Masum Vanlıoğlu Hodja, who was among the brothers of Mahmud Effendi, talked about Mahmud Effendi, who had recently passed away. Noting that they are in pain of losing a great Islamic scholar and a Sufi master at the same time, Vanlıoğlu said, “Maybe we may not be able to explain it sufficiently while composing some sentences. If our friends give our deficiency here to our sadness and sorrow, that will make us happy. Mahmud Ustaosmanoğlu Hodja, with a new expression, our deceased master, our sheikh built his life on three basic principles. Scholarship, deed and sincerity to the extent that everyone knows very well... He has made a great struggle to spread these three main issues not only to men but also to women.”
HE WAS IN LOVE WITH SCHOLARSHIP
Masum Vanlıoğlu Hodja said that Mahmud Effendi, as a Muslim, made it the basic rule of life that not only individuals but the whole society could live during the practice of Islam. Vanlioglu stated that His Holiness was known by his people as a person in love with science from his childhood, he tried his best to reflect the knowledge he had acquired into his life, and he gave sermon advice to people he knew or did not know so that they could become good Muslims as a requirement of the knowledge he had acquired.
THE FIRST JOB WAS TO REVIVE THE SUNNAH
Masum Vanlıoğlu Hodja, who talked about the precious life of Mahmud Effendi, also shared a memory about His Excellency. Vanlıoğlu used the following expressions: An incident we know very well is that he got his permission at the age of 16. He received his license at the age of 16 from the famous Dursun Feyzi Güven Hodja from Of. Dursun Effendi is a scholar who graduated from Ottoman madrasahs and could go beyond being a professor in today's terms. His Excellency Mahmud Effendi studied with him for a long time and then graduated. After graduation, he taught students there. Here is a memory from those days... The late Hasbi Hodja is both the elder brother of His Holiness Mahmud Effendi and a muezzin of the İsmailağa Mosque. The father of our Hasbi Hodja Effendi, after the speech of His Holiness Mahmud Effendi during the ratification ceremony in those days, came to our Master and said that he wanted to be his brother in the hereafter. Our Master's first condition for him is as follows; If you keep the beard, which is the sunnah of our Prophet (PBUH), I will be your brother in the hereafter. Think of a person who has just completed his scientific life and received a new license. The first thing he does is to revive the sunnah. This love of sunnah, which started in the days when Mahmud Effendi was still a student, continued until the last minute of his life.
HE FOLLOWED THE PATH OF OUR MASTER (PBUH)
Stating that His Holiness Mahmud Effendi established madrasahs for both men and women, Vanlıoğlu said, "According to the thought of our Master, something that is read and learned should be lived in such a way that it should be filled with sincerity. How the Prophet (PBUH) raised his friends Mahmud Effendi, who followed his path, also made an effort to raise his relatives, even those he did not know, in this way.”
HE IS A HIGHLY VALUABLE PERSON FOR THE COUNTRY
Speaking about the funeral prayer of His Holiness Mahmud Effendi, Masum Vanlıoğlu conveyed the speech of a person who attended the funeral on the phone. Regarding the subject, Vanlıoğlu added, “The funeral prayer of His Holiness Mahmud Effendi showed us that; Millions of people were deeply attached to this beautiful person. I wonder if people ask, ‘Why did we attend this funeral?’ How did they answer the question? A person who attended the funeral was using the following expressions while walking on the street, addressing the person he was talking to on the phone; ‘If so many people have attended this person's funeral, this person is a very valuable person for this country.’”
THOSE WHO MEET HIM TRIED TO FIX THEIR LIFE
He said that Mahmud Ustaosmanoğlu was a person in love with scholarship, servitude, invitation, and raising children, and he invited the people around him to Islam without hurting them. Vanlıoğlu said, “We learned that from His Excellency Mahmud Effendi; ‘Always run for the better, always further, always for the sake of Allah.’ Our Master, His Holiness, always conveyed the beauties of Allah Almighty to the people who met him. Those who met him tried to enter the path of knowledge, tried to fix their life.”
HE WAS AGAINST MOVING THE PEOPLE AWAY FROM ALMIGHTY GOD
Masum Vanlıoğlu Hodja added that His Holiness Mahmud Effendi had an attitude towards all kinds of scientific circles that distanced people from Almighty God. In his speech, Vanlıoğlu said, "He used to say that all of these are sciences that belong to Allah Almighty, so as not to leave an environment of conflict between him neither with mathematics, nor with physics, nor with chemistry nor with scientific developments."