depending entirely on each semazen’s disciplined timing of bows and forward steps. The circle eventually breaks and widens into a horseshoe, still maintaining the movement. The semazens stand in a new line, heads cocked once again. The second part ends when the semazens, except for the postnishin (semazen leader), remove their hırkas to reveal the brilliant white gowns underneath.
Thus begins the third part, the Four Salams. Each semazen crosses his arms on his chest, turns to his right, and moves into the actual whirling from which the concert derives its name. Six of them form an outer circle, one stands in the middle and as they all spin on their right foot, the postnishin, in what appears to be an instructive style, negotiates himself between each semazen. The semazens whirl with their arms outstretched and askew, their right palms facing the sky (heaven), left palms facing the ground (the earth, perhaps symbolising humility). They whirl with the unbroken grace of a ballerina in a music box. It is a performance that demands utmost physical endurance and fealty to precision. The whirling dervishes move into a circle, stop; begin, move into a circle, stop again; it is a pattern repeated a few times in the Four Salams before it ends. The final part of the Sema ritual is the concluding prayer, where the semazens return to their original seated positions, dressed in their hırkas as before, the cycle complete.
The Four Salams essentially fall under what Arnold van Gennep described in his 1909 book Rites de Passage as the liminal stage of rituals. Liminality is a concept invented by Gennep, and expanded upon by Victor Turner in the 1960s, which explores the transformational phase between two states of individuals, groups, communities, societies and even whole civilisations. For individuals, the liminal stage can exist between the shifts one makes from a non-spiritual outlook on life to a spiritual one. For the Sema ritual, it is the Four Salams, the seemingly chaotic (but in actuality disciplined and precise) movement between the other three parts which, when taken together, represent the spiritual journey of a believer. The whirling in the Four Salams is the search for truth; the spectacle of it and the emphasis on it shows that the most essential component of a spiritual journey is the search itself.
 
It is appropriate; Bluestar Intercultural Centre hosted a performance of the Whirling Dervishes in Canberra. BIC mission statement, “To create and sustain enduring affinity and relationships with people through intercultural and interfaith dialogue and understanding,” is a social manifestation of the Mevlevi Sema ritual.