Is it Possible to Speak of an Illuminationist Circle in the Ottoman Scholarly World? An Analysis of the Ottoman Scholarly Conception of Illuminationism
Journal Title: Nazariyat İslam Felsefe ve Bilim Tarihi Araştırmaları Dergisi - Year 2018, Vol 4, Issue 3
Abstract
This article seeks to answer the questions of how Ottoman scholars perceived Illuminationist thought and Illuminationism and whether a milieu favorably disposed to Illuminationism existed. It first questions how and through which works the debates on the nature of Illuminationism, which is foremost a pursuit of truth, reached the Ottoman scholarly milieus. It then traces over their works how the Ottoman scholars defined Illuminationism, who they viewed as being within this circle, and what sort of a relation they had with it. Since the Illuminationist philosophy is discussed in the literature together with theology, mysticism, and the Peripatetic philosophy, it is regarded as an alternative system. However, the exchange between Illuminationist philosophy and the aforementioned systems of thought, as well as their subsets, was present from the very beginning and continued from the fourteenth century onward in Iran and the Near East. As such, one may argue that the Illuminationist perspective and interpretation during the Ottoman era that constitutes the subject of study at hand is interwoven with other thought systems, as opposed to having an independent standing, meaning that it moved along methodical convergences.
Authors and Affiliations
Müstakim Arıcı
Touching the Point: Mu’ayyadzāda ‘Abd Al-Rahmān Efendi’s Treatise on Juz’ Alladhī Lā Yatajazza’: An Analysis, Critical Edition, and Translation
This article provides the analysis, translation, and critical edition (taḥqīq) of Muʾayyadzāda ʿAbd al-Raḥmān Efendi’s (d. 922/1516) treatise on al-juzʾ alladhī lā yatajazzaʾ (Treatise on the indivisible part), which is...
Between Reality and Mentality -Fifteenth Century Mathematics and Natural Philosophy Reconsidered-
Why did the members of the Samarqand Observatory School stand closer to the science of kalām for metaphysical principles in the fifteenth century and reserve more space to Mathematics in the description of the nature? Wh...
Debating Sufi Knowledge in the Eighteenth-Century Ottoman Thought: An Analysis of the Saçaḳlīzāde-‘Alamī Debate on Divine Inspiration (‘ilm al-ladunn)
At the beginning of the eighteenth century, two Ottoman scholars named Saçaḳlīzāde and ‘Alamī Aḥmad Efendi wrote treatises and engaged in a scientific debate about divine inspiration (al-‘ilm al-ladunnī). Saçaḳlīzāde’s R...
Two Competing Approaches in the Mu‘tazilite View of the Human Being: The Traditions of Abū al-Hudhayl and al-Naẓẓām
The aim of this article is to illustrate the two human conceptions introduced in the Basran School of Muʿtazila with their reflections on the fields like theoretical physics, epistemology, and ethics. In the Muʿtazilite...
Fakhr al-Dīn Al-Rāzī’s Epistle on al-Hayūlā wa Al-Sūrah: A Study and Editio Princeps
This article examines Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī’s work entitled al-Hayūlā wa al-Sūrah, whose subject pertains to a critique of the opinion, held by peripatetic philosophers such as al-Fārābī, Ibn Sīnā, that the “body” is comp...