“In our faith there’s a concept. We surrender ourselves to death. If you are the leader, you have to communicate the message of immortality to your people. Because I believe if a leader hides behind a rock, his people will hide behind a mountain.”

— Excerpt from “60 Minutes” interview with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan

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Immortality.

We don’t hear, or use, that word much nowadays. Back in America you might hear it in an episode of “Game of Thrones.” Here, we don’t hear it much either – the fast-food, myopic Internet culture has taken hold as much as it has anywhere else.

Let’s face it: here on Earth, folks, immortality doesn’t mean anything, except maybe in the Cistine Chapel. But even that doesn’t amount to much. I remember my wife and I passing through the Cistine Chapel, after a two or three-hour tour of the Vatican. Remembering our dear Robin Williams, and his “Good Will Hunting” speech, I struggled vainly to ascertain the smell of the interior. I’ll be honest: I didn’t smell a thing, except the need to step outside to have a cigarette.

Here in Istanbul, you are surrounded, crammed, with antiquity. You can’t escape it. But antiquity doesn’t mean immortality. Check the dictionary, but I am sure the words are quite different. “Very old” doesn’t mean “everlasting.”

Of course, President Erdogan was not referring to old buildings or the back pages of history books when he dropped the ‘I’ bomb. He was talking about a leader’s role, especially in times of crisis.

Watching the “60 Minutes” interview with my wife the other night, this word, for whatever reason, rang out. It bothered me, or set off a series of thoughts, emotions, something.

Immortality:

Who the hell uses that word nowadays?

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Although the sound of Erdogan’s stern, cunning voice is a daily fixture in our lives – every day you hear it on the radio, on TV – this was the first time I’d really listened to him speak so directly about his personal motivations, or the philosophy of his controversial leadership style. Maybe the only immortality is in this electronic stratosphere that we have constructed. Cut the wires, knock out a couple of satellites, send in an asteroid, and all bets are off.

Back to “60 Minutes,” (tick-tick-tick-tick-tick-)

We see a montage of nationalists, religious conservatives – a sea of red and white flags, paying homage to Erdogan, while the voice-over tells us that “disillusionment” is wide-spread in Turkey. Much of the growing anti-Americanism, Kroft says, stems from the events of the past July. (Really?Just from this past July?) We see a gripping montage of the failed coup attempt, in which 241 people were killed. Tanks storming bridges, jets streaking over Istanbul, the bombing of the Parliament building in Ankara, soldiers firing on citizens.

Steve Kroft: Were you afraid for your life, and for your family members?

Erdogan (sighs): Steve, in our faith there is a concept. We surrender ourselves to death. If you’re the leader, you have to communicate the message of immortality. Because I believe if a leader hides behind a rock, his people will hide behind a mountain.

(My translation: Oh, Stevie, Stevie, Stevie. Stevie, Stevie, Ste-vie! My darling boy! (You don’t mind if I call you ‘Stevie,’ do you? You obviously have never ruled a country before, especially not one in the Middle East.)

Actually, “Steve” is spot on, most of the time. He wastes no time reminding American viewers of the crackdown since the failed coup – the 30,000 arrests, the 100,000-plus firings and dismissals, ranging from the military, to the police, to the courts, teachers and journalists, even members of Parliament, all of whom were suspected of either supporting the coup, or at the very least being supporters of Fetullah Gulen, the exiled cleric accused by Erdogan of orchestrating the takeover attempt. We see the impressive Gulen complex in Pennsylvania, while the voice-over reminds us of Turkey’s repeated requests that the United States government to extradite Gulen, so that he may face prosecution here.

Again, we’ve been over this in my letters, so we can move on, and return to the interview.

Erdogan: This man (Gulen) is the leader of a terrorist organization that has bombed my Parliament. We have extradited terrorists to the United States in the past, and we expect the same thing to be done by the United States.

(My translation: Stevie, Stevie, my dear Stevie. Spare me the Western hypocrisy and crocodile tears. OK, it makes for great television. But we are two men talking sincerely about business. We are not getting personal. BTW, Might I recommend Edward Said’s, “Orientalism?” It’s not bad reading.)

(Aside: Steve, why didn’t you ask Erdogan why he and Gulen, who used to be allies, suddenly become enemies? You might have asked about the events of December 2013, in which several members of Erdogan’s party were arrested on accusations of bribery – which he would have claimed to have been ‘trumped up’ charges by the Gulen-infiltrated police and judiciary. I don’t know who’s right, but you could have at least raised the question.)

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The sit-down version of Erdogan who spoke to Steve Kroft on “60 Minutes” was quite an experience. It was a big contrast to the man who presides over modern Turkey, the man, the powerhouse, the dictator, or the savior, depending on who you ask.

Of course, Erdogan was on his home court, sitting in the recently completed 1,100-room palace in Ankara.

I imagined the interview airing back in America. Sunday evening and millions of Americans sitting down to dinner, Thanksgiving just a few days away, while this calm, even august figure holds forth on immortality. Maybe those who attended Sunday services would nod knowingly, but I’m guessing it must have sounded baffling to all the rest of my compratiots.

I don’t know, maybe not.

After all, the past couple of weeks have already had their share of shocks. And in comparison with some of President-elect Donald Trump’s tweets, perhaps Erdogan’s remarks seem rather mild, even bland, sanguine.

“If you are the leader, you have to communicate the message of immortality to your people …”

That quote just sticks with me, for some reason.

Perhaps it explains to me something about President Erdogan. Perhaps it accounts, in part, for his enormous popularity among the conservative Islamic masses in central and eastern Anatolia – not to mention is cult of personality in much of the Middle East. I’ve seen him, over the years, give speeches to adoring crowds from Ankara to Cairo. I’ve seen him withstand internal strife, from the Taksim Square protests to last July’s failed military coup, in which some 241 people reportedly died, and even the Parliament building in Ankara was bombed. Erdogan himself reportedly escaped assassination by the skin of his teeth, with his security team getting wind of the coup in the nick of time.

The night of the coup attempt, my wife and I, like the rest of the stunned and anxious nation, were glued to the news. We watched as Erdogan addressed the nation, using Face chat on a borrowed mobile phone, urging citizens to stand up to the “traitors.” An hour or so later, he was on the ground in Istanbul, looking very much composed (or mostly, given the circumstances), and calmly talking to reporters.

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Looking over what I’ve written, I’m scratching my head a bit about where this letter is going. Was I going to offer some insights on his leadership style, what makes him tick – his thoughts on the hereafter?

Immortality – or the projection of it – is a tricky business. I’ve never tried it myself. At times, I have managed to communicate a message of sincerity while lying through my teeth; on occasion I have mimicked sobriety better than the soundest judge, notwithstanding the protests of the half-dozen pints stirring in the blood, and once at disco, I even convinced a very naive female that I was from Australia (Yeah, mate!). But I have never been confronted with the task of persuading the masses that I was not now, nor would ever be, within a lick of breathing my last breath.

But then, I suppose I’ve never had to deal with the issues on Erdogan’s plate: a civil war just over the border, ongoing terrorism in the east, the spectre of ISIS, the chess game between East and West powers, the balancing act of religious belief and secularism, not to mention the Kurdish question.

It would seem that Erdogan, in his 13 years of rule, has never known anything but conflict, crises.

“If a leader hides behind a rock, then the people will hide behind a mountain.” Erdogan hasn’t had the luxury of hiding, not in this part of the world. Right now, it’s arguably the powder keg for the next world conflict, or the center of the world’s desire, as it has been so often throughout the ages.

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Perhaps I’ve written this just to have a clearer picture of Erdogan in my own mind, to sort of assemble the simulacra – bits and pieces, flashes from the media, from Turkish friends and associates, from my own impressions – into something concrete and – wait for it … relatable (I hope that’s a word that will soon fall out of fashion).

I understand now a little better the controlled exasperation with which Erdogan answered the “60 Minutes” reporter’s seemingly innocuous question. Time and again, it seems, the West seems to naively, or willfully, misinterpret both Erdogan the leader and his ambitions. It is not personal security in fact that Erdogan seeks. I believe him when he says he does not worry much about his personal safety. He may in fact believe he is bullet-proof. Ultimately, he is after something much bigger.

The immortality Erdogan refers to, and that which he seeks, is that rarest of blends, one that is reserved for only a few, such as his predecessors, from Osman to Mehmet III, from Suleyman the Magnificent to Ataturk. His aim is to restore Turkey to its glorious past, and in doing so, secure his place in the ages, his name permanently etched in stone, alongside the many others already here in this storied corner of the world.

Maybe up until now, Western leaders have failed to grasp this key aspect of Erdogan. The incoming Trump administration has indicated that Turkey will be a top priority. What they really mean by Turkey, of course, is President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. For he is right about one thing: he is the face, and voice, of this nation now, and most likely for a long time to come.

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James Tressler, a former Lost Coast resident, is a writer and teacher living in Istanbul.