[11] They have faced significant institutional stigma from the Ottoman and later Turkish state and academia, being described as heterodox[17] to contrast them with the "orthodox" Sunni majority.

[30] Alevis acknowledge the four revealed scriptures also recognised in Islam: the Tawrat (Torah), the Zabur (Psalms), the Injil (Gospel), and the Quran.

[31] Additionally, Alevis are not opposed to looking to other religious books outside the four major ones as sources for their beliefs including Hadiths, Nahjul Balagha and Buyruks.

The plurality in nature is attributed to the infinite potential energy of Kull-i Nafs when it takes corporeal form as it descends into being from Allah.

[37] A Dede (literally meaning grandfather) is a traditional leader that is claimed to be from the lineage of Muhammad that performs ritual baptisms for newborns, officiates at funerals, and organises weekly gatherings at cemevis.

The ceremony's prototype is the Muhammad's nocturnal ascent into heaven, where he beheld a gathering of forty saints (Kırklar Meclisi), and the Divine Reality made manifest in their leader, Ali.

The love of the creator for the created and vice versa is symbolised in the Cem ceremony by the use of fruit juice and/or red wine[citation needed] [Dem] which represents the intoxication of the lover in the beloved.

Hıdırellez honors the mysterious figure Khidr (Turkish: Hızır) who is sometimes identified with Elijah (Ilyas), and is said to have drunk of the water of life.

Some of the most frequently visited sites are the shrines of Şahkulu and Karacaahmet (both in Istanbul), Abdal Musa (Antalya), Seyyid Battal Gazi Complex (Eskişehir), Hamza Baba (İzmir), Hasandede (Kırıkkale).

In the case of the Hacibektaş celebration, since 1990 the activities there have been taken over by Turkey's Ministry of Culture in the interest of promoting tourism and Turkish patriotism rather than Alevi spirituality.

Alevis are expected to give zakat, but there is no set formula or prescribed amount for annual charitable donation as there is in other forms of Islam (2.5% of possessions above a certain minimum).

During the great Turkish expansion from Central Asia into Iran and Anatolia in the Seljuk period (11–12th centuries), Turkmen tribes accepted a Sufi and pro-Ali form of Islam that co-existed with some of their pre-Islamic customs.

Their conversion to Islam in this period was achieved largely through the efforts not of textual scholars (ulema) expounding the finer points of Koranic exegesis and shari‘a law, but by charismatic Sufi dervishes a belief whose cult of Muslim saint worship, mystical divination and millenarianism spoke more directly to the steppe mindset.

Many times, Ottoman campaigns were accompanied or guided by Bektaşi dervishes, spiritual heirs of the 13th century Sufi saint Haji Bektash Veli, himself a native of Khorasan.

After the conquest of Constantinople in 1453, the Ottoman state became increasingly determined to assert its fiscal but also its juridical and political control over the farthest reaches of the Empire.

[44] The resulting Alevi revolts, a series of millenarian anti-state uprisings by the non-Sunni Turkmen population of Anatolia that culminated in the establishment of a militantly Shiite rival state in neighbouring Iran.

Perhaps ten percent of Alevis belong to a religious elite called ocak "hearth", indicating descent from Ali and/or various other saints and heroes.

Traditionally, dedes did not merely lead rituals, but led their communities, often in conjunction with local notables such as the ağas (large landowners) of the Dersim Region.

In the wake of 20th century urbanization (which removed young laborers from the villages) and socialist influence (which looked upon the dedes with suspicion), the old hierarchy has largely broken down.

"[54] However journalist Jeffrey Gettlemand claims that both Alevi and the less than one million Alawite minority in Turkey "seem to be solidly behind Syria’s embattled strongman, Bashar al-Assad" and leery of Syrian Sunni rebels.

Opposing political nationalism, with Alawites supporting their ruling dictatorship and considering Turks (including Alevis) an "opponent" of its Arab "historic interests".

[citation needed] Alevi "possess an extensive and widely-read religious literature, mainly composed of spiritual songs, poems, and epic verse."

[61] In the 2021 United Kingdom census, Alevism was discovered to be the eighth largest religion in England and Wales, after Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Sikhism, Buddhism, Judaism and Paganism.

The followers of this congregation, who later turned out to support Erdoğan Çınar, hold ritual unions of a religious character and have established cultural associations named after Pir Sultan Abdal as well.

According to their philosophy, the human being should enjoy a central role reminiscent of the doctrine of Khurramites, and as illustrated by Hurufi phrase of God is Man quoted above in the context of the Trinity.

According to the philosophy developed by this congregation, Christian mystic St Francis of Assisi and Hindu Mahatma Gandhi are better believers of God than many Muslims.

There are many other practices and ceremonies that share similarity with other faiths, such as a ritual meal (muhabbet) and yearly confession of sins to a baba (magfirat-i zunub مغفرة الذنوب).

Bektashis generally revere Sufi mystics outside of their own order, such as Ibn Arabi, Al-Ghazali and Jelalludin Rumi who are close in spirit to them.

Traditionally the residence of the dedebaba was the Pir Evi (The Saint's Home) which was located in the shrine of Hajji Bektash Wali in the central Anatolian town of Hacıbektaş (Solucakarahüyük).

Concepts such as Odjak, inclusive social roles for women, musical performances, various rituals celebrating the nature or the seasons (like Hıdırellez) and some customs like the cult of ancestors, trees and rocks are both observed in Alevism and Shamanism.