Placing the evolution of Ottoman attitudes toward conversion and converts in the broader context of Mediterranean-wide religious trends and the Ottoman rivalry with the Habsburgs and Safavids, Contested Conversions to Islam draws on a variety of sources, including first-person conversion narratives and Orthodox Christian neomartyologies, to reveal the interplay of individual, (inter)communal, local, and imperial initiatives that influenced the process of conversion.
Placing the evolution of Ottoman attitudes toward conversion and converts in the broader context of Mediterranean-wide religious trends and the Ottoman rivalry with the Habsburgs and Safavids, Contested Conversions to Islam draws on a variety of sources, including first-person conversion narratives and Orthodox Christian neomartyologies, to reveal the interplay of individual, (inter)communal, local, and imperial initiatives that influenced the process of conversion.
Contested Conversions to Islam: Narratives of Religious Change in the Early Modern Ottoman Empire
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Contested Conversions to Islam: Narratives of Religious Change in the Early Modern Ottoman Empire
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Overview
Placing the evolution of Ottoman attitudes toward conversion and converts in the broader context of Mediterranean-wide religious trends and the Ottoman rivalry with the Habsburgs and Safavids, Contested Conversions to Islam draws on a variety of sources, including first-person conversion narratives and Orthodox Christian neomartyologies, to reveal the interplay of individual, (inter)communal, local, and imperial initiatives that influenced the process of conversion.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9780804793322 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Stanford University Press |
| Publication date: | 07/01/2014 |
| Edition description: | New Edition |
| Pages: | 280 |
| Product dimensions: | 6.00(w) x 9.30(h) x 0.60(d) |
About the Author
Read an Excerpt
Contested Conversions to Islam
Narratives of Religious Change in the Early Modern Ottoman EmpireBy Tijana Krstic
STANFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS
Copyright © 2011 the Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior UniversityAll right reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-8047-7317-1
Chapter One
Muslims through NarrativesTextual Repertoires of Fifteenth-Century Ottoman Islam and Formation of the Ottoman Interpretative Communities
* * *
Sometime around 1403 Kutbeddin Mehmed Izniki (d. 1418), an Ottoman scholar from Iznik, wrote the work Mukaddime (The Introduction)—one of the earliest, if not the first, manuals of faith ('ilm-i hal) in Ottoman Turkish. As its title suggests, Mukaddime aspired to be a comprehensive introduction to Islam and gained considerable popularity in the ensuing decades, so much so that in 1458 a copy was prepared for the imperial library at the express wish of Sultan Mehmed II (r. 1451–83), and some early sixteenth-century converts singled it out as the key text that guided them in acquiring their knowledge of Islam. In the customary introduction where the author states the reasons for composing the work (sebeb-i te'lif), Izniki relates:
This poor one saw that there are fine and beautiful books on compulsory religious duties [farz-i 'ayn] but only in Arabic and Persian, and that many people cannot understand their meaning or if they can, they soon forget and cannot relate what they learned. For that reason this poor one wished to compose an introduction to the knowledge of obligatory duties in Turkish, so that it is read to the novices [mübtedi] and to the boys and girls who are about to reach maturity until they retain the commands of the law in their hearts and beliefs ... and after they come of age they act accordingly.
Izniki's sebeb-i te'lif presents an interesting snapshot of the Ottoman Muslim community in the early 1400s. It conjures up a developing community striving to meet the needs of the new believers, both novices in faith and the young, but lacking religious literature in the language of its congregants. Izniki's remarks remind the student of Ottoman history of a simple fact that is often forgotten: the development of Ottoman Islam has a history of its own, and this history unfolded parallel to the foundation of the Ottoman polity and Islamization of the domains that came under its rule.
This chapter explores the phenomenon of Islamization or the process by which the religious tradition of Islam became a major factor within the early Ottoman polity by focusing on the production and dissemination of early Ottoman texts seeking to instruct its readers and listeners how to become pious Muslims. These texts ranged from more formal catechetical works such as 'ilm-i hals to hagiographies of holy men to various other genres of dogmatic ('akaid) literature. Islamization in the early Ottoman Empire was informed by unique political and spiritual currents emanating from thirteenth-century Anatolia—the search for alternative political and religious means of legitimization in the wake of the Mongol destruction of the Abbasid caliphate (1258) and the intellectual and spiritual legacy of the great Sufi master and systematizer of Sufi thought, Ibn Arabi. Furthermore, the processes of Islamization and foundation of Ottoman Muslim communities cannot be fully understood without taking into consideration the competing political and religious agendas that marked the formation of the Ottoman polity in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.
The concept of interpretative communities is central to the ensuing discussion. The spread of Islam in the Ottoman domains entailed the formation of multiple "textual" or interpretative communities—microsocieties organized around common understanding of a "text." However, this text did not necessarily have to be a literary artifact—it could also be a group experience (such as participation in the conquest of Rumeli), an individual life story (such as the lives of warriors and saints), or simply a term. The participants in a community shared views and experiences, which allowed them to coalesce around particular texts and determine their meaning and practical implications. The process of the formation of these communities, which constantly evolved and changed form over time around particular texts, accounted for diversity within Ottoman Islam.
By focusing on the concept of a textual or interpretative community, it is possible to break down the distinction between oral and written modes of communication and bring listeners into the realm of written texts. The relationship between the written and spoken registers in Ottoman society was complex and dialectic because the two registers existed side by side rather than developed one after the other in an evolutionary manner. As a cultural milieu with restricted literacy and where the printing press (for texts in Arabic script) started being used only in the eighteenth century, Ottoman society placed a special importance on the public performance of written texts as a means of disseminating information to those who could not read. Preaching ranged from highly formal exhortatory religious sermons in the mosques to didactic storytelling in a variety of informal venues. Its practitioners and audience also spanned a wide social spectrum and transcended gender boundaries. It is therefore my contention that in order to obviate the cultural models postulating the independence and occasional mixing of the "high" and "popular" cultures, it is necessary to focus on the cultural artifacts shared within a society and their multiple social appropriations.
Several questions are particularly central to this investigation into the formation of the Ottoman Muslim interpretative communities and the repertoire of early Ottoman Islam. Which texts and what kinds of cultural brokers were pivotal in the formation of these communities? What kinds of religious sensibilities did they articulate? Was there anything distinctly Ottoman about them? How did religious interpretation and the understanding of history interact in the formation of interpretative communities in the early Ottoman polity? How distinct were these communities from each other?
Finally, we address two distinct aspects of Islamization, which nevertheless cannot be separated from each other and which operated simultaneously. On the one hand, the process entailed a "universalizing" impulse that sought to regulate belief, maintain Muslim identity through the production of prescriptive texts, and bring the people, both Muslims and those newly entering the community, under the umbrella of Islam. On the other hand, Islamization also entailed an "indigenizing" impulse or adjustment to the local conditions and challenges they posed to Islamic identity as it strove to take hold throughout the Ottoman domains, especially in Rumeli. Although these challenges are often addressed in terms of syncretism or Islam's absorption of elements from local belief systems, we focus here on the impact indigenization had on relations within the Muslim community and the texts that were produced as a result.
In Pursuit of a Universal Community of Believers
Teaching Islam to both "new" and "old" Muslims was central to the universalizing aspect of Islamization. However, as Izniki points out in his introduction to the Mukaddime, early Ottoman educators faced the crucial gap between Arabic (and to a lesser extent Persian) as the language of the authoritative Islamic texts and Turkish as the medium for religious instruction of converts and Muslim congregations in the Ottoman context. The Qur'an, rather than the primary instrument of Islamization, was a venerated but ever-remote authority for most new Muslims, both in Anatolia and in Rumeli. This aura of incomprehensibility gave rise to all sorts of magical beliefs surrounding the Qur'an, a phenomenon that also occurred in other non-Arabic-speaking cultures on the path of Islam's expansion. At the same time, the Qur'an could prove frustrating as a precise guide on how to improve one's conduct or lead a pious life. Thus arose the need for texts and individuals who would produce authoritative interpretation of the Islamic precepts embodied in the Qur'an and hadith (reports on sayings and deeds of the Prophet Muhammad), which explains how 'ilm-i hal literature came into existence.
A survey of library catalogues of Ottoman manuscript collections reveals that 'ilm-i hal and 'akaid literature constitutes a significant portion of all collections and that certain works enjoyed particular popularity. For instance, in the most prominent Rumeli collections, in Sarajevo and Sofia, the list of the most copied works (after the Qur'an) is led by Birgivi Mehmed Efendi's (d. 1573) Vasiyetname (Risale-yi Birgivi) (The Testament or Birgivi's Treatise) and Tarikat-i Muhammediye (Ar. al-Tariqa al-Muhammadiya) (The Muhammadan Path); followed by Yazicizade Mehmed's (d. 1451) Muhammediye (The Story of Muhammad); Kitab-i Üstüvani (Üstüvani's Book), composed by a student of the Kadizadeli preacher Üstüvani Mehmed Efendi (d. 1661); and Hibetullah b. Ibrahim's (fourteenth-century?) Sa'atname (The Book of the Hour). Contrary to the widespread belief that every 'ilm-i hal is essentially identical to other examples of the genre, these sources from the early Otto man period suggest that researchers must subject themselves to the constant process of conscious defamiliarization. A brief investigation into the contents of these popular Ottoman manuals of faith will demonstrate several instances of progressive change in religious sensibility from early to late 'ilm-i hal literature and flesh out some of the main themes and frameworks that the texts aspired to impart to their audience.
Izniki's Mukaddime, written about 1403, was probably the first Otto man 'ilm-i hal. The author himself was one of the first generation of Ottoman scholars educated in the theological seminary in Iznik, established after the Ottoman conquest of the city in 1336 and initially led by Davud-i Kayseri (d. 1350). In his introduction to this work Izniki argues for an accessible didactic text in simple Turkish language that would allow the young and the novices to easily comprehend the truths of Islam. In order to stay true to the ideal of simplicity, Izniki begins with the so-called Gabriel hadith in which the archangel Gabriel is directed by God to assume the appearance of a man and go to the Prophet Muhammad to ask him what faith is. Gabriel appears to Muhammad and requires of him an exposition of faith. In response, Muhammad declares that faith is belief in one God, in God's angels, in books that descended from heaven, in prophets, in the Day of Resurrection, and that all things good and lawful are because of God. These six articles are then repeated again and again throughout the text as the preconditions for a complete faith. An important aspect of Izniki's work is the eschatological framework within which the question of knowing or not knowing the articles of faith is set. He relates the story of Münker and Nekir, the two angels who will question each person after death regarding the individual's belief in God, the prophet, and the contents of his or her faith. Depending on the answers, the person will be sent either to heaven or to hell. Both the beauties of heaven and horrors of hell are then elaborated to the minutest detail, drawing on the extensive tradition of the "torments of the grave" (Ar. 'azab al-qabr).
What is interesting about this emphasis on the Gabriel hadith and the "torments of the grave" is the oral aspect of both traditions—one has to not only know the right answers but also be able to enunciate them. This suggests that Islam was most likely taught in a question-and-answer format. Indeed, evidence from Ottoman personal miscellanies confirms that converts memorized their Islam as a set of answers to specific questions on topics such as the contents of faith, obligatory duties, and schools of law. For instance, a personal miscellany of a Hungarian convert to Islam from the sixteenth century contains a catechism in which each entry begins with "If they ask you ..." and continues with "you should answer them ..." Drawing from all the legal traditions rather than only Hanefi, Izniki relates the ambiguity regarding the need to profess orally the six articles of faith. He says that according to certain experts on law it is not necessary to say them out loud and it is possible to enter paradise by only believing in them; however, according to other interpretations, which he himself endorses as well, since the worldly government is external (zahir), it is also necessary to outwardly express one's belief if one is to be considered a Muslim rather than an infidel.
Regarding the issue of conversion, Izniki states that an infidel who becomes a Muslim is entirely cleansed of sins. It is interesting that this issue does not normally appear in later catechisms, such as Birgivi's Vasiyetname, an 'ilm-i hal that achieved unprecedented popularity and is still used as a catechism among Muslims in Turkey and the Balkans. At the same time, one can trace a development in interpretation of this particular issue in relation to the earlier 'ilm-i hals as well. For example, a manual of faith dated tentatively to the mid-fourteenth-century Karasi province has a section in which converts, new Muslims, are said to be going directly to paradise without having to answer any questions after death or at the Day of Resurrection (hesabsuz uçmaga varurlar). The rules that are supposed to be applicable to all Muslims are therefore bent in the case of new Muslims, which testifies to a great concern and need to boost the spread of Islam. Sinasi Tekin has argued that this tenor of interpretation suggests that the manual was written by earlier converts to attract new ones.
Izniki's comments relating to novices in Islam are completed by a discussion on whether it is essential to understand what is implied when one pronounces shahada in the act of conversion. He summarizes the views of Imam Abu Hanifa, who maintains that only the rebellious and obstinate cannot understand or refuse to understand that God is one. Whoever does not learn it or refuses to learn it is an infidel. Izniki also cites al-Ghazali, who asserts that only the faith of those who internalize shahada in their hearts leads to salvation. As for those who profess it only outwardly, it is sufficient to make them Muslims in this world, but they would be judged in the hereafter. In conclusion, Izniki says that a believer is considered to be the person who enunciates the six articles of faith, who believes from the heart, and who performs the obligatory duties. This indicates that he attributed particular importance to the condition of being a novice in Islam as well as to the challenges that numerous new Muslims posed to the Muslim community, such as how to know whether someone is a sincere believer or not. The rest of Izniki's work addresses numerous other questions on personal and communal worship, introducing Sufi values and views, and striving to provide the guidelines for a society that appears quite latitudinarian in its implementation of Islamic precepts.
Izniki's attention to new Muslims stands in contrast to later 'ilm-i hals. For example, unlike Mukaddime, which conveys the notion of a new and expanding Islamic polity looking outward, Birgivi's Tarikat-i Muhammediye and the Kitab-i Üstüvani, written in the sixteenth and the seventeenth century, respectively, look inward, focusing on the problems of an established Islamic society with many rivaling registers of piety, struggling to impose order on diversity of practice. For instance, Birgivi's Tarikat-i Muhammediye was written in Arabic and typically used as a manual by imams and judges (kadi). It covered the topics of piety and morality as well as the Sufi path to the divine. Once a member of the Bayrami Sufi order himself, Birgivi sharply criticized the innovation (bid'at) and superstitions (hurufe) introduced to Sufism by some dervis orders of his time and adhered firmly to the Sunni Sufi path as articulated by al-Ghazali, although with some important differences. Birgivi insisted on the Qur'an and sunna (the deeds and sayings of the Prophet Muhammad) being the only sources of Muslim faith, dismissing pernicious innovations such as visitation of saint's shrines and accompanying rituals. Moreover, in his Vasiyetname, he provides explicit rules not only of worship and belief but also of proper conduct, including the rules on what is improper to say, look at, or do. This explicit effort toward social disciplining caused Birgivi's work to become an inspiration for the seventeenth-century Islamic reform movement of the Kadizadelis, who argued for a return to a pristine Islam from the time of the Prophet, devoid of accrued traditions and innovations. Kitab-i Üstüvani reflects these Kadizadeli values, sharply criticizes perceived innovations introduced by the Sufis, and cites Tarikat-i Muhammediye in many places. These texts thus reflect different moments in the history of the Ottoman Muslim community and attendant religious needs. (Continues...)
Excerpted from Contested Conversions to Islam by Tijana Krstic Copyright © 2011 by the Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior University. Excerpted by permission of STANFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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Table of Contents
Contents
Acknowledgments....................ixNote on Transliteration and Pronunciation....................xiii
INTRODUCTION Turning "Rumi": Conversion to Islam, Fashioning of the Ottoman Imperial Ideology, and Interconfessional Relations in the Early Modern Mediterranean Context....................1
CHAPTER ONE Muslims through Narratives: Textual Repertoires of Fifteenth-Century Ottoman Islam and Formation of the Ottoman Interpretative Communities....................26
CHAPTER THREE In Expectation of the Messiah: Interimperial Rivalry, Apocalypse, and Conversion in Sixteenth-Century Muslim Polemical Narratives....................75
CHAPTER FOUR Illuminated by the Light of Islam and the Glory of the Ottoman Sultanate: Self-Narratives of Conversion to Islam in the Age of Confessionalization....................98
CHAPTER FIVE Between the Turban and the Papal Tiara: Orthodox Christian Neomartyrs and Their Impresarios in the Age of Confessionalization....................121
CHAPTER SIX Everyday Communal Politics of Coexistence and Orthodox Christian Martyrdom: A Dialogue of Sources and Gender Regimes in the Age of Confessionalization....................143
CONCLUSION Conversion and Confessionalization in the Ottoman Empire: Considerations for Future Research....................165
Notes....................175
Bibliography....................217
Index....................253