page_title: Baba Rexheb
section_title: Early life
hierarchical_section_title: Baba Rexheb / Early life
caption_attribution_description: English: The room in Arabati Baba Teke where visitors are received with all the features of the Bektashi and photos from various meetings with prominent figures from different areas of lifeМакедонски: Просторијата во Арабати баба Теќе каде се примаат посетителите со сите обележија на бекташите и фотографии од разни средби со видни личности од ралични области од животот
context_page_description: Rexheb Beqiri, better known by the religious name Baba Rexheb, was an Albanian Islamic scholar and Sufi. He was the founder and the head of the Bektashi Sufi lodge located in Taylor, Michigan, United States.
context_section_description: Baba Rexheb was born as Rexheb Beqiri, on 18 August 1901, into a family with strong Bektashi ties in Gjirokastër, southern Albania, at a time when Albania was still part of the Ottoman Empire. His father, Refat Beqiri, was a local mullah in the old neighbourhood of Dunavat, Gjirokastër. Refat’s family had originally migrated to southern Albania from the Kosovar town of Gjakova. His mother was from Elbasan in central Albania as was his murshid, his spiritual guide, Selim Baba Elbasani. He entered the Bektashi Order at the age of sixteen and was promoted to the rank of dervish at the age of twenty. A year later, he took an additional vow as a mücerred (celibate) dervish. For the next twenty-five years he served in the Asim Baba Tekke, under the guidance of his maternal uncle, Baba Selim. During World War II, Dervish Rexhep followed the guidance of his murshid and went from village to village, telling the people that the communists "Din yok, vatan yok," that is, "They have no religion, they have no homeland." Because of this he was forced to flee in 1944 when the communists under Enver Hoxha came to power. He spent four years in a displaced persons camps in Italy. His dream was to serve Bektashis in America, but after World War II, it was very difficult to come to America. So instead he went to the Bektashi Kaygusuz Sultan Tekke in the Mokattam in Cairo,  Egypt. He stayed there for four years until his number for the United States finally came up. He traveled to New York City where one of his sisters, Zejnep Cuçi, had preceded him.
caption: Photo of Baba Rexheb (on the right over the red Allah-calligraphy) in the Harabati Baba Tekke of Tetovo, Macedonia.
exif: {"Image ImageWidth": "3456", "Image ImageLength": "4608", "Image BitsPerSample": "[8, 8, 8]", "Image PhotometricInterpretation": "2", "Image Make": "Canon", "Image Model": "Canon PowerShot A2300", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image SamplesPerPixel": "3", "Image XResolution": "180", "Image YResolution": "180", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop CS6 (Windows)", "Image DateTime": "2014:10:21 16:15:44", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "Image Tag 0x1001": "4608", "Image Tag 0x1002": "3456", "Image SensitivityType": "Standard Output Sensitivity and Recommended Exposure Index", "Image CustomRendered": "Normal", "Image ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "Image WhiteBalance": "Auto", "Image DigitalZoomRatio": "1", "Image SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "Image CameraOwnerName": "", "Image ExifOffset": "412", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "1278", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "8753", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/60", "EXIF FNumber": "14/5", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "500", "EXIF SensitivityType": "Standard Output Sensitivity and Recommended Exposure Index", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0230", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2014:10:18 15:03:22", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2014:10:18 15:03:22", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF CompressedBitsPerPixel": "3", "EXIF ShutterSpeedValue": "189/32", "EXIF ApertureValue": "95/32", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "95/32", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF Flash": "Flash fired, compulsory flash mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "5", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "3456", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "4608", "EXIF FocalPlaneXResolution": "1728000/91", "EXIF FocalPlaneYResolution": "2304000/121", "EXIF FocalPlaneResolutionUnit": "2", "EXIF SensingMethod": "One-chip color area", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF DigitalZoomRatio": "1", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard"}