Knowledge on the Move in a Transottoman Perspective: Dynamics of Intellectual Exchange from the Fifteenth to the Early Twentieth Century [1 ed.] 9783737011853, 9783847111856

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Transottomanica Osteuropäisch-osmanisch-persische Mobilitätsdynamiken

Band 5

Herausgegeben von Stefan Rohdewald, Stephan Conermann und Albrecht Fuess

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Evelin Dierauff / Dennis Dierks / Barbara Henning / Taisiya Leber / Ani Sargsyan (eds.)

Knowledge on the Move in a Transottoman Perspective Dynamics of Intellectual Exchange from the Fifteenth to the Early Twentieth Century

With 9 figures

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Bibliografische Information der Deutschen Nationalbibliothek Die Deutsche Nationalbibliothek verzeichnet diese Publikation in der Deutschen Nationalbibliografie; detaillierte bibliografische Daten sind im Internet über https://dnb.de abrufbar. Gedruckt mit freundlicher Unterstützung der Deutschen Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) im Rahmen des SPP 1981: Transottomanica: Osteuropäisch-osmanisch-persische Mobilitätsdynamiken (Projektnummer 313079038) www.transottomanica.de © 2021 V&R unipress, Theaterstraße 13, D-37073 Göttingen, ein Imprint der Brill-Gruppe (Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, Niederlande; Brill USA Inc., Boston MA, USA; Brill Asia Pte Ltd, Singapore; Brill Deutschland GmbH, Paderborn, Deutschland; Brill Österreich GmbH, Wien, Österreich) Koninklijke Brill NV umfasst die Imprints Brill, Brill Nijhoff, Brill Hotei, Brill Schöningh, Brill Fink, Brill mentis, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Böhlau, Verlag Antike und V&R unipress. Dieses Werk ist als Open-Access-Publikation im Sinne der Creative-Commons-Lizenz BY International 4.0 („Namensnennung“) unter dem DOI 10.14220/9783737011853 abzurufen. Um eine Kopie dieser Lizenz zu sehen, besuchen Sie https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. Jede Verwertung in anderen als den durch diese Lizenz zugelassenen Fällen bedarf der vorherigen schriftlichen Einwilligung des Verlages. Umschlagabbildung: Tuhfe-i S¸a¯hidı¯, Ms. 1229-1 (Date of transcription 1586), The Ghazi Husrev-beg ˙ Library, Sarajevo. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht Verlage | www.vandenhoeck-ruprecht-verlage.com ISSN 2626-9449 ISBN 978-3-7370-1185-3

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Contents

Evelin Dierauff / Dennis Dierks / Barbara Henning / Taisiya Leber / Ani Sargsyan Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

7

Ani Sargsyan Persian-Turkish Dictionaries of the mid-15th–16th Centuries: A Trajectory of Knowledge Mobility . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

39

Taisiya Leber Christian-Jewish and Jewish-Christian Polemics in the Transottoman Context . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

71

Barbara Henning Trajectories of Early-Modern Ottoman Advice Literature: Nas¯ıhatna¯mes ˙˙ as Sites of Transottoman Transfers of Knowledge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115 Dennis Dierks Scripting, Translating, and Narrating Reform. Making Muslim Reformism in the European Peripheries of the Muslim World at the Turn of the 20th Century . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157 Evelin Dierauff The Appropriation of Political Concepts in Halı¯l as-Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s ‘Orthodox ˘ Renaissance’ (1908–14) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 223 Index of Names

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 279

Index of Places and Subjects

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 283

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Evelin Dierauff / Dennis Dierks / Barbara Henning / Taisiya Leber / Ani Sargsyan

Introduction

1.

Subject of the Volume & Theoretical Frameworks

For several decades, scholars in the humanities and historians in particular have been working on widening our view on the world, in an attempt to overcome the limitations that the grand narratives of the First Modernity1 have imposed. At the crossroads of these approaches, the discipline of global history has highlighted the worldwide connection of human action, even in seemingly remote areas. In the meantime, the interest in movement and connection has informed and inspired a number of sub-disciplines of cultural history: Global intellectual history,2 which aims at reconstructing global flows of ideas; the history of science – whose dominating narrative of the “rise of modern science” as a Western accomplishment has been challenged by investigations into the polycentricity of global knowledge production;3 and the history of literature, which has begun to reconstruct the “world history of world literature”,4 to name but a few examples. Such a global perspective not only aims at overcoming the notorious parochialism of national historiographies and Eurocentrism, but also calls into question the conventions of area studies, in particular their tendency to conduct research according to spatially delimited geographic units, defined by academic habits, conventions, and mental geographies. Alternative conceptual approaches such as translocality suggest a new understanding of the links between space and the production of culture and meaning.5 Here, an emphasis is put on flows of 1 Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and Ambivalence (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1991). 2 To name but one example: Samuel Moyn & Andrew Sartori (eds.), Global Intellectual History (New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 2013). 3 Prominently argued in: Kapil Raj, Relocating Modern Science: Circulation and the Construction of Knowledge in South Asia and Europe, 1650–1900 (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010). 4 May Hawas (ed.), The Routledge Companion to World Literature and World History (London, New York: Routledge, 2018). 5 Ulrike Freitag & Achim v. Oppen, “Translocality. An Approach to Connection and Transfer in Regional Studies,” in Translocality – The Study of Globalising Phenomena from a Southern Perspective, eds. Ulrike Freitag & Achim v. Oppen (Leiden: Brill, 2010), 1–21.

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actors, goods and ideas, following them as they transcend boundaries between spaces of very different scale and type; doing so can reshape local perceptions of boundaries, spaces and belonging. In this book, we apply the heuristic and analytical concept of translocality to the emerging field of the history of knowledge. The affinity between these approaches is evident. Both translocality and the history of knowledge are very much inspired by the worldwide experience of profound societal and cultural transformation, evoked by what we usually describe as the emergence of a global knowledge society. What is more, both approaches have complementary research interests: While the translocal approach is concerned with understanding the dynamics of transboundary mobility and their local repercussions, the history of knowledge investigates the social and cultural preconditions of the (re)production, dissemination, appropriation, and application of knowledge, pointing out that knowledge is shaped and reshaped in processes of continued, multi-layered circulations. In this book, we focus on flows of knowledge between and within two regions that are conventionally addressed as the Middle East and Eastern Europe. We engage with movements of knowledge that transcended boundaries as they have been perceived by the actors involved or, which is even more challenging, as they have been constructed by traditional Western scholarship evolving since the 19th century. We do so in an experimental setting that we label as ‘Transottoman’. In our understanding this term has spatial, temporal, and, most importantly, methodological implications. Although the starting point of our investigation into the history of knowledge is a politically defined territory – the Ottoman Empire – it is not our intention to circumscribe a geographically determined research area. Instead, we approach our subject through the ‘lens of mobility’,6 investigating multi-layered and multi-directional processes of exchange and cultural production between the Ottoman Empire and the world around it. We are interested in reconstructing concrete figurations of interaction that attest to different kinds of spatial relationality. In the settings of our case studies – which cover a time frame from the 15th to the early 20th century and are concerned with a wide variety of social spaces and geographical areas, including the Ottoman capital Istanbul, provincial settings like Ottoman Palestine, and also Egypt, Bosnia, Crimea, the Persian realm and Poland-Lithuania – the understanding of space is contextual and case-specific. Regarding the history of knowledge, the Transottoman perspective has the potential of putting a greater emphasis on both the spatial and transcultural 6 Stephan Conermann, Albrecht Fuess & Stefan Rohdewald, “Einführung: Transosmanische Mobilitätsdynamiken. Mobilität als Linse für Akteure, Wissen und Objekte,” in Transottomanica: Osteuropäisch-osmanisch-persische Mobilitätsdynamiken, eds. Stefan Rohdewald, Stephan Conermann & Albrecht Fuess (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2019), 47–57.

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Introduction

dimensions of knowledge. In addition, it urges us to question and challenge previously existing spatial categories of transcultural analysis. It offers an incentive to think beyond bilateral interactions and to instead widen the scope of research to include multilateral transcultural encounters and multiple entanglements of knowledge in motion, thus shedding light on transregional and globalized interdependencies of knowledge. Concerning the study of translocality, the Transottoman perspective provides a still underexplored empirical testing ground. Insights from this Transottoman laboratory can contribute to widening the temporal scope of research, given that currently, investigations into the historical dimensions of translocality often do not go beyond the Age of Empire and the first globalization of the 19th century; a Transottoman perspective also takes into account the preceding centuries. In our book we apply the Transottoman approach to empirical case studies focusing on knowledge reflected in texts and moving between textual bodies. The textual bodies we analyze are part of still unexplored time periods and, in turn, different cultures of knowledge production: They include Orthodox polemics and Persian-Turkish bilingual dictionaries from the 15th and 16th centuries, earlymodern Ottoman advice literature in a longue durée perspective extending to the mid-20th century, and finally, periodicals from late-Ottoman Palestine and Egypt and post-Ottoman Bosnia and Crimea. This transregional and diachronic approach is at the core of what is addressed as ‘Transottoman’ in our book, bringing together a spatial and temporal dimension. In the particular context of this volume, an approach which looks across and beyond epochal, regional, and cultural boundaries facilitates new understandings of knowledge mobility, pointing out dimensions of connectivity and interaction which have so far been neglected in historical research. Engaging with both entanglements and comparative perspectives, our framework of discussion allows for the description of processes of knowledge mobility in more abstract ways. The book thus prepares the ground for conversations about the development of models to describe translocal and transcultural mobilities of knowledge as part of a truly global history of knowledge. All contributions assembled in this volume face a common methodological challenge: To devise research designs that allow for a closer understanding of the complex dynamics that impact and channel the mobility of knowledge in space and time. Facing this challenge, our case studies engage with methodological approaches from outside the field of the history of knowledge. Some inspiration can be found in the field of social anthropology: Following the cultural turn and the insight that cultural logics and meaning can be produced translocally – in contexts closely entangled but possibly many miles apart – ethnographical research became more complex. Social anthropologists had to complement existing methodological approaches like traditional fieldwork with new strategies

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to track down and follow their by now ‘moving targets’ through multiple sites of observation. George E. Marcus addressed this methodological dilemma, arguing for a multi-sited ethnography and suggesting concrete mapping strategies to trace transcultural processes. The six strategies he introduces – in his own terms, follow the people, follow the thing, follow the metaphor, follow the plot, follow the biography and follow the conflict – allow for empirically grounding a multi-sited research design.7 Borrowing from Marcus, our attempt to follow the knowledge understands ideas and concepts as situated in multiple contexts and offers a fruitful strategy to map out and trace movement, scopes and moments of translation and appropriation of certain bodies of knowledge, of ideas and concepts. The advantage of this approach in a Transottoman research context is threefold: It allows one to imagine and empirically trace cultural logics that are produced not in a single context or location, but rather stem from the interaction and entanglement of multiple locations, temporal layers and social contexts. In addition, following the knowledge allows one to discover previously unexpected trajectories and connections between spaces, time periods and discourses. Thus, alternative configurations and frameworks of communication and interaction can come into focus. And finally: Cultural production and interactions between different sites are propelled by processes of translation, bringing moments and mechanisms of cultural transfer between different sites into focus. We combine this perspective with a keen attention to conceptual history. This means that we are interested in the genealogies and layers of meaning inherent in key concepts, along with changes in meaning and/or terminology over time. Thereby, we identify and map out moments of conceptual change, translation and knowledge transfer. Taking inspiration from these approaches, all of our contributions track the bodies of knowledge we are interested in to empirically ground our analysis and hypotheses. Drawing on these approaches, we confront our source material with the following questions: – Of what type is the knowledge we examine, and how can it be defined? – What can we say about the movement of knowledge: First of all, what routes does it take – in terms of layers of meaning, historically and geographically – as it moves from generation to generation and from context to context between the Ottoman, Persian and Russian Empires and Eastern Europe, or between different sites within the Ottoman realm? And second, what factors facilitate and channel the movement and trajectories of knowledge: Who are the agents

7 George E. Marcus, “Ethnography in/of the World System: The Emergence of Multi-Sited Ethnography,” Annual Review of Anthropology 24.1 (1995): 95–117.

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Introduction

that negotiate the knowledge and/or carry it along, and what are their interests? – How does the transmission of knowledge work? How are the cognitive structures, the meanings and conceptual understandings conveyed transformed on the way, and how can this transformation be grasped through measurable terminological changes? Before engaging with these questions in greater detail, our understanding of knowledge in the concrete context of our case studies needs some further explanation.

2.

Aspects and Categories of Knowledge(s) in Motion

There is, so far, no consensus on a definition of ‘knowledge’ in research literature. However, what research agrees upon are two things: (1) to understand knowledge as a social and cultural construction and (2) to conceptualize it in a broad way and, in so doing, to take the actors’ own conceptions, imaginaries and truth claims seriously. Knowledge is, following the definition of the sociologist David Bloor, whatever is taken to be knowledge in a given milieu or culture.8 Our understanding of knowledge is therefore not limited to intellectual categories and scientific or scholarly knowledge, but also includes local and popular culture as well as patterns of daily action. While our overarching collective deliberations are concerned with the more abstract flows of knowledge in Transottoman frameworks of interactions, our individual contributions focus on different aspects and subcategories of concrete bodies of knowledge: Normative discussions of knowledge on governance are addressed, but more practical knowledge of learning a new language with the help of literary dictionaries is being looked at as well. While some examples of knowledge discussed here are open and accessible to many people, other bodies of knowledge appear much more arcane, with access being limited according to social status, level of education and proficiency in certain languages or contingent on membership in specific communities, be it early modern printers or late-19th century political circles. Examples of specialist knowledge of experts illustrate not only the flow, but also the functions of knowledge and its role in claiming resources like social status. A great variety of types of knowledge are operating at the same time in any given context. To come to terms with this plurality and the inherent overlaps and entanglements, recent research tends to speak of knowledge(s) in the plural and 8 David Bloor, Knowledge and Social Imagery (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1976), 5.

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to consider entire cultures of knowledge. Given this plurality, the wide geographical scope and the broad timespan of the individual contributions, it cannot be the aim of this book to establish a uniform definition of knowledge that pretends to integrate all aspects and examples discussed in the following chapters. What we suggest instead is a focus on the interplay between the movement of knowledge and the production of culture and meaning in translocal frameworks of interaction. From this perspective, three aspects of knowledge are of particular relevance: (a) the materiality and mediality of the knowledge analyzed, (b) the political and social preconditions of the (re)production, transmission and appropriation of knowledge and its social functions and impacts, and (c) knowledge as cultural and social practice:

a)

The materiality and mediality of knowledge

The individual chapters of this book deal with a wide range of textual knowledge in different Transottoman contexts, including handwritten dictionaries and charters, early printed books, printed dictionaries, travel accounts, works of political advice literature, memoirs and diaries, political pamphlets and modern periodicals. Looking at them as objects on the move, these different textual bodies are conceptualized and analyzed as ‘knowledge reservoirs’ (Wissensspeicher): Texts that preserve and encode knowledge for absent or future audiences. Processes of compiling and re-arranging knowledge in such ‘reservoirs’ deserve our particular attention – they constitute moments of opportunity for actors to transform and translate knowledge, making it suitable for specific contexts and audiences. To capture the dynamics of knowledge on the move, it seems fruitful to study these condensations of knowledge in respective reservoirs in conjunction with the ongoing movement and trajectories of knowledge as it moves between and across different contexts, carriers and formats. We assume that any textual source examined here provides but a snapshot of these dynamics, as it engages with knowledge that has already been transformed multiple times, deriving from earlier, sometimes oral traditions or sets of ideas. This aspect is, for instance, highly relevant in the case of Ottoman political advice literature examined in Henning’s contribution, a textual tradition that engages closely and creatively with previous texts from Persian, Arabic-Islamic and Ancient Greek contexts, to name but a few.

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Introduction

b)

Social preconditions and impacts of knowledge

Since the groundbreaking studies of Foucault and Bourdieu, no inquiry into the history of knowledge can ignore the political and social frameworks in which processes of producing, transmitting, transforming, and appropriating knowledge take place. We observe that flows of knowledge are channeled by power relations. This implies rules of what to say and what not to say, be it defined by codes of conduct of certain communities and institutions, be it written laws or be it exercised by regimes of (self-)censorship. Power relations also structure contexts in which value is assigned to knowledge, be it symbolic or economic. Processes of producing and disseminating knowledge depend on the existence of ‘markets’, in the sense of situations of exchange and encounter where knowledge is being evaluated, passed on and consumed. An early-modern court environment where literary works are presented to potential sponsors is an example of such a marketplace situation. Such encounters can also happen ‘on unequal terms’, especially with regard to colonial and imperial contexts.9 To borrow again from Bourdieu’s perspective, knowledge can be regarded as capital, as a kind of currency in social and political interactions, used to claim status and privileges, to access information or to endorse truth claims. An imbalance of power, however, does not preclude agency also of more disadvantaged groups. As the chapters of this monograph show, actors involved were keenly aware of the need to assign value and generate interest for their products, as literary works tailored and customized to the tastes of potential patrons illustrate. Looking at exchanges and encounters that channel flows of knowledge, we need to consider the agency of the relevant actors involved. In the tradition of Bourdieu, the ‘sociology of knowledge’ has focused on the connections between knowledge and social hierarchies. In this respect, Foucault added a historical perspective on the relations between knowledge and power by identifying localized ‘orders of knowledge’ and ‘regimes of truth’. Our research illustrates this by zooming in on the management of flows of knowledge by powerful agents, e. g. through the collection and provision of texts, the patronage and commission of intellectual output, the maintenance of archives, financial investments in education and providing access to knowledge to selected individuals. The production and reproduction of knowledge is also accompanied by valorization and de-valorization techniques by which knowledge is marked as ‘official’ or legitimate, or as illegitimate and ‘wrong’. A focus on power, however, should not obscure the fact that knowledge as we understand it has a concrete impact on a wide variety of actors, its basic function

9 Peter Burke, What is the History of Knowledge? (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2016), 35.

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being to inform, motivate, and direct human action – often across political and linguistic borders, allowing for transboundary mobility.

c)

Knowledge as social and cultural practice

Looking at knowledge as a cultural practice has three central consequences for our approach: It allows us to inquire about the role of knowledge in establishing difference and identity, to ask about its importance in communicating and facilitating understanding across long distances, and also to include questions about functions of and attitudes toward certain bodies of knowledge. Zooming in on our case studies, we find that knowledge both constitutes community and shared identities – but also, at the same time, establishes difference, setting those who know and are experts apart from those who are either to be instructed or not supposed to know at all. Knowledge is a basis of sociability; community is based on shared knowledge. This shared knowledge includes a set of rules and conventions regulating the interaction within these social formations. Getting access to these aggregations of knowledge means getting access to a certain community. This holds especially true for communities of experts. In these cases, knowledge functions as a distinction marker. Shared cultures of knowledge can create and maintain long-distance networks and frameworks of communication, as is illustrated by networks of Muslim scholars or early modern printers. Texts are also ‘social practice’ at work, since they help to constitute and consolidate social groups and thus draw social boundaries and differentiate between groups. To understand knowledge systems as ‘culture’, their historical contingencies, epistemological preconceptions and social functions need to be considered. This also requires exploration of the consequences of knowledge in social contexts and its effects on the lives of the actors involved, the forms of its perception and the receptions that it provokes, as far as possible through the sources investigated. In order to have an impact on individual and social life, knowledge has to be translated and communicated by concepts, images, narratives, and scripts. The embodied character of knowledge in knowledge reservoirs has already been mentioned, but other aspects of knowledge cultures, including performative practices (i. e. individual or collective readings or recitations of texts), attitudes and ways of organizing knowledge need to be considered as well, even though they are sometimes much harder to trace in the sources.10 Different practices of

10 On discussions about circulations and ways to capture less explicit, practical and even tacit knowledge, see Simone Lässig, “Übersetzungen in der Geschichte – Geschichte als Überset-

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Introduction

staging knowledge in concrete situations, be it by language, be it visually or bodily, often aim at convincing an addressed audience. Therefore, such practices have to be adapted to the needs and experiences of different recipients. Investigations into the transmission of knowledge have to analyze such communicative strategies and claims to expertise as well.

3.

State of the Art

Analyses of knowledge systems have been an essential branch of cultural history since the 1980s. In German-speaking academia ‘Wissensgeschichte’ was established as a field of study in the early 2000s. Researchers interested in conceptual history and the history of ideas, among them notably the Swiss historian Philipp Sarasin, were among the first to delineate a newly emerging field of ‘Wissensgeschichte’ and its potentials.11 These discussions are only now beginning to receive attention in Middle Eastern Studies and Ottoman history – and we understand our volume as a further step in this direction. Until the mid-20th century, the study of knowledge in the Ottoman realm has been part of a broader narrative of Islamic and Ottoman decline that impeded or at least delayed modernization.12 This narrative has depicted Islamic learning as a stage that needed to be overcome in order to achieve progress and modernization. Moreover, the decline of Islamic learning was explained, variably, by pointing to the stifling role of religious orthodoxy, and the infiltration of new, allegedly less educated or scholarly-minded actors into the Islamic realm, notably Turkish and Mongol invaders. This view helps explain why, for the longest time, Western historians were not particularly interested in studying Ottoman cultures of science and knowledge: According to the decline paradigm they had internalized, there was simply nothing to find. This perspective was grounded in a positivist outlook on the history of science, according to which knowledge was seen as progressing in a linear fashion, through certain consecutive stages, and only in one direction. The cultural and social context of knowledge production and dissemination was not so much of interest, but rather were the achievements, insights and activities of a handful of seminal scholars. Turkish-Republican historians like Adnan Adıvar subscribed to this Western narrative of Ottoman

zung?,” Geschichte und Gesellschaft 38.2 (2012): 189–216, accessed March 17, 2020, https://doi. org/10.13109/gege.2012.38.2.189. 11 Philipp Sarasin, “Was ist Wissensgeschichte?,” Internationales Archiv für Sozialgeschichte der deutschen Literatur 36.1 (2011): 159–172. 12 For the Ottoman case, see Dana Sajdi, Ottoman Tulips, Ottoman Coffee (London: I.B. Tauris, 2007), 1–40.

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decline as well, equating science with European science only, and dismissing alternative, non-Western bodies of knowledge as superstitions.13 Foucault’s work on the relation between knowledge, power and social control14 had substantial consequences for research perspectives on Middle Eastern history and caused a serious shift in this regard.15 From the 1970s onward and in the context of post-colonial studies, historians have increasingly challenged the narrative of Middle Eastern intellectual history after the ‘Golden Age’ of classical Islam as a story of decline and backwardness compared to European science. In this context, Edward Said coined the term ‘Orientalism’, and criticized the image of the ‘Orient’ as a construction of Western scholarship that was deeply influenced by the imperial perception of the superiority of the ‘self ’ and the inferiority of the Oriental ‘other’. Yet, it has to be pointed out that in his work, Said retained the East-West dualism and moved within the same categories that he himself had criticized.16 However, even after the shift of post-colonial studies, the guiding question asked by scholars regarding knowledge production in the Middle East has largely remained: “What went wrong?”17 Scholars still were occupied with asking why the West surpassed the Islamic world in the fields of science and why Islamic scholars seemingly forfeited intellectual curiosity and excellence, even though they had, as some have argued, been superior to European scholars for many centuries.18 A way out of the ‘East-West-paradigm’ was proposed by Clifford Geertz: He called for a study of knowledge in context, and for an understanding of knowledge systems as created by historical actors in specific circumstances and therefore not only ‘objects to change’ but also as forms of ‘localized knowledge’.19 Ottoman knowledge can be better studied by putting an emphasis not so much

13 Miri Shefer-Mossensohn, Science Among the Ottomans: The Cultural Creation and Exchange of Knowledge (Austin, TX: University of Texas Press, 2015), 10–11, and Jane H. Murphy, “Islamic Knowledge Systems: Circulation, Rationality and Politics,” in The Blackwell History of Islam, ed. Armando Salvatore (Oxford: John Wiley & Sons, 2018), 479–481; Kemal H. Karpat, Studies on Ottoman Social and Political History: Selected Articles and Essays (Leiden: Brill, 2002), 5–6. 14 Michel Foucault, Histoire de la folie à l’âge classique. Civilisations d’hier et d’aujourd’hui (Paris: Plon, 1961); idem, L’Archéologie du savoir (Paris: Gallimard, 1969). 15 As is illustrated in the works of Edward Said, Orientalism (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1978) and Khaled Fahmy, All the Pasha’s Men (Cambridge; Cambridge University Press, 1997). 16 Said, Orientalism. 17 Bernard Lewis, What Went Wrong? (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002). 18 E. g. John Freely, Light from the East (London: I.B. Tauris, 2011). 19 Clifford Geertz, Local Knowledge (New York: Basic Books, 1983), his ideas were taken up by Dale F. Eickelman, Knowledge and Power in Morocco (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1985).

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Introduction

on inventions, but on creative applications.20 Further attention needs to be paid to emic concepts of knowledge used in Ottoman sources and also to the concepts and ideas research languages rely on to differentiate and evaluate different types of knowledge.21 Here, seminal work has already been done by Brentjes on the changing definitions and complex relationship between emic concepts and different types of knowledge in Islamic thought.22 Increasingly, Ottoman conceptual frameworks are being discussed on their own terms, leaving room to trace complex strategies of interacting with and selectively adopting ideas from beyond the Ottoman context.23 Thus, recent studies on Ottoman knowledge have refuted the idea that Islamic and Ottoman knowledge systems were static or unchanging and have overcome the misleading dichotomy of ‘Western scientific progress’ and ‘traditional Islamic learning’.24 In recent years, scholars have focused on the dynamics of Islamic and Ottoman knowledge systems in astronomy, geography, cartography, or medicine and have pointed out bustling activity and prolific scientific endeavors and innovations, and they have also emphasized the role of non-human factors in the production and dissemination of knowledge.25 Exploring a specific context of encounters in Islamic knowledge production, scholars have studied the influence of Persian as one of the “transregional contact languages”,26 “an increasingly large part of Islamdom, the language of polite culture”27 and the dissemination of knowledge in the Islamic World in medieval and early modern times as a product of Persianate cultural commu20 Shefer-Mossensohn, Science Among the Ottomans, 17–19. 21 Burke, What is the History of Knowledge?, 8. 22 Sonja Brentjes, “On the Location of the Ancient or ‘Rational’ Sciences in Muslim Educational Landscapes (AH 500–1000),” Bulletin of the Royal Institute for Inter-Faith Studies 4 (2002): 47–71. 23 Ariel Salzman, Tocqueville in the Ottoman Empire: Rival Paths to the Modern State (Leiden: Brill, 2004); Rifa’at Ali Abou-El-Haj, Formation of the Modern State: The Ottoman Empire Sixteenth to Eighteenth Centuries. 2nd ed., (Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 2005); Virginia Aksan & Daniel Goffman, The Early Modern Ottomans: Remapping the Empire (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), Baki Tezcan, The Second Ottoman Empire: Cambridge Studies in Islamic Civilization (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010). 24 Daniel A. Stolz, The Lighthouse and the Observatory (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018); Shefer-Mossensohn, Science Among the Ottomans. 25 Bruno Latour, Pandora’s Hope (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1999); Timothy Mitchell, Rule of Experts (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2002); Sonja Brentjes, Teaching and Learning the Sciences in Islamicate Societies (800–1700) (Turnhout: Brepols Publishers, 2018). 26 Bert Fragner, Die “Persophonie.” Regionalität, Identität und Sprachkontakt in der Geschichte Asiens (Berlin: Anor, 1999). 27 Marshal Hodgson, The Venture of Islam. Conscience and History in a World Civilization. The Expansion of Islam in the Middle Periods, vol. 2 (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1974), 293.

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nication.28 Another recent development is the model of Persographia, focusing on Persian as a written contact language.29 This research has addressed the mobility of an intellectual milieu,30 a branch of Persian-Ottoman translations in poetry, ethics, law, politics, and history31 as well as the history of early Persian lexicography in Iran, India, and the Ottoman Empire.32 However, studies on the symbolic use of Ottoman Turkish in processes of knowledge transmission are still a desideratum, in particular as regards the post-Ottoman period. Non-Muslim translators and dragomans who acted as transmitters of knowledge between the Ottoman Empire and Europe during the early modern period have received special scholarly attention.33 Brentjes addressed the state of science in the Ottoman and the Persian Empire based on travel accounts, looking at book markets, the exchange of manuscripts, the studying of languages, philosophy, astronomy, medicine, etc. She has pointed out the role of Jews, trained in Hebrew, Turkish and Arabic, and their role as mediators between European travelers looking for manuscripts (initially, their interest was in Latin and Greek works), and Ottoman booksellers and merchants.34 On the other hand, Brentjes also emphasized the consolidation of prejudices in European travel accounts,

28 Nile Green, “Introduction: The Frontiers of the Persianate World (ca. 800–1900),” in The Persianate World: The Frontiers of a Eurasian Lingua Franca, ed. Nile Green (Oakland, CA: University of California Press, 2019), 1–71. 29 Brian Spooner & William L. Hanaway “Introduction: Persian as Koine: Written Persian in World-Historical Perspective,” in Literacy in the Persianate World: Writing and the Social Order, eds. Brian Spooner & William L. Hanaway (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, 2012), 1–68. 30 A. C. S. Peacock & Sara Nur Yıldız, “Literature, Language and History in Late Medieval Anatolia,” in Islamic Literature and Intellectual Life in Fourteenth- and Fifteenth-Century Anatolia, eds. A.C.S. Peacock & Sara Nur Yıldız (Würzburg: Ergon, 2016), 19–45. 31 Anja Pistor-Hatam, “The Art of Translation. Rewriting Persian Texts from the Seljuks to the Ottomans,” Essays on Ottoman Civilization, Archiv orientální: Supplementa VIII (1998): 305– 316; Victoria R. Holbrook, “Concealed Facts, Translation and the Turkish Literary Past,” in Translations: (Re)shaping of Literature and Culture, ed. Saliha Paker (Istanbul: Bog˘aziçi University Press, 2002), 77–107; Gottfried Hagen. “Translations and Translators in a Multilingual Society: A Case Study of Persian-Ottoman Translations, Late Fifteenth to Early Seventeenth Century,” Eurasian Studies 2.1 (2003): 95–34. 32 Solomon Baevskii, Early Persian Lexicography Farhangs of the Eleventh to the Fifteenth Centuries, Language of Asia Series 6. tr. by N. Killian, rev. and upd. John R. Perry (Kent: Global Oriental LTD, 2007); Yusuf Öz, Tarih Boyunca Farsça-Türkçe Sözlükler (Ankara: Türk Dil Kurumu, 2016). 33 Miltos Pechlivanos, “Vom Dragoman der Osmanen zum Dragoman der Heimat. Mehrsprachigkeit und Personkonstitution im griechischsprachigen Osmanischen Reich,” in Selbstzeugnis und Person. Transkulturelle Perspektiven, eds. Claudia Ulbrich et al. (Cologne: Böhlau, 2012), 227–241. 34 Sonja Brentjes, Travellers from Europe in the Ottoman and Safavid Empires, 16th – 17th Centuries: Seeking, Transforming, Discarding Knowledge (London: Routledge, 2010), xxiii ff.

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Introduction

depicting Muslims as ignorant, but Christian renegades or Jewish emigrants as the true source of knowledge in Muslim societies of the modern age.35 Going beyond the ‘European eye’ on Ottoman knowledge through the exploration of Western travel accounts, the focus on knowledge transfer as cultural translation allows for new perspectives on the mobility of concepts between different regions of Europe and Asia. Here, the flow of knowledge through translators of divers backgrounds (Ottoman Karaites and Jews,36 Greeks, and Armenians),37 the mediation and translation of knowledge by converts from Christianity to Islam in the Ottoman Empire,38 and the circulation of manuscripts between the Ottoman Empire and Russia until the late 18th century are important aspects in the Transottoman circulation of knowledge.39 Of special interest in this regard is the role of different scripts as ‘cultural mediators’ circulating between Ottoman regions via various ethnic or religious minorities, such as the Armenians, Greeks and the Jews, book trade or the like.40 Apart from Islamic knowledge, secular knowledge, and often the statesponsored settings of science, technology and education that emerged in the context of 19th-century reform and modernization policies, are in the focus of scholarly research. However, these newly-emerging types of knowledge are no longer seen as replacing or surpassing previously existing forms of knowledge or intellectual traditions. Instead, recent studies have shown how new concepts were incorporated into existing intellectual frameworks and terminologies, leading to cross-pollination and changes.41

35 Ibid., 450. 36 Zsuzsa Barbarics-Hermanik, “Books as a Means of Transcultural Exchange between the Habsburgs and the Ottomans,” in International Exchange in the Early Modern Book World, eds. Matthew McLean & Sara K. Barker (Leiden: Brill, 2016), 109. 37 Efthymios Nicolaidis, “Scientific Exchanges between Hellenism and Europe: Translations into Greek, 1400–1700,” in Cultural Translation in Early Modern Europe, eds. Peter Burke & R. Po-Chia Hsia (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 143, 191. 38 On the other hand, Portuguese interpreters in India were often ‘new Christians’ of Jewish background. See Peter Burke, “Cultures of Translation in Early Modern Europe,” in Cultural Translation in Early Modern Europe, eds. Peter Burke & R. Po-Chia Hsia (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 14. 39 Ibid., 22. 40 Éva Á. Csató, Bernt Brendemon, Lars Johanson, Claudia Römer & Heidi Stein, “The Linguistic Landscape of Istanbul in the Seventeenth Century,” in Spoken Ottoman in Mediator Texts, TURCOLOGICA 106, eds. Éva Á. Csató et al. (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2016), 1–31; Evangelia Balta & Mehmet Ölmez (eds.), Between Religion and Language: Turkish-speaking Christians, Jews and Greek-speaking Muslims and Catholics in the Ottoman Empire (Istanbul: Eren, 2011). 41 On knowledge about astronomy and time keeping as coveted by both natural scientists and Islamic ulema see Stolz, The Lighthouse and the Observatory.

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Currently, knowledge in the Ottoman context is studied by looking at institutions,42 key actors,43 practices and techniques,44 seminal texts and their carriers,45 and the intricate networks linking these aspects throughout the Ottoman realm and beyond.46 In keeping with broader currents in the history of knowledge, interest in social and cultural aspects of knowledge has increased, along with an awareness that one must study knowledge in conjunction with imperial politics and state ambitions. In this context, attention is increasingly paid to previously marginalized sites of knowledge production.47 Beyond that, the approaches of conceptual history have found traction in the history of lateOttoman and post-Ottoman spaces like the Arab Middle East. In this regard, Reinkowski has investigated Ottoman reform concepts and notions of political rule in 19th-century Istanbul and Lebanon from a comparative perspective.48 42 Jonathan Berkey, The Transmission of Knowledge in Medieval Cairo (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1992). 43 Madeline C. Zilfi, The Politics of Piety: The Ottoman ulema in the Postclassical Age (1600– 1800) (Minneapolis, MN: Bibliotheca Islamica, 1988); Gottfried Hagen, Ein osmanischer ˇ elebis G ˘ iha¯nnüma¯. Geograph bei der Arbeit: Entstehung und Gedankenwelt von Ka¯tib C (Berlin: Schwarz, 2003); Hagen, “Translations and Translators in a Multilingual Society: A Case Study of Persian-Ottoman Translations, Late Fifteenth to Early Seventeenth Century,” 95–134; Robert Dankoff, An Ottoman Mentality: The World of Evliya Çelebi (Leiden: Brill, 2004); Murat U. I˙nan, “Imperial Ambitions, Mystical Aspirations: Persian Learning in the Ottoman World,” in The Persianate World: The Frontiers of a Eurasian Lingua Franca, ed. Nile Green (Oakland, CA: University of California Press, 2019), 75–92. 44 Rudolph T. Ware, The Walking Qur’an. Islamic Civilization and Muslim Networks (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2014). 45 Nelly Hanna, In Praise of Books: A Cultural History of Cairo’s Middle Class, Sixteenth to the Eighteenth Century (Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 2003); Frédéric Hitzel, “Manuscrits, livres et culture livresque à Istanbul,” Revue des mondes musulmans et de la Méditerranée 87/88 (1999): 19–38; Linda T. Darling, “Ottoman Turkish: Written Language and Scribal Practice, 13th to 20th Centuries,” in Literacy in the Persianate World: Writing and Social Order, eds. Brian Spooner & William L. Hanaway (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania, 2012), 171–196. 46 Suraiya Faroqhi, The Ottoman Empire and the World Around it (London: I.B. Tauris, 2004); Stefan Reichmuth, The World of Murtada¯ al-Zabı¯dı¯ (Cambridge: Gibb Memorial Trust, 2009); Michael Kemper, Sufis und Gelehrte in˙ Tatarien und Baschkirien, 1789–1889: der islamische Diskurs unter russischer Herrschaft (Berlin: Schwarz, 1998). 47 Raj, Relocating Modern Science. 48 Maurus Reinkowski, Die Dinge der Ordnung. Eine vergleichende Untersuchung über die osmanische Reformpolitik im 19. Jahrhundert (München: Oldenbourg, 2005). Similar investigations into concepts of order and processes of circulation and appropriation between capital and provinces are also to be found in Henning Sievert, “Intermediaries and Local Knowledge in a Changing Political Environment: Complaints from Libya at the Turn of the 20th Century,” Die Welt des Islams 54.3/4 (2014): 322–362; Henning Sievert, Felix Konrad & Tobias Heinzelmann, “Introductory Remarks: Competing Notions of Order in the Later Ottoman Empire (18th-20th Centuries),” Die Welt des Islams 54.3/4 (2014): 287–291; Bedross Der Matossian, Shattered Dreams of Revolution: From Liberty to Violence in the Late Ottoman Empire (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2014); Michelle U. Campos, Ottoman

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The mobility of knowledge, along with aspects of its transmission, transfer and translation, has been studied for the 19th century in particular as impacted by imperialist politics and state interests – both European and Ottoman – to promote or obstruct knowledge in the age of modernization and globalization, an age characterized by the introduction of new technologies, the rapid increase of human mobility, the intensified circulation of goods and concepts, and the expansion of knowledge and transregional intellectual networks to an extent never seen before.49 Here, the Ottoman state could rely on existing networks, language skills and Islamic institutions with a reach well beyond the borders of its own territory. The integration of the Ottoman Empire into global markets and the rise of imperialism also allowed for new constellations of actors, knowledge and systems of knowledge transfer.50 Increasing migration movements and the displacement of people that accompanied the decline, shrinking and collapse of empires from the late 19th century onward and the rise of the idea of the nationstate had an impact on the mobility of knowledge as well.51 So far, the history of knowledge in the Ottoman realm has been predominantly written without transcending linguistic or geopolitical boundaries, largely indifferent to the multi-lingual, multi-religious and multi-ethnic character of Transottoman knowledge systems and networks. While recent studies have pointed out the complex, entangled processes of knowledge transfer between the Ottoman lands and Europe, our Transottoman approach is uniquely positioned to take this argument one step further by tracing knowledge formation and mobility in a transregional setting, as part of a global history of knowledge that does not take Europe as its exclusive point of reference.

Brothers: Muslims, Christians, and Jews in Early 20th Century Palestine (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2010). 49 For concepts of globalization, see Jürgen Osterhammel & Niels Petersson, Geschichte der Globalisierung: Dimensionen – Prozesse – Epochen (München: C.H. Beck Verlag, 2003); 7–15. For the links between globalization and “civilizing missions”, see Jürgen Osterhammel, “The Great Work of Uplifting Mankind: Zivilisierungsmission und Moderne,” in Zivilisierungsmissionen: Imperiale Weltverbesserung seit dem 18. Jahrhundert, eds. Boris Barth & Jürgen Osterhammel (Konstanz: UVK Verlag, 2005), 363–426. For processes of imperial aggregations of knowledge, see e. g. Ulrike von Hirschhausen & Jörn Leonhard, “Zwischen Historisierung und Globalisierung: Titel, Themen und Trends der neueren Empire-Forschung,” Neue Politische Literatur 56 (2011): 389–404. 50 Stolz, The Lighthouse and the Observatory, 14–15. 51 Joseph Lowry & Devin Stuart, Introduction to Essays in Arabic Literary Biography II: 1350– 1850, eds. Joseph Lowry & Devin Stuart (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2009), 1–11. For a comparison between Ottoman and Habsburg decline, see Karen Barkey, “Changing Modalities of Empire: A Comparative Study of the Ottoman and Habsburg Decline,” in Empire to Nation. Historical Perspectives on the Making of the Modern World, eds. Joseph W. Esherick & Hasan Kayalı (London: Littlefield, 2006), 167–197.

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4.

Operationalizing our Approach: Knowledge En Route in Time and Space and Translating Knowledge

To capture the different stages, the scope, directions and mechanisms at work during the moments of knowledge movement, transmission and appropriation, the volume suggests following the ‘flow of knowledge’ through time and space while it is produced and reproduced through human interaction and textual communication between a range of actors. This implies our first focus on both mobility and actors. We presume that actors-driven movement of knowledge in space and time presupposes the existence of particular frameworks that facilitate, channel or inhibit flows of knowledge. In the final part of this introduction, we conceptualize how knowledge is transmitted and adopted, using the prism of cultural translation.

Mobility & Actors Approach Since knowledge is constructed by human actors for a certain pool of recipients, it is never ‘locked up’ in a ‘container’ or a ‘vacuum’. It has a social nature and always resonates, in one way or another, in human communication, in processes that include the sending, the perception, and necessarily the interpretation of information. Thus, one of the basic features of knowledge is its transmissibility: It is received and perceived by a circle of actors who discuss and interpret it, approve or oppose its contents, distribute it among other circles and further develop nuances of it. These individual actions and moments of exchange add up to a process of knowledge in motion as it is passed on from one circle of recipients to another, from one generation to another and from one region to the other. Since any knowledge content is open to changes, we perceive it as a body of dynamic concepts that takes on changing shapes. Since concepts – meaning the abstract epistemological building blocks of a knowledge system in the form of key ideas and terminology, metaphors, narrations or myths – can never be locked up, but always move between social groups and scientific disciplines, they travel through time and space, constantly changing shape in the process. This is what the heuristic metaphor of travelling concepts also suggests. In different social contexts, we observe that concepts are negotiated and translated according to the distinct needs of local communities or groups. This opens the door to localizations of knowledge, to speak with Bal – a process that will be explored in greater detail below.52 52 Mieke Bal, Travelling Concepts in the Humanities: A Rough Guide (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2002), 22. Bachmann-Medick prefers in this context to speak of a translation of

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The study of knowledge in motion requires the identification of key actors as relevant agents and tracing their movements and the encounters happening between them.53 Authors, publishers, translators, scribes, journalists, printers and the like – any patrons and institutions supporting text and knowledge production or helping to conserve it play a central role as agents who intentionally transmit a certain type of knowledge and follow certain strategies. With regard to the intentions of the actors involved, knowledge transmission can be interpreted as a ‘speech act’, with the purpose to intervene into a discourse on certain topics, as Dierks’ chapter on conceptualizations of Muslim reformism in early 20th-century Bosnia will show.54 Expertise in knowledge production is especially crucial during the early modern period, at a time when actors ostentatiously demonstrated (‘staged’) their educational background, social and political rank, cultural tradition and networks representing the interest of a group or an institution, and stressed their official recognition as experts from a ruler or acknowledged scholars of their time. Apart from merely being an expert, it was central to stage oneself as an authority of official reputation with undoubted legitimacy to provide knowledge to a circle of recipients or readers.55 This happened not only by means of the demonstration of one’s extraordinary qualities and social ranking, but also by assigning value to their expert knowledge in comparison to opponents, competitors and previous bearers of knowledge – disqualifying other scholars, diplomats, rulers, or religious leaders as ignorant, outdated, unprofessional or wrong experts. In these cases, knowledge took on a very personalized character and should be followed back to a certain institution or agent, while in others, the dynamic character of a text is more important, or the role of its translators as agents of change.56 With regard to the actors approach, we will identify what motivates key actors to channel knowledge content. Here, the consideration of knowledge as a means to direct human action and as a distinction marker is helpful, since knowledge is produced, transmitted, appropriated and adapted to exert influence over peo-

53 54 55

56

concepts instead of a hybridity of concepts. See Doris Bachmann-Medick, “From Hybridity to Translation. Reflections on Travelling Concepts,” in The Trans/National Study of Culture. A Translational Perspective, ed. Doris Bachmann-Medick (Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter, 2014), 122–129. Burke, What is the History of Knowledge?, 78. Quentin Skinner, Visions of Politics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002). Ronald Hitzler, “Wissen und Wesen des Experten. Ein Annäherungsversuch zur Einleitung,” in Expertenwissen. Die institutionalisierte Kompetenz zur Konstruktion von Wirklichkeit, eds. Ronald Hitzler et al. (Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag, 1994), 27; Cf. Eric Ash, “Introduction: Expertise: Practical Knowledge and the Early Modern State,” Osiris 25 (2010), 1–24. S¸ehnaz Gürçag˘lar-Tahir, Saliha Paker & John Milton, introduction to Tradition, Tension and Translation in Turkey, eds. S¸ehnaz Gürçag˘lar-Tahir et al. (Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company, 2015), 2.

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ple’s behavior, to secure the status quo of existing power and social relations or to legitimize political uprisings, or simply to ensure the status of actors staging themselves as ‘experts of knowledge’. Following the knowledge implies reconstructing such actors’ motivations, which depend on socio-historical contexts within which they operate. In this respect, Leber’s study will concentrate on Greek hierarchs in the Ottoman Empire who represent themselves as experts on interreligious dialogue in order to shift and strengthen borders between various religious and confessional groups. Sargsyan will examine how the authors of Persian-Turkish dictionaries in the Ottoman Empire demonstrate their expertise through commentary, criticizing their predecessors’ texts compiled in Iran and Central Asia as well as in the Ottoman environment. Henning will investigate how the different interests, networks and outlooks of authors, editors and translators impacted the trajectories of selected works of early-modern Ottoman advice literature. Dierks’ chapter discusses how reformist intellectuals in Eastern Europe ‘borrowed’ symbolically the authority of the centers of the Muslim world in order to legitimize their modernizing agendas. Dierauff will demonstrate how central political concepts of the Second Ottoman Constitutional Era were instrumentalized by Christian intellectuals in Palestine to push local reforms. In all cases, these actors had efficient networks at their disposal to disseminate knowledge and acted in institutional frameworks such as religious or ecclesiastical, as well as educational institutions that functioned, to reference Burke, as ‘centres of knowledge’.57 Via these centers, key agents tried to establish ‘communicational communities’ on the imperial or transimperial levels, both of which are to be addressed in this volume. Among (in)formal institutions for obtaining knowledge are Islamic schools, Sufi communities and Christian Orthodox brotherhoods as institutions that provided education to their members and organized libraries, scriptoria or printing presses. For instance, key actors in the Christian Orthodox movement in late Ottoman Palestine, as discussed by Dierauff, tried to establish a discourse on Orthodox reforms via the operation of social and welfare associations with modern party-like structures, created a bureau for public relations and circulated publications among the congregation.

Knowledge en route: Frameworks and Obstacles To follow the knowledge implies retracing and defining spaces as well as routes and networks of movement. In contrast to earlier studies on cultural transfers between one place and another, this monograph conceptualizes the movement of

57 Burke, What is the History of Knowledge?, 87.

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knowledge in a multi-directional manner.58 Furthermore, research is not limited to ‘center vs. periphery’ contexts as we also look at dynamics of exchange between regions that were each perceived as ‘peripheries’, for instance with regard to the popularization of Muslim reformism in Habsburg Bosnia, which also referred to the example of Muslim reform movements in the Russian Empire as will be addressed in Dierks’ case study. Networks of actors and institutions play a particular role in these processes of multi-directional movement of knowledge. In the selected case studies of this volume, we address very different aspects of such frameworks, including the very practical ways of disseminating knowledge by the use of certain media types (handwritten dictionaries, early printed books, encyclopedias, journals, etc.) and the techniques of text description, storage, preservation, categorization and verification. Based on our case studies, we assume that knowledge transmissions not only passively happen within these frameworks, but also actively impact and modify the underlying networks and structures. Knowledge disseminates not only geographically, but also horizontally in societies. To capture both dynamics, our study addresses factors and obstacles that support or impede the way knowledge moves. As knowledge management is never detached from the power structures of the distinct context in which it is produced, its transmission is directly or indirectly supported or oppressed by political patronage. For instance, the dedication of texts to political rulers or patrons functioned as a resource for their own prestige. In this way, a text was an instrument to keep the memory of a patron and his achievements alive for the community. In this sense, knowledge production has helped to reproduce religious, social and political hierarchies. Apart from political and social aspects of patronage, we also address the economic aspects of sponsorship, where it is possible.59 It is certain that economic factors could be both supporting and hindering to the flow of knowledge. In addition, text production and dissemination was also prevented or stimulated by the change of political regimes. Apparently, knowledge production was also regulated or oppressed by different forms of censorship (including internal community and self-censorship). Official or religious authorities actively tried to control, limit or even prohibit the dissemination of knowledge content since unlimited access by the public to certain types of information was regarded as dangerous. This concerns not only military or political secret information that was not supposed to transcend borders, but also any kind of allegations against belief systems or otherwise critical of religious or state authorities that had to be oppressed. Still, these restrictions could be overwritten, as Leber’s case study on interreligious polemic 58 Ibid., 88. 59 See Burke on this subject, ibid., 47–74.

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demonstrates. Jewish intellectual arguments against Christianity could never be published and disseminated in early modern Europe, but they were printed and adopted in the Ottoman Empire. On the contrary, anti-Muslim or anti-Jewish treatises by Patriarch of Constantinople Gennadios Scholarios or Patriarch of Alexandria Meletios Pegas needed to be published abroad, not only because of limited printing facilities among the Ottoman Greeks, but also because of censorship mechanisms in the Ottoman Empire. Besides actors and the frameworks and networks they act in (and also act upon), the notion flow of knowledge indicates that we have to put an emphasis on the internal dynamics of textual knowledge itself once it is brought into new contexts. That is why we address the issue of translation and localization in the following section.

Cultural Translation and the Localization of Concepts Taking into account the multiple linguistic, social and cultural contexts of actors and textual bodies involved, this monograph conceptualizes movements of knowledge as processes of cultural translation. This refers to translations between different languages, but also includes intralingual translations, i. e. translations between different local contexts and sociocultural milieus that make content accessible and comprehensible for specific audiences.60 As knowledge interacts with and impacts local settings and audiences, it undergoes changes: Popularizations, vernacularizations and conceptual localizations have an effect on content, modes of presentation and formats of knowledge. The choices made in these processes of localizing and appropriating knowledge reflect specific understandings, conceptual frameworks and interests. One strategy of localizing knowledge by means of narrative strategies is ‘biographization’: In these cases, knowledge is closely tied to certain personalities as the carriers of knowledge, or biographies of ‘heroes of cultures’ (Kulturhelden)61 are constructed. Biographies of protagonists like the 16th-century Ottoman governor of Bosnia Gazi Husrev bey should provide early-20th-century Bosnian Muslim reformers both a biographical model and legitimation for their agenda, and similar tendencies can be

60 Balta & Ölmez, Between Religion and Language; Ebru Diriker, “On the Evolution of the Interpreting Profession in Turkey: From the Dragomans to the 21st Century,” in Tradition, Tension and Translation in Turkey, eds. S¸ehnaz Tahir-Gürçag˘lar et al. (Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company, 2015), 89–107. 61 For this concept, see Wladimir Fischer, Dositej Obradovic´ als bürgerlicher Kulturheld. Zur Formierung eines serbischen bürgerlichen Selbstbildes durch literarische Kommunikation 1783–1845 (Frankfurt a.M.: Lang, 2007).

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observed in 19th-century characterizations of authors of early-modern Ottoman advice literature. Processes of translation are the results of choices, as they include, exclude or modify concepts. The resulting translations of knowledge make sense in distinct social, cultural and political contexts and reflect the interests of local actors. One consequence of locally distinct bodies of knowledge is the establishment of borders between the self and the other. Thus, translation and local interpretation of knowledge are closely tied to the negotiation of difference between individual agents or collectives.62 Localizations of knowledge impact processes of group formation and the constitution of group identities. As Pollock has pointed out, it is through the production of knowledge and the establishment of discourses around it that social groups “understand themselves as groups”.63 In Transottoman settings marked by diglossia and multilingualism, concepts of similar content are available in different languages. Translation choices made by individual authors might therefore tell us something about prestige and valorizations of languages in specific contexts and can point to needs for differentiation perceived by authors who introduced new thoughts or felt the need to claim a certain legacy for their ideas. This is clearly shown by the case of Bosnian Muslim reformists who ostentatiously referred to Ottoman discourses and concepts while concepts of similar content would have been available in the works of ‘Western’ authors as well. On the one hand, translation into local settings can occasion moments of potential conflict and friction: Misunderstandings, communicational dilemmas and dead-ends are common, and some aspects are even lost in translation or untranslatable. On the other hand, however, such “mis-translations” can also be productive, as they allow for creativity, adaption and new connections, thus driving conceptual changes.64 These conceptual changes – understood as alterations in social, cultural and political meanings that happen while concepts ‘travel’ between linguistic and cultural contexts – have been explored by Koselleck (1979, 2006). In his ‘Begriffsgeschichten’, he identified a number of key concepts that played a central role during a period of fundamental changes in Western Europe between 1750 and the second half of the 19th century. Reading linguistic transfers and terminological innovations as indicators of social change, Koselleck took modifications in the use of political terminology as evidence for

62 Burke, What is the History of Knowledge?, 42. 63 Sheldon Pollock, Literary Cultures in History: Reconstructions from South Asia (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2003), 27–28. 64 This holds true, for example, for the Western concept of pan-Islamism, the negative connotation of which is ignored by Bosnian Muslim reformists, giving it a positive meaning in terms of religious, cultural, and political emancipation as Dierks’ case study shows.

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the transformation of historical realities.65 The extent to which his approach to conceptual history can be applied to the Ottoman context is currently being discussed.66 With these discussions in mind, to better understand the nature of conceptual change and ground our discussions in empirical findings, we draw on an approach developed by Steinmetz: He suggests observing repeated communicational situations between selected actors to identify key terms, contexts, and different stages of conceptual change. By mapping out ‘terminological clusters’ instead of looking at key terms in isolation, we can reflect on localized understandings while also tracing conceptual changes over time and between contexts.67 Although this methodological approach was also developed with European history in mind, it suggests itself as a suitable tool to explore conceptual mobility in the Transottoman context. A focus on concepts and key terminology allows the capture of dynamics of conceptual change. Thinking about conceptual changes and moments of translation, layers of meaning and traces of previous contexts are of particular interest: Terms used to introduce knowledge in specific local settings can simultaneously carry experiences from different linguistic and cultural contexts, allowing for multiple meanings at the same time – tangible especially during the early phases of conceptual change. In our discussion, we are attentive to moments of polysemy and different layers of meanings inherent in individual terms, as they can be read as traces of processes of translating and localizing knowledge. Terms like inkıla¯b ˙ (revolution) and umma (today translated as ‘nation’, describing a community that shares a common ethnic origin, territory and/or collective memory) are examples of key concepts in a Transottoman setting that can be shown to have taken on multiple meanings at different points in time, integrating ideas, but also creating and endorsing new socio-cultural fault and political lines. While lateOttoman modernity constitutes a crucial period in this process, the ensuing conceptual changes also draw heavily on previous political ideas and discourses. So far, our discussion has focused on moments of agency and intentionality in processes of knowledge transmission, reading translations as intentional discursive interventions or ‘speech acts.’ In a complex, multi-dimensional and multi-directional framework of interactions, however, additional dynamics and 65 According to him, the introduction and definition of ‘modern’ political terms as ‘ideal standards’ contains an anticipation of future conditions and makes them concepts in motion. See Reinhart Koselleck, introduction to Geschichtliche Grundbegriffe, vol. 1, eds. Otto Brunner et al. (Stuttgart: Klett Cotta, 1979), xv. 66 Alp Eren Topal & Einar Wigen, “Ottoman Conceptual History: Challenges and Prospects,” Contributions to the History of Concepts 14.1 (2019): 93–114. 67 See Willibald Steinmetz, “40 Jahre Begriffsgeschichte – State of the Art,” in Sprache – Kognition – Kultur. Sprache zwischen mentaler Struktur und kultureller Prägung, eds. Heidrun Kämper & Ludwig Eichinger (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2008), 174–197.

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interferences have to be taken into account. Apart from the intentions of agents involved in translation processes, we also observe unintended consequences of knowledge transfer. Whenever knowledge is appropriated into new contexts, previously involved agents and experts have only limited control over the ensuing readings and translations. Because of the social nature of knowledge, which prevents it from being fully controlled or possessed by one individual or one group of actors alone, movements and translations of knowledge are translocal processes – in the sense that the interplay of different local contexts impacts both the content and the trajectories of knowledge on the move.68

5.

Roadmap of the Volume

The chapters of this volume focus on the flow of knowledge through space and time. This implies an analytical approach, which privileges processes of mobility and exchange. The cover image of our anthology reminds us of the intricacies of knowledge mobility in a Transottoman context: It shows a manuscript that is kept in the Gazi Husrev Bey Library (Gazi Husrev-begova biblioteka) in Sarajevo, an institution established in the 16th century. Unlike the manuscript collection of the Oriental institute in the same city, which burned down after shell fire in 1992, this manuscript survived the siege of Sarajevo – in spite of several attempts to also destroy the collections of the Gazi Husrev Bey Library. Being a rhyming PersianTurkish dictionary, which aimed at spreading knowledge of Persian among nonPersian native speakers, the existence of the manuscript allows us to tell a translocal story of Ottoman and post-Ottoman multilingualism. At the same time, it epitomizes intellectual connectivity between Eastern Europe and the Middle East – in this case Bosnia and the Persian speaking world, the knowledge of Persian being part of a living lyric and mystic tradition in Bosnia until the second part of the 20th century.69 The volume as a whole is a result of a collective effort of five scholars who have been part of a working group in the framework of the Priority Program Transottomanica. Eastern European-Ottoman-Persian Mobility Dynamics funded by the German Research Foundation (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, DFG). Alongside two other research groups – one dealing with “Mobile Actors”, and the other one with “Object Mobility” – our working group has been focusing on flows of knowledge. We have been attentive to the trajectories of knowledge in multi68 James A. Secord, “Knowledge in Transit,” Isis, The History of Science Society 95.4 (December 2004): 655–672. 69 Smail Balic´, Kultura Bosˇnjaka: Muslimanska komponenta (Zagreb: Izdavacˇko Prometno Preduzec´e “R&R”, 1994), 86.

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directional settings, without presupposing one-directional and possibly hierarchical ways of ‘transfer’ or ‘circulation’. The case studies presented here are based on our broader individual research projects and fields of interest, which all have one common denominator: the focus on movement of knowledge and its historical, cultural, political, linguistic or religious connections to the Ottoman Empire. The main goal of this volume is twofold: First, testing out the methodological approach and analytical toolkit presented in this introduction against empirical evidence from a wide array of settings and time periods. And second, investigating dimensions of transboundary intellectual connectivity mostly neglected by scholarship so far. The contributions are arranged chronologically and cover different categories of knowledge, media types, and geographic and temporary movement of texts, meanings, and concepts between various contexts. Ani Sargsyan’s contribution investigates the trajectories of the flow of the knowledge about the Persian language based on Persian-Turkish bilingual dictionaries compiled from the mid-15th until the 16th century in the Ottoman Empire. Mainly focusing on the introductions and rarely the dictionary part of the texts, Sargsyan elaborates upon the main passageways where knowledge via these texts moves between the producers and addressees and traces the main incentives of compilation of Persian-Ottoman Turkish dictionaries. Giving an insight through the prism of follow the knowledge, Sargsyan analyzes the texts, especially the dictionary parts, in which the early and primary sources, mainly produced in Iran, as well as in the Ottoman environment, are not only appreciated and circulated, but also are criticized and disqualified. This also led Sargsyan to discuss the experts whose knowledge transfers and diffuses through time and space. Taisiya Leber’s contribution concentrates on the features of interreligious polemics between Jews and Orthodox Greeks in the Ottoman Empire until the end of the 16th century. On the basis of a case study of one Greek polemical text that traveled from Ottoman Constantinople to Lviv (Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth), Alexandria (Ottoman Egypt), Ias¸i (Moldavia) and Muscovy, Leber tries to discover the reasons for its rich migration experience. She argues that one of the functions of this Christian-Jewish polemical text was to serve as a knowledge reservoir that was worthy of dissemination across borders, publishing in print, and translating into vernacular and foreign languages. Barbara Henning’s contribution applies the idea of following the knowledge to a discussion of early-modern Ottoman texts on political advice (nasihatname), tracing their trajectories from the late-16th into the 20th century. It asks why and how these texts – which were initially aimed at a small group of specialists and experts on governance – survived and were being copied, translated, read and reread by different audiences over time. From this perspective, a transregional

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network of ideas, material texts and experts unfolds in which knowledge about Ottoman governance is being recorded, passed on and reinterpreted. Dennis Dierks’ chapter focuses on a group of Muslim élite members in BosniaHerzegovina at the beginning of the 20th century who tried to make their agenda on social and cultural reform understood and accepted by their addressees, the Muslim population of the Habsburg province. Analyzing the reformist journal Behar, he argues that they did so by ostentatiously ‘Islamizing’ the bodies of knowledge in question (concepts, images, narratives, and techniques of argumentation), which implied referring to examples from Muslim history and the contemporary ‘Muslim world.’ In so doing, they aimed at proving that their reformist program was in line with the teachings of Islam. Finally, Evelin Dierauff explores the appropriation of political concepts in Halı¯l as-Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s discussion of the ‘Orthodox Renaissance’ (an-nahda al-ur˙ ˘ tu¯duksı¯ya), a reform movement of Arab Palestinians of Greek-Orthodox con¯ ¯ fession in the Jerusalemite Patriarchate, ruled by Greek clerics, in the context of Young Turk Rule in Palestine (1908–14). At the center of the study is how Saka¯kı¯nı¯ discussed ideas of political legitimacy and civic rule relevant in global debates but presented through the lens of Ottoman Constitutionalism and the vernacular of post-revolutionary Jerusalem. Thus, it deals with Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s presentation of the Orthodox case as a translation of late Transottoman modernity, transmitting reform concepts from the center of the Empire to the periphery. Neither the chapters of this volume nor the volume as a whole aim at an encyclopedic or comprehensive description of knowledge mobilities in Transottoman contexts, nor does this volume set out to develop a universally applicable model of knowledge mobility. What we rather present in this anthology are experimental explorations of processes and parameters that play a role in channeling the transmission and appropriation of knowledge. The authors of this volume are well aware of possible criticism that might arise against such an approach – and that has been formulated against globally and translocally oriented inquiries into cultural history in general: that they have blind spots for actors, milieus, and phenomena that are not shaped by mobility. Our answer to any such criticism is twofold: First, patterns of immobility only emerge after investigating figurations of mobility. Second, even in situations of spatial immobility, knowledge itself never stays stagnant, due to its social and communicative character described above, making our analytical approach still relevant. The most important result of our shared deliberations is the understanding that our approach can indeed be adapted to settings as diverse in temporal, spatial, social, and cultural terms as the material presented in this volume. From the vantage point of an empirically enriched Transottoman perspective, some hints toward more nuanced understanding of mechanisms of knowledge mobility in general emerge, such as the importance of language (both as a skill and

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symbolically) in processes of knowledge transmission, questions of translation, especially in situations of multilingualism, as well as imaginations of the ‘self ’ and the ‘other’, of ‘inside’ and ‘outside’ and the boundaries in-between. These findings challenge us to further investigate histories and trajectories of knowledge from a transregional perspective.

6.

Some Notes on Transliteration

In this edited volume we analyze source material in Arabic, Persian, Ottoman Turkish, Greek, Ladino, and different Slavic vernaculars. The passages from Persian and Arabic are fully transliterated according to the Encyclopaedia of Islam (EI 3) in Sargsyan’s and Henning’s chapters, and according to IJMES in Dierk’s and Dierauff ’s chapters. The passages from Ottoman Turkish have been rendered according to IJMES (in Sargsyan’s and Dierk’s chapters and according to DMG in Henning’s chapter). Where applicable, dates are provided in both the hijri and common era.

Acknowledgements We are grateful to our fellow members of the Transottomanica project who shared their views on our approach during the discussions of our working group, especially Andreas Renner, Stephan Conermann, Alexander Bauer, Caspar Hillebrand, and Albrecht Weber. Besides that, we owe particular thanks to Ingeborg Baldauf, Ferenc Csirkés, Maciej Czerwin´ski, Albrecht Fuess, Susanne Härtel, Christoph Herzog, Ovidiu Olar, Johannes Pahlitzsch, Ludwig Paul, and Stefan Rohdewald for reading the whole of the volume or some of its chapters or for commenting on certain aspects of them.

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Social Order, edited by Brian Spooner and William L. Hanaway, 1–68. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, 2012. Steinmetz, Willibald. “40 Jahre Begriffsgeschichte – State of the Art.” In Sprache – Kognition – Kultur. Sprache zwischen mentaler Struktur und kultureller Prägung, edited by Heidrun Kämper & Ludwig Eichinger, 174–197. Berlin: De Gruyter, 2008. Stolz, Daniel A. The Lighthouse and the Observatory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018. Tezcan, Baki. The Second Ottoman Empire: Cambridge Studies in Islamic Civilization. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010. Topal, Alp Eren & Einar Wigen. “Ottoman Conceptual History: Challenges and Prospects.” Contributions to the History of Concepts 14.1 (2019): 93–114. Ware, Rudolph T. The Walking Qur’an. Islamic Civilization and Muslim Networks. Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2014. Zilfi, C. Madeline. The Politics of Piety: The Ottoman ulema in the Postclassical Age (1600– 1800). Minneapolis, MN: Bibliotheca Islamica, 1988.

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Ani Sargsyan

Persian-Turkish Dictionaries of the mid-15th–16th Centuries: A Trajectory of Knowledge Mobility

1.

Introduction

The multilingual character of knowledge in the Ottoman realm in the 15th–16th centuries becomes obvious through the large number of ‘knowledge reservoirs’ (Wissensspeicher1). The main purpose of this research, thereby, focuses on knowledge about the Persian2 language and the situation of its cultural features in the multilingual diversity of the Ottoman Empire in the 15th–16th centuries, an issue which has long been an object of interest of researchers from different perspectives. Indeed, the spread of the knowledge would have been impossible without the vast circulation of glossaries, commentaries and philological works devoted to the grammatical and lexicographical aspects of Persian. Predominantly, we focused on the period of the 15th–16th centuries, which is justified by a boost of production and consumption of Persian-Turkish glossaries, verse dictionaries and commentaries nourished by Arabic and Persian lexicographic traditions. Revisiting the history of Ottoman lexicography, we outline some of the earliest Persian-Turkish dictionaries compiled in the Ottoman realm, which were considered templates for further similiar works: Tuhfe-i Hüsa¯mı¯ (Gift of ˙ ˙ Hüsa¯mı¯), which is the first rhyming dictionary written in 1399/1400 by Hüsa¯m b. ˙ ˙ Hasan el-Konevı¯, Mifta¯hu l-edeb (Key of manners), a prose Persian-Turkish ˙ ˙ ˙ dictionary with a section on Persian grammar, written in 1400/01(?) by Mutahhar ˙ b. Ebı¯ Ta¯lib-i La¯dik¯ı, and the anonymous Uknu¯mu l-ʿAcem (The Basis of Persian) ˙ ˙ 3 ˙ compiled in 1404(?). 1 Frank Grunert and Anette Syndikus, “Einleitung,” in Wissensspeicher der Frühen Neuzeit. Formen und Funktionen, eds. Frank Grunert and Anette Syndikus (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2015), vii–xix. 2 The term “Persian” in the examined period refers to Classical Persian. In our examined dictionaries, this language is called Fa¯rsı¯, Pa¯rsı¯, and Darı¯. 3 ʿAlı¯ Ashraf Sa¯deqı¯, “Persian Dictionaries,” in Encyclopædia Iranica, ed. Ehsan Yarshater, vol. 7 ˙ California: Mazda Publishers, 1995), 387–97; Yusuf Öz, Tarih Boyunca Farsça(Costa Mesa, Türkçe Sözlükler (Ankara: Türk Dil Kurumu, 2016), 79.

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It is noteworthy that the study of Persian-Turkish dictionaries, a part of Persian medieval lexicography, has started predominantly from the 17th century, which was a period when a large-scale interest in Persian literary culture was diffused throughout the European environment.4 In this regard, among the studies and early brief discussions on Persian-Turkish dictionaries written in the Ottoman realm, we should mention those by Hyde,5 Lagarde,6 a supplemented overview on Lagarde’s analysis written by Salemann,7 succinct descriptions of the manuscripts by Flügel,8 Rieu,9 surveys on Persian-Turkish dictionaries by Deny,10 Storey11 and Ottoman Turkish lexicography by Tietze,12 etc. Of special interest is the history of early Persian lexicography, including India and the Ottoman Empire.13 Furthermore, there exist also critical texts of some Persian-Turkish dictionaries compiled by European, Turkish and Iranian researchers to which we refer in subsequent parts of the survey. Hence, our contribution as it is mentioned above will be confined to a group of Persian-Turkish bilingual dictionaries written in the mid-15th and 16th centuries. A primary focus of this research is based on the previously neglected parts, in particular introductions, and rarely dictionary parts of the works. Focusing on them first, the essay discusses whether and to what extent the authors benefited 4 See Paul de Lagarde, Persische Studien (Göttingen: Dieterische Verlags-Buchhandlung, 1884); Solomon Baevskii, Early Persian Lexicography Farhangs of the Eleventh to the Fifteenth Centuries, Language of Asia Series, trans. N. Killian, rev. and upd. John R. Perry, vol. 6 (Kent: Global Oriental LTD, 2007), 1–27. 5 Thomas Hyde, Historia religionis veterum Persarum eorumque magorum (Oxonii [Oxford]: E Theatro Sheldoniano, 1700), 426. 6 Lagarde, Persische Studien, 17–24, 29–31, 33–34, 44–45, 53–55. 7 Carl Salemann, “Paul de Lagarde, Persische Studien,” Literatur-Blatt für orientalische Philologie 2 (1884): 74–86. 8 Gustav Flügel, Die arabischen, persischen und türkischen Handschriften der Kaiserlich-Königlichen Hofbibliothek zu Wien, vol. 1 (Vienna: K. K. Hof- und Staatsdruckerei, 1865). 9 Charles Rieu, Catalogue of the Persian Manuscripts in the British Museum, vol. 2. (London: British Museum, 1881). 10 Jean Deny, “L’osmanli Moderne et le Türk de Turquie,” Philologiae Turcicae Fundamenta 1 (1959): 233. 11 Charles A. Storey, Persian Literature. A Bio-bibliographical Survey, vol. 3 (Leiden: Brill, 1984), 62–77. 12 Andreas Tietze, “Die Lexikographie der Turksprachen, I: Osmanisch Turkisch,” in Wörterbücher: Ein internationals Handbuch zur Lexikographie, ed. Franz Josef Hausmann et al., vol. 3 (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1991), 2399. 13 Sa¯deqı¯, “Persian Dictionaries,” 387–97; Muhammad Dabı¯r Sı¯ya¯qı¯, Farhangha¯-ye Fa¯rsı¯ be ˙ ˙ ¯ rsı¯ va Fa¯rsı¯ be Zaba¯nha¯-ye Dı¯gar, 2nd ed. (Teheran: ¯ ra¯ʿ,1376 [1997]), 262–300; Baevskii, Fa A Early Persian Lexicography; Yusuf Öz, Tuhfe-i S¸âhidî S¸erhleri (Konya: Selçuk Üniversitesi Yayını, 1999); Öz, Tarih Boyunca; Pas¸a Yavuzarslan, Osmanlı Dönemi Türk Sözlükçülüg˘ü (Ankara: Tiydem Yayıncılık, 2009), Murat Umut I˙nan, “Imperial Ambitions, Mystical Aspirations. Persian Learning in the Ottoman World,” in The Persianate World. The Frontiers of a Eurasian Lingua Franca, ed. Nile Green (Oakland: University of California Press, 2019), 78.

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from the previous sources compiled in and beyond the Ottoman lands. Second, the other part of the essay based on the introduction parts of the dictionaries discusses the main stimulus and incentives of the authors in compiling the works. In other words, these texts could explicitly represent how knowledge was altered and moved throughout the Transottoman environment, and reveal the ‘product’ of language contacts in the Persian-Turkish cultural ‘crossroads’. Mapping the main trajectories of the mobility of Persian knowledge along with the aspects of transmission and transfer, we could approach the hypothesis that circulation of knowledge is widely linked to people and groups but, at the same time, it is not controlled by individual actors alone.14 This conjecture enables us to think about the mode of “follow the knowledge” coined by Marcus,15 focusing on the mobility of knowledge through time and space and grasping the moments of its appropriation embedded in the processes of Transottoman encounters. Taking into account key features of the knowledge, the paper addresses the following questions: What is knowledge about Persian language, how does it ‘flow’ within the dictionaries, what are the main imperatives or purposes of the consumption of the knowledge, how is it circulated or transferred between- /to disciplines and influential social groups, and how is it appropriated through time and space?

2.

Where does Persian knowledge come from? Historical outline

With the beginning of the period of the Samanid dynasty, New Persian served as a “transregional contact language” (transregionale Kontaktsprache), a lingua franca, for a certain territory of Islamic culture,16 and as Hodgson stresses, “became in an increasingly large part of Islamdom, the language of polite culture”.17 In early 13th century Persian, as an ‘official language’ of the Seljuq state, was increasingly widespread in the newly emerging Islamic Anatolian courts and cities. Then, with the growth of Ottoman power the position of Ottoman Turkish was enhanced in the 15th and in the late 16th century, when the language was utilized in 14 Johan Östlig et al., “The History of Knowledge and Circulation of Knowledge: An Introduction,” in Circulation of Knowledge. Explorations in the History of Knowledge, ed. Johan Östling et al. (Lund: Nordic Academic Press, 2018), 12; James A. Secord, “Knowledge in Transit,” Isis. The History of Science Society (2004): 655. 15 George E. Marcus, “Ethnography in/of the World System: The Emergence of Multi-Sited Ethnography,” Annual Review of Anthropology 24 (1995): 95–117. 16 Bert Fragner, Die “Persophonie.” Regionalität, Identität und Sprachkontakt in der Geschichte Asiens (Berlin: Anor,1999), 33–39. 17 Marshall G. S. Hodgson, The Venture of Islam. Conscience and History in a World Civilization, vol. 2, The Expansion of Islam in the Middle Periods (Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 1974), 293.

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political, social and cultural frameworks and the rise was connected with “new tastes and patronage networks”.18 Although Persian in this phase began dropping out of its leading positions in the administrative and commercial registers, it is noteworthy that “the region continued to participate in the “Persophonie” by virtue of elite culture literary production in Persian” in a wide variety of genres and discourses.19 In brief, Persian continued to maintain its important role as a prestigious language of literary heritage propagated in the court circles, Sufi communities and could also be attested via the content of Ottoman library collections.20 The examined period was accompanied by a broad-scale compilation and consumption of Persian lexical works i. e. Persian-Turkish prose and rhyming dictionaries, glossaries and an increase of appropriation projects from Persian and Arabic into Ottoman Turkish, which in turn led to Ottoman Turkish intensively absorbing vocabulary and stylistic and grammatical elements of Arabic and Persian.21 Here, in this situation, we should draw attention to the

18 Ferenc Czirkés, “Turkish/Turkic Books of Poetry, Turkish and Persian Lexicography: The Politics of Language under Bayezid II,” in Treasures of Knowledge. An Inventory of the Ottoman Palace Library (1502/3–1503/4), eds. Gülru Necipog˘lu, Cemal Kafadar, and Cornell H. Fleischer, vol. 1 (Leiden: Brill, 2019), 675–76; see also Linda T. Darling, “Ottoman Turkish: Written Language and Scribal Practice Thirteenth to Twentieth Centuries,” in Literacy in the Persianate World: Writing and Social Order, eds. Brian Spooner and William L. Hanaway (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania, 2012), 172; Anja Pistor-Hatam, “The Art of Translation. Rewriting Persian Texts from the Seljuks to the Ottomans,” In Essays on Ottoman Civilization, Archiv orientální: Supplementa 8. Proceedings of the XIIth Congress of the Comité International d’Études Pré-Ottomanes, ed. Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, Oriental Institute (Prague: Academia Publ. House, 1998), 305; Heather L. Ferguson, The Proper Order of Things: Language, Power, and Law in Ottoman Administrative Discourses (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2018), 112; also Brian Spooner and William L. Hanaway, “Introduction: Persian as Koine: Written Persian in World-Historical Perspective,” in Literacy in the Persianate World: Writing and the Social Order, eds. Brian Spooner and William L. Hanaway (Philadelphia; University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, 2012), 1; Nile Green, “Introduction: The Frontiers of the Persianate World (ca. 800–1900),” in The Persianate World: The Frontiers of a Eurasian Lingua Franca, ed. Nile Green (Oakland, CA: University of California Press, 2019), 34. 19 Gottfried Hagen, “Translations and Translators in a Multilingual Society: A Case Study of Persian-Ottoman Translations, Late Fifteenth to Early Seventeenth Century,” Eurasian Studies 2 (2003): 130–31; Fragner, Die “Persophonie”, 69, 84; see also Andrew C. S. Peacock and Sara Nur Yıldız, “Introduction: Literature, Language and History in Late Medieval Anatolia,” in Islamic Literature and Intellectual Life in Fourteenth- and Fifteenth-Century Anatolia, ed. Andrew C. S. Peacock, Sara Nur Yıldız (Würzburg: Ergon-Verlag, 2016), 19–21. 20 For example, in the palace library inventory of Ba¯yezı¯d II (r.1481–1512), prepared by the librarian ʿAtufi, the vast majority of the books in the collection were in Arabic and Persian and a small number were in Turkish. See Czirkés, “Turkish/Turkic Books of Poetry,” 673–733. 21 Christine Woodhead, “Ottoman Languages,” in The Ottoman World, ed. Christine Woodhead (London: Routledge, 2012), 155; Walter C. Andrews, “Starting Over Again: Some Suggestions for Rethinking Ottoman Divan Poetry in the Context of Translation and Transmission,” in Translations: (Re)shaping of Literature and Culture, ed. Saliha Paker (Istanbul: Bog˘aziçi

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indispensable role of the intellectuals, i. e. poets, Sufi mystics or administrators etc., who mastered the Persian and Arabic languages and who could raise their social status not only via their knowledge, but also their “contribution to the fashioning of Ottoman Turkish as the language of the imperial chancery, prose and poetry”.22 Perceiving knowledge as a historical phenomenon provided by the knowledge brokers and transmitted between people and groups23 brought us to understanding the crucial role of the intellectual milieu that implemented the diffusion of Persian as a language of cultural discourse moving from one court to another during religious antagonism between Anatolia and Iran. This favorable climate as remarked by Peacock, coincides with the influx of not only Iranian scholars from Iran, but also of the ‘middle class’ immigrants, and Persian penetrated urban Anatolia and probably, of the main cities of Central Anatolia, was one of the everyday spoken languages.24 These movements continued in the propitious environment of the Ottoman era, particularly in the 15th–16th centuries, which attracted large numbers of intellectuals in search of patronage.25 The literary and artistic life was primarily concentrated in the surroundings of the court and princely residences where the imperial elite mostly followed Persian, along with the Arabic language,26 promoting and sponsoring the flow of

22 23 24

25

26

University Press, 2002), 34–35; Darling, “Ottoman Turkish,” 172–73; Ferguson, The Proper Order of Things, 112–13. Tijana Krstic´, “Of Translation and Empire. Sixteenth-Century Ottoman Imperial Interpreters as Renaissance Go Betweens,” in The Ottoman World, ed. Christine Woodhead (London: Routledge, 2012), 131. Peter Burke, A Social History of Knowledge (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2012), 86. Andrew C. S. Peacock, “Islamisation in Medieval Anatolia,” in Islamisation: Comparative Perspectives from History, ed. Andrew C. S. Peacock (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2017), 144; Carole Hillenbrand, “Ra¯vandı¯, the Seljuk Court at Konya and the Persinisation of Anatolian Cities,” Mésogeios 25–26 (2005): 157–69. Robert L. Canfield, Turko-Persia in Historical Perspective (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), 19; Abdurrahman Atçıl, “Mobility of Scholars and Formation of a Self-Sustaining System in the Lands of Ru¯m during the Fifteenth Century,” in Islamic Literature and Intellectual Life in Fourteenth- and Fifteenth-Century Anatolia, eds. Andrew C. S. Peacock and Sara Nur Yıldız (Würzburg: Ergon-Verlag, 2016), 315–32 and Selim S. Kuru, “The Literature of Rum: The Making of a Literacy Tradition (1450–1600),” in Cambridge History of Turkey, ed. Suraiya N. Faroqhi and Kate Fleet, vol. 2 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013), 552–53; as well as I˙nan, “Imperial Ambitions, Mystical Aspirations,” 76, 80. The main distinction and the principal dichotomy between usage spheres of Persian and Arabic is obvious: Persian as a language of literature, especially poetry, satisfied expressive and imaginative needs and had a prominent place in this sphere, whereas Arabic was the language covering informational and scientific spheres. See Peter B. Golden, “Turks and Iranians: An Historical Sketch,” in Turkic-Iranian Contact Areas Historical and Linguistic Aspects, eds. Lars Johanson and Christiane Bulut (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2006), 33; Victoria R. Holbrook, “Concealed Facts, Translation and the Turkish Literary Past,” in Translations: (Re)shaping of Literature and Culture, ed. Saliha Paker (Istanbul: Bog˘aziçi University Press, 2002), 85. Moreover, it should be noted that the position of the Arabic language was restricted from the end of the twelth century and it was reserved for religious texts, scientific

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knowledge through the environment. It is true that the imperative of this climate, which was created in the Ottoman realm since the above named period, as stated by Hagen, was “an integration into centuries-old Islamic elite culture in Arabic and Persian and the adaptation of its cultural production”.27 Hence, in the Ottoman realm Persian was in a broad sense retained in court circles and social environments, achieved its transregionality via its literature, and was valued as a code of cultural production and ‘communication’ for a long period (until the 19th century).

3.

The knowledge reservoirs: Case study

After this brief introduction, let us turn to the subject of our paper: PersianTurkish prose (mensu¯r) and rhyming (nisa¯b, manzu¯m) dictionaries, which were ¯ ˙ ˙ considered a desideratum for Persian learning in the Ottoman capital and beyond. Pedagogigal-Mneomotechnical rhyming dictionaries (Pädagogisch-mnemotechnische Reimwörterbücher) defined by Tietze in the survey of Ottoman Turkish lexicography,28 were mostly poems called mesnevı¯, (a long epic poem ¯ written in rhyming couplets): each stanza or kitʿa traditionally begins with an ˙˙ Arabic title, in which the meter is announced. These types of dictionaries were mainly driven by the goal of propagating Persian classical literature par excellence. In addition, rhyming dictionaries explain the numerical value of the Arabic alphabet letters (ebced hesa¯bı) and even contain basic grammatical nu˙ ances such as conjugations. Prose dictionaries were mostly defining target vocabulary, providing Turkish, often Arabic equivalents, and sometimes discussing the origin of Persian lemmata. Despite comments that educated people in the Ottoman realm in the examined period, lacking knowledge of Persian, were not able to understand Persian works, so the dictionaries and commentaries were not efficient anymore,29 the abundance of the copies of these works lets us confidently point out that these were capable of rendering and appropriating sufficient knowledge until the early 20th century. In addition, we could surmise that these texts as indispensable manuals which stored explanations of Persian words as well as rudiments of Persian grammar were of service to novices due to their texts, and commentaries. See Agâh S. Levend, Türk Dilinde Gelis¸me ve Sadeles¸me Evreleri (Ankara: Türk Tarih Kurumu Basımevi, 1960), 6–7; Cornell H. Fleischer, Bureaucrat and Intellectual in the Ottoman Empire. The Historian Mustafa Âli (1541–1600) (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1986), 22. 27 Hagen, “Translations and Translators,” 95. 28 Tietze, “Die Lexikographie der Turksprachen,” 2399. 29 Muhammed E. Riyâhî, Osmanlı Topraklarında Fars Dili ve Edebiyatı (I˙stanbul: I˙nsan Yayınları, 1995), 219; Pistor-Hatam, “The Art of Translation,” 307.

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demand both in formal and informal educational institutions: Palace schools (Enderu¯n mektebi), primary schools (sibya¯n mektebi), and Sufi lodges, especially ˙ the Mevlevı¯ convents where Persian was explicitly propagated.30 Moreover, vast numbers of dervish convents located in larger cities and the countryside and their libraries with amazing collections dealt with the vocational ways of obtaining Persian knowledge “as a language of literary education”.31 Thus, in our survey we will mainly focus on nine dictionaries (Lüg˙at-i Halı¯mı¯, ˙ Nisa¯rü l-mülk, Mifta¯hu l-meʿa¯nı¯, Mifta¯hu l-lüg˙at, Vesı¯letü l-meka¯sıd ila¯ ahseni l¯ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ mera¯sıd, Tuhfe-i S¸a¯hidı¯, Lüg˙at-i manzu¯me, Daka¯yiku l-haka¯yik, Lüg˙at-i Niʿme˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ tulla¯h). As we mentioned above, we deal with the introductions in particular, which could visually map out the main trajectories of transfer of knowledge and determine various fields where Persian knowledge interacts or appropriates.32 For the examination of the codices, we attempted to include the earliest available copies. The first two, Lüg˙at-i Halı¯mı¯ (Halı¯mı¯’s Dictionary), Nisa¯rü l-mülk (Dissem¯ ˙ ˙ ination of Possession) are compiled by Halı¯mı¯ Lutfulla¯h bin Abı¯ Yu¯suf, an Ot˙ ˙ toman poet, lexicographer and ka¯d¯ı of Persian origin from Amasya (d. 902?/ ˙ ˙ 1497). These works were dated 1455–1468. Lüg˙at-i Halı¯mı¯ is a commentary on ˙ Bahru l-g˙ara¯yib (Ocean of Subtleties), another work written by the author. It is ˙ also known as Ka¯sımiyye or Ka¯ʿime and in most catalogues mentioned as Nisa¯rü ¯ ˙ ˙ l-mülk, Bahru l-g˙ara¯yib, S¸erh-i bahru l-g˙ara¯yib (Commentary on Ocean of ˙ ¯ ˙ ˙ 33 Subtleties) or Iz˙a¯h-ı bahru l- g˙ara¯yib (Explanation on Ocean of Subtleties). We ˙ ˙ have used the manuscript of Lüg˙at-i Halı¯mı¯ available in Sarajevo34 and also a ˙

30 Jan Schmidt, “The Importance of Persian for Ottoman Literary Gentlemen: Two Turkish Treatises on Aspects of the Language of Kemalpashazade (d. 1536),” in Kitaplara Vakfedilen bir Ömre Tuhfe. ˙Ismail E. Erünsala Armag˘an 2. Edebiyat ve Tasavvuf Kütüphanecilik ve Ars¸ivcilik, ed. Hatice Aynur et al. (I˙stanbul: Ülke, 2014): 852–53. On the history of Ottoman education see Osman Ergin, Türk Maarif Tarihi, vols. 1–2 (I˙stanbul: Eser Matbaası, 1977). 31 Suraiya Faroqhi, Subjects of the Sultan: Culture and Daily Life in the Ottoman Empire (London: Tauris, 2000), 186–91. 32 Quoted passages from Ottoman Turkish are fully transcribed using a version of the IJMES system. We kept to Ottoman Turkish transcription for the personal names of the authors and the titles of the dictionaries (compiled in the Ottoman realm). As the letters ‫ ﺥ‬and ‫ ﻩ‬are not differentiated in the scheme, we adopted the transliteration letter according to DMG (‫ﺥ‬-h), as ˘ the well as we used g˙ for ‫ﻍ‬. The passages from Arabic and Persian and the titles and names of authors of the dictionaries compiled in Iran are transcribed according to the simplified system of the Encyclopaedia of Islam (EI3). Unless noted otherwise, the translations from Ottoman Turkish are mine. I am most grateful to Hülya Çelik and Ali Emre Özyıldırım for advice on Ottoman Turkish texts and Maximilian Kinzler, Ramin Shaghaghi, and Pejman Firoozbakhsh for advice on transcription and translation of Persian texts. 33 Öz, Tarih Boyunca, 104. 34 Lüg˙at-i Halı¯mı¯, Ms. 3053, The Ghazi Husrev-beg Library, Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina. ˙

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critical text by Adem Uzun.35 For the analysis of Nisa¯rü l-mülk we used the ¯ manuscript held in Ankara,36 and for the dictionary Mifta¯hu l-meʿa¯nı¯ (Key of ˙ Meanings) compiled by Fevrı¯ b.ʿAbdulla¯h in 1487, we used the manuscript from Ankara.37 The fourth dictionary entitled Mifta¯hu l-lüg˙at (Key of Words) is written by ˙ Mahmu¯d b. Edhem from Amasya. We have used the autograph available in ˙ 38 Vienna and the manuscript from Istanbul.39 No less famous a dictionary is Vesı¯letü l-meka¯sıd ila¯ ahseni l-mera¯sıd, (Ap˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ pliance [to reach the] objectives and the best of the Observatories) by Hat¯ıb ˘ ˙ Rüstem Dede binʿAbdulla¯h el-Mevlevı¯, the grammatical part of which is written in verse. It is considered as the first verse grammar work written in the examined territory.40 We have used the manuscript available in Istanbul.41 Of special interest are rhyming dictionaries Tuhfe-i S¸a¯hidı¯ (Gift of S¸a¯hidı¯) by ˙ Mevlevı¯ Sufi I˙bra¯hı¯m Dede S¸a¯hidı¯42 and Lüg˙at-i manzu¯me (Dictionary in Verse) ˙ by Mahmu¯d b. ʿOsma¯n b. ʿAlı¯ al-naqqa¯s¸ b. I˙lya¯s, known as La¯miʿı¯ Çelebi43 (also as ¯ ˙ “the Ca¯mı¯ of Ru¯m”), an Ottoman Naks¸ibendı¯ Sufi writer and poet of the first half ˙ of the 16th century. We have used early codices available in Istanbul44 and the critical text published by Öztahtalı.45 For the examination of Tuhfe-i S¸a¯hidı¯ we ˙ used the manuscript from Sarajevo,46 the publication by Verburg who provided a transcription and English translation of the text47 as well as an unpublished PhD thesis by I˙mamog˘lu.48

35 Lutfullah b. Ebu Yusuf el-Halîmî, Lüg˘at-i Halîmî, ed. Adem Uzun (Ankara: Türk Dil Kurumu Yayınları, 2013). 36 Nisa¯rü l-mülk, Ms. A.1504, Milli Kütüphane [National Library of Turkey], Ankara, Turkey. ¯ 37 Mifta¯hu l-meʿa¯nı¯, Ms. A. Ötüken 432, Milli Kütüphane [National Library of Turkey], Ankara, ˙ Turkey. 38 Mifta¯hu l-lüg˙at, Cod. A. F. 448, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, Vienna, Austria; see also Flügel,˙ Die arabischen, persischen und türkischen Handschriften, 1:124. 39 Mifta¯hu l-lüg˙at, Ms. Karaçelebizade 341, Süleymaniye Library, Istanbul, Turkey. ˙ G. Özgüdenli, “Katıb Rostam Dede,” in Encyclopædia Iranica, Vol. 16, Fasc. 2. (2013): 40 Osman ¯ ˙ 123, accessed June 11, 2019 http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/katib-rostam; Öz, Tarih Boyunca, 123. 41 Vesı¯letü l-maka¯sıd ila¯ ahseni l-mera¯sıd, Ms. As¸ir Ef. 389, Süleymaniye Library, Istanbul, ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ Turkey. 42 See Abdülbaki Gölpınarlı, Mevlânâdan sonra Mevlevîlik (I˙stanbul: GÜL Matbaası, 1983), 132–41. 43 See Barbara Flemming, “La¯miʿı¯,” in Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed. [=EI2], ed. Peri Bearman et al. (Leiden: Brill, 2012). 44 Lüg˙at-i manzu¯me, Ms. As¸ir Ef. 322, Süleymaniye Library, Istanbul, Turkey. ˙ 45 I˙mran I˙. Öztahtalı, Lâmî Çelebi ve Lügat-i Manzumu (Tuhfe-i Lâmi’î) (Bursa: Gaye Kitabevi, 2004). 46 Tuhfe-i S¸a¯hidı¯, Ms.1229/1, The Ghazi Husrev-beg Library, Bosnia and Herzegovina. ˙ 47 Antoinette C. Verburg, “The Tuhfe-i S¸a¯hidı¯: A Sixteenth-Century Persian Ottoman Dictionary ˙ in Rhyme Part I,” Archivum Ottomanicum 15 (1997).

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In the frame of the research paper, we include also Daka¯yiku l-haka¯yik ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ (Subtleties of the True Things) written by S¸emseddı¯n Ahmed ibn Süleyma¯n ibn ˙ Kema¯l Pasha, also known as I˙bn Kema¯l or Kema¯lpas¸aza¯de (873–940/1468–1534), a prolific Ottoman scholar of the time, who reached the position of Sheikhü lIslam in the reign of Süleyma¯n the Magnificent (r.1520–1566). The disorderly glossary is a philological work in which Persian synonyms, antonyms and homographs are analyzed and poetical quotations absorbed.49 We have used the manuscript from Istanbul50 and the unpublished thesis by Karaca.51 The last one, no less popular, is Lüg˙at-i Niʿmetulla¯h (Niʿmetulla¯h’s Dictionary) by Niʿmetulla¯h ibn Ahmed al-Ru¯mı¯, Naks¸ibendı¯ Sufi.52 We have used the auto˙ ˙ graph available in Ankara53 and also the critical text prepared by Adnan I˙nce.54

4.

Valorization and transfer of Persian knowledge

The dictionaries to a large extent were aimed at teaching the Persian language, belles-lettres and versification rules. As we mentioned above, the farhangs, with rare exceptions, were not limited only to explaining the words and providing the equivalents in Arabic, but were also saturated with poetical quotations. These types of dictionaries are also known as ¸sevahitli (with examples) and intimate their networks to classics of Persian poetry: Ru¯dakı¯, Firdawsı¯, Asadı¯ Tu¯sı¯, ʿUn˙ surı¯, Shams-i Fakhrı¯, Anvarı¯, Asjadı¯, Ru¯mı¯, Niza¯mı¯, Ha¯fiz, Saʿdı¯ etc.55 Another ˙ ˙th ˙ th ˙ merit, that was obvious in Persian farhangs from the 11 to 15 century would be the intermeshed or separate parts devoted mainly to Persian grammatical cate48 Ahmet H. I˙mamog˘lu, “Farsça-Türkçe Manzum Sözlükler ve S¸ahidi’nin Sözlüg˘ü (I˙ncelemeMetin)” (PhD diss., Atatürk University, Erzurum, 1993). 49 On the methodological examination of the glossary, see Hasmik Kirakosyan and Ani Sargsyan, “On the Appropriation of Lexicographic Methods of Kema¯lpas¸aza¯de’s (1468–1534) Glossary Daka¯yiku l-haka¯yik”, Diyâr, 2 Jg., 1 (2021): 14–26. ˙ ˙ Bag˘˙ datlı Vehbi 1975, Süleymaniye Library, Istanbul, Turkey. 50 Daka¯yiku l-h˙aka¯˙yik, Ms. ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ 51 Abdullah Karaca, “Kemal Pas¸azâdenin Dekâyıku’l-Hakâyık’ı (Metin-I˙ndeks)” (M. A. thesis, Kırıkkale University, 2002). 52 See Otto Blau, “Über Niʿmatullah’s persisch-türkisches Wörterbuch,” Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft (ZDMG) 31 (1877): 484–94; Lagarde, Persische Studien, 53–55; Rieu, Catalogue of the Persian Manuscripts, 514; Ahmed Ni’metu’llâh, Lügat-i Ni’metu’llah, ed. Adnan I˙nce (Ankara: Türk Dil Kurumu Yayınları, 2015), 9. 53 Lüg˙at-i Niʿmetulla¯h, Ms. A. 452, Türk Dil Kurumu Library, Ankara, Turkey. An incomplete, possible autograph (Cod. Or. 164, dated 966/1559) is also mentioned in the catalogue of Turkish manuscripts in the library of Leiden University and the author mentions as a writer of the copy. See Schmidt, Catalogue of Turkish Manuscripts in the Library of Leiden University and Other Collections in the Netherlands (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2012), 15–16. 54 Ahmed Ni’metu’llâh, Lügat-i Ni’metu’llah. 55 Lutfullah b. Ebu Yusuf el-Halîmî, Lüg˘at-i Halîmî, 8; Baevskii, Early Persian Lexicography, 129.

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gories. These parts focused on the explanations of relevant usages of Persian parts of speech: noun (asa¯mı¯) and infinitive (masa¯dir ‘verbal abstract’).56 Taking ˙ into consideration these contributions of grammar and the lexicographical parts of the dictionaries, we can conjecture that the authors not only cared about the grammatically correct use of the Persian language, but also established standardization and valorization of Persian learning. The ensemble of the texts (mostly introductions and dictionary parts) could elucidate the corpus of the dictionaries compiled earlier, which was predominantly accumulated and mentioned by the lexicographers of the examined period. They are Lughat-i furs (Dictionary of Persian) or Mushkila¯t-i furs (Difficulties of Persian) by Asadı¯ Tu¯sı¯ (d. 465/1072), compiled apparently after 1066, ˙ Muntakhab-i Hakı¯m Qatra¯n (Selected by Hakı¯m Qatra¯n), compiled by the poet ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ Qatra¯n Tabrı¯zı¯ (d.482/1089 [?]) in the 11th century, Siha¯h al-furs (Correctness of ˙ ˙˙ ˙ Persian), written in 1328 in Tabriz by Hindu¯sha¯h Nakhjawa¯nı¯ (d. ca. 768/1366), and Miʿya¯r-i Jama¯lı¯ (Jama¯lı¯’s Touchstone) by Shams-i Fakhrı¯ Isfaha¯nı¯ (674/1275/ ˙ 6–749/1348/9), compiled in 1343/4 in Shiraz.57 Drawing attention to the methodological part of the dictionaries, we should point out that the authors primarily followed the principles of Arabic and Persian lexicography.58 The arrangement of lemmata of the dictionaries (Lüg˙at-i Halı¯mı¯,59 Nisa¯rü l-mülk, Mifta¯hu l-meʿa¯nı¯, ¯ ˙ ˙ Mifta¯hu l-lüg˙at, Vesı¯letü l-meka¯sıd ila¯ ahseni l-mera¯sıd etc) follows an alpha˙ ˙ ˙ 60˙ ˙ betical order, by initial letter. Another model was also observed in dictionaries, which is known as kafiye sistemi61 or kafiye ekolü (verse system). This system was used by the Persian lexicographer Asadı¯ Tu¯sı¯ and served as a template for the ˙ Ottoman lexicographers until the 17th century.62

56 Baevskii, Early Persian Lexicography, 151; see also Hasmik Kirakosyan, Ani Sargsyan. “The Educational Role of the Late Medieval Persian-Ottoman Turkish Bilingual Dictionaries. The Codices of the Matenadaran,” Turkic Languages 22, no. 2 (2018): 169. 57 See Sa¯deqı¯, “Persian Dictionaries,” 387–97; Öz, Tarih Boyunca, 29–35; Baevskii, Early Persian ˙ Lexicography, 31, 51–61. 58 On early Arabic-Persian lexicography, see John R. Perry, “Early Arabic-Persian Lexicography: The Asa¯mı¯ and Masa¯dir Genres,” in Proceedings of the Colloquium on Arabic Lexicography ˙ Dévényi et al. (Budapest: Eötvös Loránd University Chair for Arabic (C.A.L.L.), ed. Kinga Studies, Csoma de Ko˝rös Society, 1993), 247–60. 59 Lug˙at-i Halı¯mı¯ is considered to be the first Persian-Turkish dictionary according to alpha˙ betical arrangement. 60 Öz, Tarih Boyunca, 49–50. 61 The entry words in this type of dictionaries are primarily arranged by the last letter, then the second and third letter, and in each case the primary category is announced as the ba¯b ‘chapter’, which is included in the fasl ‘section’. See Öz, Tarih Boyunca, 27–28. 62 Baevskii, Early Persian Lexicography,˙ 53, 153; Yavuzarslan, Osmanlı Dönemi, 2; Hulûsi Kılıç, “Tâcü’l-Luga, I˙smail b. Hammâd el Cevherî’nin (ö. 400/1009 dan önce) Arapça Sözlüg˘ü,” Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı ˙Islâm Ansiklopedisi 39 (2010): 356–57.

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In order to trace connections between the texts, we should try to discuss the aspect of knowledge transmission by following its movement and arguing whether the predecessors’ scholarship was altered en route from one generation to another. Here we could also agree with Brilkman’s idea that the circulated knowledge was an “old knowledge which passed on in a new form, interpreted and shared”,63 and argue that previous sources in a broad sense served the authors as a model to construct and enrich the content of the work. In this regard, focusing on some examples, we should also underline the main trajectories, which could provide us with an indicator for moments of knowledge flow in Transottoman perspective through time and space. It should be noted that the name of Asadı¯ Tu¯sı¯ was mostly circulated in the prefaces and dictionary parts of ˙ the glossaries, especially those written in early periods. For instance, in the preface of the Mifta¯hu l-meʿa¯nı¯, Asadı¯ Tu¯sı¯’s dictionary ˙ ˙ Mushkila¯t-i furs and also the work Mifta¯hu l-edeb written by Mutahhar b. Ebı¯ ˙ ˙ Ta¯lib-i La¯dik¯ı are mentioned as primary sources for the glossary.64 ˙ ˙ “… Baʿzı Mus¸kila¯t-i fürsden ve Mifta¯hu l-edebden ve dahı buldug˙ım lüg˙atlerden cemʿ ˙ ˙ ˘ idüp bu kita¯ba derc eyledüm…”65

Trans.: I collected some [words] from the Mushkila¯t-i furs and Mifta¯hu l-edeb and also ˙ from [other] dictionaries that I found and inserted [them] into this book…

Not providing data in the preface, in his dictionary section Halı¯mı¯ refers to ˙ materials from the earliest Persian defining dictionaries mentioned above and mostly cites and circulates the predecessors’ explanations in the analysis of lemmata. For example, when glossing the word ba¯d-rang (a species of cucumber; an orange) he writes: “ba¯d-rang: ¸sinhıyar. Asadı¯ Tu¯sı¯ ve S¸ams-i Fahrı¯ turunc maʿna¯sına nakl eylediler…”66 ˙ ˙ ˘ ˘ Trans.: A large cucumber kept for seed. Asadı¯ Tu¯sı¯ and Shams-i Fakhrı¯ glossed the word ˙ as “orange”.

Explaining the entry word parva¯ (power, strength, fear) the author writes: “…Ekser erba¯b-i Lüg˙at, Hakı¯m-i Katra¯nı¯ Urmavı¯ ve Asadı¯ Tu¯sı¯ ve S¸ams-i Fahrı¯ ve ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˘ Hindu¯¸sa¯h Nahcava¯nı¯ bigi parva¯, fera¯g˙at ve ta¯kat maʿna¯sına nakl eylediler…”67 ˙ ˙ ˙ ˘

63 Kajsa Brilkman, “The Circulation of Knowledge in Translations and Compilations. A Sixteenth-Century Example,” in Circulation of Knowledge, ed. Johan Östlig et al. (Lund: Nordic Academic Press, 2018), 166. 64 See also Ka¯tib Çelebi, Kes¸fü’z-Zünu¯n, eds. S¸. Yaltkaya and Kilisli Rifat Bilge (I˙stanbul: Maarif Matbaası, 1941–55), 1758. ˙ ˙ 65 Mifta¯hu l-meʿa¯nı¯, Ms. A. Ötüken 432, ff. 002r.; see Öz, Tarih Boyunca, 116. ˙ Halı¯mı¯, MS. 3053, f. 018v. 66 Lüg˙at-i ˙ alı¯mı¯, MS. 3053, f. 030r; Baevskii, Early Persian Lexicography, 33. 67 Lüg˙at-i H ˙

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Trans.: Most experts of the dictionaries, [like] Hakı¯m-i Qatra¯nı¯ Urmawı¯, Asadı¯ Tu¯sı¯, ˙ ˙ ˙ Shams-i Fakhrı¯ and Hindu¯sha¯h Nakhjawa¯nı¯ glossed the word parva¯ [fear, anxiety] with the meaning of abnegation and strength.

Sometimes Halı¯mı¯ attempts to add his own version of explanation while citing ˙ the early sources. When analyzing the lemma paga¯z/baga¯z, Halı¯mı¯ glosses the ˙ verse by Farrukhı¯ established previously by Asadı¯ Tu¯sı¯ and Hindu¯sha¯h Nakhja˙ wa¯nı¯ and gently provides his explanation of the word ga¯z (pasturage; a hole or trench dug in the ground as a shelter for men and cattle). “Dag˙larda ve yabanlarda olan inler ki koyun kıs¸lar ka¯raba¯nlar sıg˙ınur…. Asadı¯ Tu¯sı¯ ve ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ Hindu¯¸sa¯h Nahcava¯nı¯ bu lüg˙ati böyle nakl eylediler ve bu beyti istis¸ha¯d getürdiler. Za¯hir ˙ ˙ ˘ 68 budur, asl-ı lüg˙at ga¯zdur, evvelinde ba¯ ilsa¯k içun kılmıs¸dur.” ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ Trans.: These are hiding places in the mountains and deserts where the sheep huddled in winter and caravans stayed… Asadı¯ Tu¯sı¯ and Hindu¯sha¯h Nakhjawa¯nı¯ explained this ˙ word in this way and cited this verse. Apparently, the origin of the word is ga¯z, and ba¯ rendered to the beginning [of the word].

Or, glossing the lemma h¯ız (a vessel used in baths; a catamite): ˙

“Ol og˙la¯n ki muhannes ola. Asadı¯ Tu¯sı¯ ve Hindu¯¸sa¯h Nahcava¯nı¯ ve Hakı¯m-i Katra¯nı¯ ¯ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˘ ˘ Urmavı¯ ve S¸ams-i Fahrı¯ ¸söyle tash¯ıh etdiler ki asl-ı lüg˙at hı¯zdur, zı¯ra¯ ki Fa¯rsı¯de ha¯-i ˙˙ ˙ ˙ ˘ mühmele mühmeldür, hı¯z diyü Pehlevı¯ce hama¯m ta¯sına dirler. Muhanneslik iden kis¸iye ¯ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˘ kime gerekse tutuldug˙ı eclden ötüri sebı¯l-i istiʿa¯re hı¯z dirler. Kesret-i istiʿma¯le hak¯ıkat ¯ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ gibi olmıs¸dur ՙa¯mme ha¯yla telaffuz itdikleri eclden burada zikr olundı.”69 ¯ ˙ ˙ Trans.: The boy that may be effeminate. Asadı¯ Tu¯sı¯ and Hindu¯sha¯h Nakhjawa¯nı¯ and ˙ Hakı¯m-i Qatra¯nı¯ Urmawı¯ and Shams-i Fakhrı¯ rectify [it] in that manner that the origin ˙ ˙ of the word is hı¯z [catamite], as in Persian undotted ha¯ has no sense, as saying hı¯z in Pahlavi language [they] call the metal bowl of the bathhouse. To a person who is acting cowardly, in this case to anyone else for whom it is necessary, in a metaphorical way [they] say hı¯z. With the magnitude of use it has been like a true statement and here it is mentioned because they pronounced [the word] with common ha¯. ˙

Undoubtedly these are significant examples stored in Halı¯mı¯’s works that justify ˙ our suggested approach of the mobility of knowledge accentuating the main interactions and connections with the previous knowledge provided beyond the Ottoman Empire. In this regard, we should stress that Halı¯mı¯’s dictionaries ˙ 68 Lüg˙at-i Halı¯mı¯, MS. 3053, f. 034r. ˙ alı¯mı¯, MS. 3053, ff.059v–60r. This lemma is also glossed by La¯miʿı¯ Çelebi, (see I˙nan, 69 Lüg˙at-i H ˙ “Imperial Ambitions, Mystical Aspirations,” 75), also in Mifta¯hu l-lüg˙at, (see Ms. Kara˙ çelebizade 341, f.052r) and in Lüg˙at-i Ni’metu’llah. In this regard, Niʿmetulla¯h not only circulated the explanations provided by Asadı¯ Tu¯sı¯ and Hindu¯sha¯h Nakhjawa¯nı¯, but also ˙ provided details on the metaphorical meaning comparing the metal bowl with a “naughty boy [yaramaz og˘lan] who is passing from hand to hand,” Ahmed Ni’metu’llâh, Lügat-i Ni’metu’llah, 165.

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predominantly served as effective templates for the later counterparts and were frequently referenced in the subsequent works. For instance, Lüg˙at-i Halı¯mı¯ was ˙ not only fascinated by the authors of the dictionaries Mifta¯hu l-lüg˙at, Daka¯yiku l˙ ˙ ˙ haka¯yik, and Lüg˙at-i Niʿmetulla¯h and circulated as a primary source but also was ˙ ˙ ˙ criticized in the dictionary parts. In the preface Kema¯lpas¸aza¯de does not mention the sources that he used during the compilation of Daka¯yiku l-haka¯yik and only ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ in the examination of the lemmata he refers to Lüg˙at-i Halı¯mı¯, values the source ˙ or sometimes criticizes explanations of the lemmata that he considers to be wrong. In his dictionary he uses the following expressions: “Halı¯mı¯ Bahru l˙ ˙ g˙ara¯yibinde dimis¸dür… isa¯bet itmemis¸dür” (Trans. Halı¯mı¯ said in Bahru l-g˙a˙ ˙ ˙ ra¯yib … did not guess rightly) or “Bahru l-g˙ara¯yib sa¯hibi Halı¯mı¯ eyle sanmıs¸, ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ g˙alat itmis¸ dür” (Trans. The owner of Bahru l-g˙ara¯yib Halı¯mı¯ thought in this way, ˙ ˙ ˙ made a mistake), “Bahru l-g˙ara¯yib sa¯hibi fark itmemis¸dür, hata¯ itmis¸dür” ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˘ ˙ (Trans. The owner of Bahru l-g˙ara¯yib did not differentiate, made a mistake) etc.70 ˙ For instance, when analyzing the word entry da¯r (imp. of da¯shtan; holding, possessing, keeping, etc.) and gı¯r (imp. of giriftan; take, seize, hold), he writes: “… Da¯r burada ca¯nba¯z ipine ıtla¯k olınmus¸ degüldür. Bahru l-g˙ara¯yib sa¯hibi Halı¯mı¯ eyle ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ sanmıs¸, g˙alat itmis¸ dür. S¸ol kus¸a ki Türkı¯de aña ag˙aç delen dirler,ʿAcem da¯rsünb dir”.71 ˙ ˙ ˙ Trans.: Here da¯r did not refer to the rope of a highrope dancer. The owner of Bahru l˙ g˙ara¯yib, Halı¯mı¯ thought in this way [and] made a mistake. This bird which they call in ˙ Turkish ag˙açdelen [woodpecker], in Persian is da¯rsunb.

It is noteworthy to mention that the preface of Lüg˙at-i Niʿmetulla¯h also clusters much data to bring together the sources that were appreciated, appropriated and transmitted by the author: In the introduction, the author writes: …Pas ba¯ bisya¯r ku¯shish az çandı¯n lugha¯t jamʿ kardam. Hamçu Uqnu¯m-i ‘Ajam, wa Qa¯simiyya-i Lutfulla¯h Halı¯mı¯, Wası¯latul-maqa¯sid va Lughat-i Qarahisa¯rı¯,72 wa Siha¯h-i ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙˙ ˙˙ ˙ ʿAjam-i Dı¯rı¯na-i Mukhtasar wa Siha¯h-iʿAjam-i Jadı¯d-i Kabı¯r wa juz ¯ınha¯ az bisya¯r kutub ˙ ˙˙ ˙ 73 çı¯dam va bar si qism murattab sa¯khtam… . Trans.: … Then with much effort I gathered [the words] from several dictionaries: Like Uknu¯mu l-ʿAcem, Ka¯simiyye of Lutfulla¯h Halı¯mı¯, Vesı¯letü l-meka¯sıd, and Karahisa¯rı¯ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ dictionary, and the old brief Siha¯h-i ʿAjam (Siha¯h-i ʿAjam-i Dı¯rı¯na-i Mukhtasar) and ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙

70 Daka¯yiku l-haka¯yik, Ms. Bag˘datlı Vehbi 1975, ff. 038v, 041r–42v, 044v, 047v. ˙ a¯yik ˙ u l-h ˙ ak ˙ a¯yik ˙ , Ms. Bag˘datlı Vehbi 1975, ff. 0038rv. 71 Dak ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ 72 The dictionary is ˙also called S¸a¯milü l-Lüg˙a, compiled by Hasan b. Hüseyin b.ʿI˙ma¯d el˙ ˙ Karahisa¯rı¯, see Öz, Tarih Boyunca, 134–137. ˙ ˙ ˙ 73 Lüg˘at-i Niʿmetulla¯h, Ms. A. 452, ff. 002rv.

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the new large Siha¯h-i-ʿAjam (Siha¯h-iʿAjam-i Jadı¯d -i Kabı¯r) 74 etc., I selected many ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ books and I arranged it into three parts.

In the dictionary part, Niʿmetulla¯h also refers to the dictionaries not listed in the preface: Mifta¯hu l-lüg˙at, Daka¯yiku l-haka¯yik and especially Miʿya¯r-i Jama¯lı¯, ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ which are considered to be essential sources for the work.75 It is noteworthy that Niʿmetulla¯h, while explaining the lemmata, quotes the verses by Shams-i Fakhrı¯ and criticizes him more often than other sources mentioned in the introduction. The author combines the previous explanations on word-entries, and then supplements them with his own remarks.76 Reading and repeating aloud the rhyming dictionaries and scanning versification schemes were an integral element of teaching77 and, as Krstic´ states, it “was an important aspect of the communication and articulation of social identity.”78 To some extent, introductions (dı¯ba¯ce) of rhyming texts are lacking information on previous sources and we could only guess, looking through the structural and thematic corpus of the work and tracing connections with previous ones. Here we can mention Lüg˙at-i manzu¯me, which indicates no sources, and we can merely ˙ conjecture the previous works used. Another picture is drawn in the preface of Tuhfe-i S¸a¯hidı¯ where we can obviously note that the author, mentioning his ˙ fascination for many dictionaries in verse, outlines his decision to write a dictionary, an imitatio of Tuhfe-i Hüsa¯mı¯ (Gift of Hüsa¯m), which he read first, and ˙ ˙ ˙ emphasizes the noteworthy advantages and superior features of his work compared to Hüsa¯m’s work: ˙ 74 There was a confusion related to the authorship of the Siha¯hu l-ʿAjam (sometimes it is called ˙ occurred in many copies proSiha¯hu l-ʿAjamiyye, Siha¯h-i ʿAjamiyye) and especially ˙a ˙part ˙ ˙ ˙ after the 16th century, ˙ ˙ ˙ in which the original name of the author Hindu¯sha¯h bin Sanjar duced was changed to Muhammed bin Pı¯rʿAlı¯ el-Bı¯rgı¯vı¯, a theologian of the 16th century. See Ka¯tib ˙¯ n, 1074; Oleg F. Akimushkin, “On the Date of Al-Sıha¯hu’l -‘Ajamiyya’s Çelebi, Kes¸fü’z-Zünu ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙Manuscripts ReComposition,” Manuscripta Orientalia: International Journal for Oriental search 3, no. 2. (1997): 31–32; I˙smail Aka, “Hindüs¸ah es-Sa¯hibı¯,” Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı ˙Islâm Ansiklopedisi 18 (1998): 116–17. As mentions Turan, Muhammed bin Pı¯rʿAlı¯ el-Bı¯rgı¯vı¯ used Siha¯hu l-ʿAjam and prepared simplified versions of the ˙work, which he used as textbooks ˙ ˙ ˙ his classes, and his name appeared as an original author of the work on various copies. during See Fikret Turan, “Adventures of a Mediaeval Language Book into Modern Times: Persistence of Sıha¯hu’l -‘Ajam in Ottoman Language Learning and its Textual Problems,” in Turcology ˙ ˙ and˙ Linguistics: Éva Ágnes Csató Festschrift, eds. Nurettin Demir et al. (Ankara: Hacettepe Üniversitesi, 2014), 444; Öz, Tarih Boyunca, 110–11. In our opinion, Niʿmetulla¯h writes about these two versions calling them “old” and “new” without mentioning the names of the authors. 75 Baevskii, Early Persian Lexicography, 60. 76 Ahmed Ni’metu’llâh, Lügat-i Ni’metu’llah, 115, 153, 347. 77 Öz, Tuhfe-i S¸âhidî S¸erhleri, 5,9; Öztahtalı, Lâmî Çelebi ve Lügat-i Manzumu, 35. 78 Tijana Krstic´, Contested Conversions to Islam. Narratives of Religious Change in the Early Modern Ottoman Empire (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2011), 38.

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Okıdum evvela¯ Tuhfe-i Hüsa¯mı ˙ ˙ ˙ Muʿattar old’anuñla can mes¸a¯mı ˙˙ Dahı manzu¯m okıtdı çok lüg˙a¯ti ˙ ˙ ˙ ˘ ˙Içürdi tabʿıma a¯b-ı haya¯tı ˙ ˙ S¸u resme oldum lüg˙atʿilminde ma¯hir Lüg˙at kim bilmesem oldı na¯dir.79 “I have first read the Tuhfe-i Hüsa¯m ˙ ˙ The smell of the soul was perfumed by this He made me read more dictionaries in verse He made my nature drink the water of life This way I became skillful in lexicology. A dictionary that I did know was rare.”80 Diledüm ki yazam bir hos¸ça na¯me ˘ Naz¯ıre ola ol Tuhfe-Hüsa¯ma ˙ ˙ ˙ “It was my desire that I would write a nice piece of work In imitation of Hüsa¯m’s Tuhfe.”81 ˙ ˙ Ne deñlü var ise anda ceva¯hir Getürdüm bunda illa¯ k’ola na¯dir Kodum anları k’istiʿma¯li yokdur ˙ ˙ Velı¯ olmayan anda bunda çokdur.82 ˙ “No matter how many jewels there may be over there I have brought them hither because they are rare indeed. I have left out those that are not in use But there are also many here which are not there.”83

Thus, mapping the attestations stored in these texts we plainly conceive that Persian lexicographic traditions and inspirations were inherently adopted, appropriated, referenced by the Ottoman authors-lexicographers and transformed also to later counterparts in the Ottoman realm and beyond across longue durée.

79 80 81 82 83

Tuhfe-i S¸a¯hidı¯, Ms. 1229/1, f.002r. ˙ Translation by Verburg, “The Tuhfe-i S¸a¯hidı¯,” 15. Verburg, “The Tuhfe-i S¸a¯hidı¯,” 15.˙ Tuhfe-i S¸a¯hidı¯, Ms.˙ 1229/1, f.002v. ˙ Verburg, “The Tuhfe-i S¸a¯hidı¯,” 16. ˙

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Educational and societal contexts and motivation of transmission of Persian language

Prior to mapping impetus and incentives for the consumption of the texts, first of all we should have focused attention on the educational background, social ranking and networks of the authors. It is therefore not easy to determine the “nation” and “national language” of the multilingual authors and as Andrews outlines, there exist “not isomorphic territorial and linguistic boundaries… when culture, language and political domination are not remotely co-terminus.”84 In this regard, in order to map out the authors’ career pathways, we should refer to biographical data, the introductions of the texts, which could provide us with a glimpse to draw not only the authors’ family networks with Iran (Halı¯mı¯, ˙ Kema¯lpas¸aza¯de) and different passageways for learning Persian in the Ottoman environment and abroad, but also their interrelations with members of different social groups. These factors could also help us trace connections across the ‘centers’ of Persian learning (home-grown, domestic, (in)formal educational centers or institutions abroad), and to portray the vibrant roadmap of knowledge mobility from the epicenter and to have a close look at the transfer process of knowledge about Persian language and literature in a longue durée. Ottoman interest in Persian language and literature, as we mentioned above, is predominantly propagated by the Ottoman court, which highly encouraged intellectuals to implement intercultural projects in the mid-15th and 16th centuries. Here we should draw attention to the interrelations of the authors with Ottoman ruling elites and refer to a great number of authors who had positions in imperial service and were closely linked with the court. Moreover, we should mention the fact that the (re)producers of knowledge could, to a large extent, captivate the attention of the sultans or high-ranking bureaucrats via seeking their input and then explicitly dedicating their works to them.85 In this regard, we can emphasize the judge (ka¯d¯ı), accomplished lexicographer and literary theorist Halı¯mı¯, who ˙ ˙ ˙ traveled to Iran, improved his Persian and acquired proper knowledge about Islamic jurisprudence and mysticism. He was a protégé of Mahmud Pasha, a tutor to Prince Mehmed, the future Sultan Mehmed the Conqueror (r. 1451–81), ˙ ˙ and held a position as a teacher also for Prince Ba¯yezı¯d, the governor of Amasya, to whom he dedicated his dictionary Nisa¯rü l-mülk.86 ¯ 84 Andrews, “Starting Over Again,” 33. 85 Holbrook, “Concealed Facts,” 86–87. 86 Süreyya Mehmed, Sicill-i Osmanî, ed. Nuri Akbayar, vol. 2 (I˙stanbul: Tarih Vakfı Yurt Yayınları 30, 1996), 241 (588); Tahsin Yazici, “Halimi, Lotf-Alla¯h,” Encyclopædia Iranica, ed. ˙ Persia Press, 2003): 588–89; I˙nan, Ehsan Yarshater, vol. XI, Fasc. 6 (New York, NY:˙ Bibliotheka “Imperial Ambitions, Mystical Aspirations,” 82.

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“… wa ¯ın dara¯rı¯-i durar-i darı¯ ra¯ ba-su¯rat-i nazm-u nasr nisa¯r-i darga¯h-iʿa¯lam-pana¯h-i ¯ ¯ ˙ ˙ shahza¯da-i jawa¯n-bakht … al-sulta¯n ibnil-sulta¯n sulta¯n Ba¯yazı¯d ibn Muhammad Kha¯n ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ khalladulla¯hu sulta¯nahuma¯ wa awz˙ahaʿalal-ʿa¯lamı¯n burha¯nahuma¯ [kardam]87 wa ism˙ 88 ˙ 89 i ¯ın durar-i darı¯ [Nitha¯rul-mulk] niha¯da shud.” Trans.: …and these bright stars of Dari pearls in the form of verse and prose I devoted to the world-protecting court of the young fortunate Prince… the Sultan, the Son of Sultan, Sultan Ba¯yazı¯d, son of Muhammad Kha¯n, may God make their Rules everlasting ˙ and may he make visible their justification on both worlds and the name of these Dari pearls was put (called) [Nisa¯rü l-mülk]. ¯

The prominent scholar of the time, Kema¯lpas¸aza¯de, who had Iranian roots from his mother’s side, took his first steps in Adrianople (Edirne), where he obtained knowledge from highly regarded teachers and continued as a müderris, ka¯d¯ı of ˙ ˙ Edirne, ka¯d¯ıʿasker of Anatolia and later became Sheikhü l-Islam, the position he ˙ ˙ held until his death.90 His over two hundred works compiled in Arabic, Persian and Ottoman Turkish attest to his diverse research interests, which included linguistics, lexicography, history, law and theology.91 Among his theological works of great interest are treatises (risa¯le) written against kızılbas¸ (“red˙ head”),92 in which Kema¯lpas¸aza¯de attempted to prove the legality of Holy War against Shiites.93 Parallelly, we should state his great love for Persian language and literature, the propagation of which is diffused throughout his philological and literary works. Mapping his pedagogical pathway, we should also bring attention to his disciples for whom he paved the way to become attendants (müla¯zım), teachers of medreses, translators of Persian works into Ottoman Turkish, ka¯d¯ıs ˙ ˙ and muftis, etc.94 87 Dabı¯r Siyaqı¯ added kardam in the transcription part of the text, which is lacking in the copies I have consulted. See Dabı¯r Siyaqı¯, Fahangha¯-ye Fa¯rsı¯, 270–71. 88 In the Ms. A.1504, there is a space instead of the name of the dictionary, which is missing and we restored it from the text by Dabı¯r Siyaqı¯, 270–71. 89 Nisa¯rü l-mülk, Ms. A.1504, f.102r. ¯ 90 Latîfî, Tezkiretü′s¸-S¸u′arâ ve Tabsıratü′n-Nuzamâ, ed. Rıdvan Canım (Ankara: Atatürk Kültür Merkezi Bas¸kanlıg˘ı, 2000), 159–62; Ta¯hir Mehmed Bursalı, ʿOsma¯nlı Müʾellifleri (I˙stanbul: ¯ ˙ ¯ mire, 1333 (1915)), 223; ˙see also Victor L. Ménage, “Kema¯l Pas̲h̲a-Za¯de,” in EI2, Matbaʿa-i ʿA ˙ ed. Peri Bearman et al. (Leiden: Brill, 2012). 91 See the list of Kema¯lpas¸aza¯de’s works, Nihal Atsız, “Kemalpas¸aog˘lu’nun Eserleri,” S¸arkiyat Mecmuası 6 (1966): 73; Robert Brunschvig, “Kemâl Pâshâzâde et le persan,” Mélanges d’orientalisme offerts a Henri Massé (1963): 50. 92 On kızılbas¸ see more Roger M. Savory, “K˚izi˚l-Bas̲h̲,” in EI2, ed. Peri Bearman et al. (Leiden: ˙ ˙ 2012). Brill, ˙ 93 Halil Inalcik, The Ottoman Empire. The Classical Age 1300–1600 (London: Phoenix, 1995), 174; see also Adel Allouche, The Origins and Development of the Ottoman-Safavid Conflict ˙ (906–962/1500–1555) (Berlin: Klaus Schwarz Verlag, 1983), 111. 94 Mustafa Kılıç, “Kemal Pas¸a-Zâdenin (I˙bn Kemal) Talebeleri,” Belleten 58, no. 221 (1994): 55– 70; Kaya S¸ahin, Empire and the Power in the Reign of Süleyman. Narrating the SixteenthCentury Ottoman World (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013), 22; Douglas A.

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Indeed, Kema¯lpas¸aza¯de was integrated in Ottoman elite circles and his knowledge was highly appreciated by the Ottoman elite members, especially by Grand Vizier I˙bra¯hı¯m Pasha (d.1536), to whom he dedicated his glossary: “…Meclis-i safa¯-efza¯-yı A¯saf-a¯ra¯y-ı haz˙ret-i ˙Ibra¯hı¯m Pas¸aya ki sa¯hib-dı¯va¯n-ı Süleyma¯n˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ı zama¯ndur, tuhfe itmege la¯yı¯k gördüm.”95 ˙ ˙ Trans.: …I found it worthy to gift it to the joyous Asaph-adourned seat of his Majesty I˙bra¯hı¯m Pasha, the owner of the divan of Süleyma¯n of the time.

Indeed, the aim of dedicating their works to rulers or high-ranking persons was not only to bring the author himself to court circles’ notice and increase social status, but also to promote (re)production and consumption of the texts throughout the Ottoman realm and beyond. One of the questions addressed here is whether Kema¯lpas¸aza¯de’s educational background, social rank, links, and the references of his counterparts could lead us to consider him an “expert of knowledge”96 of the period. Accordingly, we could refer to Kema¯lpas¸aza¯de’s expertise in knowledge production that was explicitly appreciated and praised by counterparts of the period and by later generations: Ahmed b. Hız˙ıru l-Üskübı¯ who organized Kema¯lpas¸aza¯de’s glossary ˙ ˙ according to alphabetical order,97 and Niʿmetulla¯h, who, according to Blau, compiled his work according to the advice of Kema¯lpas¸aza¯de etc.98 Although in the introduction part, Niʿmetulla¯h does not mention the name of Kema¯lpas¸aza¯de, in the subsequent parts of the dictionary while examining the lemma previously analyzed by Kema¯lpas¸aza¯de, he refers to him as ‘ferı¯d-i ʿasr Ke˙ ma¯lpas¸aza¯de’ (Kema¯lpas¸aza¯de, a unique [person] of the period”).99 In this respect, we can see how Niʿmetulla¯h explicitly duplicates and transmits Kema¯lpas¸aza¯de’s explanations of the word entries gently beginning with “…böyle buyurur ve eydür ki…” (“he shows in this way and says…”), “… s¸öyle tahk¯ık ˙˙ ˙ eylemis¸ ki…” (“he investigated in that manner”), or “…fark itmis¸dür…” (“he ˙ 100 realized or made a difference) expressions, etc.

95 96 97 98 99 100

Howard, A History of the Ottoman Empire. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017), 111. Daka¯yiku l-haka¯yik, Ms. Bag˘datlı Vehbi 1975, f.024r. ˙ ˙Hitzler, ˙ ˙ “Wissen ˙ Ronald und Wesen des Experten. Ein Annäherungsversuch zur Einleitung,” in Expertenwissen. Die institutionalisierte Kompetenz zur Konstruktion von Wirklichkeit, eds. Ronald Hitzler et al. (Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag, 1994), 13–30. Öz, Tarih Boyunca, 160; Flügel, Die arabischen, persischen und türkischen Handschriften der Kaiserlich-Königlichen Hofbibliothek zu Wien, vol. 1,131. Blau,“Ueber Niʿmatullah’s persisch-türkisches Wörterbuch,” 486; Evgeniı˘ E. Berthels, “Niʿmat Alla¯h b. Ahmad,” in EI2, ed. Peri Bearman et al. (Leiden: Brill, 2012). ˙ Lügat-i Ni’metu’llah, 9. Ahmed Ni’metu’llâh, Ahmed Ni’metu’llâh, Lügat-i Ni’metu’llah, 99–100, 144, 199, 243, 426, 468.

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This highly recommended language was extremely prestigious not only at the court or princely residencies, but also in Sufi communities. It is not a secret that big cities may have more than dozen lodges that would have libraries which, as Kim outlined, would include grammatical treatises and dictionaries among hagiographies.101 Moreover, the propagation of Persian as a ‘liturgical language’ of Sufi orders, in particular Mevlevı¯102 and Nak¸sibendı¯,103 attracted audiences and ˙ highly enhanced the circle of providers and recipients of knowledge in the examined period.104 The association with Sufi lodges, which we briefly mentioned above in the presentation of the codices, could motivate future authors to obtain knowledge of the Persian language and literature and paved their way to become preeminent figures or ‘experts of knowledge’. This phenomenon appears clearly when we refer to biographical details provided in Güls¸en-i Esra¯r (Garden of Secrets) written by S¸a¯hidı¯: First he attained home-grown education from his father Hüda¯yı¯ Dede.105 After his father’s death he continued his studies abroad ˘ (Iran and Arabic lands) and, returning to Mug˘la, became a student of the prominent Mevla¯na¯ S¸eyhs Hayreddı¯n, Bedreddı¯n and then mostly followed ˘ ˘ Mehmed Çelebi106 pursuing parallelly a pedagogical career, which also was a great ˙ impetus to compile his dictionary created especially for children. This dictionary became a model for later lexicographers, enjoyed popularity, was spread in wide geographical areas as a popular genre, and had more than thirty commentaries and translations into different languages.107 Likewise, we can emphasize the biographical data of Niʿmetulla¯h, an enameler from Sofia, who moved to Istanbul and, following the Nak¸sibendı¯ order, acquired ˙ knowledge of the Persian language and was engaged in philological works, being also a collector of books and curiosities.108 In addition, we can refer to La¯miʿı¯ Çelebi, son of ʿOsma¯n Çelebi, the defterda¯r of Sultan Ba¯yezı¯d II (r. 1481–1512), ¯ who learned Arabic and Persian, obtained medrese education from accomplished 101 Sooyong Kim, “Minding the Shop: Zati and the Making of Ottoman Poetry in the First Half of the Sixteenth Century” (PhD diss., University of Chicago, 2005), 76. 102 Holbrook, “Concealed Facts,” 87; I˙nan, “Imperial Ambitions, Mystical Aspirations,” 77. 103 Michael Winter, “Egyptian and Syrian Sufis Viewing Ottoman Turkish Sufism: Similarities, Differences and Interactions,” in The Ottoman Middle East. Studies in Honor of Amnon Cohen, eds. Ginio Eyal and Podeh Elie, vol. 55 (Leiden: Brill, 2014), 100; Dina Le Gall, A Culture of Sufism: Naqshbandı¯s in the Ottoman World 1450–1700 (Albany, NY: State University of New York, 2005), 92, 172–73. 104 Dina Le Gall, A Culture of Sufism, 76. 105 Öz outlines that S¸a¯hidı¯’s father taught him Persian using Tuhfe-i Hüsa¯mı¯, which S¸a¯hidı¯ learned by heart and mentioned in his dictionary. Öz, Tuhfe-i S¸˙ âhidî˙ S¸erhleri, 23. 106 See Nuri S¸ims¸ekler,“S¸âhidî I˙brâhîm Dede’nin Güls¸en-i Esrâr’ı: Tenkitli metin-tahlil (PhD diss., Selçuk University, Konya, 1998), 14–40; see also Ahmet H. I˙mamog˘lu, “Farsça-Türkçe Manzum Sözlükler ve S¸ahidi’nin Sözlüg˘ü (I˙nceleme-Metin)”, 13–27. 107 See Öz, Tuhfe-i S¸âhidî S¸erhleri. 108 Storey, Persian Literature, 70.

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molla¯s, and then followed his spiritual guide, one of the prominent figures of the Nak¸sibendı¯ order, who played a pivotal role in his further career.109 The name of ˙ Mahmu¯d bin Edhem, the author of the dictionary Mifta¯hu l-lüg˙at is also linked to ˙ ˙ the Nak¸sibendı¯ order. ˙ It is not a secret that Sufi mystics were highly respected by Ottoman sultans and that the patronage also played a big role in promoting and diffusing their knowledge.110 In the case of the authors-representatives of Sufi orders, we can outline that the traditional and core structure of the introduction of rhyming dictionaries was limited to the words addressing God and did not mention the name of their Maecenas. To some extent, we could refer to biographical data of the authors or their other works where we could find references to their patrons. In this respect, we can mention La¯miʿı¯ Çelebi whose works attracted Sultan Selı¯m I, Sultan Süleyma¯n the Magnificient, and especially Grand Vizier I˙bra¯hı¯m Pasha, to whom as an act of gratitude the author dedicated some mesnevı¯s.111 ¯ Delineating briefly the educational background of the actors of knowledge 112 interwoven with Iran and Ottoman “centers of knowledge”, their societal links and relationships to the authorative dominant institutions and centers of power, we could attest that these aspects predominantly were considered an integral way to encourage the flow of Persian knowledge. Another question linked to the providers of knowledge, which is also under scrutiny in this paper, is to understand the impetus, purposes and motivations stored in the introduction parts of the glossaries and commentaries. Classifying the main incentives, we will explicate two main reasons for compiling the texts: (1) In the examined corpus of dictionaries, a broad range of authors in the introduction parts use idiosyncratic phrases stressing the privileges and prevalence of Persian knowledge, the main imperative of which is to assist the recipients to read and understand great poems and treatises written in Persian. For instance, Halı¯mı¯ in the prefaces of his dictionaries addressed the main motiva˙ tions for the extension of his previously composed dictionary Bahru l- g˙ara¯yib as ˙ follows: “…çun bahr-i z˙abt-i zaba¯n-i mala¯hat kita¯b-i ja¯miʿ-u pur-lita¯fat bar rishta-i niza¯m ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ kashı¯da bu¯dam wa ba-anwa¯ʿ-i qawa¯nı¯n-u lata¯ʾif a¯ra¯yı¯da wa ba-na¯m-i bahrul- g˙ara¯yib ˙ ˙ ishtiha¯r da¯shta wa har kas bar way dastı¯ afra¯shta amma¯ dar mushkila¯t-ash mutaraddid gashtand bar su¯-i faqı¯r-u haqı¯r mutaraddid gashtand pas bar hirs-u niya¯z-i ¯ısha¯n ˙ ˙ ˙ raʾfat-ı¯ burdam-u qasd-i towz˙¯ıh-i ¯ın kita¯b kardam… .”113 ˙ ˙ 109 Âs¸ık Çelebi, Mes¸âʿirü’s¸-S¸uʿarâ, ed. Filiz Kılıç (Istanbul: I˙stanbul Aras¸tırmalar Enstitüsü, 2010), 745; Flemming, “La¯miʿı¯”. 110 Kim, “Minding the Shop,” 42. 111 Âs¸ık Çelebi, Mes¸âʿirü’s¸-S¸uʿarâ, 746; Öztahtalı, Lâmî Çelebi ve Lügat-i Manzumu, 27. 112 Peter Burke, What is the History of Knowledge? (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2016), 87. 113 Lüg˙at-i Halı¯mı¯, Ms. 3053, f. 001v. ˙

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Trans.: As I wrote the comprehensive book full of tenderness in order to record the language of elegance and I decorated it with all kinds of rules and delicateness and it was famous under the name of Bahru l- g˙ara¯yib and everyone raised their hands on it [was ˙ interested in this book], but they became doubtful regarding its problems, they came to [me] the humble and poor servant, thus I felt compassion for them and decided to write an interpretation for that book.

or “…zaba¯n-i fa¯rsı¯ ba-fara¯sat-i fa¯risa¯n-i fasa¯hat wa bala¯ghat-i usta¯da¯n-i mala¯hat afsah-i ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ alsina wa amlah-i abniya ast wa a¯n bada¯yiʿ-i fasa¯hat wa sana¯yiʿ-i bara¯ʿat wa dawa¯wı¯n-i ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ kiba¯r wa rasa¯yil-i na¯mda¯r ki ba-dı¯n zaba¯n dar ¯ın zama¯n su¯rat-i tajallı¯ ya¯fta ast dar ˙ hadd-i za¯t-i hı¯ç zaba¯nı¯ maʿlu¯m nı¯st.”114 ¯ ˙ Trans.:… with the sagacity of the cavaliers of eloquence and the comeliness of the masters of elegance, the Persian language is the most eloquent of the languages and the most elegant of the structures, and those novelties of eloquence and the rhetorical figures of excellence, and the divans of great ones and renowned treatises which found the form of brilliancy [which have appeared] in this language at this time are known in the dimension of the substance of no [other] language.

Emphasizing the dominant status of Persian, Mahmu¯d b. Edhem writes about the ˙ main impetus of his work, which is to understand works compiled in Persian and translations implemented from the Arabic language:115 “…Baʿdehu¯ lüg˙at-ı Fürs fa¯risa¯n-i ʿarsa-i fasa¯hat ve muba¯riza¯n-i meyda¯n-ı bela¯g˙at ˙ ˙ ˙ arasında efsah-i lüg˙a¯t ve emlah-ıʿiba¯ra¯t olub ve ekser-i udeba¯ kütüb-i lüg˙a¯t-iʿarabiyyeʾ-i ¯ ˙ ˙ ˙ fa¯rsiyle terceme itdükleri sebebden taʿallüm-i lüg˙at-i Fürs lüg˙at-i ʿArab üzerine mukaddem olub ve deva¯vı¯n-i kiba¯r ve resa¯yı¯l-i na¯mda¯r ekseriyya¯ lüg˙at-i fürsde silk-i nazma ¯ ˙ ˙ geldiyse bu z˙aʿı¯f-i ¸sikeste-ba¯l ve nah¯ıf-i berges¸te-ha¯l lüg˙at-i mezku¯renüñ esa¯lı¯bini te¯ ˙ ˙ tebbuʿ idüb ve meva¯ziʿ-i istiʿma¯lini z˙abt idüb ve lüg˙a¯t-i müteda¯velesini cemʿ idüb Mifta¯hu ˙ ˙ l-lüg˙at ismiyle müsemma¯ kıldı. Va¯hibü l-a¯ma¯l ve-l-ema¯nı¯dan mesʾu¯l ve mutaz˙arriʿ oldur ˙ 116 ki bu lüg˙at dahı sa¯yir lüg˙a¯t-i müdevvene gibi müteda¯vil olub…” ˘ Trans.: After the Persian language has been formulated as the most eloquent language among oratory and as the most beautiful language of speech and as well – educated people translated books from Arabic into Persian, learning the Persian language is [becomes] preferable to the Arabic language and as the majority of the elegant Divans and famous treatises, series of verses are compiled in Persian. I pursued the above mentioned dictionary with difficulties and covered the common topics and collected with great efforts and called Mifta¯hu l-lüg˙at. It is suppliant from the Granter of our ˙ wishes and demanded purpose, that this dictionary like others collected might be common in use… 114 Nisa¯rü l-mülk, Ms. A.1504, f. 101v. ¯ 115 Several copies exist, the prefaces of which are written or translated into Persian as the autograph’s introduction is in Ottoman Turkish. 116 Mifta¯hu l-lüg˙at, Cod. A. F. 448, ff. 002rv. ˙

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Stating that the most beautiful treatises are compiled in Persian, the authors, especially those who are followers of the Mevlevı¯ order at the same time, emphasize the main incentive of the work, which is teaching Persian parallel with metric schemes, as well as to help novices with these works to have access to the ‘knowledge of Mevla¯na¯’ (ʿilm-i Mevla¯na¯). This phenomenon is widely attested in Tuhfe-i S¸a¯hidı¯: ˙ Yak¯ın bildüm ki bir nev-reste maʿsu¯m ˙ ˙ Lüg˙atlar okıya vezn ile manzu¯m ˙ ˙ Aña¯ herʿilm olur elbette a¯sa¯n Olurʿa¯lemde bir merd-i suhenda¯n.117 ˘ “I became convinced that for an innocent little child who reads dictionaries with rhythm and meter every science will certainly be easy; he becomes an eloquent man in this world”.118

Mura¯dım bu ki Tuhfem bula ¸söhret ˙ K’ola evza¯n ile etfa¯la kudret ˙ ˙ ˙Ideler Fürs ile evza ¯ nı ha¯sıl ˙ ˙ Olalarʿilm-i Mevla¯na¯ya ka¯bil ˙ Zihı¯ ʿizzet zihı¯ devlet saʿa¯det Anuñ k’and’ola buʿilme liya¯kat.119 ˙ “It is my wish that my Tuhfe will become famous That through its meter it will give power to the children In order that together with Persian, they will learn the meters That they will be skillful in the science of Mevla¯na¯. What glory what prosperity and happiness For him who then becomes fit for this science.”120

Kema¯lpas¸aza¯de outlines the eloquency of the Persian language in the introduction part where Persian is considered to be one of the perfect languages selected by the people of Paradise. “…zeba¯n-ı Darı¯de ki reyb [u]ʿaybdan berı¯dür ve cina¯n ehlinüñ ihtiya¯r itdükleri sah¯ıh ve ˙ ˙ ˙ ˘ fas¯ıh lisa¯nlaruñ biridür, bu risa¯le-i rengı¯n-küla¯le ve ¸s¯ırı¯n-maka¯leyi tertı¯b kıldum. Es¸ca¯r-ı ˙˙ ˙ ˙ es¸ʿa¯rda olan ezha¯r-ı esra¯rı izha¯r ile ol lisa¯n-ı ru¯¸sen-beya¯nuñ güls¸en-i pür-safa¯sınuñ ˙ ˙ tema¯¸sa¯sına ebna¯-yı zama¯nı terg˙¯ıb kıldum…”121 ˙ Trans.: … Darı¯ language which is free of doubt and fault, is one of the perfect and eloquent languages chosen by the people of Paradise. [Therefore] I compiled this

117 118 119 120 121

Tuhfe-i S¸a¯hidı¯, Ms. 1229/1, f.002r. ˙ Verburg, “The Tuhfe-i S¸a¯hidı¯,”15. ˙ Tuhfe-i S¸a¯hidı¯, Ms.1229/1, f 002r. ˙ Verburg, “The Tuhfe-i S¸a¯hidı¯,” 16. ˙ , Ms. Bag˘datlı Vehbi 1975, f. 024r. Daka¯yiku l-haka¯yik ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙

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treatise [as] colorful ringlets and charming words. I led the contemporaries to watch the joyful rosegarden of this distinct language by exploring the buds of the secrets on the trees of poetry…

Moreover, while examining the word-entries pa¯rsı¯, darı¯, pahlawı¯, the author quotes the hadith, mentioned in the book entitled Ka¯fı¯ by Ha¯fizu l-Dı¯n-i Nasafı¯, ˙ ˙ who transmitted it from the Hanafite faqı¯h Abu¯ Saʿı¯d Bardaʿı¯ (d. 930): Lisa¯nu 122 ahli l-jannati l-ʿArabiyyatu wa-l-Fa¯risiyyatu l-Dariyya (“The language[s] of the people of paradise are Arabic and Dari Persian [i. e. courtly Persian]”). This hadith in Persian translation was circulated by Persophone scholars (ʿulema¯) during sermons.123 Probably Kema¯lpas¸aza¯de while discussing Persian as an eloquent language of the time, attempted to represent Persian as a sacred language of Islam. Furthermore, Kema¯lpas¸aza¯de’s explanations are similarly referenced by Niʿmetulla¯h while explaining the lemma darı¯.124 (2) The second incentive of the authors for compiling Persian-Turkish dictionaries is to provide access to the Arabic language, which is also stressed by S¸ahin125 and Öz.126 Why are the dictionaries necessary for acquiring knowledge of the Arabic language? Was it the sacred momentum for the authors in order to enhance the motivation of the recipients providing two interwoven incentives? In this respect, we could presumably surmise a lack of Arabic dictionaries in the examined period and, suggesting the means to obtain useful knowledge, the providers of knowledge could gradually solve the main imperatives of the time.127 Moreover, Arabic equivalents, the usages and the attempts of the authors to provide etymological analysis, were intermeshed in the lemmata examination parts. For instance, in Mifta¯hu l-meʿa¯nı¯ the author mainly outlined the im˙ portance of the dictionary as a way to obtain Persian and Arabic knowledge: “…I˙hva¯ndan birisi bir gün ben fak¯ır-i hak¯ırden iltima¯s idüb eydür fuz˙ala¯-yi dehr-i nazm ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˘ u nesr ki kütüb-i lüg˙at cemʿ itmis¸lerdür cümlesin Pa¯rsı¯ diliyle ¸serh itmis¸lerdür. La¯-cerem ¯ ˙ evvel Pa¯rsı¯ dilin bilmek gerek ve baʿd eza¯nʿArabı¯ lüg˙a¯ti bilmek gerek ve çunʿilm-i lüg˙a¯t dükeliʿulu¯muñ kilı¯didür. siz dahı lutf idüb zeba¯n-i fa¯rsı¯den bir nice elfa¯z cemʿ idüb bir ˙ ˘ ˙

122 Daka¯yiku l-haka¯yik, Ms. Bag˘datlı Vehbi 1975, f. 030v; Schmidt, “The Importance of Per˙ 860–61. ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ sian,” 123 Ashirbek Muminov, “Dihqa¯ns and Sacred Families in Central Asia,” in Sayyids and Sharifs in Muslim Societies. The Living Links to the Prophet, ed. Kazuo Morimoto (London: Routledge, 2012), 204. 124 Ahmed Ni’metu’llâh, Lügat-i Ni’metu’llah, 199–200. 125 S¸eyh I˙mam el-Bardah¯ı, Ca¯mi‘ü’l-Fürs, vol. 1–2, ed. H. S¸ahin, in Turkish Sources 65, ed. Cemal ˘ ˘ Kafadar and Gönül Alpay Tekin (Harvard, MA: The Department of New Eastern Languages and Civilizations, 2006), xxvi. 126 Öz, Tarih Boyunca, 49–50. 127 S¸eyh I˙mam el-Bardah¯ı, Ca¯mi‘ü’l-Fürs, xxvi. ˘ ˘

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ya¯diga¯r koyasız. Ol ya¯diga¯r sebebiyle ta¯lib-i ʿilm ve ra¯g˙ib-i maʿrifet olanlar fa¯yda tuta˙ ˙ ˙ lar…”128 Trans.: … One day one of the brothers asking me, the humble servant, said that the superiors of the verse and prose world who collected dictionaries commented completely in Persian language. By all means, (of course) first of all it is essential to know Persian and then the Arabic language and as the knowledge of the dictionary (words) is an important key to [all as] sciences. [And] you should do a favor collecting many words from the Persian language and leave [them] as a souvenir [for later generations]. Let that souvenir in this manner be useful for the students of science and ones who desire knowledge.

On the other hand, the incentive of obtaining knowledge about the Arabic language via Persian becomes vivid when we take into account the important fact that numerous treatises on the main customs and rules of Sufi lodges, especially Mevlevı¯ were in Arabic and that these dictionaries could help the recipients also to have a point of access to knowledge of Arabic.129 In this regard, we could refer to the introduction part of the Vesı¯letü l-meka¯sıd ila¯ ahseni l-mera¯sıd, where the ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ author, highlighting his main purposes, states the following: “… amma¯ baʿd çunı¯n mı¯gu¯yad azʿafuʿiba¯dilla¯hil-qawı¯ Khat¯ıb Rustam al-Mawlawı¯ çun ˙ ˙ Mawlawı¯-za¯dega¯n baʿawn-iʿina¯yat-i yazda¯n hifz-i za¯t130 kardand çuna¯nki har yakı¯ ra¯ ˙ ˙ ¯ ahlulla¯h wa amı¯nulla¯h wa kha¯zin-i kala¯mulla¯h guftan la¯zim a¯yad. pas khwa¯stam az-ı¯n ʿulu¯m bahramand shawand ba tarı¯q-i maslu¯k-i mukhlis¯ın131 ibtida¯ ba lugha¯t-i ta¯zı¯ ˙ ˙ kunand, dı¯dam a¯nha¯ nı¯z ba zaba¯n-i Pa¯rsı¯ a¯sa¯n bimı¯-gardad. ¯ın risa¯la ra¯ az-ı¯n jahat jamʿ kardam wa qawa¯nı¯n-i kulliya¯t-i Furs ra¯ bi-qadril-wusʿ wal-ka¯fa ba nazm a¯wardam ta¯ ˙ ta¯liba¯n ra¯ khu¯b wa ra¯ghiba¯n ra¯ marghu¯b nama¯yad.”132 ˙ Trans.: …But then says the weakest among the servants of the mighty God, Hat¯ıb el˘ ˙ Mevlevı¯ thus: first those who were born from Mevlevı¯ [Mevlevı¯ students] learned the essence by the assistance of the kindness of God so that every one [of them] should be called man of God and trustee of God and guardian of the word of God. Thus, I desired them to benefit from these sciences [and] start [learning] Arabic words in the way of manners of the sincere ones. And I realized that they [words] would become easily via Persian language.133 I compiled this treatise for this reason and I arranged the rules of the collected works of the Persian in [my] capacity and in sufficient measure in order to make the students better and make better those who desire [to learn].

128 129 130 131 132 133

Mifta¯hu l-meʿa¯nı¯, Ms. A. Ötüken 432, f. 001v. ˙ Holbrook, “Concealed Facts,” 85. hifz-i qurʾa¯n (memoration of Koran), Ms. Nurosmaniye 4722, f. 001v, Süleymaniye Library. ˙ba ˙tarı¯q-i sulu¯k-i tahs¯ılı¯ (in the way of manner of learning), Ms. Nurosmaniye 4722, f. 001v. ˙¯letü l-maka¯sıd ila ˙ ˙¯ ahseni l-mera¯sıd, Ms. As¸ir Ef. 389, ff. 001v–002r. Vesı ˙ ˙ could˙be translated ˙ as “And I realized that they [words] are also easily Or, this sentence translatable to Persian language”.

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Thus, dwelling on the main purposes of the authors led us to argue that these knowledge reservoirs compiled especially in early periods were addressed to disciples not only to appropriate Persian language and literature, but also in a direct or indirect way were presented as an important way of obtaining knowledge of Arabic and paving a way to the key ofʿilm.

Concluding remarks The selected copies of works (re)produced by the providers of knowledge discussed above are most crucial in shedding light on the main trajectories of dissemination of Persian learning across the Ottoman environment. The evidence of widespread consumption of the Persian-Turkish dictionaries not only nuanced our understanding on qua influence of Persian and its crucial role from the 15th and 16th centuries onward, but also leads us to portray the route of flow of knowledge through time and space from a Transottoman perspective. In fact, these knowledge reservoirs profoundly accumulate erudite engagements of the agents of knowledge, which is especially visible in the references to previous works, attesting their views that they provide into the knowledge and scholarship mainly produced in Central Asia and Iran in earlier periods. It is most important to emphasize that diffusion and appropriation of the previous knowledge were merely in unaltered form in early sources (especially in Halı¯mı¯’s works), but ˙ gradual change and explicit critical nuances appeared in the texts written in later periods. Another takeaway of the (re)production and diffusion of Persian knowledge through the formal and vocational educational institutions or centres is the conducive climate that was created in a sense of productive communication between the agents of Persian knowledge and the patrons, ranging from Ottoman sultans and princes to other representative members of the court coterie. Focusing mainly on the indirect spread of knowledge, which was the key agenda for our research, we also attempted to classify the main incentives of the authors. Moreover, we showed attempts to negotiate the links between the providers and patrons in the introduction parts of the dictionaries stressing the nuances of the sponsorship for the reception of Persian knowledge. Indeed, we could argue that the motivation to learn and understand the Arabic language via Persian learning, which we could observe especially in the works of the early periods, gradually altered since the end of the 15th century and beginning of the 16th century when the propagation of Persian as the most eloquent language and even a sacred language of Islam gained importance. Arguably, this paper builds a basis especially for thinking about the transmissibility of knowledge by evaluating this movement or rather transfer in a new form, and awaits further studies to also include other, no less important, reservoirs of the examined period.

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Figure 1: Cod. A. F. 448, Mifta¯hu l-lüg˙at, ff. 001v–002r, Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, cf. ˙ http://data.onb.ac.at/rep/10002F6F.

Figure 2: Ms. 3053 , Lüg˙at-i Halı¯mı¯, ff. 001v–002r , (Date of transcription 1495), The Ghazi Husrev˙ and Herzegovina. beg Library, Sarajevo, Bosnia

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Bibliography Primary sources Daka¯yiku l-haka¯yik, Ms. Bag˙datlı Vehbi 1975, ff.023v–147r, (dated H. 959), Süleymaniye ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ Library, Istanbul, Turkey. Lüg˙at-i Halı¯mı¯, Ms. 3053, Vol. 7 (dated H. 900), Ghazi Husrev-beg Library, Sarajevo, Bosnia ˙ and Herzegovina. Lüg˙at-i manzu¯me, Ms. As¸ir Ef. 322 (dated H. 980), Süleymaniye Library, Istanbul, Turkey. ˙ Lüg˙at-i Niʿmetulla¯h, Ms. A. 452 (dated H. 947), Türk Dil Kurumu Library, Ankara, Turkey. Mifta¯hu l-lüg˙at, Cod. A. F. 448, ff.001v–076r (dated H. 896), Österreichische National˙ bibliothek, Vienna, Austria. Mifta¯hu l-lüg˙at, Ms. Karaçelebizade 341 (dated H. 897), Süleymaniye Library, Istanbul, ˙ Turkey. Mifta¯hu l-meʿa¯nı¯, Ms. A. Ötüken 432, Milli Kütüphane[National Library of Turkey], An˙ kara, Turkey. Nisa¯rü l-mülk, Ms. A.1504 (dated H.1236), Milli Kütüphane [National Library of Turkey], ¯ Ankara, Turkey. Tuhfe-i S¸a¯hidı¯, Ms. 1229/1 (dated H. 994), Ghazi Husrev-beg Library, Sarajevo, Bosnia and ˙ Herzegovina. Vesı¯letü l-meka¯sıd ila¯ ahseni l-mera¯sıd, Ms. As¸ir Ef. 389 (dated H.903), Süleymaniye ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ Library, Istanbul, Turkey. Vesı¯letü l-meka¯sıd ila¯ ahseni l-mera¯sıd, Ms. Nurosmaniye 4722, Süleymaniye Library, ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ Istanbul, Turkey.

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Dabı¯r Sı¯ya¯qı¯, Muhammad. Farhangha¯-ye Fa¯rsı¯ be Fa¯rsı¯ va Fa¯rsı¯ be Zaba¯nha¯-ye Dı¯gar, ˙ Farhangha¯-ye Mowz˙u¯ʿı¯ va Gu¯yeshha¯-ye Mahallı¯ va Farhang-gu¯neha¯, 2nd ed. Teheran: ˙ ¯ Ara¯ʿ,1376 [1997]. Darling, T. Linda. “Ottoman Turkish: Written Language and Scribal Practice Thirteenth to Twentieth Centuries.” In Literacy in the Persianate World: Writing and Social Order, edited by Brain Spooner and William L. Hanaway, 171–96. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania, 2012. Deny, Jean. “L’osmanli Moderne et le Türk de Turquie,” Philologiae Turcicae Fundamenta 1 (1959): 182–239. Ergin, Osman. Türk Maarif tarihi. Vols. 1–2. I˙stanbul: Eser Matbaası, 1977. Faroqhi, Suraiya. Subjects of the Sultan: Culture and Daily Life in the Ottoman Empire. London: Tauris Publishers, 2000. Ferguson, L. Heather. The Proper Order of Things: Language, Power, and Law in Ottoman Administrative Discourses. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2018. Fleischer, H. Cornell. Bureaucrat and Intellectual in the Ottoman Empire. The Historian Mustafa Âli (1541–1600). Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1986. Flemming, Barbara. “La¯miʿı¯.” In Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed., edited by Peri Bearman, Thierry Bianquis, Clifford Edmund Bosworth, Emeri J. van Donzel, and Wolfhart P. Heinrichs. Leiden: Brill, 2012. Accessed June 14, 2019. http://dx.doi.org/10.1163/15733912_islam_SIM_4635. Flügel, Gustav. Die arabischen, persischen und türkischen Handschriften der KaiserlichKöniglichen Hofbibliothek zu Wien. Vol. 1. Vienna: K. K. Hof- und Staatsdruckerei, 1865. Fragner, G. Bert. Die “Persophonie.” Regionalität, Identität und Sprachkontakt in der Geschichte Asiens. Berlin: Anor, 1999. Golden, B. Peter. “Turks and Iranians: An Historical Sketch.” In Turkic-Iranian Contact Areas Historical and Linguistic Aspects, edited by Lars Johanson and Christiane Bulut, 17–38. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2006. Gölpınarlı, Abdülbaki. Mevlânâdan sonra Mevlevîlik. I˙stanbul: GÜL Matbaası,1983. Green, Nile. “Introduction: The Frontiers of the Persianate World (ca. 800–1900)”. In The Persianate World: The Frontiers of a Eurasian Lingua Franca, edited by Nile Green, 1– 71. Oakland, CA: University of California Press, 2019. Grunert, Frank, and Anette Syndikus. “Einleitung.” In Wissensspeicher der Frühen Neuzeit: Formen und Funktionen, edited by Frank Grunert and Anette Syndikus, vii-3. Berlin: De Gruyter, 2015. Hagen, Gottfried. “Translations and Translators in a Multilingual Society: A Case Study of Persian-Ottoman Translations, Late Fifteenth to Early Seventeenth Century,” Eurasian Studies 2, no. 1 (2003): 95–134. Hillenbrand, Carole. “Ra¯vandı¯, the Seljuk Court at Konya and the Persinisation of Anatolian Cities,” Mésogeios 25–26 (2005): 157–69. Hitzler, Ronald. “Wissen und Wesen des Experten. Ein Annäherungsversuch zur Einleitung.” In Expertenwissen. Die institutionalisierte Kompetenz zur Konstruktion von Wirklichkeit. Edited by Ronald Hitzler, Anne Honer, and Christoph Maeder, 13–30. Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag, 1994.

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Hodgson, Marshall G. S. The Venture of Islam. Conscience and History in a World Civilization. Vol. 2, The Expansion of Islam in the Middle Periods. Chicago, ILL: The University of Chicago Press, 1974. Holbrook, Victoria R. “Concealed Facts, Translation and the Turkish Literary Past.” In Translations: (Re)shaping of Literature and Culture. Edited by Saliha Paker, 77–107. Istanbul: Bog˘aziçi University Press, 2002. Howard, A. Douglas. A History of the Ottoman Empire. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017. Hyde, Thomas. Historia religionis veterum Persarum eorumque magorum [History of the religion of the ancient Persians and their priests]. Oxonii [Oxford]: E Theatro Sheldoniano 1700. I˙mamog˘lu, H. Ahmet. “Farsça-Türkçe Manzum Sözlükler ve S¸ahidi’nin Sözlüg˘ü (I˙ncelemeMetin).” PhD diss., Atatürk University, Erzurum, 1993. I˙nalcik, Halil. The Ottoman Empire. The Classical Age 1300–1600. London: Phoenix, 1995. I˙nan, Murat Umut. “Imperial Ambitions, Mystical Aspirations. Persian Learning in the Ottoman World.” In The Persianate World. The Frontiers of a Eurasian Lingua Franca. Edited by Nile Green, 75–92. Oakland, CA: University of California Press, 2019. Karaca, Abdullah. “Kemal Pas¸azâdenin Dekâyıku’l-Hakâyık’ı (Metin-I˙ndeks).” M. A. thesis, Kırıkkale University, 2002. Kılıç, Hulûsi. “Tâcü’l-Luga, I˙smail b. Hammâd el Cevherî’nin (ö. 400/1009 dan önce) Arapça Sözlüg˘ü,” Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı ˙Islâm Ansiklopedisi 39 (2010): 356–57. Kılıç, Mustafa. “Kemal Pas¸a-Zâdenin (I˙bn Kemal) Talebeleri,” Belleten 58, no. 221 (1994): 55–70. Kim, Sooyong, “Minding the Shop: Zati and the Making of Ottoman Poetry in the First Half of the Sixteenth Century.” PhD diss., University of Chicago, 2005. Kirakosyan, Hasmik, and Sargsyan, Ani. “The Educational Role of the Late Medieval Persian-Ottoman Turkish Bilingual Dictionaries. The Codices of the Matenadaran,” Turkic Languages 22, no. 2 (2018): 167–75. –. “On the Appropriation of the Lexicographic Methods of Kema¯lpas¸aza¯de’s (1468–1534) Glossary Daka¯yiku l-haka¯yik”, Diyâr, 2 Jg., 1 (2021): 14–26. ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ Krstic´, Tijana. Contested Conversions to Islam. Narratives of Religious Change in the Early Modern Ottoman Empire. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2011. –. “Of Translation and Empire. Sixteenth-Century Ottoman Imperial Interpreters as Renaissance Go Betweens.” In The Ottoman World. Edited by Christine Woodhead, 130–42. London: Routledge, 2012. Kuru, S. Selim. “The Literature of Rum: The Making of a Literacy Tradition (1450–1600).” In Cambridge History of Turkey. Vol 2. Edited by Suraiya N. Faroqhi and Kate Fleet, 548– 92. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013. Lagarde, de Paul. Persische Studien. Göttingen: Dieterische Verlags-Buchhandlung, 1884. Le Gall, Dina. A Culture of Sufism. Naqqshbandı¯s in the Ottoman World, 1450–1700. Albany, NY: State University of New York, 2005. Levend, Agâh Sırrı. Türk Dilinde Gelis¸me ve Sadeles¸me Evreleri. Ankara: Türk Tarih Kurumu Basımevi, 1960. Marcus, E. George. “Ethnography in/of the World System: The Emergence of Multi-Sited Ethnography,” Annual Review of Anthropology 24 (1995): 95–117.

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Ménage, L. Victor. “Kema¯l Pas̲h̲a-Za¯de.” In Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed.. Edited by Peri Bearman, Thierry Bianquis, Clifford Edmund Bosworth, Emeri J. van Donzel, and Wolfhart P. Heinrichs (Leiden: Brill, 2012). Accessed June 17, 2019. http://dx.doi.org /10.1163/1573-3912_islam_COM_0480. Muminov, Ashirbek. “Dihqa¯ns and Sacred Families in Central Asia.” In Sayyids and Sharifs in Muslim Societies. The Living Links to the Prophet. Edited by Kazuo Morimoto, 198– 209. London: Routledge, 2012. Östling, Johan, David Larsson Heideinblad, Erling Sandmo, Anna Nilsson Hammar, and Kari H. Nordberg. “The History of Knowledge and Circulation of Knowledge: An Introduction.” In Circulation of Knowledge. Explorations in the History of Knowledge. Edited by Johan Östling, Erling Sandmo, David Larsson Heideinblad, Anna Nilsson Hammar, and Kari H. Nordberg, 9–33. Lund: Nordic Academic Press, 2018. Öz, Yusuf. Tarih Boyunca Farsça-Türkçe Sözlükler. Ankara: Türk Dil Kurumu, 2016. –. Tuhfe-i S¸âhidî S¸erhleri. Konya: Selçuk Üniversitesi Yayını, 1999. Özgüdenli, G. Osman. “Katıb Rostam Dede.” In Encyclopædia Iranica, Vol. 16, Fasc. 2. ¯ ˙ (2013): 123. Accessed June 11, 2019. http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/katib-rostam. Öztahtalı, I˙. I˙mran. Lâmî Çelebi ve Lügat-i Manzumu (Tuhfe-i Lâmi’î). Bursa: Gaye Kitabevi, 2004. Peacock Andrew C. S. “Islamisation in Medieval Anatolia,” in Islamisation: Comparative Perspectives from History, edited by A. C. S. Peacock, 134–55. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2017. –., and Sara Nur Yıldız. “Introduction: Literature, Language and History in Late Medieval Anatolia.” In Islamic Literature and Intellectual Life in Fourteenth- and FifteenthCentury Anatolia. Edited by Andrew C. S. Peacock and Sara Nur Yıldız, 19–45. Würzburg: Ergon-Verlag, 2016. Perry, R. John. “Early Arabic-Persian Lexicography: The Asa¯mı¯ and Masa¯dir Genres.” In ˙ Proceedings of the Colloquium on Arabic lexicography (C.A.L.L.). Edited by Kinga Dévényi, Tamás Iványi, and Avihai Shivtiel, 247–60. Budapest: Eötvös Loránd University Chair for Arabic Studies: Csoma de Ko˝rös Society, 1993. Pistor-Hatam, Anja. “The Art of Translation. Rewriting Persian Texts from the Seljuks to the Ottomans.” In Essays on Ottoman Civilization, Archiv orientální: Supplementa 8. Proceedings of the XIIth Congress of the Comité International d’Études Pré-Ottomanes. Edited by Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, Oriental Institute, 305–16. Prague: Academia Publ. House, 1998. Rieu, Charles. Catalogue of the Persian Manuscripts in the British Museum. Vol. 2. London: British Museum, 1881. Riyâhî, Muhammed Emin. Osmanlı Topraklarında Fars Dili ve Edebiyatı. Translated by Kanar Mehmet. I˙stanbul: I˙nsan Yayınları, 1995. Sa¯deqı¯, ʿAlı¯ Ashraf. “Persian Dictionaries.” In Encyclopædia Iranica. Vol. 7, Fasc. 4. Edited ˙ by Ehsan Yarshater (Costa Mesa, California: Mazda Publishers, 1995), 387–97. Saleman, Carl. “Paul de Lagarde, Persische Studien.” Literatur-Blatt für orientalische Philologie 2 (1884): 74–86. Savory, Roger Mervyn. “K˚izi˚l-Ba¯s̲h̲.” In Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed. Edited by Peri ˙ Bearman, Thierry Bianquis, Clifford Edmund Bosworth, Emeri J. van Donzel, and Wolfhart P. Heinrichs. Leiden: Brill, 2012. Accessed September 17, 2019. http://dx.doi. org/10.1163/1573-3912_islam_SIM_4415.

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Schmidt, Jan. Catalogue of Turkish Manuscripts in the Library of Leiden University and other Collections in the Netherlands. Vol. 3. Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2012. –. “The Importance of Persian for Ottoman Literary Gentlemen: Two Turkish Treatises on Aspects of the Language of Kemalpashazade (d. 1536).” In Kitaplara vakfedilen bir ömre tuhfe. ˙Ismail E. Erünsala Armag˘an 2. Edebiyat ve Tasavvuf Kütüphanecilik ve Ars¸ivcilik. Edited by Hatice Aynur, Bilgin Aydın, and Mustafa Birol Ülker, 851–64. Istanbul: Ülke, 2014. Secord, A. James. “Knowledge in Transit.” Isis, The History of Science Society 95, no. 4 (2004): 655–72. Spooner, Brian, and William L. Hanaway. “Introduction: Persian as Koine: Written Persian in World-Historical Perspective.” In Literacy in the Persianate World: Writing and the Social Order. Edited by Brian Spooner and William L. Hanaway, 1–68. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, 2012. Storey, Charles A. Persian Literature. A Bio-Bibliographical Survey, Volume III, Part I, A. Lexicography, B. Grammar, C. Prosody and Poetics. Leiden: Brill, 1984. S¸ahin, Kaya. Empire and the Power in the Reign of Süleyman. Narrating the SixteenthCentury Ottoman World. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013. S¸ims¸ekler, Nuri. “S¸âhidî I˙brâhîm Dede’nin Güls¸en-i Esrâr’ı: Tenkitli metin-tahlil.” PhD diss., Selçuk University, Konya, 1998. Tietze, Andreas. “Die Lexikographie der Turksprachen, I: Osmanisch-Türkisch.” In Wörterbücher: Ein internationals Handbuch zur Lexikographie. Vol. 3. Edited by Franz Josef Hausmann, Oskar Reichmann, Herbert Ernst Wiegand, and Ladislav Zgusta, 2399– 2407. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1991. Turan, Fikret. “Adventures of a Mediaeval Language Book into Modern Times: Persistence of Sıha¯hu’l -‘Ajam in Ottoman Language Learning and its Textual Problems.” In Tur˙ ˙ ˙ cology and Linguistics; Éva Ágnes Csató Festschrift. Edited by Nurettin Demir, Birsel Karakoç, and Astrid Menz, 441–48. Ankara: Hacettepe Üniversitesi, 2014. Verburg, C. Antoinette. “The Tuhfe-i S¸a¯hidı¯: A Sixteenth-Century Persian Ottoman Dic˙ tionary in Rhyme Part I.” Archivum Ottomanicum 15 (1997): 5–87. Winter, Michael. “Egyptian and Syrian Sufis Viewing Ottoman Turkish Sufism: Similarities, Differences and Interactions.” In The Ottoman Middle East. Studies in Honor of Amnon Cohen. Vol. 55. Edited by Eyal Ginio and Elie Podeh, 93–111. Leiden: Brill, 2014. Woodhead, Christine. “Ottoman Languages.” In The Ottoman World. Edited by Christine Woodhead, 143–58. London: Routledge, 2012. Yavuzarslan, Pas¸a. Osmanlı Dönemi Türk Sözlükçülüg˘ü. Ankara: Tiydem Yayıncılık, 2009. Yazici, Tahsin. “Halimi, Lotf-Alla¯h.” In Encyclopædia Iranica. Vol. 11, Fasc. 6. Edited by ˙ ˙ Ehsan Yarshater (New York: Bibliotheka Persia Press, 2003), 588–89. Accessed June 11, 2019. http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/halimi-lotf-allah-b-abi-yusof.

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Taisiya Leber

Christian-Jewish and Jewish-Christian Polemics in the Transottoman Context

In 1593 the printing house of the Orthodox Brotherhood of Lviv published a book under the title “On the Christian Piety – an Answer Against the Jews”.1 It was a polemical treatise written by the Greek hierarch Meletios Pegas (1549/50– 1601) – the Patriarch of Alexandria. This treatise was translated by the members of the Brotherhood from Greek into Slavonic and printed simultaneously in both languages without the participation of Meletios, who had never visited the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. This fact raises some questions that need to be addressed in the following chapter. Why did the Greek hierarch compose a text against Jews in the Ottoman Empire at the end of the 16th century? And why was this treatise published in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth? The first question needs to be answered in the context of Greek-Jewish polemics in the Ottoman Empire. After all, some scholars claim that after the fall of Constantinople in 1453, Greek hierarchs were no longer interested in disputes with Jews, “as it was the order of the day to take a critical look at the followers of Islam”.2 This is the assertion of Andreas Külzer (1999), who – as had previously A. Lukyn Williams (1935) – considered the anti-Jewish dialogue by the Patriarch of Constantinople Gennadios Scholarios (1464) to be the last example (or at least one of the last examples) of post-Byzantine polemics against Jews.3 Even about 1 The British Library General Catalogue, 321, no. 868a21. 2 See Andreas Külzer, Disputationes Graecae contra Iudaeos. Untersuchungen zur byzantinischen antijüdischen Dialogliteratur und ihrem Judenbild (Stuttgart: Teubner, 1999), 220: “Die Auseinandersetzung mit dem Judentum scheint für die Bekenner der Griechischen Orthodoxie in der Folge an Attraktivität verloren zu haben, die vielfältigen Impulse, die das jüdische Leben beispielsweise ab dem 16. Jahrhundert nach der Eingliederung der aus Spanien vertriebenen sephardischen Juden in das Osmanische Reich erfahren hat, waren, wie man dem Handschriftenbestand im allgemeinen entnehmen kann, für die gleichfalls als Minderheit lebenden Christen kein Grund, der antijüdischen Literatur durch Neukomposition von Texten oder aber die vermehrte Tradierung von vorhandenen Werken eine ‚neue Blüte‘ zu bescheren; wenn überhaupt, so war es eher ein Gebot der Stunde, sich mit den Anhängern des Islams kritisch auszutauschen”. 3 Arthur Lukyn Williams, Adversus Judaeos. A Bird’s-Eye View of Christian Apologiae until the Renaissance (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1935), 189.

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this dialogue by Scholarios some scholars argue that it in fact addresses Islam, not Judaism,4 and thus support the presumption of scholars that even if Greek hierarchs composed some texts against Jews, their actual opponents were Muslims (who were not addressed directly because of the fear of censorship and persecutions). In light of this state of affairs, it seems hard to understand the reasons why a new text on polemics against Jews was composed by Meletios Pegas long after the fall of Constantinople, if Christian disputes with Jews had declined in popularity. And why exactly was this anti-Jewish treatise by Meletios – not any other theological or polemical text – translated and published in the PolishLithuanian Commonwealth? It seems that some reassessment is necessary in this field, which can be achieved through examining both Greek and Jewish perspectives on interreligious disputes in the Ottoman Empire in order to estimate how important these disputes were, which roles they played in the context of the social and religious history of Jews and Christians in the Empire, and who the actual targets of such polemical texts were. These questions also from the Transottoman perspective are yet to be explored. I presuppose that such polemical texts were multifunctional5 and addressed different audiences. Their contents can be roughly defined as religious knowledge in specific historical frameworks6 which is not limited to only dogmatic or theological postulates of one belief system, but includes arguments and methods of showing the superior and exclusive character of one religion over an opponent’s as a matter of early modern “expertise”.7 One of the functions of such texts was to serve as “knowledge reservoirs”8 that under special circumstances were worthy of dissemination, translation and publication. That is why on the basis of case study of one Greek polemical text that traveled from Ottoman Constantinople to Lviv (Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth), Alexandria (Ottoman Egypt), Ias¸i (Moldavia) and Muscovy, I try to discover the reasons for its rich 4 George Karamanolis, “Form and Content in the Dialogues of Gennadios Scholarios,” in Dialogues and Debates from Late Antiquity to Late Byzantium, ed. Averil Cameron and Niels Gaul (London: Routledge, 2017), 246. 5 Vincent Déroche, “Forms and Functions of Anti-Jewish: Polemics Polymorphy, Polysémie,” in Jews in Byzantium. Dialectics of Minority and Majority Cultures, ed. R. Bonfil et al. (Leiden: Brill, 2012), 545; Heinz Schreckenberg, Die Christlichen Adversus-Judaeos-Texte und ihr literarisches und historisches Umfeld (13.–20. Jh.) (Frankfurt am Main: Lang, 1994). 6 Peter-André Alt and Volkhard Wels, eds., Religiöses Wissen in der Lyrik der Frühen Neuzeit (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2015). 7 Eric H. Ash, ed., Expertise: Practical Knowledge and the Early Modern State. Osiris, vol. 25 (Chicago, ILL.: The University of Chicago Press, 2010); Ronald Hitzler, “Wissen und Wesen des Experten. Ein Annäherungsversuch zur Einleitung,” in Expertenwissen. Die institutionalisierte Kompetenz zur Konstruktion von Wirklichkeit, ed. Hitzler Ronald, Honer Anne, and Maeder Christoph (Opladen: Westdeutscher Verlag, 1994), 13–30. 8 Frank Grunert and Anette Syndikus, eds., Wissensspeicher der Frühen Neuzeit. Formen und Funktionen (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2015).

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migration experience, to reconstruct its value as a knowledge reservoir, and to follow its numerous translations into these different contexts. What can be anticipated in the genre of Christian-Jewish polemics – which had persisted since the Late Antiquity9 – in the circumstances of the Ottoman Empire? How was the new religious situation after 1453 perceived by both religious groups? How do these groups reflect their status in the Empire in comparison to other groups? How authentic do the interlocutors appear? How much knowledge about the protagonist’s religion do such polemical texts prove? What kind of audience do they target? There is no doubt historically that for both – for the Orthodox Greeks, who lost their status of ruling (also in a religious sense) majority, and Jews, who had to adapt themselves to the Muslim reign instead of the Christian one – their relations to the Muslim mastery were more crucial than their attitudes toward the other religious “minority”. In this sense, the so-called “foundation myths”10 of Greek and Jewish communities are very characteristic, where especially important are legends that give accounts of the particular connection between the Ottoman sultan Mehmed II (1432–1481) and a Christian or Jewish religious leader respectively. The most radical of Greek legends claimed that Mehmed II not only visited Christian churches, but actively discussed religious matters with the Patriarch Gennadios Scholarios, who not only showed him “the truth” of the Orthodox faith,11 but was even able to persuade the Ottoman sultan to be baptized.12 The Jewish legends reported that Mehmed II read Torah regularly, met 9 On Christian-Jewish and Jewish-Christian dialogues in the Early Middle Ages, see Amos B. Hulen, “The ‘Dialogues with the Jews’ as Sources for the Early Jewish Argument against Christianity,” Journal of Biblical Literature 51 (1932): 58–70; Patrick Andrist, “Literary Distance and Complexity in Late Antique and Early Byzantine Greek Dialogues Adversus Iudaeos,” in Dialogues and Debates from Late Antiquity to Late Byzantium, ed. Averil Cameron and Niels Gaul (London: Routledge, 2017), 43–64. On the historical/theological perspective of such dialogue: Günter Stemberger, “Historische Aspekte einer Dialogkultur zwischen Judentum und Christentum,” in Der “jüdisch-christliche” Dialog veränderte die Theologie. Ein Paradigmenwechsel aus ExpertInnensicht, ed. Edith Petschnigg and Irmtraud Fischer (Köln: Böhlau, 2016), 18–28. Specifically on dialogues with the Jews in Byzantine controversial literature: Külzer, Disputationes Graecae. On the theological aspects of relations/controversies between Orthodox Christians and Jews: George Papademetriou, Essays on Orthodox Christian-Jewish Relations (Briston, IN: Wyndham Hall Press, 1990); Petra Heldt, “Bibliography of Dialogue between Orthodox Christians and Jews,” Immanuel 26/27 (1994): 240–49. 10 See Benjamin Braude, “Foundation Myths of the Millet System,” in Christians and Jews in the Ottoman Empire, vol. 1: The Central Lands, ed. Benjamin Braude and Bernard Lewis (New York, NY: Holmes and Meier, 1982), 69–88. 11 On, e. g., the Chronicle Historia politica et patriarchica Constantinoples, see Tom Papademetriou, Render unto the Sultan. Power, Authority, and the Greek Orthodox Church in the Early Ottoman Centuries (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015), 24–26. 12 Gennadios Scholarios, Genadija patriarxa konstanstantinopol′skago, po narecˇeniju Skoljarisa dialog ili samo druga rozmova (Vilnius: s.n., 1585).

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Jewish scholars in order to speak of religious matters and even ordered kosher foods for his palace in Constantinople.13 The permanent reality of Muslim reign compelled Christian and Jewish intellectuals and religious leaders to ensure that their flock and coreligionists remained guarded from conversions. A Jewish chronicle from the second part of the 16th century provides two interesting examples about the encounters between Sephardic Jews and Greeks in the Ottoman Empire. This Crónica de los Reyes Otomanos was written by Moses Almosnino (ca. 1515–ca. 1580)14 and contains important accounts of Almosnino’s own mission to Constantinople (1566/7) that he undertook in order to negotiate the sum of taxes paid by the Jewish community of Salonica.15 An episode with the Greek Patriarch was introduced by Almosnino to show the superiority of Ottoman Jews in comparison to Christians in the hierarchy of the sultan’s subjects. According to Almosnino, after Suleyman’s death (in 1566), the Patriarch of Constantinople (Metrophanes III) – to whom the deceased sultan had given “an absolute power to dismiss or appoint metropolitans and collect money in all parts of the empire from which they pay the tax to the king so that he would allow them to continue practicing the prescriptions of their law”16 – wanted a new sultan, Selim II, to renew the royal decree. In order to achieve this, the Patriarch went to see Joseph Nasi, Ottoman Court Jew and diplomat of

13 On the Chronicle of Elijah Kapsali, Seder Eliyahu Zuta, see Steven Bowman, The Jews of Byzantium (1204–1453) (Tuscaloosa, ALA: University of Alabama Press, 1985), 182. 14 Rabbi Moses Almosnino was famous in the first place because of his intellectual ethical treatises – Regimento de la vida and Tratado de los suenyos. Both were published in Salonica in 1564. See their critical edition by John M. Zemke, Mosˇe ben Baruk Almosnino. Regimiento ˙ de la vida; Tratado de los suenyos (Tempe, AZ: Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, 2004). On the contents of Almosnino’s writings: Hava Tirosh-Samuelson, “The Ultimate End of Human Life in Postexpulsion Philosophic Literature,” in Crisis and Creativity in the Sephardic World, 1391–1648, ed. Benjamin R. Gampel (New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 1997), 230, 232–33, 242–44., etc. 15 This chronicle is preserved only in one manuscript. Its critical edition was prepared by Pilar Romeu Ferré, Moisés Almosnino. Crónica de los Reyes Otomanos (Barcelona: Tirocinio, 1998). On the history of the Ottoman society according to Almosnino, see Martin Jacobs, Islamische Geschichte in jüdischen Chroniken. Hebräische Historiographie des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2004), 53–55. On the language and the circumstances of the appearence of the Crónica, see Pilar Romeu Ferré and Iacob M. Hassan, “Apuntes sobre la lengua de la ‘Crónica de los reyes otomanos’ de Moisés Almosnino según la edición del manuscrito aljamiado del siglo XVI,” in Actas del II Congreso Internacional de Historia de la Lengua Española, ed. Manuel Ariza Viguera et al. (Madrid: Pabellón de España, 1992), 161–69. 16 Almosnino, Crónica de los Reyos, Book IV, 242: “El patriarcado del patriarca de los cristianos que res´ide contino en Constantina con mandamiento del rey, que le da poder absoluto para tirar y poner metropolitas y coger los dineros en todas partes del reino que de ellos dan el tributo a el rey porque les consients seguir los órdenes que siguen conforme a su ley, le hiz´o confirmer”.

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Portugese origin, who had much influence with both sultans.17 The Patriarch handed Joseph Nasi a huge monetary gift and Suleyman’s decree, begging him, at his feet, to have it renewed by Selim. Don Joseph, “as he admits, did it more because of his [the Patriarch’s] confidence in him than for the profit he got.”18 When Nasi returned with good news, he had the Patriarch come again and gave him a new decree “wonderfully adorned with gold.” The delighted Patriarch bent to kiss his hand, which Nasi did not let him do “out of courteousness”, but later received from him another “magnificent gift.”19 The main reason why Almosnino tells this story is to chastise the Jewish leadership in Salonica for being less reasonable than Christians and not taking advantage of Joseph Nasi’s position. But his detailed description of the humiliation of the Greek Patriarch in front of Court Jew Nasi is determined also to show that Ottoman Christians are inferior to Jews20 and dependent upon them because Jews have better access to the Ottoman Muslim authorities. Greek sources also support the presumption about particular relations between the Patriarch Metrophanes III and Joseph Nasi. There is a decree by the Patriarch to the Greek Orthodox people of the island of Crete (under Venetian rule), stating that no Greek Orthodox Christian person living on the island should harass any of the Jewish people living there.21 According to Tom Papa17 See Moritz Abraham Levi, Don Joseph Nasi, Herzog von Naxos, seine Familie und zwei jüdische Diplomaten seiner Zeit. Eine Biographie nach neuen Quellen dargestellt (1859. Reprint, Berlin: Ulan Press 2012); Paul Grunebaum-Ballin, Joseph Naci. Duc de Naxos (Paris: Mouton, 1968); Robert Mantran, “Foreign Merchants and the Minorities in Istanbul during the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries,” in Christians and Jews in the Ottoman Empire, vol. 1: The Central Lands, ed. Benjamin Braude and Bernard Lewis (New York, NY: Holmes and Meier, 1982), 128; Cecil Roth, The House of Nasi: The Duke of Naxos (1948. Reprint, New York, NY: Greenwood Press, 1969). 18 Almosnino, Crónica de los Reyos, Book IV, 242: “Lo cual concedió y efectuó el señor don Yosef según entendimos dél, más por haberse confiado dél tan libremente que por el interese que dél tuvo”. 19 Almosnino, Crónica de los Reyos, Book IV, 242: “Y delante de nos´otros en su cas´a vino el patriarca como él llegó, que le había mandado pedir las albricias, y allí sacó el nuevo mandamiento que le había sacado labrado de oro a meravilla. Y el patriarca dicho mostró recibir tanto contentamiento que se abaǰó a bes´arle la mano, lo cual no consintó dito señor por cortes´ía…le mandó un muy macnífico pres´ente”. English translation of this story by Olga Borovaya, The Beginnings of Ladino Literature: Moses Almosnino and His Readers (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2017), 121–22. 20 Borovaya, Beginnings, 121. 21 George Papademetriou, “An Encyclical of the Ecumenical Patriarch Metrophanes III (1520– 1580) Condemning the Oppression of Jews,” Journal of Ecumenical Studies 26, no. 2 (Spring 1989): 340: “Inasmuch as the Jews residing in the entire Island of Crete reported to us in a loud cry and with many tears that some Christians there mistreat them… Furthermore, the Christians, unreasonably hasten to mistreat the Jews, thinking that they [the Christians] will receive reward from the God of all. For this reason we write this letter in the name of the Holy Spirit to declare to all those Christians who commit these unjust acts and cast false accusa-

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demetriou, this as he claims “curious and anomalous document” was a result of a particular connection between Metrophanes III and Don Joseph Nasi, the Duke of Naxos, who possibly asked the Patriarch for a favor that he was happy to do, as he needed the Duke’s support in a competitive struggle against his opponent Michael Kantakuzenos.22 Another episode in Almosnino’s chronicle concerns the issue of conversion to Islam as the easiest way of achieving a better social, economic and legal status in the Ottoman Empire. According to Almosnino’s account of his audience with Ottoman officials (1567), one of the viziers, pointing to an old Christian who was converting to Islam at that very moment,23 offered to grant Almosnino’s request and liberate the community from the poll tax if the Jews in Salonica also converted.24 In response, the Salonican rabbi, fighting fear and tears, requested only what was legally due to his community. After this exchange was repeated three times, the pasha exclaimed, “Those people are not like Christians who easily understand the truth; they will not do it even if you kill them”.25 The request, however, was granted. Thus, it was Almosnino’s steadfastness that finally decided the matter.26 It is obvious that this passage was addressed to Jewish readers in order to point out the importance of their belonging to the Jewish faith, which may not be given up no matter what. The behavior of the Jew is the right one: He declines conversion to Islam, preserves his religious community, and even achieves relaxation of taxes, whereas the Christian does not stand for his faith, and this behavior is characteristic for Christians, something that Ottomans expect from them. According to Olga Borovaya, the goal of Almosnino’s chronicle was to show that conversion is not the only option for those Jews who want to succeed in the Ottoman Empire. Ottoman Jews do not need to be converted; they are heard at the Divan and can win a legal case if they are persistent. The first prerequisite for success, according to Almosnino, is being faithful to the sultan; the second condition is, apparently, becoming educated about the greatness of

22 23 24 25 26

tions against the Jews, and bring unjust and unreasonable harm and destruction to them; those who are not satisfied with the judgment of the most honorable rulers in the legal systems rush insolently and unrestrained, and they raise their hands against them [the Jews]; those Christians who commit these insolent acts against the Jews are excommunicated from God Almighty and are cursed and are unforgiven and remain bound even after death. Injustice, therefore, and slander, regardless to whomever acted upon or performed against, is still injustice”. Papademetriou, Render unto the Sultan, 206. Almosnino, Crónica de los Reyos, Book IV, 266: “Un cristiano que se había venido a hac´er turco y estaba von el dedo alevantado dic´iendo las palabras que les hac´en dec´ir en tal efecto”. Almosnino, Crónica de los Reyos, Book IV, 266: “Respondió el pacˇhá y diǰo: ‘Venid, hac´edvos turcos y seréis libres y muselemes de toda suerte de pecha y agravio’”. Almosnino, Crónica de los Reyos, Book IV, 267: “Estos no son como los cristianos, que vienen fácilmente a conocer la verdad, que estos, aunque lo maten, no lo harán”. The description of this episode is quoted after the translation by Borovaya, Beginnings, 121.

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the Empire (for the purpose of which he wrote Book II of the Crónica).27 Their Christian opponents, on the contrary, are not steady enough in their faith; they are weak conformists – such an observation was intended to help the Ottoman Jews to feel their spiritual supremacy in the economic and legal rivalries28 with the Ottoman Christians. These examples are intended to support our interest in the Ottoman context of Christian-Jewish religious disputes by illustrating how their coexistance as non-Muslim taxpayers in the Ottoman Empire necessarily provoked contacts and/or conflicts and incentivized providing explanations (often of a religious character) proving the superiority of one or another community.

1.

Greek-Jewish polemics shortly after 1453

Gennadios Scholarios (c. 1400–1472),29 the first “Ottoman” Patriarch of Constantinople, was author of the earliest post-Byzantine anti-Jewish treatises that were known only in handwritten form.30 The Patriarch was famous for his knowledge of philosophy and scholastic tradition, unrivaled in Byzantium. He was a very productive author of theological and philosophical texts who preferred the dialogic form for some of his popular theological writings such as an antiLatin dialogue on the Procession of Holy Spirit, but also for his polemical writings against the Jewish faith (1464) and polemics opposing the Muslims.31

27 Borovaya, Beginnings, 121. 28 E. g., with the issue of access to the “Christian” vineyards in Salonica that Jews were not allowed to enter without a license from Ottomans: “Habían idos aquel día todos los cristianos de la civdad a queǰarse que se pasaba el tiempo de vendimiar sus viñas y que no os´aban etrar sus uvas sin licencia”. Almosnino, Crónica de los Reyos, Book IV, 266. 29 For the most recent information on Gennadios Scholarios’ biography, intellectual achievements and writings, see Franz Tinnefeld, “Georgios Gennadios Scholarios,” in: La théologie byzantine et sa tradition, vol. 2: XIIIe–XIXe s., ed. Carmelo Giuseppe Conticello and Vassa Conticello (Turnhout: Brepols Publishers, 2002); Andreas Rhoby, “Sprache und Wortschatz des Gennadios Scholarios,” in Lexicologica Byzantina. Beiträge zum Kolloquium zur byzantinischen Lexikographie (Bonn, 13.–15. Juli 2007), ed. Erich Trapp and Sonja Schönauer (Göttingen: V&R unipress, 2008); Marie-Hélène Blanchet, Georges-Gennadios Scholarios (vers 1400-vers 1472). Un intellectuel orthodoxe face à la disparition de l’empire byzantin (Paris: Inst. Français d’Études Byzantines, 2008). 30 Two manuscripts are known: Paris.gr.1294a (1464), Bernensis 579 saec.XVI. See, Külzer Disputationes Graecae, 213–18. 31 Karamanolis, “Form and Content,” 237–38; Angeliki Ziaka, “Rearticulating a ChristianMuslim Understanding: Gennadios Scholarios and George Amiroutzes on Islam,” Studies in Church History 51 (2015): 150–65. Gennadios Scholarios’ Dialogue with a Muslim with an extended preface was published in 1585 in Vilnius. The only exemplar of this Slavonic edition is located at the Russian National Library (RNB) in Saint Petersburg, I.5.41. See Gennadios Scholarios, Genadija patriarxa konstantinopol’skago.

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Gennadios Scholarios’ dialogue against the Jews32 is framed to show the falsity of Judaism and the truth of Christianity in a didactic way, according to scholastic principles. The author does not mention a place or circumstances of an actual encounter with a Jewish interlocutor. Both protagonists are depersonalized; they appear solely as the Jew and the Christian.33 Gennadios Scholarios addresses two interesting subjects in his dialogue – the issue of the self-identification of Jews and Christians of the Ottoman Empire,34 as well as the consequences of the fall of Constantinople in 1453 for the history of Christianity. In the first passage, the Christian asks his opponent if he is a Jew (ioudaı˜os). He uses this question for the purpose of deconstructing this last term. According to the Christian’s argument, the “Jew” means of Judaean origin, from the region around Jerusalem, but this does not apply to his opponent, who could be an Ephesian, a Byzantine, or a Thessalian. On the Jew’s arguments that this term means belonging to the Jewish people, following Jewish religious laws and using Jewish language,35 the Christian disproves these and repeats that his opponent’s origin cannot be Judean, but it can be Thessalian or Byzantine ( just as the Christian himself is Thessalian and Byzantine). The Christian rejects the argument of the language by pointing out that his own knowledge of the Latin language does not make him Latin; he also wouldn’t call himself Greek (because of the pagan connotation of this word), but prefers, according to his religious beliefs, to be called Christian.36 As for the Jew, 32 The Greek title is: “Élenkhos te¯˜s ioudaïke¯˜s nu˜n pláne¯s ék te te¯˜s graphe¯˜s kaì to˜¯ n pragmáto¯n kaì te¯˜s pròs te¯`n khristianike¯`n ale¯´theian parathéseo¯s, en skhe¯´mati dialόgou” (“Refutation of the error of the Jews from Scripture and from history, from facts and from comparison with the Christian truth, in the form of a dialogue”). For the full text of the dialogue (in Greek), see Albertus Jahn, Anecdota Graeca Theologica cum prolegomenis. Gennadii archiepiscopi cpolitani dialogus Christiani cum Iudaei sive refutatio erroris iudaici et eiusdem delectus prophetiarum de Christo e codice Bernensi DLXXIX primum edidit et adnotavit Albertus Iahnius (1893. Reprint, Hildesheim: Gerstenberg, 1973); Louis Petit, Xénophon A. Sidérides, and Martin Jugie, eds., Œuvres complètes de Gennade Scholarios, publiées pour la première fois, vol. 3: Œuvres polémiques. Questions théologiques. Ecrits apologétiques (Paris: Bonne Presse, 1930), 251–304; the English summary of it by Lukyn Williams, Adversus Iudaeos, 190–201; the German summary of it Külzer, Disputationes Graecae, 215–17; Tinnefeld, “Georgios Gennadios Scholarios,” no. 47, 502, 530. 33 Külzer, Disputationes Graecae, 217. 34 Jahn, Anecdota Graeca, 1–3; Petit, Sidérides, and Jugie, Gennade Scholarios, 3: 252–54. 35 Petit, Sidérides, and Jugie, Gennade Scholarios, 3: 252, 20–22: “Ioudaı˜os d’eı˜nai phe¯mí, hóti te¯`n pátrion to¯˜n Ioudaío¯n dόxan diaphulátto¯ kaì toı˜s ioudaïkoı˜s nόmois kaì éthesi zo˜¯ , kaì te¯˜ͅ ioudaïke˜¯ͅ kékhre¯mai glo¯´tte¯ͅ”. 36 Jahn, Anecdota Graeca, 2; Lukyn Williams, Adversus Judaeos, 190; Bowman, The Jews of Byzantium, 320; Petit, Sidérides, and Jugie, Gennade Scholarios, 3: 252, 25–253, 7: “[…] Ei me¯` gàr diephérou he¯mo˜¯ n toı˜s toioútois diaphόrois, kàn to¯˜ͅ te¯˜s ale¯thou˜s patrídos en e¯˜ͅ egenne¯´the¯s onόmati kaloúmenos ékhaires, ho¯´sper kamoì nu˜n oudèn diaphérei Thettalo¯˜ͅ eı˜nai e¯` Buzantío¯ͅ kaì légesthai, héo¯s me¯´te te¯˜ͅ glo¯´tte¯ͅ me¯´te toı˜s dόgmasí te kaì éthesi Thettaloì nu˜n kaì Buzántioi diaphérontai, ho¯s pálai íso¯s poté…Kago`¯ gàr te¯`n latinike¯`n oı˜da glo¯˜ttan; all’ ouk ero¯˜ Latı˜nos eı˜nai…kaì au˜this, Élle¯n o`¯ n te¯˜ͅ pho¯ne¯˜ͅ, ouk án pote phaíe¯n Élle¯n eı˜nai, dià tò me¯` phroneı˜n ho¯s

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who thinks he would follow Moses, he does not, because he together with other Jews ignores the divine message. As the Christian maintains later, only two religions rule and divide the world – Christianity and Islam – the latter rules Egypt and Palestine and thus eliminates the chance that Jews would ever gain posession of Jerusalem and await the Messiah there, which makes them hopeless as a religious group.37 This “Byzantine” origin of the Jewish protagonist, as well as the comparison of the “Jewish language” with Latin means that Gennadios had in mind Byzantine Jews, so called Romaniotes, whose spoken language was Greek38 and who only used Hebrew as a sacred or second language. The Christian in the dialogue practically denies the existence of Judaism and Jews by questioning their diaspora identity, their religious beliefs and their language. He emphasizes common features – similar place of origin, belonging to the (Byzantine) empire and common spoken language. Also the difference in religious tradition between Christians and Jews is shown to be insignificant (as in the later treatise by ephrόnoun potè Hélle¯nes; all’ apò te¯˜s idías málista thélo¯ onomázesthai dόxe¯s. Kaì eí tis éroitό me tís eimí, apokrinou˜mai khristianòs eı˜nai”. 37 Petit, Sidérides, and Jugie, Gennade Scholarios, 3: 258: “Dià tau˜ta, hóper eı˜pon, anélpiston eı˜nai deı˜ autò kath’ autò tò episunakhthe˜¯nai án humãs pálin en Hierousale¯`m metà te¯˜s loipe¯˜s eukle¯rías he¯`n elpízete. Épeita kaì adúnatόn estin Ioudaı˜όn tina sunáxein humãs ekeı˜ metà te¯˜s eukle¯rías ekeíne¯s. De¯˜lon gàr hóti te¯`n te¯˜s oikouméne¯s arkhe`¯n nu˜n dúo thre¯skeı˜ai dianeimámenai skhedòn ékhousin; Ioudaı˜oi dè olígoi sporáde¯n douleuousin amphotérais taı˜s arkhaı˜s pantakhou˜. Héo¯s án toínun árkho¯sin Aigúptou kaì Palaistíne¯s kaì te¯˜s álle¯s autόthi ge¯˜s hoi nu˜n árkhontes, he¯ elpìs humo¯˜n adúnatos éstai. Íso¯s dè kaì iskhurόteron toı˜s khristianoı˜s epithe´¯sontai, kaì toı˜s mékhri nu˜n eleuthérois; kaì tou˜to mékhri te¯˜s sunteleías hoúto¯ probaı˜non, adúnaton, ho¯s éphe¯men, te¯`n elpída taúte¯n poie¯´sei”; Lukyn Williams, Adversus Judaeos, 190–91. 38 On the use of the Greek language (or Judaeo-Greek dialect) by Byzantine and later Ottoman Jews, see Nicholas De Lange, “The Byzantine Jewish Other,” in Identity and the Other in Byzantium. Papers From The Fourth International Sevgi˙ Gönül Byzantine Studies Symposium, Istanbul, 23–25 June 2016, ed. K. Durak and I. Jevtic´ (Istanbul: Koç University, 2019), 34. This language use by Romaniotes was preserved in written form in the 1547 Constantinople trilingual edition of the Bible. As the publishers of this volume wrote in a preface: “We saw fit to print a translation of the Bible into the Greek language and la’az [Ladino], the two languages that are habitual among the members of our Nation in this exile […] who live in the lands of the Turks.” (quoted after Joseph R. Hacker, “Authors, Readers and Printers of SixteenthCentury Hebrew Books in the Ottoman Empire,” in Perspectives on the Hebraic Book. The Myron M. Weinstein Memorial Lectures at the Library of Congress, ed. Peggy K. Pearlestein (Washington D.C.: Library of Congress, 2012), 21). See Julia G. Krivoruchko, “The Constantinople Pentateuch within the Context of Septuagint Studies,” in XIII Congress of the International Organization for Septuagint and Cognate Studies, ed. Melvin K. H. Peters (Ljubljana: International Organization for Septuagint and Cognate Studies, 2007); Steven Bowman, “The Jewish experience in Byzantium,” in The Jewish-Greek Tradition in Antiquity and the Byzantine Empire, ed. James K. Aitken and James Carleton Paget (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014), 45–46; Nicholas De Lange, Japheth in the Tents of Shem: Greek Bible Translations in Byzantine Judaism (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2015).

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Meletios Pegas), as a (Jewish) misinterpretation that ultimately leads to the only true Christian understanding. By accentuating the hegemonic role of two monotheist religions – Christianity (see also below) and Islam (however, without mentioning the name of this second religion) – the Christian demonstrates that Judaism is superfluous. The second passage concerns the life of Christians after the fall of Constantinople and that event’s influence on the history of Christianity. The question about the suffering of the Christians after their sacred things (churches and church treasures, relics, etc.) have perished (as a result of the conquest) comes from the Jewish side as a logical reaction to Gennadios’ long passages on God’s punishment of Jews – that they had lost Jerusalem and never achieved rebuilding their temple (because they were unable to recognize Jesus as Messiah) – the Jewish interlocutor wonders how to explain the similar destiny of Christians39 – he means their misery under the Ottoman rule. Gennadios argues that these “present sufferings” under “the violence of the master” concern only one small part of Christians; they are temporary and cannot be really compared with God’s punishment of the Jews.40 However, this argument is pretty weak, because for Greeks themselves the similarity between the destiny of the dispersed Jewish diaspora (after the destruction of Jerusalem) and the Greek mass exile that followed the loss of sovereignty (after the fall of Constaninople) would remain a painful factor in the perception of their own history.41 Thus early modern Russian author Arsenij Suxanov wrote in 1650 the following lines comparing the Jewish destiny with the Greek one: “So spoke Arsenij to the Greeks: God used to have his beloved Israel. But God rejected Israel and abandoned them, instead of 39 Jahn, Anecdota Graeca, 32: “Ei dè kaì humeı˜s pisteúontes to¯˜n auto˜¯ n he¯mı˜n peirãsthe kako˜¯ n, oudè ioudaı˜oi ára dià te¯`n pròs tòn Ie¯sou˜n apistían pepόnthasí te kaì páskhousin; all’ he¯´tis án apodotheíe¯ toı˜s khristianikoı˜s aitía kakoı˜s, haúte¯ kaì toı˜s ioudaikoı˜s àn apodotheíe¯ toı˜s khristianikoı˜s aitía kakoı˜s, haúte¯ kaì toı˜s ioudaikoı˜s án apodidoı˜to dikaío¯s. epeì toínun olíga, phasí, sopho˜¯ ͅ, kaì sù tòn he¯méteron hápanta kateile¯pho¯`s en toı˜s olígois toútois skopόn, anáskhou kaì perì toúto¯n he¯mı˜n légein há soi parístatai”. 40 Jahn, Anecdota Graeca, 44–46; Lukyn Williams, Adversus Judaeos, 196–97. 41 See the writing by the metropolitan of Paleopatras Theophanes to the Tsar Mixail Fedorovicˇ in 1645: “The Turks do not allow us [Greeks] to print books in Constantinople […] And that is why, oh the powerful great Tsar, the poor Greeks have to humble themselves. And other peoples scold them, not only Francs and Lutherans, but also Armenians, and Jews. And they tell them that they do not have an empire and in this sense they are humiliated by other peoples, and that they are not dignified to have their own book printing.” See Boris N. Florja, “Materialy missii Feofana Paleopatrskogo v Rossiju v 1645 g.,” in Svjazi Rossii s narodami Balkanskogo poluostrova. Pervaja polovina XVII v., ed. Boris N. Florja (Moscow: Nauka, 1990), 221. On historical parallels, perception and identity of Jews and Greeks, see Minna Rozen, ed., Homelands and Diasporas. Greeks, Jews and their Migrations (London: Tauris, 2008), 28; Anastassia Papadia-Lala, “Collective Expatriations of Greeks in the Fifteenth through Seventeenth Centuries,” in Homelands and Diasporas. Greeks, Jews and their Migrations, ed. Minna Rozen (London: Tauris, 2008).

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Israel God chose you, Greeks, and other believers; and Jewish churches were devastated, and in their place were erected the Christian ones. And since then you Greeks became so proud of yourselves and you called yourselves the source of faith for all peoples; and for this pride God abandoned you, as he had abandoned the Jews, and He gave your empire to pagan Muslims and put you all in captivity.”42 It seems that Patriarch Gennadios wanted to demonstrate in these passages his understanding and approval of the current situation under Ottoman rule, where the borderline between the subjects of the sultan was defined by religion, not by language, ethnicity or place of origin. Thus he intended to strengthen the feeling of this religious identity in his readers (also by making differences between Western and Eastern Christian traditions appear smaller). Gennadios also emphasizes recalls of the goal of his polemical writings – Christians’ own confirmation in their faith and the confutation or persuasion of the Jews.43 At the end of the dialogue, the Jew admits defeat, being convinced by the Christian interlocutor. He asks for some supplementary material Gennadios promised him in order to study it and to become even more persuaded by the Christian truth. He hopes to see Gennadios again and probably even be converted by him because of this particular knowledge that Gennadios has demonstrated in the dispute with the Jew. As this convinced Jewish opponent reports: In the past I often encountered Christians who tried to discredit the Jewish faith on the basis of Jewish prophecies, against which the Jews devised many replies, as I thought at least earlier, but now your methods have shown to me that these were rather ways to escape. The path that your arguments take is the shortest possible and unique and brings someone directly to the knowledge of truth, so that it not only can convince the Jews, but also anyone else with a different faith.44

This passage is a compliment to the author and his skills because his methods and arguments were best suited to convince his religious opponent on the way to “the knowledge of truth”. The Jew asks Gennadios to write down their conversation because he is sure that this would be a valuable reservoir of religious knowledge 42 Arsenij Suxanov, “Prenija s grekami o vere,” in Arsenij Suxanov, vol. 2, ed. Sergej Belokurov (Moscow: Univ. Tipografija, 1894), 100: “Arsenij zˇe grekam govoril: byl u Boga vozljublennyj Izrail′. I Izrailja Bog otverzˇe i predade ix v zapustenie, i v mesto Izrailja prijal Bog vas grekov i procˇix verujusˇcˇix; i cerkvy zˇidovskija razoreny, v to mesto sozdany xristianskija. I ot togo vremeni vy Greki razgordestesja nad mnogimi i nazyvaete sebja istocˇnik very vsem; i za tu vasˇu gordost′ vas Bog otrinul, jakozˇe i zˇidov, i carstvo vasˇe poganym busurmanam i vas vsex v nevolju otdal.” 43 Jahn, Anecdota Graeca, 34: “he¯meı˜s gàr prόs te he¯metéran bebaío¯sin kaì to˜¯ n ioudaío¯n élenkhon e¯` peitho`¯ sùn eunoia˛, háte kaì autoì tòn émphrona kaì ale¯the¯˜ idiopoioúmenoi ioudaїsmon.” 44 Jahn, Anecdota Graeca, 56–57. Here, I am using the English translation of this dialogue by George Karamanolis (Karamanolis, “Form and Content,” 245).

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not only for Jews, but also for representatives of other religions. Gennadios appears as an “expert of knowledge”, recognized even by his Jewish opponent, who himself is praised in the dialogue as “not ignorant” of the Old Testament (unlike other Jews) and even having some knowledge about the New Testament,45 which makes this appreciation even more valuable. But also the comparison with previous Christian polemists, who are considered here to be not convincing enough, should emphasize his intellectual superiority. One of the main goals of such a polemical dialogue is to pave the way for conversion by convincing the partner of the falseness of his religious beliefs and the superiority of the author’s own religion. In this case, it should be seen as fulfilled. This conclusion strongly resembles Justin’s dialogue with Tryphon the Jew,46 presumably the archetypical dialogue between Jew and Christian.47 The second known anti-Jewish treatise by Gennadios is a short text,48 which is to be found in the two known manuscripts directly after the main dialogue and consists of the Christian interpretation of the prophecies, as well as numerous allusions to the New Testament (more than sixteen49) that are supposed to show the false character of Judaism in a very brief way.50 As A. Lukyn Williams (1935) has already argued, Gennadios Scholarios showed no knowledge of Judaism or Jewish teachings in his dialogue and even less in his appendix on prophecies, which Lukyn Williams explained by the fact that the Patriarch most probably had never had any contact with learned Jews, but only “with more prosperous [Jews], such as merchants and semi-political leaders…quite ignorant of Rabbinic learning.”51 This argument does not seem completely convincing to account for the lack of “Jewish knowledge” in Gen45 Jahn, Anecdota Graeca, 31; Lukyn Williams, Adversus Judaeos, 194. 46 This dialogue is perhaps the most studied in the history of the Christian-Jewish polemics. See Lukyn Williams, Adversus Judaeos, 31–42. 47 Külzer, Disputationes Graecae, 215; Karamanolis, “Form and Content,” 245. Justin’s dialogue with Tryphon the Jew was also popular in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. The translation of the dialogue into Polish, as well as a printed edition of it were prepared by famous intellectual Protestant Symon Budny and Laurentius Krzyszkowski (Justyna swietego meczennika rozmowa z Tryfonem zydem. Nieswiez: 1564). See: Erich Bryner, “ ‘Über den Ausgang des Heiligen Geistes’. Eine Schrift eines anonymen Russen als Beilage im Brief von Simon Budny an Heinrich Bullinger vom 18. April 1563,” Zwingliana 37 (2010). 48 The title of the treatise reads: “Ék to˜¯ n perì tou˜ kuríou he¯mo¯˜n Ie¯sou˜ Khristou˜ prophe¯teio¯˜n hai saphésterai entau˜tha etéthe¯san, pleísto¯n ouso¯˜n en pãsi toı˜s to˜¯ n prophe¯to˜¯ n lόgois (“From the prophecies about our Lord Jesus Christ that are found in large numbers in all the speeches of the prophets, the clearest are listed here”). See, Tinnefeld, “Georgios Gennadios Scholarios,” no. 48, 502; Jahn, Anecdota Graeca, 58–68. 49 Anna Karamanidou, “References to Paul in Works ‘Against Jews’ of the Ottoman Occupation Period,” Cosmos 2 (2013): 116. 50 See the appendix by Lukyn Williams, Adversus Judaeos, 202–03; Külzer, Disputationes Graecae, 217–18. 51 Lukyn Williams, Adversus Judaeos, 189.

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nadios’ dialogue, as he e. g. in another writing asserted that the knowledge of his other famous opponent, philosopher Gemistus Pletho (1355–1452), had come from a certain intellectual Jew, an expert on Aristotle.52 So it is difficult to believe that Gennadios could not have had contact with Jewish rabbis or scholars, as he also considered his Jewish interlocutor in the dialogue to be knowledgeable about his own faith. It is more about the traditional genre of explaining Christology to the “ignorant of truth” Jews in Byzantine polemics, where there is no need to use any other “Jewish” sources, such as the Byzantine version of the Old Testament. Unlike the anti-Jewish writing of the later period, these texts by Gennadios Scholarios received much attention from scholars. In this context, questions arose regarding why the first ecumenical Patriarch of the Ottoman Empire, who had been actively involved in the negotiations with Catholics during the Council of Ferrara-Florence, and had to adjust to the new circumstances of the Muslim reign, would be interested in composing texts specifically against the Jewish faith and Jews. There is no doubt that this text, so rich in rhetorical, historical and theological details, was presupposed to undertake different tasks and address different audiences. As Scholarios himself pointed out, the goal of the text was to support Christians in confirmation of their own faith and to convince the Jews of the Christian truth.53 As Vincent Déroche wrote, Byzantine-Jewish polemics always had more than one function, “it is either a polemic which seems close to the real controversy and geared to at least two different audiencies (Jewish opponents, wavering Christians), or the text has multiple aims (catechize as well as debate, persuade and define himself as well as refute). This potential polysemy is confirmed by the ease with which text segments pass from one genre to another (dialogues, homiletic, hagiography, questions and answers). All polemics are aimed not at one audience, but at a spectrum of audiences between two debating hard poles, and always imply a redefinition of himself the better to exclude the other, the opponent.”54 Several passages in the dialogue by Gennadios Scholarios showed how important his opponent was for him, as the opponent allowed him to 52 See, e. g., the famous epistle by Gennadios Scholarios to Theodora Palaeologina on Pletho’s spiritual groundings: “The sum total of his apostasy was consummated by a certain Jew with whom he studied because he was an expert on Aristotle. He was a follower of Averroes and of the other Arab and Persian commentators of Aristotle’s works, which have been translated by the Jews into their own language.” See Louis Petit, Xénophon A. Sidérides, and Martin Jugie, eds., Œuvres complètes de Gennade Scholarios, publiées pour la première fois. Vol. 4: Polémique contre Pléthon. Œvres pastorals, ascétiques, liturgiques et poétiques (Paris: Bonne Presse, 1935), 152. This fragment was translated and commented upon by Polymnia Athanassiadi, Mutations of Hellenism in Late Antiquity (Farnham: Ashgate Variorum, 2015), 248– 50. 53 Jahn, Anecdota Graeca, 34: “he¯meı˜s gàr prόs te he¯metéran bebaío¯sin kaì to˜¯ n ioudaío¯n élenkhon e¯` peitho`¯ sùn eunoia˛, háte kaì autoì tòn émphrona kaì ale¯the¯˜ idiopoioúmenoi ioudaїsmon.” 54 Déroche, “Forms and Functions,” 545.

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formulate some ideas on Christian identity and self-determination under current circumstances. He preferred this Jewish interlocutor because he had to be a religious person first of all55 (e. g. not an intellectual adherent of Aristotelianism) in order to bring up classical Christian methods and quotations for the persuasion of a Jew. The big victory of Christian truth is the goal, but also, as scholars suggested, another aim was signifying boundaries in relation to other religious groups of the Ottoman Empire, like Jews and Armenians, after the Orthodox Greeks lost their status of ruling strata.56 The claim by George Karamanolis that anti-Jewish dialogue actually addresses almost exclusively the issue of the Muslim religion, which “is targeted under the cover of Judaism”57 seems too exaggerated. It is certain that presenting Christian interpretations of Scripture as the only “knowledge of truth” means in some sense debating also with Muslims. The supremacy of Christianity over all religions needs to be clear first of all to the Christian readers. The Jewish comment at the end of the dialogue that it could be useful for convincing not only Jews, but also “anyone else with a different faith”58 can be interpreted again as a tool for polemics against Muslims, but the number of anti-Jewish arguments, critiques of Jewish identity and the Jews’ false expectations – not only because of their faith, but also because of historical circumstances, where only two monotheist religions rule – shows clearly how important these anti-Jewish sentiments and interpretations that finally found their place in his dialogue were for Scholarios. Another post-Byzantine author of anti-Jewish treatises as well as Gennadios Scholarios’ contemporary and acquaintance, Theodoros Theophanes Agallianos (c.1400–1474), dedicated at least three texts to the polemics against the Jews, which he wrote during his service as a metropolitan of Medeia between 1468 and 1474. Unlike Theodoros Agallianos’ anti-Latin writings that were already included in the polemical volumes published by Patriarch of Jerusalem Dositheos in Ias¸i (1692 and 1698),59 these anti-Jewish texts were never edited, so for my paper I could use only the short description of manuscripts provided by Christos Patrinelis (1966) and Andreas Külzer (1999) in their monographs.60 The first of Agallianos’ writings, a short manual, is based on the “Eight Homilies against

55 Jahn, Anecdota Graeca, 31. 56 Steven Bowman, “Two Late Byzantine Dialogues with the Jews,” The Greek Orthodox Theological Review 25/1 (1980): 88; Külzer, Disputationes Graecae, 215. 57 Karamanolis, “Form and Content,” 246. 58 Jahn, Anecdota Graeca, 31. 59 Dositheou, Tómos Katallage¯´s: en o¯ periékhontai sungraphaí. Ias¸i 1692, 432–39; Dositheou, Tómos Agápe¯s katà Latíno¯n: sullegeís kaì aitupotheís. Ias¸i 1698, 333–67. 60 Christos G. Patrinelis, Ho Theodoros Agallianos tautizomenos pros ton Theophanen Medeias kai oi anekdotoi logoi tou (Athens: Ekd., 1966), 45–46; Külzer, Disputationes Graecae, 218–20.

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Jews” by John Chrysostom.61 The author already emphasized in the title that he had used as his main source writings of the Church Father John Chrysostom and composed this manual upon the request of one Jew.62 The text consists of two parts: one of them addresses the alleged godlessness of Jews, who rejected the Old Testaments and were punished by the destruction of Jerusalem. The second part is dedicated to the most favorite subject of Christian anti-Jewish treatises – blaming Jews for the crucifixion of Christ.63 Another two of Agallianos’ texts are staged as records of a religious dispute that took place in his metropolis in Medeia between him and several learned Jews; the first dispute occurred in 1468 or later,64 and the second conversation should have happened one year after the first one.65 The treatises by Gennadios Scholarios and Theodoros Agallianos were written in the decade following the fall of Constantinople, which does not seem to be a coincidence. It took some turbulent years not only for Greeks, but also for Romaniotes to get acquainted with the new Muslim rule. But afterwards it seems realistic that there was a necessity of exchange between Greek-speaking Jews and Greek hierarchs. As for Jews, they were no longer subordinated to the Christian ruler and Canon law, but still shared a common language and similar identity with Greeks. As for Greek hierarchs, they had to formulate the new framing of 61 Homilies against Jews by John Chrysostom remained very popular in the early modern time. Contra Iudaeos homiliae VI were published in 1602 in Augsburg in Greek with an extensive Latin introduction explaining the usefulness of this text for exposing “errors and misconceptions” of the Jews. This volume of 1602 also contained letters of leading Greek intellectuals of this epoch – Maximos Margounios, Kyrillos Loukaris and Leontios Eustratios. See Émile Legrand, Bibliographie hellenique ou description raisonnée des ouvrages publiés par des Grecs au dix-septième ciècle. Vol. 1 (Paris: Alphonse Picard et Fils, 1894), no. 8, 17–19. Another popular edition of these homilies was a miscellany called “Margarit”. It was published in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in Ostrog in 1595. Its Romanian translation was printed in Bucharest in 1691. 62 Enkheirídion katà Ioudaío¯n – parexeble¯´the¯ dè apò to¯˜n lόgo¯n tou˜ megálou oikoumenikou˜ pho¯ste¯˜ros Io¯ánnou tou˜ Khrusostόmou dià tou˜ megálou oikoumenikou˜ pho¯ste¯˜ros Io¯ánnou tou˜ Khrusostόmou dià tou˜ megálou oikonόmou, hu˜steron dè Me¯deías, Theophánous, aite¯´santos tinòs to¯˜n Ioudaío¯n (The Manual against the Jews – extracted from the words of the great oecumenical teacher John Chrysostom by the great steward (megalos oikonomos), later [metropolitan] of Medeia, Theophanos, upon request from of one the Jews). 63 This manual is to be found in at last four manuscripts; the most important of them is Codex Alexand. Patriarch. 169 saec. XV. See Patrinelis, Ho Theodoros Agallianos, 45–46; Külzer, Disputationes Graecae, 219. 64 The title of this text is Tou˜ me¯tropolítou Me¯deías Theophánous Lόgos genόmenos prόs tinas ellogímous to¯˜n Ioudaío¯n paratukhόntas en te¯˜ͅ Me¯deía˛ (Metropolitan of Medeia Theopanos’ account that came into being in presence of some notable Jews that resided in Medeia). 65 Tou˜ autou˜ [me¯tropolítou Me¯deías Theophánous Lόgos] pròs autoùs [ellogímous to¯˜n Ioudaío¯n] met’ eniautòn eis deutéran aphigménous homilían. (Metropolitan of Medeia Theopanos’ account in presence of notable Jews, with whom we continued through to the second instruction). See Patrinelis, Ho Theodoros Agallianos, 46; Külzer, Disputationes Graecae, 219– 20.

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Christian identity for their flock in order to protect them from conversions, heresies and unnecessary contacts with Jews, Muslims, Armenians, etc. The treatises that show the glory of the Christian religion over the Jews, who were better positioned in the new Ottoman society, can be considered a consolation prize for the Orthodox Greeks.

2.

Greek-Jewish polemics in the Ottoman Empire at the end of the 16th century

The author of the already-mentioned polemical treatise against the Jews, Meletios Pegas (1549/50–1601)66, was born in Crete67 during the time of Venetian rule. He studied at the University of Padua – a favorite center of education for Greeks, especially for those from the territories ruled by Venetians.68 After his studies in Italy, he chose an ecclesiastical career in the Ottoman Empire, where he was ordained as a protosyngel in Constantinople, and later he became a Patriarch of Alexandria (1590–1601). According to Meletios Pegas, he wrote his treatise “On Christian Piety – an Answer Against the Jew”69 during his stay in Constantinople (apparently before 1590, as he calls himself “great protosyngel and archimandrite of Alexandria”) in Latin, as the dispute with the Jew had taken place in Latin. Later Meletios translated the treatise into Greek and dedicated it to the Greek residents of Constantinople and Galata.70 The manuscript No. 503 at the collection of Holy Sepulchre Exarchate’s Metochion Panagiou Tafou (MPT) Library in Constantinople is identified as a Greek autograph of Meletios Pegas, con-

66 On the life, intellectual and ecclesiastical activities of Meletios Pegas, see Ivan I. Malysˇevskij, Aleksandrijskij patriarx Meletij Pigas i ego ucˇastie v delax russkoj cerkvi, vols. 1–2 (Kiev: Tipografija Kievo-pecˇerskoj Lavry, 1872); Vasilikí Tzóga, Melétios Pe¯gás (1550–1601) Patriárkhis Alexandrías: víos – drási – ergographía. PhD-thesis, Ethnikó kai Kapodistriakó Panepistímio Athinón (EKPA), Athens 2009. 67 On the influence of Cretans on the Orthodox theology in 16–17th centuries, see George S. Bebis, “The Contribution of Cretan Theologians and Scholars in the Spiritual Life of the Greek People, after the Fall of Constantinople,” in Pepragmena tou 3ou Diethnous Kretologikou Synedriou, Rethymnon 1971, vol. 3 (Athens: Ypourgeio Politismou kai Epistemon, 1973–75). 68 Efthymios Nicolaïdis, “Scientific Exchanges Between Hellenism and Europe: Translations into Greek, 1400–1700,” in Cultural Translation in Early Modern Europe, ed. Peter Burke and Ronnie Po-Chia Hsia (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 185. 69 Kuríou Melétiou Agiotátou Pápa Alexandreías hupèr te¯˜s khristiano¯˜n eusebeías pròs Ioudaíous apología (Kyr Meletios the Holiest Patriarch of Alexandria about the Christian piety – an apology/answer towards the Jews). As I was using for my paper mainly the printed version of this treatise (Lviv 1593), an exemplar from the Kiev National Library (Kir. 988), I have to point out that this edition is without pagination. 70 Toı˜s eusebestátois toı˜s theophilestátois en kurío¯ͅ adelphoı˜s toı˜s en ko¯nstantinopόle¯, kaì galatã paroikou˜sin.

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taining the Greek text of the treatise (ff. 262–290), but also a prologue to the treatise written in Latin Meletius lectori (from 1588, ff. 290a–293).71 Some years later, a Greek member of the Orthodox Brotherhood of Lviv, Manuel Metzapetos, brought one manuscript containing this text to Lviv, where it was translated into Slavonic, published (1593) and disseminated among Orthodox readers in Eastern Europe.72 One decade later, another translation of the text took place – Maximos of Peloponnese rewrote Meletios’ polemical treatise this time in vernacular Greek with some additional comments in Alexandria, in Ottoman Egypt (1606). The manuscript with Maximos’ edition of the treatise is to be found nowadays at the Greek National Library (EBE 1896, ff. 158–200a).73 Why would the Greek hierarch Meletios Pegas compose an anti-Jewish treatise in the Ottoman Empire in Latin? Some suggestions are possible based on his own notes in the text – he joined the dispute that Catholic foreigners74 had initiated with the educated Jew in Latin. Maybe it was the Jewish opponent of Meletios, who preferred Latin, as he possibly did not speak Greek. Or ambitious Meletios wrote a text in Latin in order to spread it not only among Orthodox Greeks, but also among Western Christians in Constantinople, or even with the intent to reach Jews of Iberian origin and Christian background. As we know that the Greek manuscript with Meletios’ treatise was sent very quickly to Poland-Lithuania in order to be published there, maybe the initial purpose of Meletios was to send his treatise to Venice (the cultural and commercial center of Greek press activities75) for printing.

71 Athanasios Papadopoulou-Kerameo¯s, Hierosolumitike¯´ bibliothe¯´ke¯, e¯´toi, Katálogos to¯˜n en taís bibliothe¯´kais tou˜ hagio¯tátou apostolikou˜ te kaí katholikou˜ orthodόxou patriarkhikou˜ thrόnou to¯˜n Hierosolúmo¯n kaí páse¯s Palaistíne¯s apokeiméno¯n helle¯niko¯˜n ko¯díko˜¯ n. 2nd edition, vols. 2, 5 (Brussels: Culture et civilisation, 1963), 5, 60–61; Tzóga, Melétios Pe¯gás, 507. 72 On this edition, see Legrand, Bibliographie hellenique, Vol. 2, no. 200, 88–89; Aleksandra A. Guseva, Izdanija kirillovskogo ˇsrifta vtoroj poloviny XVI veka. Svodnyj katalog, vol. 2 (Moscow: Indrik, 2003), no. 124, 822–23; Gerhard Podskalsky, Griechische Theologie in der Zeit der Türkenherrschaft (1453–1821). Die Orthodoxie im Spannungsfeld der nachreformatorischen Konfessionen des Westens (Munich: Beck, 1988), 132. 73 The manuscript EBE 1896 also contains numerous epistles of Meletios Pegas (1580–1584, 1592–1600), his writing on Easter. In the folios 158–200 is to be found the treatise by Meletios under the title: Linos Politis, Katálogos khirográphon tis Ethnikís Vivliothíkis tis Elládos (Athens: Akademia Athinon, 1991), 20–21. The full text of Meletios’ treatise rewritten by Maximos of Peloponnese was edited by Angeliki Nikolopoulou, Angeliki, “Maximou tou Peloponnisiou exigisi tou kata ioudaion ergou tou Meletiou Piga,” Parnassos. Filologiko periodiko 36 (1995): 314–346. 74 Meletios calls the Catholic person “some teacher from the Catholic Church” (“to˜¯ ͅ te¯˜s ro¯maїke¯˜s ekkle¯sías didaskálo¯ tini”). 75 Leandros Vranoussis, L’hellénisme postbyzantin et l’Europe: Manuscrits, livres, imprimeries (Athens, 1981), 24.

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The Jewish opponent of Meletios possessed particular skills in communicating in Latin.76 His “religious knowledge” originated, according to Meletios, from his studies in Italy and France, where he learned patristics and Latin theology (in particular scholasticism77), which allowed him to be very skillful in leading religious disputes with Christians.78 It can be supposed that this Jewish opponent did not belong to the Romaniote (Byzantine Jewish) community, as otherwise the dispute could be expected to be held in Greek.79 Although we obviously can only speculate about the origin of Meletios’ religious opponent, it could still be suggested that he was one of the Iberian Sephardic Jews or even a former converso (re-converted to Judaism from Christianity in the Ottoman Empire), which could explain his interest in interreligious discussions with representatives of the Catholic Church in the neutral Ottoman territory. The dispute took place in Constantinople, where in the second half of the 16th century numerous Jewish expellees from the Iberian Peninsula settled. Galata and Pera became especially popular with Portuguese Jews whose Christian-European background and Latin languages matched those of the European Christian merchants already living there.80 The form and the contents of the treatise “On Christian piety” differ greatly from the dialogue by Gennadios Scholarios. It is not really a dialogue in its form, but more vivid reflections on some principles of Christianity, a simply written apology of Christianity without an intellectual overload of philosophical, theological and historical nature as in the text of Gennadios. As Gerhard Podskalsky wrote, this treatise constitutes a new phase of Greek theological literature – 76 Since the Middle Ages, it was not unusual, especially in Spain and Italy, for Jews to be ready to participate in debates with Christians in Latin. As Daniel Lasker writes: “It is likely, therefore, that the public defense of Judaism required the Jewish polemicist to learn Latin.” Daniel J. Lasker, “Latin into Hebrew and the Medieval Jewish-Christian Debate,” in Latin-into-Hebrew: Texts and Studies, vol. 1, ed. Resianne Fontaine and Gad Freudenthal (Leiden: Brill, 2013), 336; Mauro Zonta, Hebrew Scholasticism in the Fifteenth Century (Berlin: Freie Universität; Torino: Nino Aragno Editore, 2006), 14. 77 On the popularity of scholastic methods among Jews in inter-religious polemics with Christians, see Zonta, Hebrew Scholasticism, 22; Daniel J. Lasker, “The Impact of Christianity on Late Iberian Jewish Philosophy,” in In Iberia and Beyond: Hispanic Jews between Cultures, ed. Bernard Dov Cooperman (Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1998). 78 “Ebrãios tís epì Sophía˛ te¯˜ͅ patro¯´a˛ mégaphrono˜¯ n, eis te¯˜s latinike¯˜s paidías eis theologías te¯˜s legoméne¯s par autoı˜s skholastike¯˜s empríro¯s ékho¯n. (e¯˜n ge kat italían eis gallìan tà khristiano¯˜n ho¯s akόuo¯…o¯okrinόmenos) khristianoı˜s sphόdra antiphére) // Evreaninъ neˇkto ô premo˛drosti ôtcˇeskoj velemȣdrъstvo˛e˛j. i latinskago nakazanіe˛ i b(o)goslovіe˛, glagolemago ou nixъ sxolasticˇeskago isko˛senъ syj. (beˇ oubo vъ italіi i galіi xristıe˛nskіmъ je˛ko zˇe slysˇȣ protivȣ ôtveˇsˇtavae˛) xristіe˛nomъ zeˇlo sъprotivle˛e˛se˛.” 79 Bowman, “The Jewish Experience in Byzantium,” 45–46. 80 According to Minna Rozen, many of “these Portugese Jews traded with Christian Europe, it was natural for them to settle in the center of this trade in Galata”. Minna Rozen, A History of the Jewish Community in Istanbul. The Formative Years, 1453–1566 (Leiden: Brill, 2002), 60.

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written by an intellectual in a simple way and in a simple language, without pointing out controversies with interlocutors even in polemical texts.81 It is something between a conversation and a sermon, which is focused less on rhetorical means and canons than on spontaneous thoughts and feelings in a more comprehensible, human way.82 Meletios Pegas divides his text into four parts. He formulates three “Jewish statements” about the Christian religion that he wants to deal with: that it was not right for Christ to come; that he has not come yet; that Christians are wrong in their perception of Christ.83 Thus, he consciously decides to concentrate only on the figure of Christ and avoids any more complicated dogmatic issues like the Trinity, immaculate conception, veneration of icons, etc. In the first part of his book, in which he wants to provide evidence of Christ as the Messiah “who has already come”, Meletios explains the difference between Christians and Jews in a very “tolerant” way. According to him, what sets apart Christians and Jews is “nothing else than that we [Christians] believe and confess that Jesus has already come and they [Jews] believe and confess that He will come”.84 So using the texts of prophets (usual for Christian polemics against Jews) he manifests Christ to be the Messiah and explains that these are actually Jews who wait for Christ and that no one possessing “Jewish knowledge” can doubt that Christ is going to come. On the one hand, Meletios Pegas automatically imposes upon his Jewish opponents to be sure that Christ and the Messiah are the same person (what they must know according to “their own” holy Scriptures, otherwise they should be considered as “ignorant” of their own religious texts and beliefs85). On the other hand, Meletios convinces his Christian readers that Jews are not very different, and that it is easy to bring them to Christ using their own texts, which creates a perception of logical superiority of the Christian religion in comparison to Judaism. Very similarly, in the second part Meletios brings arguments against the Jews, who do not believe that the Messiah has come or that Christ and the Messiah are 81 Podskalsky, Griechische Theologie, 132. 82 Athina Kontali, “Melétios Pe¯gãs kaì Kúrillos Loúkaris tá “Katá Ioudaío¯n érga tous,” Mnemosune 19 (2013), 463. 83 Kontali, “Melétios Pe¯gãs kaì Kúrillos Loúkaris,” 464; Tzóga, Melétios Pe¯gás 511. 84 “oudè di’ állo tí pròs he¯mãs diaphérontai. ei me¯` hóti he¯meı˜s pistéuomen, kaì homologoúmen ele¯luthénan tòn khristòn, hón autoì kaì pisteúousi, kaì homologou˜si méllonta eltheı˜n” (The same text in Maximos’s interpretation, f. 163v, Nikolopoulou, “Maximou tou Peloponnisiou exigisi,” 317). On this passage, see also Tatjana Oparina, “La polémique anti-juive en Russie au XVIIe siècle,” in Les Chrétiens et les Juifs dans les sociétés de rites grec et latin, ed. Michel Dmitriev, Daniel Tollet, and Élisabeth Teiro (Paris: Champion, 2003), 178. 85 As Meletios writes: “Because if anyone does not say that Christ will come…he is ignorant of Jewish mysteries, as it is known by them that Christ is to come.” (“ho¯s ouk édei eltheı˜n tòn Κhristόn, hou˜te…to˜¯ n Iȣdaiko˜¯ n muste¯río¯n estìn amúe¯tos. ésti ge par autoı˜s anamphíbolon tò hòti éde tòn Κhristòn eltheı¯n.”), Vernacular version f. 163v.

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the same person. Also here he appeals to “Hebrew Holy Scriptures showing Christ coming”86 and again points out that knowing these texts makes this understanding absolutely clear. The third part of the book is dedicated to the “christological” subject – Christ as God and a human, as a God’s son, priest and sacrifice. The last part deals with many different questions, possibly because the author at one point “forgot” his intention of a clear division into parts. Here Meletios addresses the terrestrial life of Jesus Christ (birth, life, teaching, death on the cross as a sacrifice and resurrection), then turns to Moses as a forerunner and prophet of Christ, passing over to the Mosaic law and its role in Judaism, explaining the Christian view on circumcision (“circumcision of the heart”87) and celebrating Shabbat (“not Saturday of laziness, but Saturday of spirit”). Also here is the main focus on the continuity between Christianity and Judaism. Meletios provides Christ’s quotations from the New Testament about the necessity to fulfill the Mosaic law (like Mt 5,17–18; Mt 19, 16–17 etc.)88 several times and stresses that Christ himself had a sinless life in accordance with the law, before he points out the so-called limits of the law that could be resolved through Christ and the New Testament. Here he also uses classical metaphorical comparison between Jewish law and Christian faith, where the first one is a strict teacher, and the second a kind doctor. At the end of the book Meletios wished Jews to acknowledge Messiah as Christ and to “perceive the law with the heart”, but he did not bring any stories of a deep persuasion of the Jewish opponent by the “Christian truth”, nor did he claim that the Jew wished to be converted, but only reminded the reader that the dialogue took place in the Latin language and that he wrote it down for his flock in Greek. In his tractate “On Christian piety” Meletios does not demonstrate any specific knowledge of Jewish religious culture or traditions. His knowledge of Judaism is based solely on the books of the Old and New Testament,89 but his tone is always friendly and respectful to his opponent, also because he presupposes from the Jew excellent expertise concerning Holy Scriptures. At one point by referring to the biblical prophecy about Christ, Meletios emphasized in brackets the role of holy scriptures for Jews: “the word of divine scriptures (that even by Hebrews the

86 Evrejskae˛ svjasˇcˇennae˛ pisanїe˛ pokazȣjutъ prisˇedsˇa Xrista // tà to˜¯ n Ebraío¯n hierà grámmata elénkhȣsin ele¯luthόta tòn Khristόn. 87 Also by Gennadios Scholarios. See on this point Külzer, Disputationes Graecae, 216. 88 On the role of this subject in Byzantine anti-Jewish dialogues, see Külzer, Disputationes Graecae, 262–63, 285–88. 89 Meletios also applies much to Saint Paul the Apostle and his writings concerning Jews. On Meletios’ references to Saint Paul, see Karamanidou, “References to Paul,” 120–27.

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most righteous and the most honored)”90. One of the particular features in the book of Meletios is its “tolerant” character.91 Even when naming differences between both religions, it remains very factual, without reproaches or insults against the Jewish faith or Jewish opponents. The content could even be perceived as an apology of Christianity. So in a dialogue with Judaism, Meletios tries to defend Christianity, to present it to be “as attractive” as Judaism, as no less worthy, which seems quite unusual for Orthodox tradition. But it is also an easy, comprehensible attractiveness of Christianity in comparison to all other religions that this text provides to its Christian readers. If the authors of the polemical treatises in the 1460s discussed religious matters with local Jews from the Romaniote community in mind, Meletios Pegas addresses an intellectual Sephardic Jew with a similar Italian universitary background as that of Meletios himself. His education and knowledge of textual tradition of both religions motivated the Jew to look for disputants among the Catholics of Constantinople and later to discuss religious matters with the Orthodox Greek priest and intellectual. These details are far too specific to classify them as a topos or as a complete fiction. Although the person of the Jewish interlocutor cannot be identified because of the lack of details, this figure can be compared with the anonymous author of Fuente Clara (“Clear Fountain”), a Sephardic treatise against Christianity that was published in Salonica in 1595.92 The author of Fuente Clara was certainly a Sephardic Jew, possibly a former converso93, with a European university background. According to autobiographical notes from the book, the author studied philosophy and medicine.94 He used actively scholastic methods95 with numerous references to Aristotle’s phi90 Slovo zˇe bozˇestvennyxъ pisanіj ( je˛zˇe i ou evrej i najpacˇe pravedneˇ mnogȣ cˇestь sъderzˇasˇtixъ) // ho lόgos ek to¯˜n theío¯n grapho˜¯ n (to¯˜n tous par’ Ebraíois …málá ge endíko¯s ekhouso¯˜n polù tò sebásmion). 91 E. g., Tatjana Oparina called this treatise very tolerant (“Ce petit opuscule était l’exemple d’une position très tolérante”), especially in comparison with the character of offensive antiJewish writings in Muscovy, like those by famous publicist of Greek origin Maksim the Greek. See Oparina, “La polémique anti-juive,” 170. 92 Critical edition and transliteration of this Judaeo-Spanish text was undertaken by Pilar Romeu Ferré, Fuente Clara (Salónica, 1595). Un converso sefardí a la defensa del judaísmo y a la búsqueda de su propia fe (Barcelona: Tirocinio 2007). 93 Pilar Romeu Ferré suggested that the author of Fuente Clara was a former converso. This she indicated already in the title of her Spanish transliteration and edition of the text (2007), even though she pointed out that the author himself had not ever mentioned that he or his family had been converted to Christianity. (Pilar Romeu Ferré, “A New Approach to the Polemical Work ‘Fuente Clara’,” Journal of Jewish Studies 35, no. 1 (2004): 124–25). 94 Romeu Ferré, Fuente Clara, 93–94, 269; Romeu Ferré, “A New Approach,” 124. 95 On the issue of Jewish scholasticism and Jewish Aristotelianism first of all in Spain and Italy, see Zonta, Hebrew Scholasticism. On the long tradition of Jewish-Christian Disputes in late medieval Spain, see numerous contributions by Daniel J. Lasker, “Jewish-Christian Polemics in Light of the Expulsion from Spain,” Judaism 41, no. 2 (1992); “Averroistic Trends in Jewish-

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losophy already in the preface of his treatise, which he wrote in the JudaeoSpanish language (Judezmo). The excellent knowledge of the Christian religion demonstrated by the author of Fuente Clara comes presumably from Southern or Western Europe (not from the neighboring Ottoman Greeks) because the author writes a lot about the Catholic Church, papacy and inquisition (from Spain and Italy), but he also knows about the existence of different Protestant denominations, like Lutherans and Calvinists,96 which are all called in the writing “Christian sects”.97 Detailed knowledge of Christian religion in the book presupposes that the author was well acquainted with the texts of the New Testament and its interpretation by Christians (he mentions at least St. Augustine, St. Jerome, St. Thomas Aquinas and even some Lutheran treatises, including Luther’s own98), very likely of the Latin tradition. The book is written as a detailed compendium of arguments on all doctrines of the Christian faith (on St. Spirit, veneration of Jesus as son of God and Messiah, absolution through Christ’s resurrection, the virginity of St. Mary, Transubstantiation, etc.) as well as numerous Christian arguments against Judaism. This author could be a good opponent to any Christian hierarchs (as was the Jew who participated in the interreligious dispute with Meletios Pegas). Although Fuente Clara was not written as an active polemic against Christians, the first chapter begins with a Hebrew citation from the Mishnah Avot 2.14: “Know what to answer to a heretic [apiqoros]”.99 To this category of heretics in Fuente Clara belongs Jesus the Jew, all Jews converted to Christianity, to any of its “sects”, but especially to the Roman Catholic denomination.100 The main subject of this book was to explain how to resist conversions, first of all to Christianity (but also to Islam) and to stay faithful to Judaism. This resistance to conversions to Christianity is only then possible if people have enough knowledge and understanding of the falsity of Christian arguments, as according to the author,

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Christian Polemics in the Late Middle Ages,” Speculum 55, no. 2 (1980); “Breve historia de la literatura polémica judía anticristiana,” Reseña Biblica 26 (2000), etc. E. g., the anonymous author criticizes the instution of confession as a Christian sacrament and points out that England, France and Germany got rid of confession, as they opened their eyes to the falsity of it: “Destas confessiones que frades fazen se sigueron y siguen oy en día muchos adulterios y furtos. Por tanto, Inglateria, França, Alemaña, echaron de sí frades y las dichas confessiones porque abreron los ojos y bieron los males que se sigueron destas confessiones.” See Romeu Ferré, Fuente Clara, 329. “De todas estas leis y seitas echa mano Edom – papistas, luteranos, calvinistas.” Romeu Ferré, Fuente Clara, 107. See Romeu Ferré, Fuente Clara, 90. On the Lutheran book: “A esto trae es su libro un letrado luterano que escrivió cuentra los papas.” Romeu Ferré, Fuente Clara, 90. ‫דע מה שתשיב לאפיקורוס‬. To the meaning of the term apiqoros in Jewish Studies see Jenny R. Labendz, “‘Know What to Answer the Epicurean’: A Diachronic Study of the Apiqoros in Rabbinic Literature,” Hebrew Union College Annual 74 (2003). Romeu Ferré, Fuente Clara, 93–94; Romeu Ferré, “A New Approach,” 119–20.

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several groups of Jews are easy to persuade toward conversion: those lacking education, others looking for escape from their faith, and a third group who wish to convert to this religion.101 It seems that at the end of the sixteenth century there was enough potential and interest in the interreligious polemics in the Ottoman Empire from both sides, in part because among new arrivals first of all from the Iberian Peninsula, but also some from Poland, were Jews with Christian backgrounds, former converts wishing to re-convert to Judaism in better conditions under Muslim rule. Their knowledge of the Christian religion made them dangerous opponents to Christians, but it was also a challenging task for rabbis to integrate them into the life of the Jewish religious community. Jewish religious books could serve as a tool of religious education of former converts, but so could polemical treatises like Fuente Clara that were printed in different cities of the Ottoman Empire not only in Hebrew, but also in the Judaeo-Spanish language in order to also disseminate knowledge among Jews who were not very religious or well educated. The treatise by Meletios Pegas was also suitable for printing – it was not so long and not so overcharged with theological and historical perspectives as the dialogue by Gennadios Scholarios. As a short treatise with clear and simple arguments, simply written – the author intended that it would be published. But if the Jewish Fuente Clara could appear in the printing house of the Italian Jewish family Matatya Bat-Sheva in Salonica in 1595 and even be reprinted in Constantinople in 1740 by Jonah ben Yaacov Ashkenazi (refugee from Poland),102 Meletios had to send his treatise “On Christian Piety” to Poland-Lithuania in order to have it appear in print because there were no Greek printing presses in the Ottoman Empire until 1627, and in Venice no polemical writings by Greeks could be printed.

101 “Por tanto, yo, mobido por celo de ver que tantos todos los días se convierten a esta fe por no aber repuesta a los argumentos y monestaciones con los cuales pressuaden a los pobres de el entendimiento y a los viciosos deseosos de escaparen deste fuerte galut a creer, mas ellos con este escapamento falso no escapan de seren abatidos de sus feridores, como son los llamados confessos y anussim, y a todos los otros que por su veluntad se converten a esta fe…”. Romeu Ferré, Fuente Clara, 93. 102 Romeu Ferré, “A New Approach,” 129–30; Borovaya, Beginning, 227. On the printing activities of Polish Jew Jonah Ashkenazi, who re-initiated Jewish printing activities in Constantinople and made it to “the metropolitan of Hebrew printing in the entire Middle East” see Yaron Ben Na’eh, “Hebrew Printing Houses in the Ottoman Empire.” In Jewish Journalism and Printing Houses in the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey, edited by Gad Nassi (Istanbul: Isis Press, 2001), 82–83.

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Meletios’ treatise in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth

It can be suggested that Meletios Pegas himself sent or gave his handwritten text of the treatise to Manuel Metzapetos103 for printing in Lviv. The name of Manuel and his role in bringing the treatise to Poland was also mentioned in the handwritten translation into vernacular Greek by Maximos Margounios in 1606.104 Possibly, the information about this “shipment” was already stored in the manuscript that Maximos was using for his translation, or he had access to the bilingual edition of 1593. Certainly, Meletios knew about the printing house of the Orthodox Brotherhood and had connections to it because very soon after the book had been published, Meletios Pegas wrote about the printing activity of the Brotherhood and about the release of his own book in the epistle to the Russian Tsar Fedor Ivanovicˇ (in June 1593). In this epistle Pegas underlined the high costs that printing of holy books incurs and their necessity for overcoming the low level of education. That is why the members of the Brotherhood published the treatise by Meletios against the Jews.105 Obviously, Meletios Pegas considered his book to be useful as a manual of the Orthodox faith and a resource for deeper learning of the Greek language, necessary for knowledge of Orthodox theology (especially in a competitive environment with the leading Jesuit education and the almost missing Orthodox one). Meletios Pegas hoped to gain financial support for printing and educational initiatives of the Orthodox Brotherhood from the Russian Tsar, but also to awaken his interest in and excitement about the role of the Greek language there. Meletios also mentioned his anti-Jewish treatise in his other book “The Dialogue of the Orthodox Christian”, which was published by his nephew and a future Patriarch of Constantinople, Cyrill Loukaris, in Greek in Vilnius (1596).106

103 Manuel Metzapetos or Mano Mazapeta was an influential patrician in the Greek Diaspora community of Lviv, where he settled in the mid-sixteenth century, residing in the house of his father-in-law Marek Langisz, where he owned a collection of Greek books. Mazapeta’s coffin portrait is now kept in the Historical Museum in Lviv, as one of the oldest portraits of a member of the Greek Diaspora in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. He was also a member of the Orthodox Brotherhood of Lviv. Waldemar Deluga, “Greek Patronage of the Arts in Lviv in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries,” in Economy and Society in Central and Eastern Europe, ed. Daniel Dumitran and Valer Moga (Vienna: LIT, 2013), 294. 104 EBE 1896, f. 158a (according to an edition by Nikolopoulou, “Maximou tou Peloponnisiou exigisi,” 314). 105 Wilhelm Regel, Analecta Byzantino-russica (Saint Petersburg: Eggers, 1891), 105: “te¯`n gàr khalkographían polle¯˜ͅ dapáne¯ͅ hoi adelphoì kte¯sámenoi tás te hieràs bíblous ektupou˜si kaì tà paideías te¯˜s khthamalo¯téras grámmata. hén esti to¯˜n pόno¯n auto¯˜n bláste¯ma kaì tò he¯méteron toutì hupόmne¯ma tò katà Ioudaío¯n, hoper autoì labόntes katà to¯˜n te¯˜s písteo¯s te¯˜s orthodόxou ede¯moisieúsanto”. 106 The British Library General Catalogue, 321, no. C.130.b.12.

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This bilingual edition of Meletios’ treatise was prepared primarily for the needs of the Orthodox students in Lviv and with their aid. By using a text printed parallelly in Greek and Slavonic, they could understand the Greek text more easily thanks to translation, or learn Greek sentences by heart and recite them without doubting their meaning. The Orthodox Brotherhood’s school had a goal to train the students in multiple languages, so they had to learn Church Slavonic, Greek, Latin and Polish. A particular role was ascribed to Greek and Slavonic languages that had to be studied in tandem so that according to the rules of the school, “when children are speaking to each other, the one should ask in Greek and the other should answer in Slavonic, so they should not speak to each other in simple language (prosta mova), but one should talk in Slavonic and another in Greek.”107 The high level of acquaintance with not only Greek literary language, but also with the vernacular, spoken Greek was possible thanks to the active participation of the Greeks from the Ottoman Empire in the fate of the school in Lviv. One of the most important persons in this context was Metropolitan Arsenios of Elasson, leading teacher of Greek and the author of the first GreekSlavonic grammar book “Adelphotes”108 and a very interesting Transottoman actor himself because of his role in ecclesiastical affairs in the Ottoman Empire, Poland-Lithuania and most importantly in Muscovy. Not only linguistic skills (knowledge of Greek language) could be strengthened by using this treatise by Meletios, but also knowledge of one’s own religion, which was, in multiethnic and multiconfessional Poland-Lithuania, directly connected with the matter of language. Michael Rohoza, Metropolitan of Kiev, depicting in 1592 a deplorable situation with regards to education and religious learning, where because of “infidels” and “negligent and reckless priests” many people “deviated from their faith and perished in different heresies”109, complained in his writing that “the learning of Holy Scripture has deteriorated a lot, in particularly in our Slavonic Russian language, so that all people switched to [more] simple and deficient Polish writing and that is the reason why they squalled into different heresies, because of their ignorance of the power of theology with the impeccable grammar of the Slavonic language.”110 According to 107 Julija Sˇustova, Dokumenty L′vovskogo Uspenskogo stavropigijskogo bratstva (1686–1788). Istocˇnikovedcˇeskoe issledovanie (Moscow: Rukopisnye Pamjatniki Drevnej Rusi, 2009), 171. 108 ADELPHOTIS. Grammatika dobroglagolivago ellinoslovenskago jazyka (Lviv, 1591); Yaroslav Isaievych, Preemniki pervopecˇatnika (Moscow: Kniga, 1981). 109 Persˇodrukar Ivan Fedorov ta iego poslidovniki na Ukrajini (XVI–persˇa polovina XVII st.). Zbirnik dokumentiv, ed. Y. Isaievych et al. (Kiev: Naukova dumka, 1975), no. 68, 107: “mnogoe smusˇcˇenїe ot inoveˇrnyx i svoix neradivyx bezcˇinnyx pastyrej i mnozїi ot veˇry v razlicˇnyx eresex pogibosˇa”. 110 Persˇodrukar, no. 68, 107: “ucˇenїe sv( ja)tyx pisanїi zeˇlo oskudeˇ, pacˇezˇe slovenskago rosijskago nasˇego jazyka i vsi cˇ(e)l(o)v(e)cy prilozˇisˇas′ prostomu nes″versˇennomu ljadskomu pisanju i sego radi v razlicˇnyja eresi vpadosˇa neveˇdusˇcˇe v bgoslovїi sily s″versˇennago gram-

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him, only thanks to the (Greek) patriarch of Antioch Joakim, who had recommended organizing a brotherhood and a school of Greek and Slavonic scriptures, as well as a printing house, but also thanks to mediation by the Patriarch of Constantinople, could these institutions be started in Lviv.111 The Polish language was associated first of all with Catholic teaching, but also with Protestant writings. Only Slavonic (Church Slavonic with Ruthenian elements) or Greek languages complied with the Orthodox faith. So in this context it does not seem surprising that a polemical treatise by Meletios Pegas was considered to be so suitable for educational purposes, as this connection between the lack of (linguistic) knowledge and failure in disputes with “heretics” seemed to be a topos by the Orthodox bishops in Poland-Lithuania. The content of the treatise dedicated to polemics against Jews also had a particular meaning in the new context. At the end of the 16th century, the city of Lviv was famous for its ethnic and religious diversity, as a place where different Christian denominations coexisted with Jewish (and Muslim) communities. The printing activities of the Orthodox Brotherhood of Lviv (which was subordinated directly to the Patriarch of Constantinople) were supported on the one hand by Greek hierarchs and local Greek members of the Orthodox Brotherhood, while on the other hand, the printing house’s financial difficulties made it necessary to borrow money from local Jews and later to completely mortgage the printing press to a Jew, Israel Jakubovicˇ. So the Brotherhood was reliant on the Jewish community at least in financial (and legal) matters. Already in 1579 the first printer of Lviv, Ivan Fedorov (1525–1583), pledged books and some printing equipment to the member of the Jewish community of Lviv Israel Jakubovicˇ. In 1584 the Jewish court of Lviv awarded Israel Jakubovicˇ owhnership of the printing press in repayment of a debt.112 The document about this Jewish court decision was preserved in Latin in the archives of the Orthodox Brotherhood of Lviv. The court session took place in the Jewish school of Lviv, presided over by the judge Wictorino Kowalski, a local sub-judge and judge of all Jews in Lviv.113 In the presence of Jewish witnesses, Israel Jakubovicˇ showed to the court 140 books linguae Rut[h]enicae, as well as typefaces and necessary maticˇskago slovenskogo jazyka.” At the beginning of the 20th century, Russian historians explained the term “ljadskoe pisanie” as “Catholic according to the contents and Polish according to the language”. See A. A. Skvorcov and A. I. Malevicˇ, Mogilevskaja eparxija: istoriko-statisticˇeskoe opisanie, vol. 1 (Mogilev na Dnepre: Skoropecˇatnja i litografija Sˇ. Fridlanda, 1905), 78; Ivan E. Evseev, Ocˇerki po istorii slavjanskogo perevoda Biblii (Saint Petersburg: Tip. M. Merkusˇeva 1916), 31–32. 111 Persˇodrukar, no. 68, 107. 112 Wladimirus Milkowicz, Monumenta Confraternitatis Stauropigianae Leopoliensis, vol. 1 (Lviv: Inst. Stauropigiana, 1895), no. 74, 103–104; Persˇodrukar, no. 38, 69–70. 113 “Subiudice terr[estri] L[eo]p[o]l[ie]n[si] et iudice p[ro] tunc Iudeor[um]”. Persˇodrukar, no. 38, 69.

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supplies for the printing press that he took as collateral for 411 zloty from the printer Ivan Fedorov and his son Ivan. The court conferred to him this property.114 In November 1585 Gedeon Balaban, Orthodox bishop of Lviv, possibly at the request of burghers of Lviv, addressed the Orthodox clergy and the whole Orthodox population of Lviv with information that he had initiated the repurchase of the printing equipment from the Jews for 1,500 zloty (according to this act, printer Ivan Fedorov mortgaged the printing press to Jews for 1,500 zloty to repay his debts before his death115) to save it from attempts to sell this equipment to Moscow.116 In this epistle he complained about the difficulty of gathering this sum of money and expressed hope for generous contributions from Orthodox Ruthenians.117 The Patriarch of Antioch Joakim repeated this request to the Orthodox population of Lviv to support the school of the Brotherhood (“for Christian children from all social strata to be able to learn holy scripture in Greek and Slavonic”), as well as the printing house “of Slavonic and Greek types that is necessary for the school that was mortgaged for 1,500 zloty”.118 In October 1589 the Patriarch of Constantinople Jeremias II Tranos119 sent an epistle to the Orthodox population of Lviv with an appeal to help to redeem the printing press “out of Hebrew hands”, “to buy the press back from the Jew”.120 These quotations confirm that Greek Patriarchs in the Ottoman Empire also knew about the contacts between the Orthodox Brotherhood and Jews. And it was certainly the aspect of possible influence of Jewish religious tradition on the Orthodox rite that bothered Greek hierarchs. This was the main subject in the charter of the Patriarch of Constantinople Jeremias II to the Metropolitan of Kiev Michael

114 Persˇodrukar, no. 38, 69. 115 Milkowicz, Monumenta Confraternitatis, no. 79, 111. Isaievycˇ suggested that this immense difference in the price has to be explained through further loans that Fedorov and other printers had to take in these years (presumably from other lenders) and that they were consolidated by Israel Jakubovicˇ, who later was paid off by the Brotherhood. See Isaievycˇ, Preemniki pervopecˇatnika, 20–21. 116 Milkowicz, Monumenta Confraternitatis, no. 79, 111–12. 117 Milkowicz, Monumenta Confraternitatis, no. 79, 112; Persˇodrukar, no. 48, 80–82: “vespolok’ s pany mesˇcˇany lvovskimi. Kotorye tye instrumenta vseˇ storgovavsˇi u zˇida vzjalismo ih do ruk’ svoih v skar’bnicu cerkovnuju davsˇi na sebe zapis zˇidovi velikim varovanjam tye poltory tisjacˇi zolotyx dati na cˇasy pevnye”. See also Julija Sˇustova, “Tipografija l′vovskogo bratstva kak preemnik knigoizdatel′skoj tradicii Ivana Fedorova,” Fedorovskie ˇctenija (2003): 257. 118 Milkowicz, Monumenta Confraternitatis, no. 81, 119–20; Persˇodrukar, no. 48, 82–83. 119 For the actual biography and bibliography, see Christian Hannick and Klaus-Peter Todt, “Jérémie II Tranos,” in La théologie byzantine et sa tradition, vol 2, ed. Carmelo Giuseppe Conticello and Vassa Conticello (Turnhout: Brepols, 2002). 120 “sˇtambu ot ruk evreiskїi iskupiti”, “stambu vykupiti ot zˇida”. See Persˇodrukar, no. 64, 99– 100. The Brotherhood was still paying back Israel Jakubovicˇ until 1597 in order to use the printing equipment.

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Rohoza.121 Because of its importance and relevance it was printed by the Orthodox Brotherhood of Lviv in 1591 together with the confirmation from Metropolitan Michael. The main problem discussed there is that some Ruthenians celebrate and abstain from work on Friday, but do not celebrate and work on Sunday (suspicion of the “judaizing” tendencies). The other accusation concerned the idea of celebrating Easter by fasting, without bread and meat “resembling pagan Jews”.122 It would be false to assert that the Orthodox Brotherhood only received and printed Meletios’ treatise without any changes. Apart from the complete translation that was provided, an epigram dedicated to Manuel Metzapetos (Emmanuel Achilles) in Greek, a long Slavonic preface and an epilogue in both Greek and Slavonic versions were added. This preface is so characteristic that it seems worth presenting its complete translation here. Let everyone know, who wants to read this epistle, or the answer to the Judean. It was written by Meletios, the most holy Papa and Patriarch of Alexandria and oecumenical judge. When he had previously been a protosingel123 of the great Constantinople Church, he had met a very eloquent and arrogant Jew [zˇidovin]124 who boasted that he was very skilled in Hebrew and Latin scriptures. He [the Jew] debated about the Christian piety with one of the wisest and longest-serving teachers of the Latin Church. As the teacher could not prevail over the Hebrew [evreanin], he encouraged some of the dignitaries present there, as well as persuaded the princes of the Roman Church to 121 RNB I.2.12, Charter of the Patriarch of Constantinople Jeremias II to the Metropolitan of Kiev Michael Rohoza (printed in Slavonic with the title of the Patriarch in Greek in Lviv 1591). 122 RNB I.2.12, f. 2: “a ne tak jak sii oupodobivsˇesja nevernym zˇidom, pasku sebe ot xleba i mjasa sostavljajut”. 123 An honorary title awarded to Orthodox monk priests. 124 It seems worth it to pay attention to the different terms that are used in the Greek and Slavonic text. In the Slavonic title the term “iudejam” is used, an equivalence to the Greek “ι᾿ουδαίους” as a neutral one for describing a religious group. The preface uses another Slavonic term “zˇidovin” that may have different explanations. On the one hand, this term was often used in Church Slavonic texts, but was also close to the everyday language in this region (also close to the Polish word “z˙yd”). On the other hand, less probable, but still possible is that this term here is used to add some pejorative connotation, because in the whole Slavonic translation of the main text (without any insults against Jews) only two other terms are used: “evreanin” (meaning Hebrew as equivalence for Greek ἐβραίος) or “iudej”. On some peculiarities in choosing different terms on Jews in Church Slavonic and early modern Russian textual tradition, see Jacqueline Proyart, “L’image du juif dans l’œvre de l’archiprêtre Avvakum,” in Les chrétiens et les juifs dans les sociétés de rites grec et latin. Approche comparative, ed. Michel Dmitriev, Daniel Tollet, and Élisabeth Teiro (Paris: Champion, 2003). On different terms concerning Jews in medieval Russian anti-Jewish texts, see Aleksandr Grisˇcˇenko, “Naimenovanie evreev v drevnerusskix antiiudejskix socˇinenijax: k istorii ekspressivnosti etnonima zˇidove,” in Naucˇnye trudy po iudaike. Materialy XVIII Mezˇdunarodnoj ezˇegodnoj konferencii po iudaike, vol. 1, ed. Viktorija V. Mocˇalova (Moscow: The Moscow Center for University Teaching of Jewish Civilization “Sefer”, 2011), 125.

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implore the teacher of theology Meletios (about whom it was known that his life and mind were directed toward God and adorned [in God], who was an especially skillful man in divine writings in Greek and Latin) to facilitate their efforts and to mute the eloquent Hebrew. As he [Meletios] ornately debunked in short words in Latin language every Judean argument against Christians, he was begged by that dignitary to write it down for them in Latin, as a keepsake. In the same way, at the request of the Christians of our faith to write it down for them, as the other version was in Latin, he did it in Greek language for our common benefit. This now reached us too, as it was brought by Christloving Manuil [Manuel Metzapetos]. And we in great joy about this gift have prepared this [edition] with much effort and hand it over to you, Orthodox and Christ lovers. So embrace it with love as a special gift.125

This prologue had a goal of promoting the book “On the Christian Piety”, and to make it attractive for numerous readers. On the one hand, particular circumstances of the interreligious dispute in distant Constantinople were stressed; on the other hand, the defeat of the Catholic side receives more attention and new details (in comparison to the writing by Meletios). The book contains such valuable knowledge that it provides tools in fighting all kinds of religious or denominational opponents because its author was an expert, better educated and prepared than the best Jewish or even Catholic intellectuals. It was not merely an assignment that the printing house of the Orthodox Brotherhood passively received from the Patriarch of Alexandria, but rather a text that they welcomed as a knowledge reservoir that with some additions could be published in order to fulfill the needs of the Orthodox Ruthenians, to be translated from the Ottoman context into the context of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. In the same year (1593), Prince of Ostrog Konstantin (Vasilij)126 sent a letter to the Orthodox Brotherhood in Lviv with a request to send him a Greek printer with Greek typefaces. As he wrote, it was very important and very urgent for him, since he wanted to publish a piece of writing by the Patriarch of Alexandria Meletios Pegas in order to send this teaching “against schismatics and other sectarians for print in Russian and Greek” and distribute it in the whole world.127 This letter confirms also the suggestion that the bilingual book examined here was printed with concrete goals of strengthening the abilities of Or125 The text of the preface was reprinted in Guseva, Izdanija kirillovskogo ˇsrifta, no. 124, 822–23. Here, it appears in my translation into English. 126 Tomasz Kempa, Konstanty Wasyl Ostrogski (ok.1524/1525–1608) Wojewoda Kijowski i Marszałek Ziemi Wolyn´skiej (Torun´: Wydawn. Uniw. Mikołaja Kopernika, 1997); Leonid V. Timosˇenko, “Knjaz′ V.-K. Ostrozˇskij i ‘edinovernaja’ Moskovskaja Rus′,” in Pravoslavie Ukrainy i Moskovskoj Rusi v XV–XVII vekax: obsˇˇcee i razlicˇnoe, ed. Mixail Dmitriev (Moscow: Indrik, 2012). Another polemical writing by Meletios Pegas was actually published in 1596 in Vilnius in Greek with help of his nephew Kyrillos Loukaris. This time, it was an anti-Catholic treatise (Diálogos Orthόdoxos Khristianòs. Vilnius 1596). 127 Jakov Golovackij, L′vovskoe stavropigijskoe bratstvo i knjaz Ostrozˇskij (Lviv: Inst. Stavropigijskij, 1866), 16–17.

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thodox participants in religious disputes not only against the Jews, but also against Catholics. Book printing and translating from the Greek were seen as necessary tools for leading polemics in the tense confessional situation in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth shortly before the Council of Brest (1595–6).

Further trajectories of movement It is known that the book “On Christian Piety” was read not only in the PolishLithuanian Commonwealth, but also in other “Transottoman” regions. One exemplar is known to have belonged to the famous Greek theologian Gabriel Vlasios (later a Metropolitan of Naupaktos and Arta) during his stay in Moldavia, as he strove to establish contacts with the Russian Tsar. In 1642 Vlasios sent Meletios’ treatise “On Christian Piety” from Ias¸i to Muscovy together with an epistle to the Tsar Mixail Fedorovicˇ Romanov as a gift for his son and heir – Prince Aleksej Mixajlovicˇ. In his letter, Vlasios called this book “a script against Jews” and hoped that it would serve as a textbook in both languages for the “inquisitive” prince.128 This is an example of a further change of contexts and meanings with respect to Meletios’ treatise. The fact that Greek Metropolitan Gabriel Vlasios had this book in his possession in Moldavia means that this printed edition had not only circulated in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, but it was also accessible in at least one of the Ottoman tributary states – Moldavia, also several decades after its publication in Lviv. Possibly it was one of the must-have books among Greek hierarchs who were supposed to be on a mission in Eastern Europe (because of its bilingual character). This suggestion is supported by another book gift from Gabriel Vlasios to the Russian prince that had taken place in 1640. This time it was an already-mentioned Greek-Slavonic printed grammar book, “Adelphotes” (Lviv 1591).129 Although well situated in Ias¸i as a confessor and teacher of Moldavian ruler Vasilie Lupa (1634–1653), Gabriel Vlasios demonstrated his interest in strengthening connections with

128 Gavriil Vlasij posylaem carevicˇu Alekseju knigu aleksandrijskogo patriarxa Meletija (Pigasa), po-grecˇeski i po-slavjanski, soderzˇasˇcˇuju socˇinenie protiv iudeev, tak kak slysˇal, cˇto tsarevicˇ ljuboznatelen, dobrodetelen i ljubit knizˇnoe ucˇenie. Boris L. Fonkicˇ, Grecˇesko-russkie svjazi serediny XVI – nacˇala XVIII veka. Grecˇeskie dokumenty moskovskix xranilisˇcˇ (Moscow: Arxiv russkoj istorii, 1991), 26–27; Boris L. Fonkicˇ, Greko-slavjanskie ˇskoly v Moskve v XVII veke (Moscow: Jazyki slavjanskix kul′tur, 2009), 55. 129 Knigu, naricaemuju gramotiku ruskim i ellinskim jezykom. Fonkicˇ, Greko-slavjanskie ˇskoly, 53. On the dissemination of this printed grammar book, see Dzˇamilja Ramazanova, “Bytovanie pervoj greko-slavjanskoj Grammatiki (Lvov 1591 g.) v slavjanskix zemljax v XVII– XVIII vv.,” Fedorovskie cˇtenija (2003).

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Muscovy.130 He regularly sent letters to the Russian Tsar Mixail Fedorovicˇ at least once a year with news from the Ottoman Empire, praise of the Tsar, requests for financial aid and support for Orthodox Christians under the Ottoman rule. By sending Meletios’ book “On Christian Piety” to the Russian court in Muscovy, Gabriel Vlasios indicated that it was valuable enough to serve as a diplomatic gift. As a Greek Church hierarch he confirms the absolute “orthodox” contents of the treatise, which is worth reading and spreading in Muscovy. As a printed book, not a luxury illuminated manuscript, it is not dedicated to the Tsar himself, but to his son, the future ruler with concrete goals of educating him in the Greek language and providing him the source to the contemporary Greek theology, but also of supporting his anti-Jewish sentiments. This book becomes a symbolic gift, a message to the Russian rulers that Greek Orthodox knowledge is the most valuable commodity and the future of Orthodox religious education. Vlasios offers himself as a bearer of this knowledge that he can provide to Russians in service of the Tsar. Meletios’ book is a foretaste of what access to this knowledge truly means, which is available only for those fluent in the Greek language. In 1652 as Gabriel Vlasios, current Metropolitan of Naupaktos and Arta, went to Muscovy as a representative of the whole Eastern Orthodoxy with charters from the Patriarch of Constantinople, Jerusalem and Alexandria with a mission of consulting a new Patriarch of Moscow, Nikon, as well as founding a Greek educational institution in Moscow,131 he took care to remind Tsar Aleksej Mixajlovicˇ of the book gifts he had sent him some years before. In the charter of Patriarch of Jerusalem Paisios I, Vlasios brought to the Tsar these two books “where on one side it is written in Greek script, and on the other side in Slavonic”.132 This “prehistory” should have demonstrated to Aleksej Mixajlovicˇ a particularly trustworthy relationship between himself and the envoy from the Ottoman Empire, one of whose tasks was to inform the Russian Tsar of the current situation of Orthodox Christians under the Muslim rule.133 The symbolic meaning of the book gifts promoted the Russian ruler’s education in the Greek language that would support, on the one hand, the connection to the Byzantine emperors as a model of pious and royal behavior for Tsars. In his 130 Gabriel Vlasios used to be a close associate of Ecumenical Patriarch Cyrill Loukaris. After Loukaris’ violent death (1638), Vlasios was compelled to leave Constantinople and found a safe haven in the capital of Moldavia, at least until 1647. See Fonkicˇ, Greko-slavjanskie ˇskoly, 50–57. 131 Wolfram von Scheliha, Russland und die orthodoxe Universalkirche in der Patriarchatsperiode 1589–1721 (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2004), 347–78; Fonkicˇ, Greko-slavjanskie ˇskoly, 59–63. 132 Nikolaj F. Kapterev, Sobranie socˇinenij, vol. 2 (1895. Reprint, Moscow: Dar, 2008), 113. 133 Fonkicˇ, Greko-slavjanskie ˇskoly, 59.

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epistles Gabriel Vlasios called Prince Aleksej Mixajlovicˇ a “new Komnenos”, because of his name (the same as Alexios I Komnenos) as a sign of Byzantine reminiscence. On the other hand, it is an example of the valuable contemporary Greek Orthodox theology, which is free of heresy, but also has polemic tools against other religions and denominations. By arriving in Moscow, Vlasios could verify his own “orthodoxy” as the “wisest teacher, free of corruption in his Orthodox faith and distant from heretics” for teaching theology and Greek language in Muscovy, as he was described in the recommendation letter by the Patriarch of Jerusalem Paisios.134Although according to this letter, it had been the Tsar’s initiative to ask for a Greek theologian as a teacher, Vlasios’ mission did not succeed and he soon left Moscow in February 1653. It seems also that Meletios’ book “On Christian Piety” was in little demand as a knowledge reservoir in Muscovy. Among the possible reasons were the lack of skills in Greek by Russian readers, its content that could have seemed too tolerant of Jews (in comparison to offensive anti-Jewish texts that were popular in Russia by Maxim the Greek, 16th c.135), absence of trust in contemporary Greek theologians like Meletios Pegas, with his Western education and service under Muslims, but also mistrust of printed books from the Catholic lands that stopped the further dissemination of this treatise. At least no further copies or editions of it are known, but also no references to this book among Muscovite scholars could be identified until now. The only copy of the printed edition of Pegas’ “On the Christian Piety” in Russia is located at the Library of the Russian Academy of Sciences in St. Petersburg.136 It was bound together with another book by Meletios Pegas, the socalled “Book of Ten Sections” (Lviv 1598) possibly as early as the second part of the 17th century (by some Feodor Gramatik). We can speculate that this copy is the one that had been sent by Gabriel Vlasios in 1642 to Aleksej Mixajlovicˇ. At least there is no doubt that this book used to be read because it contains numerous marginalia on its pages and cover, most of which demonstrate attempts at copying Greek or Slavonic letters, words or even phrases by hand. Even if the knowledge in this form was not deeply adopted or disseminated after it reached Muscovy, at least it motivated its (possibly young) readers to hone their own writing skills and thus achieved again a new meaning in a new context. The texts examined in the first part of this contribution were written by Christian and Jewish intellectuals, important representatives of their religious groups (as bishops or patriarchs, rabbis or acknowledged Jewish scholars re134 Kapterev, Sobranie socˇinenij, vol. 2, 113; Fonkicˇ, Greko-slavjanskie ˇskoly, 60; Scheliha, Russland und die orthodoxe Universalkirche, 348. 135 Oparina, “La polémique anti-juive,” 169–71. 136 SPB BAN 1013 sp. This copy is not complete and not free of defects. For the complete description of this copy, see Nikolaj P. Kiselev, “Grecˇeskaja pecˇat na Ukraine v XVI veke,” Kniga. Issledovanija i materialy 7 (1962): 192.

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spectively). They possessed and shared intellectual religious knowledge with scientific elements of scholasticism, Aristotelian philosophy, etc. But only one of these Christian-Jewish polemical texts developed a long Transottoman mobile biography. Following the trajectory of this treatise by Meletios Pegas that was brought from the Ottoman Empire to the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, I was trying to reconstruct two different contexts of “senders” and “receivers” in order to find out why this specific reservoir of knowledge became useful in the Transottoman perspective. Its title, its contents and a simple form of narrative made the treatise attractive for further translations – into vernacular Greek and Slavonic, but also cultural translation between different contexts. The movement of this text, as well as knowledge about this text, succeeded via OrthodoxChristian, first of all Greek or post-Byzantine networks from Constantinople to Lviv and Alexandria, Ias¸i, Vilnius and Muscovy.

Figure 1: The title page of the bilingual edition of the treatise by Meletios Pegas “On the Christian Piety – an Answer Against the Jews” that was printed in Lviv in 1593 (copy from the Vernadsky National Library of Ukraine, Kiev – Kir. 988, № 593)

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Figure 2: Meletios Pegas “On the Christian Piety” folio 2.

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Figure 3: Meletios Pegas “On the Christian Piety” folio 4.

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Oparina, Tatjana. “La polémique anti-juive en Russie au XVIIe siècle.” In Les Chrétiens et les Juifs dans les sociétés de rites grec et latin, edited by Michel Dmitriev, Daniel Tollet, and Élisabeth Teiro, 165–82. Paris: Champion, 2003. Papademetriou, George. Essays on Orthodox Christian-Jewish Relations. Briston, IN: Wyndham Hall Press, 1990. –. “An Encyclical of the Ecumenical Patriarch Metrophanes III (1520–1580) Condemning the Oppression of Jews.” Journal of Ecumenical Studies 26, no. 2 (Spring 1989): 338–40. Papademetriou, Tom. Render unto the Sultan. Power, Authority, and the Greek Orthodox Church in the Early Ottoman Centuries. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015. Papadia-Lala, Anastassia. “Collective Expatriations of Greeks in the Fifteenth through Seventeenth Centuries.” In Homelands and Diasporas. Greeks, Jews and Their Migrations, edited by Minna Rozen, 127–33. London: Tauris, 2008. Papadopoulos-Kerameus, Athanasios. Hierosolumitike´¯ bibliothe¯´ke¯, e¯´toi, Katálogos to˜¯ n en taís bibliothe¯´kais tou˜ hagio¯tátou apostolikou˜ te kaí katholikou˜ orthodόxou patriarkhikou˜ thrόnou to¯˜n Hierosolúmo¯n kaí páse¯s Palaistíne¯s apokeiméno¯n helle¯niko¯˜n ko¯díko˜¯ n. Vols. 2, 5., 2nd edition. Brussels: Culture et civilisation, 1963. Patrinelis, Christos G. Ho Theodoros Agallianos tautizomenos pros ton Theophanen Medeias kai oi anekdotoi logoi tou. Athens: Ekd., 1966. Pfeiffer, Judith. “Confessional Polarization in the Seventeenth Century Ottoman Empire and Yu¯suf I˙bn Ebı¯ ˁAbdü’d-Deyya¯n’s Kes¸fü’l-esra¯r fı¯ ilza¯mi’l-Yehu¯d ve’l-ahba¯r.” In ˙ Contacts and Controversies between Muslims, Jews and Christians in the Ottoman Empire and Pre-Modern Iran, edited by Camilla Adang and Sabine Schmidtke, 15–56. Würzburg: Ergon-Verlag, 2010. Podskalsky, Gerhard. Griechische Theologie in der Zeit der Türkenherrschaft (1453–1821). Die Orthodoxie im Spannungsfeld der nachreformatorischen Konfessionen des Westens. Munich: Beck, 1988. Politis, Linos. Katálogos khirográphon tis Ethnikís Vivliothíkis tis Elládos. Athens: Akademia Athinon, 1991. Pollock, Sheldon. The Language of the Gods in the World of Men. Sanskrit, Culture, and Power in Premodern India. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2006. Proyart, Jacqueline. “L’image du juif dans l’œvre de l’archiprêtre Avvakum.” In Les chrétiens et les juifs dans les sociétés de rites grec et latin. Approche comparative, edited by Michel Dmitriev, Daniel Tollet, and Élisabeth Teiro, 183–99. Paris: Champion, 2003. Ramazanova, Dzˇamilja. “Bytovanie pervoj greko-slavjanskoj Grammatiki (Lvov 1591 g.) v slavjanskix zemljax v XVII–XVIII vv.” Fedorovskie ˇctenija (2003): 277–84. Rhoby, Andreas. “Sprache und Wortschatz des Gennadios Scholarios.” In Lexicologica Byzantina. Beiträge zum Kolloquium zur byzantinischen Lexikographie (Bonn, 13.– 15. Juli 2007), edited by Erich Trapp and Sonja Schönauer, 227–41. Göttingen: V&R unipress, 2008. Romeu Ferré, Pilar. “A New Approach to the Polemical Work ‘Fuente Clara’.” Journal of Jewish Studies 35, no. 1 (2004): 118–30. –. and Iacob M. Hassan. “Apuntes sobre la lengua de la ‘Crónica de los reyes otomanos’ de Moisés Almosnino según la edición del manuscrito aljamiado del siglo XVI.” In Actas del II Congreso Internacional de Historia de la Lengua Española, edited by Manuel Ariza Viguera et al., 161–69. Madrid: Pabellón de España, 1992.

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Roth, Cecil. The House of Nasi: the Duke of Naxos. 1948. Reprint, New York, NY: Greenwood Press, 1969. Rozen, Minna. A History of the Jewish Community in Istanbul. The Formative Years, 1453– 1566. Leiden: Brill, 2002. –., ed. Homelands and Diasporas. Greeks, Jews and Their Migrations. London: Tauris, 2008. Scheliha von, Wolfram. Russland und die orthodoxe Universalkirche in der Patriarchatsperiode 1589–1721. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2004. Schreckenberg, Heinz. Die Christlichen Adversus-Judaeos-Texte und ihr literarisches und historisches Umfeld (13.–20. Jh.). Frankfurt am Main: Lang, 1994. Skvorcov, A. A. and A. I. Malevicˇ. Mogilevskaja eparxija: istoriko-statisticˇeskoe opisanie. Vol. 1. Mogilev na Dnepre: Skoropecˇatnja i litografija Sˇ. Fridlanda, 1905. Stemberger, Günter. “Historische Aspekte einer Dialogkultur zwischen Judentum und Christentum.” In Der “jüdisch-christliche” Dialog veränderte die Theologie. Ein Paradigmenwechsel aus ExpertInnensicht, edited by Edith Petschnigg and Irmtraud Fischer, 18–28. Cologne: Böhlau, 2016. Stoupákis, Nikoláos. Geo´¯ rgios Koréssios (1570 ci–1659/60): i zí, to érgo tou kai i pnevmatikí agónes tis epokhís tou. PhD-thesis, Ethnikó kai Kapodistriakó Panepistímio Athinón (EKPA), Athens 1992. Accessed 09. 07. 2020. URL: https://www.didaktorika.gr/eadd/ha ndle/10442/14239. Sˇustova, Julija. Dokumenty L′vovskogo Uspenskogo stavropigijskogo bratstva (1686–1788). Istocˇnikovedcˇeskoe issledovanie. Moscow: Rukopisnye pamjatniki Drevnej Rusi, 2009. –. “Tipografija l′vovskogo bratstva kak preemnik knigoizdatel′skoj tradicii Ivana Fedorova.” Fedorovskie ˇctenija (2003): 257–76. Szpiech, Ryan. “Rhetorical Muslims: Islam as Witness in Western Christian Anti-Jewish Polemic.” Al-Qantara 34, no. 1 (2013): 153–85. ˙ The British Library General Catalogue of Printed Books to 1975. Vol. 321. London: Bingley, 1986. Timosˇenko, Leonid. V. “Knjaz′ V.-K. Ostrozˇskij i ‘edinovernaja’ Moskovskaja Rus′.” In Pravoslavie Ukrainy i Moskovskoj Rusi v XV–XVII vekax: obzˇˇcee i razlicˇnoe, edited by Mixail Dmitriev, 82–109. Moscow: Indrik, 2012. Tinnefeld, Franz. “Georgios Gennadios Scholarios.” In La théologie byzantine et sa tradition. Vol. 2: XIIIe–XIXe s., edited by Carmelo Giuseppe Conticello and Vassa Conticello, 477–549. Turnhout: Brepols Publishers 2002. Tirosh-Samuelson, Hava. “The Ultimate End of Human Life in Postexpulsion Philosophic Literature.” In Crisis and Creativity in the Sephardic World, 1391–1648, ed. Benjamin R. Gampel, 223–54. New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 1997. Tzóga, Vasilikí, Melétios Pigás (1550–1601) Patriárkhis Alexandrías: víos – drási – ergographía. Unpublished PhD-thesis (Ethnikó kai Kapodistriakó Panepistímio Athinón (EKPA), Athens 2009. Accessed 09. 07. 2020. URL: http://thesis.ekt.gr/thesisBookReade r/id/24623#page/1/mode/2up. Vranoussis, Leandros. L’hellénisme postbyzantin et l’Europe: Manuscrits, livres, imprimeries. Athens, 1981. Ziaka, Angeliki. “Rearticulating a Christian-Muslim Understanding: Gennadios Scholarios and George Amiroutzes on Islam.” Studies in Church History 51 (Christianity and Religious Plurality) (2015): 150–65.

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Zonta, Mauro, Hebrew Scholasticism in the Fifteenth Century. Berlin: Freie Universität; Torino: Nino Aragno Editore, 2006.

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Barbara Henning

Trajectories of Early-Modern Ottoman Advice Literature: ¯ mes as Sites of Transottoman Transfers of Nas¯h ı atna ˙ ˙ Knowledge

The following story stars rare manuscripts, avid book lovers and alleged Ottoman state secrets. It takes its cue from the somewhat puzzling observation that a number of Ottoman texts that were initially written for an audience of specialists and contained analysis and commentary on very particular sociopolitical phenomena of the 16th to 17th centuries had a surprisingly long lifespan and continued to be copied, translated and re-read by different audiences well into the 20th century. This article asks why and how this came about: Identifying key turning points in the reception and reinterpretation of early-modern Ottoman political advice literature, it suggests a timeline and explores some hypotheses as to why and in what directions readings of these texts were modified and reactivated over time. To capture long-term changes, the trajectories of a selected body of texts are explored during a broad time frame, stretching from the 16th and 17th centuries into Turkish Republican times. Four examples from the genre of Ottoman-Turkish literature on political advice (nas¯ıhatna¯me) serve as case ˙˙ studies. In chronological order, these are: The Asafna¯me by Lütfı¯ Pas¸a (after ˙ ˙ ¯ lı¯ Efendi (1563–65), Nüshat’ül 1554), Ahla¯k-ı ʿAla¯’ı¯ by Kınalıza¯de ʿA Sela¯t¯ın by ˙ ˙˙ ˙ ˘ ¯˙ Mustafa¯ ʿAlı¯ Gelibolulu (1581), and the Risa¯le by Kocˇi Beg (ca. 1630).1 All four ˙ ˙˙ texts are comparatively well-researched and available in critical editions and in translations into modern Turkish and European languages. Following a brief summary of existing research on Ottoman political advice literature or nas¯ıhatna¯me, the genre at the center of the following deliberations, ˙˙ the article zooms in on concrete moments of transfer and translation. It suggests to follow the text, borrowing a theoretical framework from cultural anthropology and exploring its potential for research into the material and sociocultural aspects of Ottoman intellectual history. Five chronological stages of interaction with early-modern Ottoman texts on governance and political advice – and 1 Due to the methodological perspective adopted, which is elaborated below, the four texts will receive a somewhat uneven treatment. A focus emerges on Asafna¯me and Kocˇi Beg’s Risa¯le – mirroring the predilections of readers and collectors from ˙the nineteenth˙ century onward.

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thereby, five different cultures of translation2 regarding such texts – can be identified: First, the texts’ geneses and earliest shelf-lives are under scrutiny. The second stage focuses on the circumstances in which European readers – orientalists, diplomats and travelers – took note of these texts on political advice from the 17th century onward. A third moment to explore is the rekindling of interest in early-modern Ottoman political advice literature in the mid-19th century by Ottoman intellectuals, notably by advocates of modernization and reform politics. The Ottoman Constitutional Revolution of 1908 and the ensuing deposition of Sultan ʿAbdülhamı¯d II in 1909 marked the onset of a fourth phase, which was ˙ perceived as a moment of opportunity for collectors of oriental manuscripts: It was hoped that the Ottoman imperial archives and palace library would relax their strict access policies and allow foreign researchers to consult their holdings. These developments sparked a renewed interest in nas¯ıhatna¯mes among Euro˙˙ pean scholars and Ottoman readers alike. Lastly, readings of political advice literature in Turkish Republican times are examined, while also casting a brief glance at the trajectory of one such text in settings beyond the borders of the Turkish Republic in the mid-20th century. Throughout the following tour d’horizon, the focus of interest is on interactions with, readings, (re-)contextualizations and classifications of the four selected texts. Looked at in conjunction rather than individually, these four slightly differently situated case studies can help to pinpoint overarching frameworks, structures and policies which enhanced or, respectively, reduced the possibilities for knowledge on Ottoman governance to reach different audiences. It comes as no surprise that interpretations, readings and functions of all four texts differed widely, both over time and between different audiences and social contexts. In the 16th and 17th centuries, Ottoman rulers, bureaucrats and highlevel administrators made up much of the audience of political advice literature.3 Both the production and the consumption of the texts in question were linked to the intricate workings of court protocol and elite etiquette. In this context, penning a text on political advice was more than an intellectual intervention. It could also involve socio-political aspects, constituting, for instance, attempts to gain recognition among peers and potential sponsors or employers. The genre of nas¯ıhatna¯me then sparked the interest of European observers in early-modern ˙˙ times, who were keen on learning about the internal workings and potential 2 Peter Burke, “Cultures of Translation in Early Modern Europe,” in Cultural Translation in Early Modern Europe, eds. Peter Burke and R. Po-chia Hsia (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 7–38. 3 These early audiences engaged with the texts by reading them themselves, but also quite possibly by listening to them being read out loud during gatherings. See Emine Fetvacı, Picturing History at the Ottoman Court (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2013), 25– 27.

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weaknesses of the Ottoman state. In the 19th century, European orientalists turned to political advice literature as a historiographical source that seemed to provide ample evidence for developments and phenomena they interpreted as Ottoman decline.4 As their early-modern predecessors had diligently collected and shelved these types of books in libraries all over Europe, 19th-century historians and orientalists did not need to look far. Rediscoveries of Ottoman political advice literature in late-Ottoman and Turkish Republican times, in turn, were often linked to contemporary discussions about governance and reform. The same texts could, as will be shown in the following, be called upon as references to make very different, at times even outright contradictory, statements about current politics.

1.

“Follow-the-text”, Translation and Knowledge on the Move

Texts and their trajectories in time and space are read here as pointers indicating the movement of ideas in a longue-durée, multilingual, transregional and multiply entangled framework of interactions. To allow for this framework to unfold and for unexpected turns to emerge as we follow along, the texts themselves need to play a leading part. The investigation therefore follows them to the libraries they are a part of, leafs through the megˇmu¯ʿa collections they were included in, and takes a close look at everyone who – in the capacity of an editor, a translator, a collector or a reader taking notes in the margins – showed an interest in them over time. This approach to “follow the text” is borrowed from cultural anthropology.5 As the investigation remains attentive to the material and social dimensions of intellectual history, manuscripts and texts in question are being traced – while paying attention to changes in use, function and meaning of the material as well as their transfers and translations into new contexts.6 A broad understanding of translation is applied here, which includes both interlingual transfers between different languages and transfers on an intralingual level, i. e. between social contexts, groups or discourses.7 Looking at translation not as a strictly linguistic activity, but also as a social practice and a form of historical 4 Dana Sajdi, “Decline, its Discontents and Ottoman Cultural History: By Way of Introduction,” in Ottoman Tulips, Ottoman Coffee: Leisure and Lifestyle in the Eighteenth Century, ed. Dana Sajdi (London: I.B. Tauris, 2007), 1–40. 5 George E. Marcus, “Ethnography in/of the World System: The Emergence of Multi-Sited Ethnography,” Annual Review of Anthropology 24, no. 1 (1995): 95–117. 6 Suraiya Faroqhi, A Cultural History of the Ottomans (London: I.B. Tauris, 2016), 3. 7 Doris Bachmann-Medick, “Translation – A Concept and Model for the Study of Culture,” in Travelling Concepts for the Study of Culture, eds. Birgit Neumann and Ansgar Nünning (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2012), 23–43.

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understanding,8 of making sense of past utterances in new contexts, comes with two advantages: First of all, it impacts the questions that can be asked: As it opens up a micro-perspective on processes, actors and their translation choices, it allows for inquiry about the constellations in which such translations were embedded, for asking about strategies translators made use of to align texts with prevailing discourses, and for zooming in on contexts of reception and routes of appropriation.9 Trajectories of translations and translational cultures were shaped by dynamics of power relations as well as patterns of resistance and acceptance.10 Passages of para-text, including prefaces, introductions, footnotes and commentaries, emerge as preferred sites for translators to take a stance on the text and situate their interventions in broader contexts. In addition, the focus on translation appears as an apt choice when dealing with a literary tradition like nas¯ıhatna¯me, a genre prone to intertextualities, allusions and borrowings from ˙˙ earlier material. The early-modern Ottoman authors in question themselves had already translated and re-arranged preexisting ideas about social order and governance in their texts. Asking about moments of translation allows a focus on fluidity and the continuous disturbance of meaning through encounter, interaction and movement, thus serving as a reminder that no text or reading is ever finalized.11

2.

¯ me, State of the Art and Research Ottoman nas¯h ı atna ˙ ˙ Approaches

Writings in Ottoman Turkish on giving advice in matters of governance and politics first appeared in the 15th century and built on a centuries-old literary tradition which combined pre-Islamic Iranian, Islamic and other, notably Ancient Greek and South Asian elements.12 Ottoman intellectuals, however, were by 8 Susan Bassnett, “Translating Across Time,” in Translation, ed. Susan Bassnett (London: Routledge, 2013), 81–103. 9 Charles Martindale, “Introduction: Thinking Through Reception,” in Classics and the Uses of Reception, eds. Charles Martindale and Richard F. Thomas (Oxford: Blackwell, 2006), 1–13; also James Clifford, Routes: Travel and Translation in the Late Twentieth Century (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1997), 1–13. 10 Sheldon Pollock, The Language of the Gods in the World of Men (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2006), 2–19; see also the two models of translation introduced in Dipesh Chakrabarty, Provincializing Europe: Postcolonial Thought and Historical Difference (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2008), 83–90. 11 Kristin Adal and Helge Jordheim, “Texts on the Move. Textuality and Historicity Revisited,” History and Theory 57, no. 1 (2018): 56–74. 12 Stefan Leder, “Aspekte arabischer und persischer Fürstenspiegel: Legitimation, Fürstenethik, politische Vernunft,” in Erlesenes. Hallesche Beiträge zur Orientwissenschaft 25, eds. Walter Belz and Sebastian Günther (Halle/Saale: Institut für Orientalistik, 1998), 120–24; Louise

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no means passive recipients or reproducers of these earlier writings, but can instead be found actively engaging with existing materials, adding on to them, finding their own interpretations and expressing them in works of translation and extensive commentary.13 Different genres were regarded as suitable vessels for the transmission of political advice, among them works on ethics and morality (ahla¯k), often with religious undertones, more hands-on treatises con˘ ˙ taining political analysis and suggestions for reform, but also historiographical works and collections of stories and proverbs. The initial target audience for works on political advice were, unsurprisingly, rulers and high-level administrators. However, some texts circulated widely and found audiences well beyond the immediate court environment. Some authors made explicit to what ends, in what particular context and for whom they had written down their thoughts. Other texts, however, are anonymous, difficult to date or remain otherwise opaque to us today. The Ottoman engagement with advice literature begins with translations and re-writings of Persian and Arabic texts. Translations, throughout the 16th and 17th centuries in particular, went both ways, with Ottoman authors translating Persian and Arabic texts into Ottoman Turkish, while others were translating Ottoman Turkish texts into Persian and Arabic. Translations, in these instances, were selective and eclectic, resulting often not so much in exact equivalents of previous texts, but in new readings and creative re-combinations of existing materials.14 Ottoman advice literature flourished during the 16th and 17th centuries. With changing socio-political conditions, the genre then underwent significant changes over the 18th century.15 While older texts were still being read, new formats emerged, mirroring the increasing bureaucratization and formalization of the Ottoman state service as they emulated, for instance, other forms of official writing like reports (telh¯ıs), lists or memoranda (la¯yiha). Advice literature was ˙ ˘˙ part of an intricate early-modern literary culture, serving multiple purposes at once: In the environment of the Ottoman court and in particular from the 16th century onwards, one of its functions was to provide a safe space to subtly Marlow, “Advice and Advice Literature,” Encyclopaedia of Islam, 3rd ed., ed. Kate Fleet et al. (Leiden: Brill, 2007). 13 Heather Ferguson, “Genres of Power: Constructing a Discourse of Decline in Ottoman Nasihatname,” Osmanlı Aras¸tırmaları 35 (2010): 81–116; Pál Fodor, “State and Society, Crisis and Reform in 15th–17th Century Ottoman Mirror for Princes,” Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae 40, no. 2/3 (1986): 217–40. 14 Gottfried Hagen, “Translations and Translators in a Multilingual Society: A Case Study of Persian-Ottoman Translations, Late Fifteenth to Early Seventeenth Century,” Eurasian Studies 2, no. 1 (2003): 95–134. 15 Marinos Sariyannis, Ottoman Political Thought up to the Tanzimat: A Concise History (Rethymno: Foundation for Research and Technology Hellas – Institute for Mediterranean Studies, 2015), 138.

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comment on governmental practices and offer guidance or even critique to rulers. For Ottoman scholars and bureaucrats, counseling the sultan was a balancing act, as it would have been risky to criticize rulers openly or too harshly. The age-old tradition of giving advice – which had notably been part of the Persian court culture and tradition of governance that early-modern Ottoman rulers held in high esteem and sought to emulate – offered an accepted way of commenting on or actively intervening in political affairs. Beyond this function as a suitable vessel for political commentary, advice literature served additional purposes, making the texts worthwhile reads not only for rulers, but also for others in the courtly environment and even beyond: First of all, texts served as a reminder to both rulers and subjects of the central bargain or social contract avant la lettre which was the basis for legitimation of power in Ottoman society: Rulers were to be obeyed. But – at least in theory – they enjoyed not only privileges, but also had a number of responsibilities towards their subjects. To ensure the continuation of the Ottoman dynasty as well as their own salvation, sultans needed to govern justly and abstain from exploiting their subjects. This attempt to keep a check on worldly power by appealing to the prospects in the afterlife and thus the conscience of the ruler is a central element to the so-called “Circle of Justice” which is explicitly spelled out in Kınalıza¯de’s Ahla¯k-ı Ala¯’ı¯ and ˙ ˘ ˙ is referred to in numerous other works on political advice.16 In addition, advice literature provided those in the court environment with argumentation strategies to get their messages across to rulers, superiors and colleagues in accepted ways and taught them to navigate a courtly environment prone to power struggles, ruses and factionalism. Some works on political advice also have a clear didactic dimension, spelling out the regulations and intricate workings of the Ottoman court in detail, for princes and young rulers to learn the ropes.17 This combination of multiple functions targeting different audiences already helps explain why some of the Ottoman nas¯ıhatna¯mes under scrutiny here – even though they ˙˙ were written to address a particular sociopolitical context – retained some relevance and interest for readers well beyond this immediate moment in time and, in some cases, well into the 20th century.

16 Linda T. Darling, A History of Social Justice and Political Power in the Middle East (London: Routledge, 2013). 17 Kocˇi Beg’s Risa¯le, addressed to Sultan Mura¯d IV, is an example for that. ˙

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121

Writing, Reading and Collecting of Ottoman Advice Literature in Early-Modern Istanbul

In early-modern Istanbul, members of an educated and well-mannered elite cared deeply about art, music and literature, as their refined tastes set them apart and were a necessary condition to their being perceived as members of a courtly elite.18 Commissioning and collecting texts on the art of governance was part of this literary culture. There is evidence that some of the historiographical and philosophical works containing elements of political advice were being read out loud during gatherings of scholars and courtiers.19 Up until the 18th century, texts on political advice were regularly presented as gifts to those in power or dedicated to prospective sponsors from among the ruling elite, with authors and copyists expecting a suitable remuneration in return for their efforts. Rulers had an interest in the circulation of literature on good governance in particular because it allowed them to present themselves not only as apt politicians, but also as sophisticated literary connaisseurs, in early-modern times an indispensable dimension of political power.20 Authors of historiographical works and treatises on political advice took notice of predilections and special interests of sponsors and patrons: Hüseyin Efendi Heza¯rfen (d. 1691) peppered his world history with ˙ maxims and advice on governance which he knew Sultan Mehmed IV appre˙ ciated, and included in-depth descriptions of China and India, areas for which the sultan had cultivated a particular interest.21 What is known about the authors and genesis of the four works drawn on as case studies here? Lütfı¯ Pas¸a, the author of the Asafna¯me was a career bureau˙ ˙ crat.22 He had been educated in the palace service and advanced through the ranks, all the way up to becoming grand vizier in 1539. Around the same time, he also got married to Sultan Süleyma¯n’s sister Devlet Sˇa¯hı¯ Sultan. Lütfı¯ Pas¸a was ˙ dismissed from his post in 1541, possibly having fallen out of favor with the sultan as a result of a disagreement with his wife. He retired to his estate in Dimetoka south of Edirne, where he was to remain until his death in 1562/63 and where he

18 Norbert Elias, Die höfische Gesellschaft, 3rd ed. (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1987 [1969]), 63–64. 19 Emine Fetvacı, Picturing History at the Ottoman Court (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2013), 25–27. 20 Sheldon Pollock, The Language of the Gods in the World of Men (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2006), 162–88. ˇ a’fer, genannt Heza¯rfenn und die 21 Heidrun Wurm, Der osmanische Historiker Hüseyn b. G ˙ 17. Jahrhunderts (Freiburg im Breisgau: K. Istanbuler Gesellschaft in der zweiten Hälfte des Schwarz, 1971), 95. 22 On his biography, see the overview by Colin Imber, “Lutfi Pasha,” in Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed., ed. Peri Bearman et al., vol. 5 (Leiden: Brill, 1986), 837–38.

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also wrote his Asafna¯me during the final years of his life.23 In his work, Lütfı¯ Pas¸a ˙ ˙ makes a point of introducing himself as an able and most of all just governor, for instance pointing out how he abolished procedures which aggrieved the population, like the right of mounted couriers (ula¯k) to confiscate horses at will.24 ˙ This particular stress on justice is in tune with Sultan Süleyma¯n’s take on imperial ideology, which also stressed the singularity and superiority of Ottoman justice.25 The image Lütfı¯ Pas¸a had created for himself stuck: The anonymous 17th-century ˙ Kita¯b-ı Müsteta¯b contains a passage describing a meeting between Süleyma¯n and ˙ Lütfı¯ Pas¸a. The sultan asks why his successor as grand vizier is able to bring so ˙ much more money into the treasury than Lütfı¯ ever had been – the Kita¯b-ı ˙ Müsteta¯b has Lütfı¯ Pas¸a draw on poetry and hadith to explain that the recent ˙ ˙ gains for the imperial treasury are fleeting, as they are the result of oppression and exploitation of the population.26 Ahla¯k-ı Ala¯’ı¯ by Kınalıza¯de counts as one of the most cited and copied Ot˙ ˘ ˙ ˇ elebi (d. 1657) praised the work in his Miza¯n: toman titles on ahla¯k.27 Ka¯tib C ˘ ˙ “That eminent savant and great scholar of Rum, Qinalizade ‘Ali Efendi, has written to this effect and has given a detailed account of the subject of music in his book Akhlaq-i ‘Ala’i. Our Muslim brethren who seek after truth should treasure this book and hold themselves bound to read it, as if it were their set readings from scripture or the litany of the Names of God, so that they may know what is important in religious and mundane affairs and act accordingly. For it is a blessed book, which reconciles philosophy and the sacred law, and its author was one of the foremost men of his age.”28 Kınalıza¯de had made his career in the Ottoman ˙ judiciary and was known also as an eminent Hanafi legal scholar.29 He wrote his 23 Rudolf Tschudi, Das Asafname des Lutfi Pascha: nach den Handschriften zu Wien, Dresden und Konstantinopel zum ersten Male hrsg. und ins Deutsche übertragen (Berlin: Mayer & Müller, 1910), xv–xvii. Lütfı¯ himself had provided a list of his works in his Teva¯rı¯h, but since ˙ ˘ Ottoman Asafna¯me was one of his very last titles, it does not figure on this list. Nonetheless, ˙ historians have consistently identified Lütfı¯ Pas¸a as the author of the Asafna¯me. ˙ the Ottoman text. ˙ 24 Tschudi, Asafname, 10–11 in the edition of 25 Caroline Finkel, Osman’s Dream: The History of the Ottoman Empire (New York, NY: Basic Books, 2007), 178. 26 Yas¸ar Yücel, Osmanlı Devlet Tes¸kilâtına Dair Kaynaklar, Kitâb-i Müstetâb-Kitabu Mesâlihi’l Müslimîn ve Menâfi‘i’l-Mü’minîn-Hırzü’l-Mülûk (Ankara: Türk Tarih Kurumu Basımevi, 1988), 20–21. 27 The catalogue of the Topkapı Sarayı alone lists ten copies of the work, dating from the sixteenth to the eighteenth century, Fehmi Edhem Karatay, Catalogue of the Topkapı Sarayı, vol. 1.1 (Istanbul: Topkapı Sarayı Müzesi, Kütüphane, 1961). The holdings of the Süleymaniye Library in Istanbul contain (at least) forty-five copies of Ahla¯k-ı Ala¯’ı¯, eight of which are ˘ ˙ (Istanbul: Klasik, 2007), vii. printed. See also Mustafa Koç, Ahlâk-i Alâ’î. Kınalıza¯de Ali Çelebi ˙ 28 Geoffrey L. Lewis, The Balance of Truth (London: Allen and Unwin, 1957), 38–39. 29 In his Die Geschichtsschreiber der Araber (Göttingen: Dieterich, 1882), 268, Ferdinand Wüstenfeld introduces Kınalıza¯de as a legal scholar only and makes no mention of Ahla¯k-ı ˙ ˘ ˙ Ala¯’ı¯ in his brief overview.

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Ahla¯k-ı Ala¯’ı¯ between 1563 and 1565, while on duty as judge (ka¯z˙ı) in Damascus. ˙ ˘ ˙ On post in Syria, Kınalıza¯de would have regularly run into Gelibolulu Mustafa¯ ˙ ˙˙ ¯ lı¯ – the author of another work on political advice which will be looked ʿA at ¯ lı¯ would have below. In the literary circles of the city, Kınalıza¯de and Mustafa¯ ʿA ˙ ˙˙ come together with other literary aficionados to read aloud, comment upon and ¯ lı¯’s writings that excriticize texts they had written. We know from Mustafa¯ ʿA ˙˙ cerpts from Kınalıza¯de’s Ahla¯k-ı Ala¯’ı¯ were presented and discussed during these ˙ ˘ ˙ ¯ lı¯ Pas¸a (d. 1565), the governor meetings.30 The work is dedicated to Semiz ʿA (beylerbeyi) of Ottoman Syria residing in Damascus, the title a play of word on the latter’s name. In the very beginning of the work, Kınalıza¯de states his reasons ˙ for setting out to write it: His goal was to assemble earlier key texts and materials on the topic of ahla¯k, making them available to readers in Ottoman Turkish. His ˘ ˙ work draws extensively on Persian and Arabic predecessors31 while also including Persian poetry and edifying stories from Sufi contexts.32 Kınalıza¯de not merely ˙ translated, but appropriated elements from these earlier works like the idea of the 33 “Circle of Justice” for the Ottoman context. Interest in the text seems to have spiked around the turn of the 17th century: A certain Dervı¯sˇ Mehmed Ahla¯k¯ı had ˙ ˘ ˙ prepared forty copies of the manuscript, many of which can be found in the holdings of various Istanbul manuscript libraries today.34 It has been cited widely, for instance by the historian Naʿı¯ma¯ (d. 1716) in one of the prefaces to his Ta¯rı¯h-i Naʿı¯ma¯.35 Ahla¯k-ı Ala¯’ı¯ has been used as a textbook in Ottoman me˘ ˘ ˙ dreses,36 where readers also engaged with the work by writing summaries for ¯ lı¯ 30 Mustafa Koç, Ahlâk-i Alâ’î. Kınalızâde Ali Çelebi (Istanbul: Klasik, 2007), 5–7. Mustafa¯ ʿA ˙˙ mentions Kınalıza¯de’s work in his historiographical work Künhü’l-Ahba¯r. ˇ ela¯leddin ad-Dawa¯nı¯’s Ahla¯k˘ -i G ˇ ela¯lı¯ and Hüseyin 31 Na¯sir al-Dı¯˙n at-Tu¯sı¯’s Ahla¯k-i Na¯sirı¯, G ˙ la¯k-i Muh ˙ ˙ -i Ka¯sˇifı¯’s˙ Ah ˙ well as al-G˙azza¯lı¯’s Ihya¯ ʿulu¯˘m ad-dı ˙ ¯n, from which ˘ ˙ sinı¯, as Va¯ʿiz Kı˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˘ nalıza¯de borrowed the three-part structure, discussing in turn personal, family-related and political morality. 32 Mustafa Koç, Ahlâk-i Alâ’î. Kınalızâde Ali Çelebi (Istanbul: Klasik, 2007), 7–9. 33 Linda T. Darling, A History of Social Justice and Political Power in the Middle East (London: Routledge, 2013), 139–40 on Kınalıza¯de’s modification of the Circle of Justice: He updated it to fit the literary and poetical˙tastes of his times, stressing the image of the world as a “walled garden” to match the idea of the Ottoman Empire as a protected realm; and Darling, “Political Change and Political Discourse in the Early Modern Mediterranean World,” Journal of Interdisciplinary History 38, no. 4 (2008): 505–31, here 515 on Kınalıza¯de’s integration of ˙ of governance and state Ottoman bureaucratic thinking with earlier Greco-Islamic traditions philosophy. 34 Adnan Adıvar, “Kınalıza¯de,” in ˙Islam Ansiklopedisi, vol. 6 (Istanbul: Milli Eg˘itim Basımevi, 1978), 709–11. ˙ 35 Lewis V. Thomas, A Study of Naima, ed. Norman Itzkowitz (New York, NY: New York University Press, 1972), 136. 36 I˙smail Hakkı Uzunçars¸ılı, Osmanlı devletinin ilmiye tes¸kilâtı (Ankara: Türk Tarih Kurumu Basımevi, 1984), 21. Mustafa Koç, Ahlâk-i Alâ’î. Kınalızâde Ali Çelebi (Istanbul: Klasik, 2007), 3.

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study purposes (muhtasar). The text then continued to be read in Ottoman ˘ ˙ schools (liseler) until the final years of the empire.37 All throughout, the Ahla¯k-ı ˘ ˙ Ala¯’ı¯ has been described as rather obscure and difficult to grasp.38 Some manuscripts and printed copies attest to this, containing traces of readers’ efforts to engage with and find access to the text, e. g. through extensive comments and marginal notes,39 or in the form of an index (fihrist) meant to orient readers.40 Compared to the well-known and widely circulating examples cited so far, ¯ lı¯ (also known as ʿA ¯ lı¯ Mustafa¯ Efendi, 1541–1600) and his Gelibolulu Mustafa¯ ʿA ˙˙ ˙˙ Nüshat’ül Sela¯t¯ın are a special case: The author received a medrese-education ˙˙ ˙ and subsequently crisscrossed the Ottoman realm as private secretary of Mustafa¯ ˙˙ Pas¸a, the tutor (la¯la¯) of Prince Selı¯m. These journeys took him to Egypt, the ¯ lı¯ was ambitious Caucasus and the Ottoman-Iranian border regions. Mustafa¯ ʿA ˙˙ and, time and again, presented his works in prose and poetry to reigning sultans in the hopes of receiving a lucrative administrative post or a promotion in return. His career in the state service, however, never really took flight. He was only appointed to middle-ranking jobs in the Ottoman financial administration of ¯ lı¯ eventually did make a name for himself – not Egypt and Anatolia.41 Mustafa¯ ʿA ˙˙ as a stellar top-level administrator, but as an author and historian. He was a prolific writer and his work demonstrates a variety of concerns, reaching from Sufi thought to travel writing and including a keen interest in the biographies of Ottoman calligraphers, painters of miniatures and bookbinders. The historiographical treatise Künhü’l-Ahba¯r counts as his most important and also most ˘ voluminous work. Nüshat’ül Sela¯t¯ın, on the other hand, a text dealing explicitly ˙˙ ˙ with political advice which he wrote in 1581 in Aleppo, was not widely studied prior to a detailed edition published by Andreas Tietze in 1979 and 1982. Tietze was able to track down eleven manuscripts of the text in libraries in Istanbul and ¯ lı¯ and disCairo.42 Joseph von Hammer-Purgstall was familiar with Mustafa¯ ʿA ˙˙ 37 Kemal H. Karpat, The Politicization of Islam (Oxford University Press, 2001), 257. 38 According to Adıvar, “Kınalıza¯de,” 709–11. ˙ Istanbul [Süleymaniye Library Istanbul] (henceforth SK), Hekim39 Süleymaniye Kütüphanesi og˘lu: 297.8 00549. 40 SK, Hüsrev Pas¸a 297.8 00283 and 297.8 00284. 41 For his biography, see Cornell Fleischer, Bureaucrat and Intellectual in the Ottoman Empire: The Historian Mustafa Ali (1541–1600) (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1986); Bekir Kütükog˘lu, “Âlî Mustafa Efendi,” TDVI˙A, vol. 2 (Istanbul: I˙SAM, 1989); Karl Süßheim ¯ lı¯,” Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed., ed. Peri Bearman et al., vol. 1 and Robert Mantran, “ʿA (Leiden: Brill, 1979), 380–81, along with Andreas Tietze in the introduction to his editions of Mustafa Ali’s Description of Cairo of 1599: Text, Transliteration, Translation, Notes (Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1975); Andreas Tietze, Mustafa¯ ˙ ʿAlı¯’s counsel for Sultans of 1581 (Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der ˙Wissenschaften, 1979). 42 Tietze, Mustafa¯ ʿAlı¯’s counsel for Sultans of 1581, 9–10. While the autograph has so far not ˙˙ been identified, one manuscript dated to 1581 does contain a colophon in the author’s

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cusses his poetry in Geschichte der osmanischen Dichtung – while remaining silent on his historiographical and political writings.43 The otherwise extensive ¯ lı¯ in the second edition of the Encyclopaedia Islamica makes article on Mustafa¯ ʿA ˙˙ ¯ lı¯ wrote his Nüshat’ül Seno mention of Nüshat’ül Sela¯t¯ın.44 When Mustafa¯ ʿA ˙˙ ˙ ˙˙ ˙˙ la¯t¯ın, he was employed as a registrar (tı¯ma¯r defterda¯rı) in Aleppo – a modest ˙ position he was apparently not too happy with. His general frustration shows in his writings, passages of which are, in the words of his translator Tietze, “full of bitter accusations, of criticism of the recent campaign [against Safavid Iran], of ¯ lı¯ does biting sarcasm.”45 Much like Kocˇi Beg’s work discussed below, Mustafa¯ ʿA ˙ ˙˙ not write his treatise from an abstract perspective of political philosophy or is concerned with a broader theory of ethics and good conduct. Rather, he zooms in on the practicalities of the Ottoman administration, pointing to flaws and needs for reform. The author of the last text under scrutiny here, Kocˇi Beg began his career as a ˙ palace official during the reign of Ahmed I. He advanced to the position of ˙ mahrem-i esra¯r, close confidant of the sultan, and wrote memoranda for Mura¯d ˙ IV and his successor I˙bra¯hı¯m. Not much is known about his biography. He seems to have been recruited through the devsˇ¯ırme and was a native of Görice,46 today Korça or Korçë in south-eastern Albania.47 Kocˇi Beg’s best-known work, his ˙ Risa¯le (also known as La¯yiha fi Tedbı¯r-i Devlet), dates from around 1630 and was ˙ addressed to Mura¯d IV. It offers an analysis of the Ottoman state and the challenges it faced at the time, suggesting a number of remedies to the perceived crisis. As his Risa¯le was originally penned for the personal use of the sultan, it comes as no surprise that the autograph is found today in the collections of the Topkapı Sarayı Müzesi. After Kocˇi Beg had passed away, a palace official – a ˙ certain ʿAbdullah Halı¯fe, possibly a relative of Kocˇi Beg’s – copied the work and ˙ ˘ brought copies outside of the palace.48 A specialist’s text on governance which was initially not meant for distribution thereby quickly reached a wider audience.

43 44 45 46

47 48

¯ lı¯’s possession, as there are handwriting. This copy seems to have remained in Mustafa¯ ʿA ˙ ˙ until 1586. additions and marginal notes made in his handwriting up Joseph von Hammer-Purgstall, Geschichte der osmanischen Dichtkunst bis auf unsere Zeit (Pest: Hartleben, s. a.), 308, 651–53. ¯ lı¯,”, 380–81. Süßheim and Mantran, “ʿA Tietze, Mustafa¯ ʿAlı¯’s counsel for Sultans of 1581, 7. ˙˙ On his biography, see Colin Imber, “Kocˇi Beg,” Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed., ed. Peri ˙ Bearman et al., vol. 5 (Leiden: Brill, 1986), 248–50; Ömer Faruk Akün, “Koçi Bey,” TDVI˙A vol. 26 (Istanbul: I˙SAM, 2002): 143–48; Hans-Jürgen Kornrumpf, “Koçi Bey,” in Biographisches Lexikon zur Geschichte Südosteuropas, eds. Mathias Bernath and Felix von Schroeder, vol. 2 (München: Oldenbourg, 1976), 422–23. In the Ottoman period, the city was the center of a sangˇak (district) and part of the vila¯yet of ˙ Manastır, see Machiel Kiel, “Görice,” TDVI˙A vol. 14 (Istanbul: I˙SAM, 1996): 157–58. Akün, “Koçi Bey”. The manuscript is at the Topkapı Sarayı Müzesi Kütüphanesi, Revan Kös¸kü no. 1323.

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What can be said, in turn, about early readers and collectors of the texts in question? Many libraries in Istanbul started out as vakfiyyes, book collections ˙ endowed by their owners to public foundations. Inventories of such collections show that interest in political advice literature was not limited to one particular group in Ottoman society. As nas¯ıhatna¯mes, at their core, discuss norms of ˙˙ governance, order in society and social hierarchy, these types of works can be expected to be part of the collections of statesmen and bureaucrats. But readers were also found outside of these circles: Among the possessions a certain I˙smiha¯n ˘ Ha¯tun bint Memisˇa¯h left behind after her death in 1059 H (1649) in the Beyceg˘iz ˘ neighborhood of Istanbul was a volume entitled Nas¯ıhatü’l Mülu¯k; the author’s ˙˙ name is not given.49 Looking for such book collections created by high-ranking Ottoman bureaucrats, we come across the libraries of Ahmed Pas¸a Köprülüza¯de ˙ (d. 1676), Mehmed Ra¯g˙ıp Pas¸a (1699–1763) and Koca Hüsrev Pas¸a (1756–1855).50 ˙ ˘ All three of them served as Ottoman grand viziers51 and were book lovers and collectors of manuscripts. Like many of their fellow Ottoman bureaucrats, they had a predilection for works of the wider adab genre, i. e. texts dealing with manners, refined conduct and literary sophistication, drawing on Arabic, Persian as well as Ottoman Turkish traditions.52 Among the works of this wider genre, Ra¯g˙ıp Pas¸a’s library contains a copy of Kınalıza¯de’s Ahla¯k-ı Ala¯’ı¯. Ahmed Pas¸a ˙ ˙ ˘ ˙ Köprülüza¯de had endowed a library in his name in the heart of Istanbul, adjacent to his family’s medrese. He gifted his personal book collection to the library and commissioned additional books to be copied specifically for its use. His library was renowned and well-known also among Europeans in 17th-century Istanbul: Antoine Galland, in his function as secretary to the French ambassador Marquis de Nointel, coveted access to it and was eager to get introduced to the librarian

49 ˙Istanbul Kadı Sicilleri, Rumeli 80 cilt 15, sayfa 192, hüküm no. 201. The honorary titles used to refer to I˙smiha¯n in the document – ha¯tun and fahrü’l muhaddera¯t – hint at her social status as ˘ ˘ see Abdülkadir Özcan, “Hatun,” a member of˘a family of Ottoman bureaucrats or˘ governors, ˙ ˙ TDVIA vol. 16 (Istanbul: ISAM, 1997): 499–500. It is not clear from the document whether she owned the collection of seventy-nine books in total as a financial investment or actually read and interacted with them. 50 The collections used to be independent but are today part of the holdings of the Süleymaniye Library in Istanbul. 51 Another seventeenth-century Ottoman statesman and avid book collector with a verified interest in political advice literature was Sˇeyh Visˇneza¯de Mehmed ʿI˙zzetı¯ (1629–1681), a ˇ elebi and˘ Hüseyin Efendi˙ Heza¯rfen, see Wurm, Der patron and sponsor of both Ka¯tib C ˙ osmanische Historiker, 65–70. 52 Henning Sievert, “Eavesdropping on the Pasha’s Salon: Usual and Unusual Readings of an Eighteenth-Century Ottoman Bureaucrat,” Osmanlı Aras¸tırmaları/The Journal of Ottoman Studies 41 (2013): 164, making the point that the megˇmu¯ʿas are more informative about readers’ tastes than book collections and libraries as such. He suggests studying both in conjunction, p. 166.

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Sahha¯f Rasu¯l Efendi in 1672.53 Among the manuscripts bearing the stamp of ˙ ˙˙ Ahmed Pas¸a’s vakf along with his personal signet are three copies of Lütfı¯ Pas¸a’s ˙ ˙ ˙ Asafna¯me. Given his prominent family’s legacy of state service, the work might ˙ have been considered a suitable gift to him. Inquiring about the social aspects of reading and knowledge transfers in the early-modern Ottoman period, in addition to libraries, megˇmu¯ʿa collections offer an interesting starting point, providing clues as to which texts were perceived as similar or complementary to each other, bound and, in turn, read together.54 Passages and texts that were assembled in these megˇmu¯ʿa collections were possibly also read together in Ottoman megˇa¯lis-settings or were used to prepare, fill in for or recall such sessions.55 Some works on political advice lend themselves particularly well to these techniques of collecting, collating and reading: In the collections stored today in the Süleymaniye Library in Istanbul, thirty-four individual entries for Lütfı¯ Pas¸a’s Asafna¯me can be found, at least eleven of which ˙ ˙ are printed copies. Thirteen, i. e. more than half of the hand-written copies, are part of a megˇmu¯ʿa. Being comparatively short, Lütfı¯ Pas¸a’s treatise was perceived ˙ as a good fit for being combined with other texts. Looking at these megˇmu¯ʿa collections, it emerges that the Asafna¯me was in many cases read – or at the very ˙ least copied and stored – together with other texts from the genre of advice literature. In some megˇmu¯ʿas, the Asafna¯me seems to have been regarded as a text ˙ of historiographical interest. Other combinations, notably with poetry and Sufi texts, are also found. And at least one collection pairs Lütfı¯ Pas¸a’s treatise with ˙ more practical kinds of counsel, containing extensive tables with medical advice. Kocˇi Beg’s Risa¯le exhibits a number of parallels to the Asafna¯me as far as col˙ ˙ lections and classifications are concerned. It can be found at least sixteen times in the holdings of today’s Süleymaniye Library in Istanbul, where it is at times classified as a historiographical work. Compared to Lütfı¯’s Asafna¯me or Kocˇi ˙ ˙ ˙ Beg’s Risa¯le, Kınalıza¯de’s Ahla¯k-ı Ala¯’ı¯ is a much more voluminous work and was ˙ ˘ ˙ therefore rarely chosen as part of megˇmu¯ʿa collections. There are, however, megˇmu¯ʿas which contain excerpts from Kınalıza¯de’s text.56 ˙

53 Wurm, Der osmanische Historiker, 38. 54 See the appendix for some examples of nas¯ıhatna¯mes in Ottoman megˇmu¯ʿa collections. ˙ ˙ 160–61, he calls megˇmu¯ʿas “the closest literary 55 Sievert, “Eavesdropping on the Pasha’s Salon,” approximation to salon conversation.” 56 SK, Tercüma¯n: 170.00109, for instance, contains ten pages of selections from the Ahla¯k-ı Ala¯’ı¯. ˘ ˙

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European Readings and Translations

European and Ottoman scholars in the in the 17th and 18th centuries did share many interests and concerns and were, as will be shown, in constant dialogue with each other, justifying it to speak of shared worlds of ideas rather than assuming two entirely separate orbits of knowledge circulation. However, in terms of text production and circulation, geographies related to print culture were indeed different from the networks within which manuscripts circulated in terms of scope and density, economic conditions and speed at which information traveled.57 While Hammer-Purgstall’s and other 19th-century works are often regarded as a major point of reference in the European reception and study of Ottoman political advice literature as a historiographical source, European interest in the nas¯ıhatna¯me genre long predates these studies.58 Some Ottoman ˙˙ political treatises and historiographies were read in Europe almost simultaneously to being popular in the Ottoman lands, and Ottoman scholars and thinkers were familiar to European observers: Lütfı¯ Pas¸a in particular left nu˙ merous traces in European archives and early-modern literature, since he was a highly visible figure, holding eminent posts in the Ottoman administration and leading campaigns and diplomatic missions.59 Not only Lütfı¯ Pas¸a’s political ˙ activities, but also his works were known to European scholars prior to the midth 19 century: An undated manuscript copy of the Asafna¯me found its way into the ˙ collection of the Orientalische Akademie in Vienna.60 With trade and diplomatic relations intensifying, the late 17th-century also constituted a particularly fruitful period for intellectual exchanges between European and Ottoman scholars in Istanbul. Conversations were led in many fields, among them astronomy, geography and – notably – also statecraft and administration. European scholars and diplomatic representatives hunted down older oriental manuscripts they hoped would contain historiographical, scientific, 57 Nile Green, The Persianate World: The Frontiers of a Eurasian Lingua Franca (Oakland, CA: University of California Press, 2019), 47–50. 58 Conversations across the Mediterranean about governance and political philosophy between Islamic and Christian scholars had been ongoing for centuries prior to the advent of the Ottoman Empire, see e. g. the discussion in Regula Forster, Das Geheimnis der Geheimnisse: Die arabischen und deutschen Fassungen des pseudo-aristotelischen Sirr al-asrar/Secretum Secretorum (Wiesbaden: Reichert, 2006), 113–30. 59 Jano Jacobo Boissardo Vesuntino, Theatrum Vitae Humanae (Frankfurt am Main, 1596), 249–52 has his biography, he appears as “Lutsis Bassa,” accompanied by an engraving. This reference is also cited by Tschudi, who reproduces the picture in his 1910 edition. 60 Albrecht Krafft, Die arabischen, persischen und türkischen Handschriften der k. k. Orientalischen Akademie zu Wien (Vienna, 1842), 181, Ms. no. CDLXXVI, described as „Eine trotz ihrer gedrängten Kürze für die Kenntnis des Staatslebens jener Zeit im türkischen Reiche wichtige und, als aus der Feder eines so großen Staatsmannes, schätzbare Schrift.” No information is given as to how the undated manuscript found its way to Vienna.

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political and administrative information and had these texts copied and translated, often in close cooperation with the European embassies in the city. Many of these European book agents also regularly met with selected Ottoman statesmen and scholars, among them for instance Hüseyin Efendi Heza¯rfen.61 French dip˙ lomats were especially keen on getting access to Ottoman historiographical and political writings. During his stay at the embassy in Istanbul from 1676 to 1681, the French orientalist François Pétis de la Croix (1653–1713) copied Heza¯rfen’s only recently finished Tenk¯ıh üt-Teva¯rı¯h.62 As a result, the text was already ˙ ˙ available in France during Heza¯rfen’s lifetime.63 These avenues of early-modern exchange and knowledge transfer worked both ways:64 Ottoman officials and scholars also made use of their contacts with foreign diplomats and travelers in order to collect information. The 17th-century Atlas Maior by Joan Blaeu, which had been gifted to the sultan by the Dutch and provided detailed information on European geography, was studied closely at the Ottoman court – and served as a ˇ elebi’s G ˇ iha¯nnüma¯.65 The keen Ottoman insource and inspiration for Ka¯tib C terest, in turn, was viewed with great suspicion elsewhere in Europe, in particular in Italy. With similar reservations, the Habsburg Empire tried to prevent European historiographical works dealing with the most recent past and in particular treating the wars against the Ottomans from being exported into the Ottoman lands.66 In this context of vibrant exchanges of ideas but also mutual suspicion, works like the Asafna¯me and Kocˇi Beg’s Risa¯le came to the attention of the French ˙ ˙ embassy. Antoine Galland (1646–1715),67 French orientalist, polyglot secretary of the French ambassador in Istanbul, and – most importantly – book enthusiast wrote a detailed journal during his time in the Ottoman capital, covering the years 1672 and 1673. He lived through interesting times, both academically and 61 Wurm, Der osmanische Historiker, 122–49. 62 Wurm, Der osmanische Historiker, 79. Heza¯rfen had finished the work in February 1673, ibid. p. 94. 63 Wurm, Der osmanische Historiker, 101. 64 See also Feza Günergun, “Ottoman Encounters with European Science: Sixteenth- and Seventeenth-Century translations into Turkish,” in Cultural Translation in Early Modern Europe, eds. Peter Burke and R. Po-chia Hsia (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 192–211. 65 Gottfried Hagen, Ein osmanischer Geograph bei der Arbeit: Entstehung und Gedankenwelt ˇ elebis G ˘ iha¯nnüma¯ (Berlin: K. Schwarz, 2003), 257–59. von Ka¯tib C 66 Wurm, Der osmanische Historiker, 31. 67 Born of modest background in the Picardy region, Galland received a thorough education in theology, Greek and Hebrew before he specialized in Oriental languages. Upon his return from Istanbul in 1675, he worked as a librarian at the Royal Library in Paris, see Charles Schefer, Journal d’Antoine Galland pendant son séjour à Constantinople (1672–1673) (Paris: E. Leroux, 1881), 2:3–4. On his biography, see Mohamed Abdel-Halim, Antoine Galland, sa vie et son oeuvre (Paris: Nizet, 1964).

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politically, which were marked by the rivalries and tensions between French, Austrian and Dutch diplomats and tough negotiations with the Ottomans to improve the French position in the empire. Galland’s notes, however, are very personal and exhibit a strong focus on his bibliographical research. They reveal a strong fascination with books and manuscripts – a sentiment which guided his strolls among the booksellers’ stands in the bazaar, informed his meetings with colleagues and Ottoman scholars alike and oriented his purchases for the embassy’s library.68 The French authorities – notably Minister of Finances JeanBaptiste Colbert, who had urged French travelers to the Ottoman Empire as well as merchants and diplomats to purchase valuable manuscripts for the royal library in Paris69 – were at the time extremely interested in obtaining Oriental manuscripts. In 1671, Colbert for the first time also explicitly asked for OttomanTurkish manuscripts. Galland’s notes mirror these interests. The various discoveries, bids and purchases he mentions in his notes included valuable illustrated manuscripts containing epics and poetry, but also books on religious matters, on recent Ottoman history, wars and conquests, and questions of governance. Early in January of 1672, Galland came across Kocˇi Beg’s Risa¯le. The small ˙ booklet with the title “Ka¯nu¯nna¯me” was brought to his attention by a Turkish ˙ language teacher of the embassy’s Enfants de Langues and recognized by Galland as a book of introduction to the art of governance, addressed to an Ottoman sultan. He was, however, not able to identify the author.70 Shortly after Galland’s examination of the book, the ambassador instructed him to purchase the copy and prepare a French translation.71 It can only be assumed that Galland did begin to do so and then sent the booklet, possibly along with his notes, off to France. In 1725, a French translation of this same text was undertaken by Alexandre Pétis de la Croix (1698–1751) 72 and published under the title Canon de Sultan Suleiman représenté à Sultan Murad IV par son instruction, en état politique et militaire tiré des archives les plus secrètes des princes Ottomans.73 In addition to Kocˇi Beg’s ˙ work, Galland also purchased a booklet with the title Muzaffarna¯me which ˙ contained political and moral advice in the form of questions and answers, 74 translated into Ottoman Turkish from Persian. 68 69 70 71 72

Charles Schefer, Journal, ix–xv. Wurm, Der osmanische Historiker, 41–42, 147 for Colbert’s interest in Oriental manuscripts. Schefer, Journal, 2:2–3. Schefer, Journal, 2:4–5. The booklet was sold for 1.25 piaster. Member of a family of translators, Pétis de la Croix was a French orientalist. He was employed at the Bibliothèque Royale in Paris and held the chair for Arabic language at the Collège Royale. 73 Pétis de la Croix’s translation was published anonymously and was never widely circulated, only few copies exist today. 74 Schefer, Journal, 1:67.

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In the late-17th century, representatives of the French embassy were by no means the only ones scouting for manuscripts they hoped would contain information on Ottoman statecraft and recent history. Luigi Fernando Marsili (1658–1730), member of the circle around the bailo Pietro Civrano in Istanbul, can be regarded as Antoine Galland’s Venetian counterpart: He also strove to get to know Ottoman scholars, met with Hüseyin Efendi Heza¯rfen on a regular basis ˙ and hunted down valuable books and manuscripts.75 With a similar interest in the alleged secrets of Ottoman statecraft, the royal libraries in Vienna, Berlin and St. Petersburg also purchased copies of Kocˇi Beg’s work in the late 17th and ˙ 18th centuries.76 The Institute of Oriental Studies in St. Petersburg accommodates two copies of Kocˇi Beg’s Risa¯le, which have been used by Vasilis Dimitrievitch ˙ Smirnov in 1897 for his analysis and a Russian translation of the text.77 The Staatsbibliothek in Munich also has a copy – which, however, was purchased later, towards the end of the 19th century, from the library of an impoverished Russian orientalist.78 19th-century orientalists and historians of the Ottoman Empire, prominently among them the Austrian scholar Joseph von Hammer-Purgstall (1774–1856), have read works of Ottoman advice literature or their translations into various European languages as a source on Ottoman history and – notably – as eye75 Wurm, Der osmanische Historiker, 145–46. Marsili’s collection of Oriental manuscripts comprises 173 volumes and is preserved today at the Instituto delle Scienze in his hometown Bologna. Marsili’s insights on the internal workings of the Ottoman state appeared as Stato Militare dell’Imperio Ottomano in 1732. 76 Akün, “Koçi Bey”. 77 Institut Vostokovedenija Rossijskoj Akademii Nauk [Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences], Ms. C 2339 (recorded with the title “Nasihat al-mülûk“) and Ms. A 319; see I[rina] E. Petrosyan, “On Three Anonymous Turkish Manuscripts from the St. Petersburg Branch of the Institute of Oriental Studies Collection. The Problem of Authorship,” Manuscripta Orientalia 1 (1995): 17–20, who also points out that both texts are almost identical to the edition prepared by Aksüt in 1939. 78 Joseph Aumer, Verzeichniß der orientalischen Handschriften in der K. Hof- und Staatsbibliothek in München … (München: Palm’sche Hofbuchhandlung, 1875), 28, no. 96 cod. or. 381, described as „die Staatsschrift des Qôdschabeg über den inneren Verfall des osmanischen Reiches,” dated to 1040 H and further characterized as of modest calligraphic quality, with numerous comments and corrections in the margins. It was purchased in the late nineteenth century from the collection of the Russian orientalist Antoni Muchlinski (1808– 1877). Muchlinski had collected manuscripts throughout his scholarly career and had them shipped back home by the box load when returning from a three-year long study trip to Egypt and the Ottoman lands in 1835. Towards the end of his life, he lived in poverty in Warsaw and was compelled to sell parts of his valuable collection to an antiques dealer based in Leipzig. From there, twenty-four manuscripts of Muchlinski’s collection, including a copy of Kocˇi Beg’s Risa¯le wound up in Munich. Other parts of Muchlinksi’s collection were sold to˙ St. Petersburg and Bayreuth, see T[amara] P. Deryagina and O[lga] B. Frolova, “Antoni Muchlinski and His Collection of Arabic Manuscripts in the St. Petersburg University Library,” Manuscripta Orientalia 3, no. 4 (1997): 45–51.

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witness accounts of Ottoman decline.79 Hammer-Purgstall included a short summary of Kocˇi Beg’s Risa¯le in his Geschichte des Osmanischen Reiches. He ˙ praised Kocˇi Beg as the first and most insightful commentator of Ottoman ˙ decline, who had had the foresight to already identify traces of crisis during the reign of Sultan Süleyma¯n II. He also refers to Kocˇi Beg as a Turkish Montesquieu: ˙ “… Kotschibeg, welcher durch sein Werk über den Verfall des osmanischen Reiches den Namen des türkischen Montesquieu verdient …”80 Similar comparisons of Ottoman scholars with figures from European intellectual history existed: Hüseyin Efendi Heza¯rfen was referred to as the “Turkish Seneca” by an ˙ Italian commentator.81 20th-century Turkish historians seem to be particularly interested in comparing Kocˇi Beg and his work to the Italian thinker Machia˙ velli.82 Adnan Adıvar, in his article on Kınalıza¯de in the ˙Islam Ansiklopedisi, ˙ identifies Ahla¯k-ı Ala¯’ı¯ as his chief work and introduces it in detail, listing not ˘ ˙ ˇ ela¯leddin ad-Dawa¯nı¯ and al-G˙azza¯lı¯ among its only Na¯sir ad-Dı¯n at-Tu¯sı¯, G ˙ ˙ ˙ sources, but also underlining an alleged influence of Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics.83 In a similar vein, attempting to link European and Ottoman literary heritage and political philosophy, Adıvar reads Kınalıza¯de’s first chapters on the ˙ human soul (nefs-i insa¯nı¯) as reminiscent of Descartes’ famous maxim cogito ergo sum. As for Kınalıza¯de’s passages on political morality, Adıvar draws a ˙ connection to works from Plato and Aristotle.84 It is worth pointing out that more recent editions of Kınalıza¯de’s work, like Koç’s edition of 2007, no longer contain ˙

79 This approach to Ottoman advice literature proved to be long-lasting: Erwin Rosenthal discussed Kocˇi Beg (along with two other seventeenth-century Ottoman texts on political advice) in ˙the broader context of Islamic political philosophy. He read all three works as commentaries on “an acute crisis of the Ottoman state,” Political Thought in Medieval Islam (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1958), 304, note 1. 80 Hammer, Geschichte des Osmanischen Reiches, 2:349–51 for the Montesquieu comparison and a summary of Kocˇi Beg’s argument; the Risa¯le is also cited numerous times as a historiographical source˙ by Hammer as he comments on the state of the Ottoman army (2:565– 66) or the Ottoman losses in the eastern parts of the empire in the sixteenth century (2:835– 36). 81 Wurm, Der osmanische Historiker, 148. 82 Gülbende Kuray, “Türkiye’de bir Machiavelli: Koçi Bey,” Belleten 205 (1988): 1655–62; and more recently Hüseyin Bal, “Machiavelli ve Koçi Bey’de Siyaset, Adalet ve Erdem,” Türkiyat Aras¸tırmaları (2008): 75–99. 83 Adnan Adıvar, “Kınalıza¯de,” 709–11. Adıvar was interested in Ottoman political advice lit˙ erature; he also extensively studied the work and life of another crucial author in this genre, ˙Ibra¯h¯ım Müteferrika. ˙ readings were part of a broader early-Republican discourse: Adıvar cites Rıza Tevfik 84 These and Feridun Kam to make his argument – alluding to broader discussions about the links between western philosophy and Islamic thought, notably centered on Ibn Sı¯na¯. These discussions were not only led in Turkish-Republican intellectual circles, but also could draw on late-nineteenth century discussions by Ottoman and Iranian intellectuals.

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such references, indicating that the framing of Kınalıza¯de’s work has shifted ˙ since the early 20th century.85 In addition to the widely-read works of Hammer-Purgstall, other mid-19th century European orientalists also engaged with Ottoman advice literature: A translation of Kocˇi Beg’s Risa¯le into German was realized by W. F. A. Behrnauer ˙ (1827–1890) in 1861. Behrnauer had access to manuscripts of the text in the Hofbibliothek in Vienna, where he worked as an assistant librarian between 1852 and 1861.86 Translations of Kınalıza¯de’s Ahla¯k-ı Ala¯’ı¯, both in its entirety and of ˙ ˘ ˙ selected passages, into Italian and German already existed prior to the 19th century.87 It did not take long for the readings and interpretations of European orientalists to find their way back into the Ottoman Empire: The French translation88 of Hammer-Purgstall’s Geschichte des Osmanischen Reiches was in turn translated into Ottoman Turkish by Mehmed Ata¯ Bey (1856–1919) and published ˙ in nine volumes between 1911 and 1917.89

5.

Ottoman Reformers from the 1840s Onwards as Readers of Advice Literature

In the late 18th and early 19th century, the discourse and attitudes that had informed early-modern Ottoman book collectors and sponsors of literary works shifted. In the wake of orientalism and imperialist interventions, learned exchanges about political advice and the ethics of governance were less and less part of a shared prestigious court culture. But interest in the genre of advice literature continued, for various newly-emerging reasons: Legitimizing imperial identity in 85 See Mustafa Koç, Ahlâk-i Alâ’î. Kınalıza¯de Ali Çelebi (Istanbul: Klasik, 2007), 1–13. ˙ 86 W[alter] F[riedrich] A[dolf] Behrnauer, “Kogabeg’s Abhandlung über den Verfall des osmanischen Staatsgebäudes seit Sultan Suleiman dem Grossen,” Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft 15 (1861): 272–332, and comments on his translation by Heinrich L. Fleischer in Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft 15 (1862): 271. On Behrnauer’s biography, see Karl Bader, Lexikon deutscher Bibliothekare (Leipzig: Harrassowitz, 1925), 359. 87 The Venetian dragoman Giovanni Medun prepared a translation into Italian in the early seventeenth century; excerpts in Italian translation were also included by Giambatist Toderini, Letteratura Turchesca (Venice: G. Storti, 1787), 95–99. German translations by Carl Rudolf Samuel Peiper, Das Kapitel von der Freigiebigkeit (Breslau: F. Hirt, 1848) and idem, Stimmen aus dem Morgenlande (Leipzig: Brockhaus, 1850); see Adıvar, “Kınalıza¯de,” 709–11. ˙ 88 J. J. Hellert, Histoire de l’Empire ottoman depuis son origine jusqu’à nos jours, 18 vols. (Paris: Bellizard, 1835–43). 89 Mehmed Ata¯ Bey, Devlet-iʿOsma¯niyye Ta¯rı¯hi, 9 vols. (Istanbul 1911–17). Already prior to that, ˙ ˘ osmanischen Dichtung had been translated into in 1907, Hammer-Purgstall’s Geschichte der Ottoman Turkish by Mehmed Sira¯gˇüddı¯n Bey and published under the title Megˇmu¯ʿa-i ˇsuʿara¯’ ˙ ˇ iha¯n Matbaʿası, 1325 H [1907]). ve tezkı¯re-i üdeba¯. Hammer J. Purgstal’den [sic] (Istanbul: G ¯

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the 19th century increasingly also meant laying claim to a well-defined and clearly distinguishable cultural heritage.90 A literary tradition, a canon of texts which were seen as expressions of the intellectual and creative achievements of the empire in question, was perceived as an integral part of this imperial heritage. This did not leave 19th-century Ottoman intellectuals unaffected: Selected texts from the genre of advice literature were included in the Ottoman-imperial literary canon. Texts by Lütfı¯ Pas¸a, Kocˇi Beg and others were in turn cited as ˙ ˙ evidence for a long-standing tradition of reform-oriented governance in the Ottoman realm, allegedly proving that Ottoman scholars and statesmen had always been concerned with reform, and that some Ottoman rulers had been open to hearing about it – a perspective which aptly fit concerns and political ideals of some parts of the Ottoman elite in the 19th century. One late-19th century discussion of the Asafna¯me makes this link explicitly, matching Lütfı¯ Pas¸a’s ˙ ˙ career to the trajectory of 19th-century reformer Midhat Pas¸a (1822–1884), down ˙ to the fact that both fell out of favor with the sultan as a result of their com91 mitment to political reform. Dog˘an Gürpınar has addressed the question of 19th-century Ottoman reformist readings and selective rediscoveries of early-Ottoman authors and historical figures. He identifies a number of instances in which 19th-century reformist attitudes are “generously attributed to Ottoman grandees” throughout Ottoman history, including Sultan ʿOsma¯n II (1604–1622), grand viziers Köprülü Mehmed Pas¸a (d. 1661) and Nevsˇehı¯rlı¯ I˙bra¯hı¯m Pas¸a (d. 1730). In this context, ˙ Gürpınar also comments on readings of Kocˇi Beg’s Risa¯le in 19th-century Otto˙ man reformist circles: Kocˇi Beg, he argues, was being read as a key protagonist ˙ of earlier reformist endeavors and seen as a model and a forerunner of the 19th-century reformist movement, whose adherents were eager to create their own historical legacy.92 The focus on Kocˇi Beg in European orientalist writings, ˙ notably in Hammer-Purgstall’s Geschichte des Osmanischen Reiches, might have helped the prominence of the Risa¯le in Ottoman reformist circles as well. In 1862/ 63, Ahmed Vefı¯k Pas¸a (1823–1891) published the first printed edition of Kocˇi ˙ ˙ ˙ Beg’s Risa¯le. Ahmed Vefı¯k Pas¸a was an Ottoman official and member of a family ˙ ˙ of dragomans. He had distinguished himself as an Ottoman diplomat and president of the first Ottoman Parliament in 1876, but was also a self-taught 90 Pieter M. Judson, The Habsburg Empire. A New History (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2016), 115–16. 91 “… la vie même de Loutfi Pacha (…), à une époque peu éloignée, pareil fait s’est produit dans la carrière de Midhat Pacha, le grand ministre réformateur.” L. B. in “Livres et Revues,” discussing Rudolf Tschudis’s edition and German translation of 1910, Revue du Monde Musulman 12 (1910): 731. 92 Dog˘an Gürpınar, Ottoman/Turkish Visions of the Nation, 1860–1950 (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013), 32–34.

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linguist with an avid interest in the Turkish language.93 His edition of the Risa¯le appeared in London and was realized on the basis of an old manuscript which was part of Ahmed Vefı¯k Pas¸a’s personal library.94 Ahmed Vefı¯k Pas¸a was also one of ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ the editors of the journal Tasvı¯r-i Efka¯r. It was in the same journal his colleague ˙ I˙bra¯h¯ım Sˇina¯si Bey (1826–1871) published an article summarizing the Risa¯le in ˙ 1279 H (1862/63).95 Ahmed Vefı¯k Pas¸a continued to be interested in Kocˇi Beg’s ˙ ˙ ˙ work. He was aware of a second text with similar contents prepared by Kocˇi Beg, ˙ but had not seen a copy himself and assumed that the text was very rare.96 Ottoman interest in other texts of the nas¯ıhatna¯me genre was palpable in the ˙˙ first half of the 19th century: An early printed version of Kınalıza¯de’s Ahla¯k-ı Ala¯’ı¯ ˙ ˘ ˙ dates from 1248 H (1833) and was realized by the Bu¯la¯k press in Cairo. Un˙ fortunately, it contains no introduction, preface or additional comments to gauge contemporary readings of the text. Adnan Adıvar was not excited about this particular edition, calling it “itinâsız,” carelessly done.97 In 1288 H (1871), a printed edition of the work’s preface (mukaddime) was prepared in Bursa by the ˙ local vila¯yet matbaʿası. In 1329 H (1911), Ahla¯k-ı Ala¯’ı¯ was again printed, this ˘ ˙ ¯ lı¯ Gelibolulu is time in Istanbul. As far as Kınalıza¯de’s contemporary Mustafa¯ ʿA ˙ ˙˙ th concerned, 19 -century Ottoman and later Turkish-Republican historians have taken an interest in his writings on Ottoman history and book culture, but have largely ignored him as a commentator on political reform.98 In the late-19th century, it was again Kocˇi Beg’s Risa¯le that prominently caught ˙ the attention of Ottoman scholars: A new printed edition with a preface was prepared by Mehmed Tevfı¯k Ebüz˙z˙iya¯ (1849–1913). The print was realized by the ˙ ˙ latter’s printing house, the Ebüz˙z˙iya¯ Matbaʿası in Istanbul in 1885. Mehmed ˙ Tevfı¯k was an Ottoman bureaucrat, who in the mid-1860s had embarked on a ˙ career as a journalist and collaborated with Na¯mık Kema¯l, I˙bra¯hı¯m Sˇina¯si and ˙ other reform-minded writers in the circles of the Young Ottomans.99 The Ebüz˙z˙iya¯ Matbaʿası operated in succession of the Tasvı¯r-i Efka¯r printing house, ˙ which had been established by I˙bra¯hı¯m Sˇina¯si Bey and was shut down after his 93 Jean Deny, “Ahmad Wafı¯k Pas̲h̲a,” Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed., ed. Peri Bearman et al., vol. 1 (Leiden: ˙Brill, 1979),˙ 298. 94 According to Ahmed Vefı¯k himself, the manuscript had been copied in the seventeenth ˙ ˙ of Kocˇi Beg, see Ali Kemalî Aksüt, Koçi Bey Risalesi (Istanbul: century, shortly after the death ˙ Vakit Matbaası, 1939), 17. ˇ ˙ 95 Ibra¯h¯ım Sina¯si Bey, in Tasvı¯r-i Efka¯r 67 (1279 [1862/63]). ˙ Koçi Bey Risalesi, ˙11 – Aksüt did locate a copy of this second Risa¯le and published a 96 Aksüt, modern Turkish edition of both texts in 1939; see below. 97 Adıvar, “Kınalıza¯de,” 709–11. ˙ tafa¯ʿAlı¯’s counsel for Sultans of 1581, 10. A printed multi-volume Ottoman edition 98 Tietze, Mus ˙˙ ba¯r was prepared in Istanbul in the 1280s H, but never completed. of Künhü’l-Ah 99 S¸erif Mardin,˘ The Genesis of Young Ottoman Thought. A Study in the Modernization of Turkish Political Ideas (Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press 2000 [1962]), 64–67.

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death in 1871. The printing house’s initial mission had been the dissemination of constitutionalist ideas. In the context of these activities, Mehmed Tevfı¯k faced ˙ ˙ state repercussions and was exiled to the island of Rhodes between 1873 and 1876 and again in 1878, after the shut-down of the Ottoman parliament. After his return and throughout the 1880s, the Ebüz˙z˙iya¯ Matbaʿası continued its work and added a focus on adult education and literacy promotion to its mission statement. To advance this goal, Mehmed Tevfı¯k initiated a series entitled Kita¯bha¯ne-i ˙ ˙ ˘ Ebüz˙z˙iya¯, which counted more than one hundred individual titles, among them the works of Na¯mık Kema¯l and I˙bra¯hı¯m Sˇina¯si, Persian poetry in Ottoman ˙ translation, Ahmed Resmı¯’s account of his journey to Vienna and also trans˙ lations from European literature, non-fiction on military and other subjects. Kocˇi Beg’s Risa¯le appeared as part of this series in 1885. In the 1890s, pressure on ˙ Mehmed Tevfı¯k was increasing again. He was arrested numerous times and ˙ ˙ eventually exiled to Konya in 1900. His printing press was shut down, until he was allowed to return to Istanbul in the wake of the general amnesty for political offenders in 1908.100 Mehmed Tevfı¯k opens his edition of the Risa¯le with a collection of short ˙ ˙ comments on Kocˇi Beg’s work by previous authors and scholars – a format not ˙ unlike the blurbs which are found in the opening pages or on the cover of today’s best-sellers. The first comment cited there, however, is far from enthusiastic: The early-19th-century historian ʿAta’ullah Mehmed Efendi Sˇa¯nı¯za¯de (d. 1826) is cited ˙ ˙ stating that Kocˇi Beg’s work, lacking respect and humility in its plain and direct ˙ writing, compared negatively to the Risa¯le of a certain al-Hakk, another early˙ ˙˙ modern Ottoman text on political advice.101 The second comment is a citation from I˙bra¯hı¯m Sˇina¯si, who in his already-mentioned article in the Tasvı¯r-i Efka¯r in ˙ 1862/63 had described Kocˇi Beg more benevolently, introducing him as a diligent ˙ and able Ottoman official who showed much clear-sightedness in suggesting suitable measures to reform the Ottoman state. The third comment is from Ahmed Vefı¯k, and the final blurb contains biographical information on Kocˇi Beg ˙ ˙ ˙ from the sigˇill-i ʿosma¯nı¯. In his own introduction, Mehmed Tevfı¯k then sheds ˙ ˙ some additional light on Sˇa¯nı¯za¯de’s comparison between Kocˇi Beg’s work and the ˙ Risa¯le of al-Hakk: This appears to be the Nahgˇ as-sulu¯k fı¯ siya¯set al-mulu¯k, a work ˙ ˙˙

100 For an extensive overview of Mehmed Tevfı¯k’s biography and works, see his grandson Ziyad ˙ ˙˙A vol. 10 (Istanbul: I˙SAM, 1994): 374–78. Ebüzziya, “Ebüzziyâ Mehmed Tevfik,” TDVI 101 Mehmed Tevfı¯k, Kocˇi Beg’iñ Risa¯lesi (Istanbul: Ebüz˙z˙iya¯ Matbaʿası, 1303 [1885/86]), 1. The ˙ referenced ˙ ˙is the Ta¯rı¯h-i Sˇa¯nı¯za¯de, an Ottoman chronicle covering the time period work ˘ Babinger, Geschichtsschreiber der Osmanen und ihre Werke between 1808 and 1820; Franz (Leipzig: Harrassowitz, 1927), 346–47, no. 314.

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attributed to Abu an-Negˇ¯ıb asˇ-Sˇayzarı¯.102 It constitutes one example of a piece of Ottoman political advice literature which seems to have been well-known throughout the late-18th and mid-19th centuries to scholars and readers, but appears to have faded into the background afterwards and was – notably – not selected for translations by European scholars around 1900. One reason for texts to fall through the cracks in this way was that manuscripts remained difficult to locate and access, especially in imperial libraries, and even printed manuscripts from the mid- and late 19th century did not have long shelf-lives: In 1939, Ali Kemalî Aksüt found that both Mehmed Tevfı¯k’s 1885 edition and earlier prints of ˙ ˙ Kocˇi Beg’s Risa¯le had become exceedingly rare – citing this fact as an argument to ˙ 103 publish his own edition in 1939.

6.

Turning Point of 1908/09: Hoping for the Great Literary Find in Ottoman Libraries

It is not a coincidence that editions and translations of a number of key texts on Ottoman statecraft and political advice were prepared and published around 1910: In 1908/09, after the Ottoman Constitutional Revolution and the deposition of Sultan ʿAbdülhamı¯d II, there was a general expectation that secret treasures, ˙ among them notably valuable manuscripts and other documents in the imperial archives and libraries, would come to be discovered. US-American and European newspapers reported extensively on the topic,104 and scholars hastened to the scene in Istanbul to take part in the search and claim their share of the discoveries. In this context, the German orientalist Karl Süßheim (1878–1947) was dispatched to Istanbul as a local representative of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences, with the mission to investigate the holdings of Istanbul’s palace library and other libraries and archives.105 At around the same time, following the orders of Sultan Mehmed V to conduct a survey of the imperial manuscript collections, ˙ Ottoman scholars had set up their own committee headed by ʿAbdurrahma¯n ˙ Sˇeref Bey (1853–1925) to screen the documents and manuscripts there. The same 102 The Ottoman bureaucrat Mehmed Emı¯n Nah¯ıfı¯ (d. 1788) translated the Persian original into ˙ ˙ Ottoman Turkish in the mid-eighteenth century (1202 H); Babinger, Geschichtsschreiber, 329. Between 1841 and the 1870s, several printed editions were published. 103 Aksüt, Koçi Bey Risalesi, 13. 104 See, for instance Marquise de Fontenoy, “Famous Library Opens to Savants.” Washington Post, May 29, 1909: 6, and also the article series by the US-American traveler and journalist William E. Curtis, who was able to access the manuscript library of the Hagia Sophia and wrote in the Boston Daily Globe about his discoveries, William E. Curtis, “The Libraries of Constantinople.” Boston Daily Globe, October 10, 1910: 10. 105 Karl Süßheim, Barbara Flemming, and Jan Schmidt, The Diary of Karl Süssheim (1878– 1947): Orientalist Between Munich and Istanbul (Stuttgart: Steiner, 2002), 25–26.

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ʿAbdurrahma¯n Sˇeref Bey was also a leading member of the Ta¯rı¯h-i ʿOsma¯nı¯ ˙ ˘ Engˇümenı¯, the society for Ottoman history, newly-founded in 1909 – the institution in charge of granting (or denying) permission to foreign researchers who hoped to access Ottoman libraries and archives. While European collectors shipped home volumes by the box load,106 their Ottoman counterparts were opposed to valuable manuscripts leaving the country, regarding them as an integral part of an Ottoman-imperial cultural heritage. As a direct consequence of this renewed interest in early-modern Ottoman manuscripts on all sides, a number of works appeared in print around 1910: An Ottoman-Turkish printed edition of the Asafna¯me was put on the market by the ˙ Matbaʿa-ı A¯midı¯ in Istanbul in 1326 H (1909/10). The text was published by ¯ lı¯ Emı¯rı¯ (1857–1924). Mehmed Sˇükrü Bey and introduced with a preface by ʿA ˙ Twenty-six pages would have cost the reader two kurus¸. It attests to a broader and empire-wide interest in the Asafna¯me at this very time that in 1911, the Jesuit ˙ priest Louis Sˇayhu (1859–1927) also published an Ottoman-Turkish printed ˘ version in Beirut. Both editions are worth looking at in their broader context: The mid-19th century explorers of early-modern Ottoman advice literature introduced above had mostly been based in the reformist camp, advocating modernization and westernization. However, not everyone in the 19th-century Ottoman context shared their views that emulating European models and pushing for drastic changes, progress and reform was obligatory or inevitable. As it turns out, more conservative Ottoman scholars also engaged with works of early-modern Ottoman advice literature – but preferred to read them differently. ¯ lı¯ Emı¯rı¯ and his edition of the Asafna¯me illustrate these The example of ʿA ˙ tendencies: Emı¯rı¯ spoke about his motivation for printing the Asafna¯me with ˙ Karl Süßheim in 1912, who recalled their meeting as follows: “Seyyid Emiri Efendi, with whom I spoke in Coffee House Diyarbakir, had Lutfi’s Siyasetname (‘Treatise on Politics’) printed at the Amid Publishing House two years ago. German encouragement had had nothing to do with it. He had the work printed according to his own wishes and was motivated by a strongly-felt necessity. It would be wrong to suppose that Professors [Georg] Jacob and [Eduard] Sachau, the Director of the School of Oriental Languages in Berlin, were the initiators of ¯ lı¯ Emı¯rı¯ would have felt the need to the Istanbul edition.”107 It is interesting that ʿA point out that he was acting on his own volition, apparently wanting to put a distance between himself and a competing scene of (foreign) researchers. Indeed, as will be discussed below, Georg Jacob was very much interested in early-Ottoman manuscripts and the Asafna¯me in particular and instructed his doctoral ˙ 106 Süßheim returned home to Munich with 212 kg of books and manuscripts in his luggage, see Süßheim, Flemming and Schmidt, Diary, 60. 107 Süßheim, Flemming and Schmidt, Diary, 53.

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student Rudolf Tschudi to work on an edition and translation into German. But ¯ lı¯ Emı¯rı¯: He was an Ottoman bureaucrat initially trained as a telegraph back to ʿA specialist when the technology was first introduced in the Ottoman realm, a supporter of the Hamidian regime and ardent defender of the Ottoman dynasty ¯ lı¯ and its uninhibited rule. Following the Constitutional Revolution of 1908, ʿA Emı¯rı¯ had retired and devoted his life to collecting rare books and manuscripts, ¯ lı¯ Emı¯rı¯ had amassing a noted collection of several thousand volumes.108 ʿA started out as a telegraph official, but then made his career in the Ottoman financial administration. He had received a traditional medrese education, was interested in classical poetry and fluent in Arabic and Persian. He did not, on the other hand, speak any European languages or care much for European literature. Throughout his life, he refused to have his photograph taken. Franz Babinger’s portrayal of him as “fast ausgestorbenen Typ mittelalterlicher muslimischer Gelehrter [der], unbekümmert um die Fortschritte der Außenwelt, sich auf [seine] Weise mit dem Dasein abzufinden [weiß]”109 captures this conservative streak.110 Less is known about his collaborator, the editor Mehmed Sˇükrü Bey: ¯ lı¯ Emı¯rı¯, he was originally from Diyarbekir, but had ˙ settled down in Like ʿA Istanbul. He was a writer and a poet, the editor of the bi-weekly journal A¯mid-i ¯ lı¯ Emı¯rı¯’s edition sevda¯ and the owner of the Matbaʿa-ı A¯midı¯ printing press.111 ʿA of the Asafna¯me was among the first texts in a series which had been created with ˙ the aim of bringing attention back to earlier, now unjustly forgotten key texts in Ottoman Turkish language. The series appeared under the title Neva¯dir-i esla¯f (“rareties of the ancestors”) and assembled five publications in total between 1908 and 1913.112 ¯ lı¯ Emı¯rı¯ provides 4.5 pages of introduction to his edition of the Asafna¯me, ʿA ˙ talking briefly about the author Lütfı¯ Pas¸a and his biography,113 but first of all ˙ discussing at great length how he himself came across the manuscript in ques¯ lı¯ Emı¯rı¯ had been hunting tion: An avid book collector and lover of poetry, ʿA down a different, very rare and valuable manuscript for decades, the Tezkı¯re of ¯ 108 Süßheim, Flemming and Schmidt, Diary, 52. The collection was handed over to the ˙Istanbul ¯ lı¯ Emı¯rı¯’s death in 1924. His personal papers are stored there as Millet Kütüphanesi after ʿA well. 109 Babinger, Geschichtsschreiber, 402–04. 110 I˙brahim Alâettin Gövsa, Mes¸hur Adamlar (Istanbul, 1935), 1:364. 111 S¸evket Beysanog˘lu, “Mehmed S¸ükrü Bey,” Diyarbakırlı Fikir ve Sanat Adamları (Istanbul: S¸ehir Matbaası, 1959), 2:231. 112 These are: The Asafna¯me (1326), Ma¯rdı¯n Mülu¯k-i Artu¯kiyye Ta¯rı¯hi (1331), texts by Mehmed ˙ ˙ G˙ıya¯seddin Nakka¯sˇ’s, Hita¯y Sefa¯retna ˙ ¯ mesi (1331). ˘ Beya¯nı¯ (1331) and Emı¯rı¯ had also worked ¯ ˘ on an edition of Kema¯lpas¸aza¯de’s˙ ˙historiographical work Teva¯rı¯h-i A¯l-i ʿOsma¯n, which he ˘ did not finish; Babinger, Geschichtsschreiber, 402–04. ¯ lı¯ Emı¯rı¯’s introduction to the Asafna¯me includes information on Lütfı¯ Pas¸a’s biography 113 ʿA ˙ these passages are and also lists information about his˙ alleged virtues and character. Some of cited from Sehı¯ Bey’s Tezkı¯re, which contains an entry for Lütfı¯ Pas¸a. ¯ ˙

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Sehı¯ Bey (d. 1548/49),114 a collection of biographical accounts of famous Ottoman ¯ lı¯ Emı¯rı¯’s interest in Sehı¯ Bey’s work matched his own literati and poets. ʿA fascination with classical Ottoman poetry: He himself had written a book on poets originating from his hometown of Diyarbekir. Both the undertaking and the very title of the work, Tezkı¯re-yi ˇsuʿara¯’-yı A¯mid, were inspired by Sehı¯ Bey. ¯ lı¯ Emı¯rı¯ was eventually successful in locating a manuscript copy of Sehı¯ Bey’s ʿA text, an edition of which was printed by Matbaʿa-ı A¯midı¯ in 1909, shortly before the Asafna¯me.115 The Asafna¯me was linked to Sehı¯ Bey’s Tezkı¯re and brought to ˙ ˙ ¯ lı¯ Emı ¯ lı¯ Emı¯rı¯ had ʿA ¯rı¯’s attention by the coincidence that the manuscript ʿA discovered contained both works in the same volume. As a former bureaucrat, ¯ lı¯ Emı¯rı¯ was interested in administrative questions and concerned about the ʿA fate of the Ottoman state in the hands of what he perceived as incompetent and corrupt administrators after the Revolution of 1908. This attitude becomes clear in his writings on the eastern provinces of the Ottoman Empire (ʿOsma¯nlı Vi¯ la¯ya¯t-ı Sˇarkiyyesi, 1918). Here, he draws on his earlier work on Lütfı¯ Pas¸a, using a ˙ ˙ very similar line of argument and sometimes almost identical phrases as in his deliberations about Lütfı¯ Pas¸a’s merits in his introduction to the Asafna¯me: ˙ ˙ Special about Lütfı¯ Pas¸a, he argues in both instances, is that at a time of outward ˙ prosperity of the empire, when it celebrated great victories on all its frontiers, Lütfı¯ Pas¸a had already suspected the first indicators of a change for the worse, of ˙ ¯ lı¯ Emı¯rı¯’s corruption, moral decline, wastefulness and degradation.116 Key to ʿA analysis is the Islamic idea of bidʿa (innovation), which threatened the Ottoman state and which, according to Emı¯rı¯’s reading rooted in his own present, Lütfı¯ ˙ ¯ lı¯ Emı¯rı¯ and his publisher and colleague Pas¸a had already warned against. Both ʿA Mehmed Sˇükrü Bey were part of an Ottoman conservative, religious milieu. They ˙ and the readers they were reaching out to seem to have taken an interest in Lütfı¯ ˙ Pas¸a’s work because of what they interpreted as a stress on the importance of Islamic law, stern warnings against bidʿa and, in conjunction, the importance accorded to religious scholars as advisors to the ruler and guardians of the ¯ lı¯ Emı¯rı¯ and his work have also been of interest to empire. Later, however, ʿA Turkish nationalist historiographers.117 From their perspective, he is regarded not as a religiously-minded guardian of empire, but as a national hero, whose ex114 The author Sehı¯ Bey had been a secretary to Sultan Süleyma¯n II when the latter was still a young prince learning the ropes of governance in the provinces and later lived in Edirne in retirement from the court – in both cases possibly mixing in the same circles as his contemporary Lütfı¯ Pas¸a. ˙ is mentioned by Süßheim, Flemming and Schmidt, Diary, 53. 115 The publication ¯ lı¯ Emı¯rı¯ (Istanbul: Matbaʿa-ı A ¯ midı¯, 1326 [1908/09]), 2–5. 116 Lütfı¯ Pas¸a, Asafna¯me, ed. ʿA ˙ ma¯nlı˙Vila¯ya¯t-ı Sˇarkiyyesi was edited and published by Abdülkadir Yuvalı and Ahmet 117 HisʿOs ¯ ˙ Halaçog˘lu in 1992, and again in an extended and revised edition in 2008, Osmanlı S¸ark vilayetleri: Osmanlı vilayat-ı ¸sarkiyyesi/Ali Emiri Efendi (Kayseri: Erciyes Üniv. Yayınları, 1992).

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traordinary love of books and, in particular, whose donations to the Turkish National Library saved Turkish cultural heritage from the greed of western collectors, preserving it for the Turkish nation instead.118 The Jesuit scholar Louis Sˇayhu (also Louis Cheikho)119 published his edition of ˘ ¯ lı¯ Emı¯rı¯’s version came out. His the Asafna¯me in Beirut in 1911, shortly after ʿA ˙ readings of Lütfı¯ Pas¸a’s work were rooted in a very different context: Sˇayhu was ˙ ˘ vocal in his critique of contemporary efforts to level and erase social hierarchy and religious difference in Ottoman society, arguing that it went against “all the natural and moral laws” to blur the boundaries between common people and religious authorities.120 Sˇayhu was a Chaldean-Catholic born in Mardin, had ˘ studied with the Jesuit order in Lebanon and Europe and later taught Arabic ¯ lı¯ Emı¯rı¯, Sˇayhu was literature at the Université de St. Joseph in Beirut. Much like ʿA ˘ a book lover and collector. He founded the Bibliothèque Orientale in Beirut and, in 1898, created a monthly literary journal titled al-Machreq. Revue Catholique Orientale. One of the publication’s goals was to familiarize Arabic-speaking readers with modern literature and literary thought, while also bringing older texts back into the limelight. The journal was widely read in Ottoman Syria and beyond. Sˇayhu was passionate about Arabic literature in particular and wrote ˘ extensively on the subject. Given this keen interest in Arabic language and literature, it is not immediately self-evident why Sˇayhu would have cared to publish ˘ Lütfı¯ Pas¸a’s early-modern Ottoman-Turkish treatise containing political advice ˙ 121 on governance. And yet, in March 1911, al-Machreq (vol. XIV, no. 3) included a contribution titled “Code du Grand Vizirat par Loutfi Pacha” by L. Cheihko. ¯ lı¯ Emı¯rı¯’s printed edition was published and before In 1910, shortly after ʿA ˇSayhu’s work became available, an edition and translation of the Asafna¯me into ˙ ˘ German was prepared by the orientalist Rudolf Tschudi (1884–1960) – whose efforts are to be read in the context of an increasing German political involvement in the Ottoman Empire in general and, more specifically, the European run on Ottoman manuscripts after 1908 described above. It was Tschudi’s first academic publication and doctoral dissertation, prepared under the supervision of Georg Jacob (1862–1937), professor for oriental studies in Erlangen and later in Kiel. The edition was reviewed by Johannes H. Mordtmann in 1911, who recalls in his review that the Asafna¯me had always been familiar to Ottoman readers and had ˙ 118 Yuvalı and Halaçog˘lu, Osmanlı S¸ark vilayetleri, 19–20. 119 See Henri Jalabert, Jésuites au Proche-Orient. Notices biographiques (Beirut: Univ. St. Joseph, 1987), 169. 120 Hanna Batatu, The Old Social Classes and the Revolutionary Movements of Iraq (Princeton, NJ: Princeton Univ. Press, 1978), 371–72. 121 Sˇayhu did, however, have an attested interest in viziers in general; see his posthumously ˘ published Les vizirs et secrétaires arabes chrétiens en Islam (622–1517) (Beirut: Librairie St. Paul, 1987).

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previously been introduced to a European-academic audience by means of summaries in Hammer-Purgstall’s work.122 Mordtmann also points out that while Tschudi’s German translation will provide access to the text for an even wider audience, Lütfı¯ Pas¸a’s dense and aphoristic way of writing presupposes a ˙ fair amount of contextual knowledge, making it a difficult text for 20th-century readers. Tschudi’s edition was not only met with interest in circles of European orientalists, but was also noticed by Ottoman historians.123 Tschudi had worked on the basis of six different manuscripts at his disposal, three of them from Vienna, one from Dresden, one from Munich and one from the collection of the Beya¯zı¯d Library in Istanbul. His edition and translation appeared in a book series initiated by his doctoral advisor Georg Jacob. Since the 1890s, possibly prompted by a research trip to Istanbul in 1892, Jacob had increasingly focused on Ottoman-Turkish sources and Ottoman history. He was one of the very few orientalists in Germany at this time to actually do so and is, together with Theodor Nöldeke (1836–1930), regarded as one of the founders of Turkish studies in German academia.124 Since a lot of ground work remained to be done, Jacob created a book series with the goal of providing reading and study material – translations and editions of Ottoman poetry, historiography, administrative texts, etc. – for learners of Ottoman-Turkish. It was in this context that Jacob encouraged his doctoral student Tschudi to work on a translation of the Asaf˙ na¯me. In the seventh installment of his book series – a translation of Ahmed ˙ Hikmet (Müftüog˘lu)’s Ha¯rista¯n ve Gülista¯n (Türkische Frauen) into German ˙ ˘ prepared by Friedrich Schrader in 1907 – Jacob explains his understanding of the series’ purpose in a preface: „Bei der langen Vernachlässigung unserer Disziplin […] schien es mir angezeigt, zunächst ganz objektiv türkische Texte selbst reden zu lassen. Verschiedenartige Erzeugnisse der türkischen Literatur, die mir besonders wichtig schienen, würden übertragen …”125 Different from his mentor, Tschudi himself does not seem to have spent extensive periods of time in the Ottoman Empire prior to his work on the Asafna¯me. Having studied classical ˙ philology and oriental languages in Basel, he came to join Georg Jacob in Erlangen, initially with an interest in Islamic mysticism. Jacob then encouraged him to take up the study of Ottoman Turkish.126 122 Johannes H. Mordtmann in Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft 65 (1911): 599–603. 123 As copies of Tschudi’s work in the holdings of several Istanbul libraries suggest. 124 Enno Littmann in his obituary in Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft 91 (1937): 486–500: „Er war der eigentliche Begründer der Turkologie in Deutschland.” 125 Ahmed Hikmet Müftüog˘lu, Türkische Frauen (Berlin: Mayer & Müller, 1907), “Vorwort des ˙ ˙ Herausgebers,” v. 126 Necmettin Alkan, “Rudolf Tschudi,” TDVI˙A vol. 41 (Istanbul: I˙SAM, 2012): 316; and obituary by Fritz Meier in Der Islam 38 (1963): 138–42.

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The foreign and Ottoman late-19th-century collectors and editors were part of far-reaching and complex scholarly networks: The German orientalist Karl Süßheim, for instance, knew Mehmed Tevfı¯k Ebüz˙z˙iya¯ personally127 and also met ¯ lı¯ Emı¯rı¯ on a regular basis˙ during his˙ time in Istanbul in 1912/13.128 Georg with ʿA Jacob, professor in Erlangen, had not only instructed his doctoral student Rudolf Tschudi to prepare an edition of the Asafna¯me, but was also a sponsor of ˙ Süßheim’s career.129 These networks, however, were also marked by strained relations, factions and fierce competition. When rare and valuable manuscripts hit the market in Istanbul, the tightly-knit scene of Ottoman and foreign collectors and book lovers would immediately know about it: Süßheim, for instance, ¯ lı¯ Emı¯rı¯ about a much sought-after copy of al-Ka¯sˇg˙arı¯’s 11thlearned from ʿA century dictionary Dı¯va¯n lug˙a¯t al-turk, which had been in the possession of the former Ottoman Minister of Finances Naz¯ıf Pas¸a and was up for sale after the ˙ ¯ lı¯ Emı¯rı¯ had wanted latter had passed away. ʿA to purchase the manuscript, but much to his chagrin, it was eventually sold to a buyer from Egypt.130 The book collectors’ networks worked best face-to-face, while foreign researchers were based in Istanbul, but relations did also continue after they returned to their home countries: Süßheim, for instance, was regularly in touch with copyists, agents and booksellers in Istanbul, ordering manuscripts and printed material to be sent to him in Germany.131

7.

Readings of Advice Literature in the Turkish Republic

In Turkish-Republican times, texts on political advice that had been popular with Ottoman reformers in the 19th century remained in favor, but underwent reinterpretations: They were now read as works of exceptionally clear-sighted thinkers, individuals ahead of their times, able to see beyond the maze of Ottoman corruption and decline, and praised as radical and uncompromising in their reformist commitment – as kindred spirits and forerunners of the contemporary Turkish-Republican political elite.132 In 1939, an edition containing both of Kocˇi Beg’s treatises was published in modern Turkish script by Ali Kemalî ˙

127 Süßheim, Flemming and Schmidt, Diary, 13, 25. 128 Süßheim, Flemming and Schmidt, Diary, 52–56, 137, 156. 129 Jacob, for instance, wrote recommendations for Süßheim when the latter was hunting for a job in the field of oriental studies, Süßheim, Flemming and Schmidt, Diary, 18. 130 Süßheim, Flemming and Schmidt, Diary, 52. 131 Süßheim, Flemming and Schmidt, Diary, 61. 132 Dog˘an Gürpınar, Ottoman/Turkish Visions of the Nation, 1860–1950 (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013), 34–35.

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Aksüt (1885–1962) in Istanbul, including a preface by the editor.133 Aksüt was born in Yanya and, after graduating from the Mülkiye school for Ottoman bureaucrats in 1908, had embarked on a career in the late-Ottoman judicial bureaucracy. On the side, he also taught history, geography and French in secondary schools. He continued to work in the state administration after the end of the Ottoman Empire, holding governor positions in Anatolia in the 1930s (in Erzincan in 1930, Bayazit in 1932, and Bilecik in 1933). He retired from active service in 1934 and began to work in the financial sector. In 1960, Aksüt accepted a position as lecturer in literature studies at the prestigious Robert College in Istanbul. Aksüt translated books from French and was also proficient in Arabic, Greek and Albanian. His list of publications reveals an interest in history, social sciences, law and governance. In Turkish-Republican times, he also regularly published articles in the journal Vakit.134 Aksüt had located a manuscript containing Kocˇi Beg’s work in the library of ˙ the Fatih Camii in Istanbul.135 In his extensive preface to the edition, Aksüt paints a bleak picture of Ottoman history following the death of Sultan Selı¯m II in 1574: During his reign, the Ottoman Empire was still at the apogee of its political power and had reached its broadest geographical extension yet. Selı¯m II’s successor Mura¯d III, however, Aksüt described as an indecisive, weak-minded and morally corrupt pushover and unfit ruler.136 Political power, Aksüt elaborates further, lay in the hands of Mura¯d’s mother Nu¯rba¯nu¯ and her entourage. Nu¯rba¯nu¯ Sulta¯n is ˙ presented in Aksüt’s account as a woman of dubious loyalties: Pointing to her Jewish and Venetian origins, Aksüt portrays her as a stranger and intruder to the Ottoman-Turkish community and lists examples of her alleged treason and lack of patriotism. These depictions sit well with Turkish nationalist thinking and broader anti-Semitic attitudes of the late 1930s. Ottoman decline itself is not called into question, but the analysis prevailing among European orientalists is challenged by Aksüt: He points out that Kocˇi Beg had correctly identified the ˙ roots of decline in an earlier period than most later scholars:137 It is during the 133 Ali Kemalî Aksüt, Koçi Bey Risalesi (Istanbul: Vakit Matbaası, 1939). He finished the manuscript in October 1937 in Kadıköy, see p. 15. 134 See Osman Nebiog˘lu, Türkiye’de Kim Kimdir? (Istanbul: Nebiog˘lu Yayınları, 1961–62), including a list of his publications, and Ali Çankaya, Mülkiye târihi ve mülkiyeliler (Ankara: Örnek Matbaası, 1954), 597. 135 He was under the impression that this manuscript was unique – which was not the case, as the manuscripts in St. Petersburg are nearly identical. See Petrosyan, “Three Anonymous Turkish Manuscripts,” 17. 136 “Ahlâkan zayıf olan (…) bir zavallı idi. Karasız, sebatsız, (…) benlik hissinden mahrum, kadınlara ve saltanat ve debdebeye düs¸kün bir zavallı.” Aksüt, Koçi Bey Risalesi, 3. 137 This claim needs to be qualified: Pétis de la Croix, in his translation of Heza¯rfen’s work, also notes that the author situated the beginnings of Ottoman decline already during the reign of Sultan Süleyma¯n II, indicating that one, Kocˇi Beg was not the only seventeenth-century ˙ author to argue along these lines and that two, European readers had always taken note of

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reign of the hapless Mura¯d III, Aksüt agrees with Kocˇi Beg, that the decline of ˙ Ottoman political power and social order had taken root. Offices in the Ottoman state administration and in the military were at this point no longer accorded on the basis of merit, but were given to followers or to the highest bidders. As a result, Aksüt argues with Kocˇi Beg, corruption and oppression of the population in˙ creased, and tax revenues dropped significantly. With an empty treasury, the Ottoman state found it increasingly difficult to provide for the upkeep of an effective standing army, weakening the empire’s defenses and provoking internal uprisings of dissatisfied subjects and former soldiers. Drawing on Kocˇi Beg, ˙ Aksüt analyzes Ottoman decline along the lines of the well-known Circle of Justice, as a complex and self-reinforcing cluster of trouble spots and crises which gained momentum from the 17th century onward.138 It is during this moment of crisis, Aksüt continues, that Sultan Mura¯d IV came to power and, from the 1630s onward, emancipated himself from harmful palace influences, instead consulting Kocˇi Beg for political advice. Aksüt’s preface can be read as a com˙ ment on contemporary political developments in 20th-century Turkey. From this perspective, Kocˇi Beg’s call for reform and Sultan Mura¯d IV’s aborted attempts ˙ towards their implementation are understood as precursors of more recent developments in Turkey. This view on Mura¯d IV and his reign is not as unprecedented and new as Aksüt makes it appear: Already in the 17th century, his successor and nephew Mehmed IV strove to imitate his uncle Mura¯d IV and ˙ hoped to equal his achievements. Other contemporary observers cautioned, however, that Mura¯d IV was also notorious for his cruelty and harshness.139 The brief description of the historical context of Kocˇi Beg’s thinking is fol˙ lowed in Aksüt’s edition by a summary of Kocˇi Beg’s biography.140 Here, Aksüt ˙ – who, several paragraphs above, had made a point to describe va¯lide sulta¯n ˙ Nu¯rba¯nu¯ as alien and thereby disloyal to the Ottoman dynasty and state on the basis of her foreign origins – faces a bit of a conundrum: Kocˇi Beg’s origins also ˙ lay outside of the Ottoman Empire: he was brought to Istanbul as a child by means of the devsˇ¯ırme to be educated in the imperial palace. Aksüt makes sure to stress how he was educated in the spirit of Islam and Turkishness and, having benefitted from the charity of the Ottoman state, became a true patriot and outspoken defender of Ottoman interests.141 Kocˇi Beg’s contemporaries, Aksüt ˙ argues, and later Ottoman commentators had failed to recognize the value of his clear and outspoken argumentation – the previously-mentioned critique of the

138 139 140 141

these ideas, ever since they were put on paper by Ottoman authors. See Wurm, Der osmanische Historiker, 131. Aksüt, Koçi Bey Risalesi, 3–9. Wurm, Der osmanische Historiker, 21, quoting the Italian Barozzi, Turchia, 2:203, 249. Aksüt, Koçi Bey Risalesi, 10–15. Aksüt, Koçi Bey Risalesi, 12 has “devlet adamı” and “millet muhibbi.”

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18th-century historian Sˇa¯nı¯za¯de, who found fault with Kocˇi Beg’s unornamented ˙ and blunt style, which was also reproduced in Mehmed Tevfı¯k’s edition of 1885, ˙ ˙ comes to mind. However, according to Aksüt’s interpretation, following the collapse of the Ottoman state and the cultural revolution of the Turkish Republic – after what was perceived and presented as a clear and total break with previous aesthetics, linguistic features and literary style – Kocˇi Beg’s previously un˙ recognized genius could finally be appreciated and understood. While Aksüt’s edition is today better known and more often cited, it is – different from what is claimed by Aksüt himself, who published his 1939 edition with the subtitle “S¸imdiye kadar elde edilmemis¸ olan tarihi eserin tamamı” – not the first attempt of a Turkish rendering in Latin script: Already in 1935, the historian Hüseyin Namık Orkun (1902–1956) had published a Turkish version of Kocˇi Beg’s Risa¯le ˙ in the journal Türk Hukuk Tarihi.142 Interest in Kocˇi Beg’s Risa¯le continued ˙ throughout the early decades of the Turkish Republic, with Süleyman Külçe including ample reference and a detailed summary of the text in his popular history of the period of Sultan Mura¯d IV from 1948.143

8.

Readings Beyond the Ottoman-Turkish Context

Kocˇi Beg is at times recruited to make an argument about the Albanian literary ˙ tradition in Ottoman times – along with Lütfı¯ Pas¸a, who was also said to have ˙ been of Albanian origins, and late-Ottoman intellectuals and artists like Sˇemseddin Sa¯mı¯ Bey (1850–1904).144 Kocˇi Beg is not, however, prominently re˙ membered in Albanian history or as part of the local history of his place of birth Korça (Görice) today.145 Nonetheless, the Albanian author and politician Mehmed 142 Hüseyin Namık Orkun, “Koçi Bey,” in Adliye Vekillig˘i. Türk Hukuk Tarihi. Aras¸tırmalar ve Düs¸ünceler, ed. Hüseyin Namık Orkun (Ankara: Köyhocası Matb., 1935), 169–232. Orkun was a historian and schoolteacher with strong Turkish-nationalist leanings. Born in Istanbul, he had studied history at the Da¯rülfünu¯n and later completed his studies in Budapest, before he returned to Turkey in 1930. He found employment teaching history with a focus on preIslamic Turkish history and most recent Republican history (inkılâp tarihi) at several state institutions, including the police academy and the medical faculty in Istanbul, and also published several books in these fields. For his biography, see Orhan M. Bayrak, Osmanlı Tarihi Yazarları (Istanbul: Osmanlı Yayınevi, 1982), 283. 143 Süleyman Külçe, Kösem Sultan, IV’üncü Murat, Koçi Bey (Izmir: Nefâset Matbaası, 1948). Interest in Kocˇi Beg’s Risa¯le was ongoing in Turkey: In 1972, Zuhuri Danıs¸man prepared a ˙ text in simplified Turkish. In 1997, Musa S¸ims¸ekçıkan followed suit with a version of the revised edition. 144 For example Robert Elsie, “Albanian Literature in the Moslem Tradition: Eighteenth and Early-Nineteenth Century Albanian Writing in Arabic Script,” Oriens 33 (1992): 287–306. 145 The otherwise very detailed historical account on the city’s official website does not mention his name. Accessed March 09, 2019, http://bashakiakorce.gov.al.

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Ekrem Bey Vlora (1885–1964) did own a copy of Aksüt’s 1939 edition of Kocˇi ˙ Beg’s Risa¯le. This copy, complete with Vlora’s hand-written ex libris on the first page, is today part of the library holdings of the Südost-Institut in Regensburg. It contains a hand-written dedication in Albanian on the front page, which translates as: “To the honorable Mr. Eqrem Vlora, a small token of memory with the hope that it will be of value to his enormous studies. Izmir, 5. 8. 1959 [?].”146 The note is signed “N. Pehlivan Zhulati,” that is Necip Pehlivan Alpan (1920– 2003), a Turkish educator of Albanian origins who lived in Izmir between 1956 and 1963.147 Vlora, Alpan’s senior by thirty-five years, had lived in Italy since 1944 and was working there on his Geschichte der Türkenherrschaft in Albanien throughout the 1950s.148 He seems to have read his copy of Kocˇi Beg’s Risa¯le ˙ thoroughly, underlining passages relevant to Albanian history, adding handwritten notes and correcting mistakes.149 In his own work, Vlora does quote Kocˇi ˙ Beg’s Risa¯le extensively when he explains the Ottoman devsˇ¯ırme – which Kocˇi Beg ˙ does talk about150 – and its effects on the early-modern Albanian elite – which are not an issue in Kocˇi Beg’s analysis, even if Vlora prefers to read it that way, thus ˙ projecting 20th-century Albanian-nationalist concerns onto Kocˇi Beg’s text.151 ˙

Concluding Remarks The endeavor of following four selected texts of early-modern Ottoman advice literature began at the imperial court of 16th-century Istanbul and has just ended, after innumerable turns and detours, on the desk of an Albanian-nationalist historian in exile in Italy in the 1950s. It is not the ultimate destination that is of interest here, but the moments of movement, of transfer and translation in 146 I am grateful to Albana Sala Dwonch for providing me with this translation. 147 Zhulati is the name of a village near the Albanian city of Gjirokastër, where Alpan was born. For Alpan’s biography and a list of publications – in the fields of education and, later in his life, Albanian history – see the preface in Necip Alpan, Tarihin ıs¸ıg˘ından Arnavutluk (Ankara: Alpan, 1975). 148 This two-volume and 1200 page-long magnum opus was never finalized, but Ekrem Vlora’s typed and hand-written notes are made available by Robert Elsie, accessed March 23, 2019, http://www.albanianhistory.net/1956_Ekrem-bey-Vlora/index.htm. Vlora’s access to sources and secondary literature must have been difficult, since he could no longer make use of his personal library in Vlorë in Albania, parts of which had been confiscated by the Communist government in December 1944, see Ekrem Vlora, Geschichte der Türkenherrschaft in Albanien, vol. 1 (unpublished manuscript), 112. 149 Ekrem Vlora in his copy of Aksüt, Koçi Bey Risalesi, 17, 110 for a handwritten correction of Albanian place names, p. 99 for an annotation in Ottoman Turkish concerning the administrative structure of Ottoman Albania. Underlined passages on pp. 4, 7, 99, 104, 112. 150 Mustafa Koç, Ahlâk-i Alâ’î. Kınalıza¯de Ali Çelebi (Istanbul: Klasik, 2007), 39. ˙ 151 Vlora, Geschichte der Türkenherrschaft, 1:149–51.

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between. Looked at under the magnifying glass, the changing readings and reactualizations of texts that had initially addressed very particular administrative circumstances of the 16th and 17th centuries, of interest only to a limited circle of specialists emerge. A cultural history of reading and engaging with Ottoman advice literature can take its cue from here, identifying changing interpretations and functions of the texts in question, but also paying attention to social, political and economic circumstances which made rediscoveries and re-readings of certain texts possible in the first place. Not least, identifying the contexts and structures in which early-modern Ottoman advice literature was “on the move” from the 16th century onwards also allows us a look beyond the familiar canon of texts that are well-known and well-researched today. Through references and comparisons in the different contexts of engaging with Ottoman advice literature sketched out here, material that used to be relevant, but has fallen between the cracks in the meantime, can come into view.152 One example is Pı¯rı¯ Pas¸a’s treatise on advice for the grand vizier, of which Mehmed Tesˇrifatı¯za¯de includes a syn˙ opsis in his late-17th-century Defter-i Tesˇrifa¯t, along with summary of Lütfı¯ Pas¸a’s ˙ 153 today much better-known Asafna¯me. Pı¯rı¯ Pas¸a’s work, on the other hand, did ˙ th not come to the attention of 19 century editors and translators in Europe or the Ottoman context.154

152 Martin Mulsow, Prekäres Wissen: eine andere Ideengeschichte der frühen Neuzeit (Berlin: Suhrkamp, 2012), 5–31. 153 Albrecht Krafft, Die arabischen, persischen und türkischen Handschriften der k. k. Orientalischen Akademie zu Wien (Vienna, 1842), 107 (Ms. no. CCLXXXIII) on the Defter-i Tesˇrifa¯t. 154 Tschudi, Asafname, xviii.

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Figure 1: Handwritten dedication to Ekrem Vlora in Albanian language on the title page of a copy of Ali Kemali Aksüt (ed.), Koçi Bey Risalesi (Istanbul: Vakit, 1939), today part of the holdings of the Leibniz Institute for East and South East European Studies in Regensburg, call number W 02/ 3092

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¯ me in Ottoman megˇmu ¯ʿa collections Appendix: Selected nas¯h ı atna ˙ ˙ Title of the work and manuscript of the megˇmu¯ʿa Asafna¯me ˙ Esad Efendi: 340.01803) (SK,

Asafna¯me ˙ Halet Efendi: 351.00366) (SK, Asafna¯me ˙ Hacı Ahmed Pas¸a: 956.07 00202) (SK,

Other texts found in the same megˇmu¯ʿa collection ˇ elebi’s Ottoman translation of Ibn ¯ sˇık C ʿA ˙¯ya’s 14th-century as-Siyasa¯t asˇ-sˇarʿiyya, Taimı a book on Islamic governance, ¯ lı¯ Gelibolulu, a shorter text by Mustafa¯ ʿA two historiographical˙ ˙texts, one dealing with the history of Istanbul Ka¯nu¯nna¯me-i Pa¯disˇa¯hı¯ ˙

¯ lı¯ Efendi, ʿAynı¯ ʿA Risa¯le-i Vaz¯ıfehora¯n ve Mera¯tib-i Bendega¯n-ı A¯l-iʿOs̲ma¯n˙ ¯ lı¯ Efendi, Asafna¯me ʿAynı¯ ʿA ˙ Hacı Ahmed Pas¸a: 956.07 00203) (SK, Risa¯le-i Vaz¯ıfehora¯n ve Mera¯tib-i Bendega¯n-ı A¯l-iʿOs̲ma¯n˙ ¯ lı¯ Efendi, Ka¯nu¯n Asafna¯me ʿAynı¯ ʿA ˙ (München, Kaiserliche Hof- und Staats- (in the margins of ˙the Asafna¯me)155 ˙ bibliothek, Katalog Aumer 1875, no. 116) Asafna¯me ˙ Laleli: 340.03736) (SK, Asafna¯me ˙ Âtif Efendi: 297.3 02790) (SK,

Veysı¯, Ha¯bna¯me, a treatise on hadith ʿAdab’ül Mülu¯k ve Nasa¯yih’ül Sela¯t¯ın ˙ ˙ ˙

Asafna¯me ˙ Laleli: 340.01608) (SK,

descriptions of Ottoman campaigns in the 17th century, a treatise on the benefits of gˇiha¯d two texts dealing with tasavvuf, a treatise on governance˙in Iran and the Ottoman Empire, a sa¯lna¯me dating from the year 1837

Asafna¯me ˙ H Hüsnü Pas¸a: 340.00678) (SK, Asafna¯me ˙ Hacı Ahmed Pas¸a: 956.07 00359) (SK, Asafna¯me ˙ Nurosmaniye: 340.04221) (SK,

a collection of prayers (duʿa¯ʾ) and mystical stories Netı¯gˇetü’l Tıbb, a poem in ˙Arabic

Asafna¯me poems from different authors, among them ˙ th c., purchased by Tschudi in Istanbul Ba¯k¯ı, Sˇemsı¯ Pas¸a and G ˇ ema¯lı¯ (18 ˙ in 1909/10)156

155 The manuscript was used by Tschudi to prepare his edition in 1910, xviii–xxi. 156 Tschudi, Asafname, 37–38. Ironically, Lütfı¯ Pas¸a himself was not only not a gifted poet, he ˙ also did not always approve of poetry, criticizing his contemporaries for their combinations of entertainment and education in the same text, Tschudi, Asafname, xiii–xiv.

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(Continued) Title of the work and manuscript of the Other texts found in the same megˇmu¯ʿa colmegˇmu¯ʿa lection ʿAbdı¯ Ta¯rı¯hi and other historiographical Kocˇi Beg’s Risa¯le ˙ Mehmed Zeki Pakalin: 956.0732 ˘ works (SK, 00055) Kocˇi Beg’s Risa¯le poetry collections ˙ H. Hüsnü Pas¸a: 350 01005) (SK, ˇ elebi, Düstu¯rü’lʿAmal Kocˇi Beg’s Risa¯le Ka¯tib C ˙ Hamidiyye: 350 01469) (SK, I˙bra¯hı¯m Müteferrika, Usu¯lü’l hikem fı¯ ni˙ ˙ ˙ za¯mü’l ümam ˙ other texts on governance Ahla¯k-ı Ala¯’ı¯ fifty-one shorter texts on fikh, kela¯m, Arabic ˙ ˘ ˙Besir Ag˘a (Eyüp): 297.8 00199–0026) grammar, philosophy and Qur’anic (SK, studies ˇ Ahla¯k-ı Ala¯’ı¯ Ka¯tib Celebi’s biographical dictionary Kasˇf ˘ ˙Or. Oct. 3510, Staatsbibliothek (Ms. az-zunu¯n ˙˙ Marburg)157

157 See Hanna Sohrweide, Türkische Handschriften, vol. 1 (Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1968), 292, no. 374.

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Bibliography Primary sources Ahla¯k-ı Ala¯’ı¯. Ms. Or. Oct. 3510, Staatsbibliothek Marburg, Germany. ˘ ˙ Ahla¯k-ı Ala¯’ı¯. Hekimog˘lu: 297.8 00549; Besir Ag˘a (Eyüp): 297.8 00199-0026, Hüsrev Pas¸a ˘ ˙ 297.8 00283 and 297.8 00284, Tercüma¯n: 170.00109, Süleymaniye Kütüphanesi Istanbul (SK) [Süleymaniye Library], Istanbul, Turkey. Asafna¯me. Esad Efendi: 340.01803; Halet Efendi: 351.00366; Hacı Ahmed Pas¸a: 956.07 ˙ 00202; Hacı Ahmed Pas¸a: 956.07 00203; Laleli: 340.03736; Âtif Efendi: 297.3 02790; Laleli: 340.01608; H Hüsnü Pas¸a: 340.00678; Hacı Ahmed Pas¸a: 956.07 00359; Nurosmaniye: 340.04221, Süleymaniye Kütüphanesi. Asafna¯me. Katalog Aumer 1875, no. 116, Kaiserliche Hof- und Staatsbibliothek, Munich, ˙ Germany. Kocˇi Beg. Risa¯le. Mehmed Zeki Pakalin: 956.0732 00055; H. Hüsnü Pas¸a: 350 01005; Ha˙ midiyye: 350 01469, Süleymaniye Kütüphanesi. Nasihat al-mülûk. Ms. A 319, Ms. C 2339, Institut Vostokovedenija Rossijskoj Akademii Nauk [Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences], St. Petersburg, Russia.

Secondary literature Abdel-Halim, Mohamed. Antoine Galland, sa vie et son oeuvre. Paris: Nizet, 1964. Adal, Kristin, and Helge Jordheim. “Texts on the Move. Textuality and Historicity Revisited.” History and Theory 57, no. 1 (2018): 56–74. Adıvar, Abdülhak Adnan. “Kınalıza¯de.” In ˙Islam Ansiklopedisi. Vol. 6, 709–11. Istanbul: ˙ Milli Eg˘itim Basımevi, 1978. Aksüt, Ali Kemalî. Koçi Bey Risalesi. Istanbul: Vakit Matbaası, 1939. Akün, Ömer Faruk. “Koçi Bey,” TDVI˙A 26 (2002): 143–48. ¯ lı¯ Emı¯rı¯. Ma¯rdı¯n Mülu¯k-i Artu¯kiyye Ta¯rı¯hi. Istanbul: Kader Matbaası, 1331 [1912/13]. ʿA ˙ ˘ ¯ midı¯, s.a. –. (ed.). Kema¯lpas¸aza¯de. Teva¯rı¯h-i A¯l-iʿOsma¯n. Istanbul: Matbaʿa-ı A ¯ ˘ ¯ –. (ed.). Lütfı¯ Pas¸a. Asafna¯me. Istanbul: Matbaʿa-ı Amidı¯, 1326 [1908/09]. ˙ ˙ Alkan, Necmettin. “Rudolf Tschudi,” TDVI˙A 41 (2012): 316. Alpan, Necip. Tarihin ıs¸ıg˘ından Arnavutluk. Ankara: Alpan, 1975. Aumer, Joseph. Verzeichniß der orientalischen Handschriften in der K. Hof- und Staatsbibliothek in München … München: Palm’sche Hofbuchhandlung, 1875. Babinger, Franz. Geschichtsschreiber der Osmanen und ihre Werke. Leipzig: Harrassowitz, 1927. Bachmann-Medick, Doris. “Translation – A Concept and Model for the Study of Culture.” In Travelling Concepts for the Study of Culture, edited by Birgit Neumann and Ansgar Nünning, 23–43. Berlin: De Gruyter, 2012. Bader, Karl. Lexikon deutscher Bibliothekare. Leipzig: Harrassowitz, 1925. Bal, Hüseyin. “Machiavelli ve Koçi Bey’de Siyaset, Adalet ve Erdem.” Türkiyat Aras¸tırmaları (2008): 75–99.

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Bassnett, Susan. “Translating Across Time.” In Translation, edited by Susan Bassnett, 81– 103. London: Routledge, 2013. Batatu, Hanna. The Old Social Classes and the Revolutionary Movements of Iraq. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1978. Bayrak, Orhan M. Osmanlı Tarihi Yazarları. Istanbul: Osmanlı Yayınevi, 1982. Behrnauer, Walter Friedrich Adolf. “Kogabeg’s Abhandlung über den Verfall des osmanischen Staatsgebäudes seit Sultan Suleiman dem Grossen.” Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft 15 (1861): 272–332. Beysanog˘lu, S¸evket. “Mehmed S¸ükrü Bey.” In Diyarbakırlı Fikir ve Sanat Adamları. Vol. 2. Istanbul: S¸ehir Matbaası, 1959. Burke, Peter. “Cultures of Translation in Early Modern Europe.” In Cultural Translation in Early Modern Europe, edited by Peter Burke and R. Po-chia Hsia, 7–38. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007. Çankaya, Ali. Mülkiye târihi ve mülkiyeliler. Ankara: Örnek Matbaası, 1954. Chakrabarty, Dipesh. Provincializing Europe: Postcolonial Thought and Historical Difference. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2008. Clifford, James. Routes: Travel and Translation in the Late Twentieth Century. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1997. Curtis, William E. “The Libraries of Constantinople,” Boston Daily Globe, October 10, 1910: 10. Danıs¸man, Zuhuri (ed.). Koçi Bey Risalesi. Istanbul: Milli Eg˘itim Basımevi, 1972. Darling, Linda T. A History of Social Justice and Political Power in the Middle East. London: Routledge, 2013. –. “Political Change and Political Discourse in the Early Modern Mediterranean World.” Journal of Interdisciplinary History 38, no. 4 (2008): 505–31. Deny, Jean. “Ahmad Wafı¯k Pas̲h̲a,” Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed., ed. Peri Bearman, ˙ ˙ vol. 1 (Leiden: Brill, 1979), 298. Deryagina, T[amara] P., and O[lga] B. Frolova. “Antoni Muchlinski and His Collection of Arabic Manuscripts in the St. Petersburg University Library.” Manuscripta Orientalia 3, no. 4 (1997): 45–51. Ebüzziya, Ziyad. “Ebüzziyâ Mehmed Tevfik,” TDVI˙A 10 (1994): 374–78. Elias, Norbert. Die höfische Gesellschaft, 3rd ed. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1987 [1969]. Elsie, Robert. “Albanian Literature in the Moslem Tradition: Eighteenth and Early-Nineteenth Century Albanian Writing in Arabic Script.” Oriens 33 (1992): 287–306. ¯ lı¯. Osmanlı S¸ark vilayetleri: Osmanlı vilayat-ı ¸sarkiyyesi/Ali Emiri Efendi. Edited Emı¯rı¯, ʿA by Abdulkadir Yuvalı and Ahmet Halaçog˘lu. Kayseri: Erciyes Üniv. Yayınları, 1992. Faroqhi, Suraiya. A Cultural History of the Ottomans. London: I.B. Tauris, 2016. Ferguson, Heather. “Genres of Power: Constructing a Discourse of Decline in Ottoman Nasihatname.” Osmanlı Aras¸tırmaları 35 (June 2010): 81–116. Fetvacı, Emine. Picturing History at the Ottoman Court. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2013. Finkel, Caroline. Osman’s Dream: The History of the Ottoman Empire. New York, NY: Basic Books, 2007. Fleischer, Cornell. Bureaucrat and Intellectual in the Ottoman Empire: The Historian Mustafa Ali (1541–1600). Princeton, NJ: Princeton Univ. Press, 1986.

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Dennis Dierks

Scripting, Translating, and Narrating Reform. Making Muslim Reformism in the European Peripheries of the Muslim World at the Turn of the 20th Century

1.

Approaching the dynamics of Muslim reformism

a)

Some first observations

19th-century reformers were serious people. They were deeply concerned with the problems of their communities – or what they believed to be the problems. In the age of questions,1 they thought they were the ones to give the answers. Often, they raised the questions first in order to make sure that they would also be the ones to define what was to be the answer. Trusting in both their intellectual capacities and the power of the word, some of them were busy with initiating journals and newspapers that aimed at showing their less-educated countrymen the way into what they presumed would be a brighter future. This was a global phenomenon, with reformers becoming global figures. The South Slav periphery of the Habsburg Empire was no exception to this trend. In 1900 a group of three reform-minded intellectuals of Muslim origin founded a literary journal. Together, the three editors represented all the folksiness, wit and elegance 19th-century provincial notables could offer. The first one, Edhem Mulabdic´ (1862–1954) was a primary school teacher writing novels and short stories depicting the life of ‘ordinary’ (Muslim) people;2 the second one, Osman Nuri Hadzˇic´ (1869–1937) held a high-ranking position in the Habsburg administration of justice and wrote at the same time astute polemics 1 Holly Case, The Age of Questions: Or, A First Attempt at an Aggregate History of the Eastern, Social, Woman, American, Jewish, Polish, Bullion, Tuberculosis, and Many Other Questions over the Nineteenth Century, and Beyond (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2018). 2 Some notes on his biography in: Robin Okey, Taming Balkan Nationalism: The Habsburg ‘Civilizing Mission in Bosnia,’ 1878–1914 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007), 46–47; cf. also: Alija Nametak, “Edhem Mulabdic´,” Novi Behar 4.14/15 (1930/1931): 214–217 and an autobiographical sketch penned by Mulabdic´ himself: Edhem Mulabdic´, “Iz biografije (povodom proslave cˇetrdeset-godisˇnjice moga kulturnog rada),” Novi Behar 4.21 (1930/1931): 305–307 and Novi Behar 4.22/23 (1930/1931): 327–328.

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against all kinds of self-declared non-Muslim specialists on (Bosnian) Islam;3 the third one was the well-off poet and scholar Safvet-beg Basˇagic´ (1870–1934) whose mindset and lifestyle in many ways resembled that of the landed gentry elsewhere in Europe.4 When establishing their journal, Mulabdic´, Nuri Hadzˇic´ and Basˇagic´ did what most founders of reformist periodicals did at that time: They first decided on a title, which, as a rule, had to be programmatic. In this particular case Behar was chosen, deriving from Persian baha¯r which means “spring” and “blossom” and alluding to the idea of renewal and rebirth (Behar’s cover visualized this idea by showing a flowering tree in front of Sarajevo’s biggest mosque, Begova dzˇamija, i. e. the Bey’s Mosque).5 Then they launched a call for collaboration and subscription, and finally they published a first editorial, giving it the form of a manifesto that was to set out the goals of their journal.6 It reads as follows: Elilmu faridatun ala kulli muslimin ve muslemetin. – These sublime words were spoken by the man God loved most, our Prophet, peace be upon Him. Therefore, learning [nauka] 7 is a religious duty [farz from Arabic fard]8 of every male and female Muslim, ˙ and this learning comprises everything men must know. In the first place, this learning [nauka] is religious, but in order to acquire knowledge [da dogjemo do te nauke], in order to be able to appropriate it and to put it into effect, it is also necessary that we do

3 Esad Zgodic´, Bosanska policˇka misao (Sarajevo: DES, 2014), 135–162. 4 Philippe Gelez, Safvet-beg Basˇagic´, 1870–1934: Aux racines intellectuelles de la pensée nationale chez les musulmans de Bosnie-Herzégovine (Athens: École Française d’Athènes, 2010); Muhidin Dzˇanko, Dr. Safvet-beg Basˇagic´-Redzˇepasˇic´, (Mirza Safvet: vitez pera i mejdana): Intelektualna povijest i ideologijska upotreba djela (Sarajevo: Sarajevo Publishing 2006); Lejla Gazic´, Naucˇno i strucˇno djelo dr. Safvet-Bega Basˇagic´a (Sarajevo: Orijentalni Institut, 2010); Zgodic´, Bosanska policˇka misao, 97–133. 5 The fruit tree flowering in spring is at the core of the imaginary connected with the expression behar in Bosnian, cf. Abdulah Skaljic´, Turcizmi u nasˇem jeziku (Sarajevo: Karika, 2014), 124– 25. 6 Cf. Muhsin Rizvic´’s groundbreaking study on Behar: Muhsin Rizvic´, Behar: Knjizˇevnohistorijska monografija. (Sarajevo: Svjetlost, 2000), 8–41. 7 The editorial translates ‘ilm as nauka. The term one would rather have expected is znanje as is the common expression for knowledge. Znanje has an etymology similar to ‘ilm: Both expressions, ‘ilm and znanje, derive from the respective verbs to know (‘alima in Arabic, znati in Bosnian and other Shtokavian varieties) while nauka derives from the verb naucˇiti – to learn. In present day usage nauka usually means science or scholarship but can also have a religious connotation that is still present in the term nauka hrisˇc´anska, which is one of the possible titles of a Serbian Orthodox catechism, cf. Jovan Borota, Pravoslavna hrisˇ´canska nauka: Za srpsku kuc´u i ˇskolu (Stari Becˇej 1899) and Jevrem A. Ilic´, Nauka hrisˇc´anska. Za ucˇenike I. i II. razreda osnovne ˇskole (Belgrade 1894). In the specific context of Behar’s first editorial, both the complexity and the concrete meaning of the term nauka is most precisely reflected by translating it as learning in the sense of accumulated knowledge. 8 Juynboll, Th.W., “Fard,”, Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd Edition, eds. P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, C.E. Bosworth, E. van˙ Donzel, W.P. Heinrichs. Consulted online on 04 December 2020 .

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learn a lot [da mnogo ucˇimo] to be able to hold firm to our holy and sublime faith; it is necessary that we learn in order to be able to stand up to other peoples both in moral and material terms. This is the second requirement for learning [To je ta druga potreba nauke], of secular learning [nauke svjetske], of education [prosvjete] in general. The basis of learning in general is the mekteb,9 the school, and for moral education [moralnom odgoju] the basis is both school and home. Without learning [bez nauke] we cannot have homes and families able to educate [sposobne za odgajanje] our offspring. Therefore, learning means learning again and again; only with learning mekteb and home influence and lead people the right way, they educate and ennoble them [a naukom tek mekteb i dom djeljuju na cˇovjeka u pravom smislu, u odregjenom pravcu, naobrazˇavaju ga i oplemenjuju]. Times change, it comes to new situations in which demands become higher, in which school and home have to address bigger tasks regarding education [odgoja] and teaching [naobrazbe]. In different situations, people have to meet much bigger challenges, people have to invest more time in their learning [u svoju nauku]; home and school alone are not able to provide such an education [odgoj]. People need knowledge [znanja] and teaching; what is more, they have to focus as much as possible on learning [naukom], not only in school and at home, but also in public; besides that, they have to read good books. Our Prophet, peace be upon Him, saith: ‘Teach your children for the times they live in.’ These glorious words oblige us to do everything to spread knowledge [da sˇirimo nauk], that we teach our Muslim community because new times imply new challenges, but also new knowledge [nauku].10

At a first glance, this editorial appears to be little more than a eulogy on knowledge, as enthusiastic as it is naïve. As presented in the text, learning seems to be one of the great magic words which reenchanted the disenchanting world of the 19th century: an idea both lofty and diffuse, that, according to its believers, once objectivized and turned into reality, would make the world a better place. Depending on the concrete milieu and setting, other such great magic words would have been free-trade,11 gymnastics,12 reform dress,13 cremation,14 or whole-meal

9 The mektep was the institution of Muslim primary education in the Ottoman Empire and in post-Ottoman Bosnia-Herzegovina. Cf. Mitar Papic´, Sˇkolstvo u Bosni i Hercegovini za vrijeme austrougarske okupacije, 1878–1918 (Sarajevo: Veselin Maslesˇa, 1972), 33–34. 10 Urednisˇtvo, “Nasˇim cˇitaljima i suradnicima,” Behar 1.1 (1900/1901): 1–3, here 1, emphasis added. All translations are mine unless otherwise stated. 11 Cf. the groundbreaking study: Frank Trentmann, Free Trade Nation. Commerce, Consumption, and Civil Society in Modern Britain (Oxford University Press, 2008). 12 With a focus on Germany: Svenja Goltermann, Körper der Nation: Habitusformierung und die Politik des Turnens 1860–1890 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 1998). 13 Patricia Ober, Der Frauen neue Kleider. Das Reformkleid und die Konstruktion des modernen Frauenkörpers (Berlin: Schiler, 2005). 14 Cf., e. g., Stephen Prothero, Purified by Fire: A History of Cremation in America (Berkeley, CA: Univ. of California Press, 2001), 13–101.

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bread,15 to name but a few examples for the Messianic ardor of 19th-century reformist discourse. However, a closer look shows that the text is much more complex and intellectually challenging: It not only introduces the leitmotiv of the new journal that was at the same time its very definition of reform – the necessity of adapting to the challenges of the present in order to hold one’s own in a rapidly changing world –, but it also defines what knowledge is to be in this process: it shall direct daily routines and activities both in terms of knowhow and moral concepts. And finally: When setting the tone for the gospel of reformism, knowledge is not only framed in a modernist, but also in an Islamic way. The text operates both with a vocabulary taken from the lexicon of 19th-century reformist discourse (including the South Slav vernacularization of key concepts such as education and Bildung: odgoj, odgojanje, and prosvjeta) and an Islamic-Arabic terminology: it refers twice to what Islamic scholarship addresses as hadith, i. e., sayings attributed to the Prophet Muhammad. In a next step, the editorial outlines how and by whom knowledge shall be disseminated: Besides mekteb – and this means learning in general [nauke u opc´e] – and home as factors of education [kao faktora naobrazbe i odgoja], good books can help a lot. Most of us once began learning [Vec´ina nas je pocˇela nauku], but gave it up; some have, unfortunately, never even begun while others, thank God, equipped themselves with knowledge [naoruzˇila se naukom] so that they can be of great help to their people. Just as the wealthy have to help the poor, those who are knowledgeable have to teach those who are ignorant [znan treba da neznana poucˇi]. Books are the only medium between them; therefore, it is by books that we will transmit knowledge from those who are knowledgeable to those who are ignorant [knjigom c´emo dakle prenijeti znanje od naucˇena nenaucˇnu]; it is by books that we will learn more easily about the needs, and be it the most little ones, of those seeking knowledge [knjigom c´emo laksˇe saznati i najmanju potrebicu onog, koji je zˇedan nauke]; it is by the book that we will most closely connect the wealthy and the poor; during this encounter the former will profit from the knowledge of the latter [tim sastankom jedan c´e se korisiti znanjem drugoga], and the latter will do a noble deed to which God obliges him. Let thus ‘Behar’ be this center […].16

As this last passage shows, the editorial also defines the roles of the educated élites and the rest of the population in the process of sharing knowledge: it is the former who have to teach the latter. Both sides have to act their parts as accepting these roles is, once again, depicted as a religious duty. Besides that, the text assigns to print media (or as the text puts it: “the book”) a role that is at the very core of the notion of media: to be the intermediary, in this case between the 15 Judith Baumgartner, “Ernährungsreform,” in Handbuch der deutschen Reformbewegungen, 1880–1933, eds. Diethart Kerbs & Jürgen Reulecke (Wuppertal: Hammer, 1998), 115–126. 16 Urednisˇtvo, “Nasˇim cˇitaljima i suradnicima,” 1.

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educated élite and a less knowledgeable audience by transmitting knowledge from the former to the latter. So, a closer look at the editorial provides initial evidence of the manifold roles that knowledge played in the process of modernizing practices of everyday life: first, knowledge was used as a code word the reformist emphatically referred to: knowledge guides action; therefore, it has to keep pace with the evolution of the world, they argued. According to them, this was not only the precondition of asserting oneself in the global competition of rivaling nations, but also a basic requirement of Islam. Second, when defining the substance of the knowledge they wanted to be applied, the reformers merged a whole string of concepts taken from most different contexts. Still, they presented their notion of knowledge as coherent and being based on Islamic tradition. Third, according to the reformers, being knowledgeable defined one’s position in society and the capacity of what has been retrospectively described as having “discursive power.”17 Hence, following this logic, those who are knowledgeable have to show society the course of action to take. And finally, fourth, we can detect in this text a set of techniques of persuasion the reformers applied in order to make their addressees both believe in their message and accept the leading role they claimed for themselves when transforming local society. The connection between these different categories of knowledge and the making of reform among Muslims at the (Eastern) European periphery of what was more and more conceptualized and experienced as the “Muslim world”18 will be analyzed in this chapter. As the bodies of knowledge involved obviously had their origin outside the communities addressed, knowledge mobility seems to have played a crucial role. Before outlining how to analyze these dynamics of mobility and interference, I shall explain what I mean when I talk of reform and Muslim reformism.

b)

Conceptualizing reformism

The process of making reform, i. e., the effort of adapting local societies to what some élite members defined as the challenges of the present, which will be analyzed in the following through the example of a region we are used to addressing as Eastern and Southeast Europe, shall be understood as a local manifestation of a broader social, cultural, and political phenomenon: 19th-century 17 Philipp Sarasin: “Was ist Wissensgeschichte?” Internationales Archiv für Sozialgeschichte der deutschen Literatur 36.1 (2011): 159–172, here 169. 18 Cemil Aydın, The Idea of the Muslim World: A Global Intellectual History (Cambridge, MA.: Harvard Univ. Press, 2017).

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reformism. I understand reformism as a discourse and technique of social intervention that was originally meant to be an alternative both to the politics of conventional laissez-faire and to the politics of revolutionary disruption. Unlike the former, reformism pleaded for involvement with social life, but the interventions this implied should be, in contrast to the latter, limited and moderate: they had to have a clear scope of well-defined aims and to be based on existing rules that, if they needed to be changed at all, only would have to be modified. Such politics of reformism could be state-induced, as was the case in what classical German social history described as “defensive modernization” in early 19th-century Prussia19 or had already been addressed in late tsarist Russia as the “great reforms” (velikie reformy) of Alexander II (r. 1855–1881),20 or what was framed as “auspicious reorganization” (tanz¯ıma¯t-ı hayriye)21 by Ottoman bu˙ reaucracy at its time. Or, reformism could be an approach of political formations which were still seeking power in order to implement their agenda. In the framework of imperial rule, local political actors would often try to adapt their reformist agendas to the policies of the imperial metropolis in order to have them implemented by using the resources of the state apparatus.22 This was also an option for non-Western reformers living in the European continental and overseas empires. However, opting for such an approach meant deciding to accept – at least to a certain extent – foreign rule and to cooperate with the local imperial authorities. If reforming local societies aimed at enabling their emancipation from Western hegemony, such a collaboration was not easy to justify. Another open question was the very substance of reform: what did the adapting to the ‘challenges of the present’ Behar’s manifesto and so many other reformist pieces were calling for mean? What should this imply: an emulation of ‘foreign’ models in terms of Westernization, or an evolution of the local community according to the model of a shared universal civilization, or going back to the imagined roots of one’s own civilization claiming that it was superior to all others – including the West? These dilemmas of non-Western reformists were reflected in their efforts of harmonizing cultural patterns of modernization with what they defined as their own traditions.

19 Hans-Ulrich Wehler, Deutsche Gesellschaftsgeschichte, vol. 1: Vom Feudalismus des Alten Reiches bis zur defensiven Modernisierung der Reformära 1700–1815 (München: Beck, 1987). 20 Beate Eschment, Die “Grosse Reform?” Die Bauernreform von 1861 in Russland in der vorrevolutionären Geschichtsschreibung (Münster: Lit, 1994). 21 Kemal H. Karpat, Reconstructing Identity, State, Faith, and Community in the Late Ottoman State (Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press, 2001); Marinos Sariyannis, A History of Ottoman Political Thought up to the Early Nineteenth Century (Leiden: Brill, 2018), 428–431. 22 Pieter M. Judson, The Habsburg Empire: A New History (Cambridge, MA: Harvard Univ. Press, 2016).

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In several non-Western societies this effort was facilitated by the existence of autochthonous concepts of reform – reform understood in a way which was also common in premodern Christian Europe: to seek remedy for the shortcomings of the present in the past, i. e. by restoring the conditions of an idealized original state, often imagined as a golden age, such as it was presented in Chinese,23 Arab Muslim,24 and Ottoman25 political and theological writing and historiographic traditions. Such traditional imaginations of the past and societal development could be blended with the concepts of 19th-century reformism. Unlike the former, the latter was not based on a certain conceptualization of the past, but, just as the concept of modernization, on the belief in man’s capacity to shape society according to his designs. The fusion of both concepts provided the reformers with an instrument of political self-empowerment and a historical self-description that could be made useable to prove the civilizational power of one’s own culture, arguing that it had to be rediscovered in order to match up with the European colonial powers. Therefore, dealing with late 19th-century Muslim reformism demands an awareness of complex conceptual interferences and the ability to decipher them. This also implies being aware of the complexity of the biographies of the reformists who were involved in quite different settings and arenas, as the example of one of its most prominent protagonists, Muhammad ʿAbduh (1849–1905), ˙ might illustrate.26 His commitment to public life, which should make him one of the key figures of Muslim reformism across the whole globe, started in lateOttoman Egypt during the 1870s after his encounter with Jama¯l al-Dı¯n al-Afgha¯nı¯ (1838/39–1897),27 one of the pioneers of Muslim reformism and anti-colonial 23 Jürgen Osterhammel, Die Verwandlung der Welt: Eine Geschichte des 19. Jahrhunderts (München, Beck: 2009), 114. 24 Eric Chaumont, “al-Salaf wa ’l-K̲h̲alaf,” Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition, eds. P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, C.E. Bosworth, E. van Donzel, W.P. Heinrichs. Consulted online on 02 December 2020. ; Ahmad Dallal. “Appropriating the Past: Twentieth-Century Reconstruction of Pre-Modern Islamic Thought.” Islamic Law and Society, 7, 1 (2000): 325–358. 25 Suraiya Faroqhi, Kultur und Alltag im Osmanischen Reich: Vom Mittelalter bis zum Anfang des 20. Jahrhunderts (München: Beck, 1995), 90–92; Marinos Sariyannis, A History of Ottoman Political Thought Up to the Early Nineteenth Century (Leiden: Brill, 2018), especially 188–231. 26 For his biography and works see Mark Sedgwick, Muhammad Abduh (Oxford: Oneworld, 2010); Johann Büssow, “Re-imagining Islam in the Period of the First Modern Globalization: Muhammad ʿAbduh and his Theology of Unity,” in A Global Middle East: Mobility, Materiality and Culture in the Modern Age, 1880–1940, eds. Liyʾat Kozma, Cyrus Schayegh & ˙ Kateman, Muhammad Avner Wishnitzer (London: I.B. Tauris, 2015), 273–320; Ammeke ˙ Brill, ʿAbduh and His Interlocutors: Conceptualizing Religion in a Globalizing World (Leiden: 2019). 27 On his life: Nikki Keddie, Sayyid Jamal al-Din “al-Afghani”: A Political Biography (Berkeley, Univ. of California Press, 1972).

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resistance. Fighting the cause of constitutionalism, educational reform and anticolonial resistance, ʿAbduh had to leave Egypt after the British occupation in 1882. During his exile, ʿAbduh spent most of his time in Beirut, where he continued engaging for reforming Muslim educational institutions. In 1884 he left for Paris, where he published alongside al-Afgha¯nı¯ the newspaper al-ʿUrwa alWuthqa (The Indissoluble Link), promoting the idea of Islamic revival and staging the Ottoman sultan-caliph Abdulhamid II. as an integration figure for pan-Islamic solidarity. In 1888 ʿAbduh was allowed to return to his homeland due to the intervention of Lord Cromer, the United Kingdom’s consul-general in Egypt at that time, who hoped that ʿAbduh, as a reformer and ‘liberal’ Muslim,28 would cool down what contemporary Western Orientalist discourse stereotypically described as “Muslim fanaticism,” and give local Islam a direction more convenient to British rule. In Egypt, ʿAbduh started a new career as a sharia judge and mufti and became a lecturer at al-Azhar in 1899, where he attracted students from all over the world, including the future Bosnian-Herzegovinian grand mufti ˇ ausˇevic´ (1870–1938).29 (reis-ul-ulema) Dzˇemaludin C When popularizing his reformist agenda, ʿAbduh became engaged with quite different audiences and individuals: Muslim reformers like al-Afgha¯nı¯; Muslim scholars, ulema (Arabic: ʿulama¯ʾ) whom he attacked as backward for opposing his ideas; the members of the Masonic lodge he entered in the 1870s; learned men in the multiconfessional and multilingual urban society of late Ottoman Beirut; and European intellectuals and political activists he corresponded with or met during his travels, inter alia to the Houses of Parliament and Universities of Oxford and Cambridge. His thoughts on Islam circulated both in European and Muslim journals like al-Mana¯r (the Lighthouse), whose editor, Muhammad ˙ Rashı¯d Rida¯ (1865–1935),30 published ʿAbduh’s commentary on the Quran and ˙ the groundbreaking fatwas he issued during his tenure as grand mufti of Egypt (1899–1905). ʿAbduh’s concept of reform reflects shared concepts of the intellectually globalizing world of the late 19th century; at the same time, the notion 28 Cf. Hussein Omar, “Arabic Thought in the Liberal Cage,” in Islam after Liberalism, eds. Faisal Devji & Zaheer Kazmi (London: Hurst & Company, 2017), 17–45, who problematizes and historicizes the labels of ‘liberal’ and ‘conservative Islam’ as concerns ʿAbduh. 29 Kateman, Muhammad ʿAbduh and His Interlocutors, 1–12; Sedgwick, Muhammad Abduh, ˙ On C ˇ ausˇevic´’s encounter with ʿAbduh: Enes Karic´, “Islamsko misˇljenje u especially 29–93. Bosni i Hercegovini na razmed¯u starog i novog i prosvjetiteljski rad Mehmeda Dzˇemaludina ˇ ausˇevic´a,” in Reis Dzˇemaludin C ˇ ausˇevic´; Prosvjetitelj i reformator, eds. Enes Karic´ & Mujo C Demirovic´ (Sarajevo: Liljan, 2002), 17–35, here 18. 30 On his biography and on al-Mana¯r: Umar Ryad, Islamic reformism and Christianity: A Critical Reading of the Works of Muhammad Rashı¯d Rida¯ and His Associates, 1898–1935 ˙ ˙ the Politics of the Public Interest (Leiden: Brill, 2009); Dyala Hamzah, “From ‘Ilm to Sihafa or (Maslaha): Muhammad Rashîd Rida and his Journal al-Manar (1898–1935),” in The Making of the Arab Intellectual, 1880–1960: Empire, Public Sphere and the Colonial Coordinates of Selfhood, ed. Dyala Hamzah, 90–127. (London: Routledge, 2013).

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he uses to address reform, isla¯h, derives from the Quran and refers to a tradition ˙ ˙ of Islamic theological thinking going back to the first centuries of Islam. And finally, ʿAbduh’s biography is also a story about complex loyalties,31 as he was both a champion of Muslim self-empowerment criticizing European colonialism and a high-ranking member of the Egyptian colonial society.32 The same story of multifaceted conceptual interferences, intricate biographical entanglements, and complex loyalties can be told of the reformist activists in the European peripheries of the Muslim world such as the Russian jadidists (from cadı¯d: “new”) or the circle around Behar and other reformist journals in Habsburg Bosnia. This complexity was enhanced by the ambiguities of imperial rule. Reformers like Osman Nuri Hadzˇic´ or the much more prominent jadidist reformists Ismail Gasprinski (1851–1914)33 lived in continental empires, where non-Muslim administrations had created institutions in order to control Muslim communities by different means, namely by coopting local religious dignitaries into the imperial power apparatus, a technique of power also applied in the European overseas empires.34 Depending on concrete settings and situations, this could be experienced as a loss of power, but it in the case of Nuri Hadzˇic´ it was actually an asset, as a member of the imperial administration of justice, was given the opportunity to participate in the exercise of power. In Russia, on the other hand, reformist jadidists had to struggle with the resistance of traditional religious élites backed by the imperial administration, as was especially the case with 31 For “loyalty” as a analytical concept, see Hannes Grandits, Nathalie Clayer & Robert Pichler, “Social (dis-)integration and the national turn in the late- and post-Ottoman Balkans: Towards an analytical framework,” in Conflicting Loyalties in the Balkans: The Great Powers, the Ottoman Empire and Nation Building, eds. Hannes Grandits, Nathalie Clayer & Robert Pichler (London: I. B. Tauris, 2011), 1–12. 32 Sedgwick, Muhammad Abduh, especially 45–56, 63–93; Kateman, Muhammad ʿAbduh and ˙ His Interlocutors, 1–17. 33 For his biography, see Cafer Seydahmet Kırımer, Gaspıralı ˙Ismail Bey: Dilde, fikirde, is¸te birlik (Istanbul: Matbaacılık ve Nes¸riyat Türk Anomim S¸irketi, 1934); Edward J. Lazzerini, Ismail Bey Gasprinskii and Muslim Modernism in Russia, 1878–1914 (Ph. D. Dissertation, University of Washington, 1973); Hakan Kırımlı, National Movements and National Identity Among the Crimean Tatars (Leiden: Brill, 1996), 32–55, 116–149; in a transimperial perspective: James H. Meyer: Turks Across Empires: Marketing Muslim Identity in the Russian-Ottoman Borderlands, 1856–1914 (Oxford: Oxford University Press 2014); for the sources of his reform agenda and the means of popularizing reformist knowledge, see Mustafa Tuna, Imperial Russia’s Muslims: Islam, Empire, and European Modernity, 1788–1914 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015), especially 149–170. 34 For Russia, see Dmitrii Ju. Arapov, Sistema gosudarstvennogo regulirovaniia Islama v Rossiiskoi imperii: Posledniaia tret’ XVIII – nachalo XX vv. (Moscow: Mosk. gos. un-t im. M. V. Lomonosova, Ist. Fak., 2005) and, focusing on a regional case study, Allen J. Frank, Muslim Religious Institutions in Imperial Russia: The Islamic World of Novouzensk District and the Kazakh Inner Horde, 1780–1910 (Leiden: Brill, 2001); for Habsburg Bosnia, see Srec´ko M. Dzˇaja, Bosnien-Herzegowina in der österreichisch-ungarischen Epoche: Die Intelligentsia zwischen Tradition und Ideologie (München: Oldenbourg, 1994), 58–64.

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Russian Turkestan.35 The same ambivalences can be stated for the fields of economy, human mobility, and culture. Expanding capitalist economies and emerging imperial markets provided new opportunities of enrichment, as the successful economic performance of entrepreneurial élites from the Volga region36 or in the booming oil town of Baku shows.37 But it could also cause economic marginalization and impoverishment, as was the case with urban artisans who were unable to compete with growing industrial mass production.38 In Habsburg Bosnia, the quest for land reform as it was especially raised by the protagonists of the different South Slav national movements was experienced as an attack on Muslim livelihoods – not only on the big landowners.39 As concerns mobility, moving to the cultural and political centers of the empire and attending their educational institutions offered new opportunities of advancement. However, intra-imperial mobility also brought migration of non-Muslim populations into regions inhabited by Muslims, fueling fears of demographic marginalization among them. Besides that, Muslims in both empires were confronted with different varieties of mainstream cultures that reproduced negative stereotypes of Islam and Muslims and positive self-images of anti-Muslim bulwarks, stories of “Turkish” or “Tatar yokes,” and verdicts of Islam as being essentially hostile to cultural progress.40 And what was more, in both empires there existed church organizations, some representatives of which had internalized the ideal of ecclesia militans, rejecting the idea of religious tolerance. Some members of the imperial élites – not only among the clergy – dreamt of Islam somehow dying away or scenarios of proselytizing Muslims, which could result in initiatives for missionizing Muslims as it happened in the Russian Empire. At the same time, both Russian and Bosnian Muslims were the addressees of policies that were presented as civilizing missions and that, among other aims, sought to make local Muslim populations accept imperial rule, often by staging the empire’s lawful35 Adeeb Khalid, The Politics of Muslim Cultural Reform: Jadidism in Central Asia (Berkeley, CA: Univ. of California Press, 1998). 36 Tuna, Imperial Russia’s Muslims, 125–145. 37 Alstadt, Audrey, “The Azerbaijani Bourgeoisie and the Cultural-Enlightenment Movement in Baku,” in Transcaucasia, Nationalism, and Social Change: Essays in the History of Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia, ed. Ronald Grigor Suny (Ann Arbor: Univ. of Michigan Press, 1996), 199–209; Zaur Gasimov, Historical Dictionary of Azerbaijan (London: Rowman & Littlefield, 2018), 60–62. 38 Peter F. Sugar, Industrialization of Bosnia-Hercegovina, 1878–1918 (Seattle: Univ. of Washington Press, 1963); Ferdinand Hauptmann, Die österreichisch-ungarische Herrschaft in Bosnien und der Hercegovina 1878–1918. Wirtschaftspolitik und Wirtschaftsentwicklung (Graz: Institut für Geschichte der Universität Graz, Abteilung Südosteuropäische Geschichte, 1983). 39 Okey, Taming Balkan Nationalism, 93–95. 40 Liliya Berezhnaya & Heidi Hein-Kircher (eds.), Rampart Nations: Bulwark Myths of East European Multiconfessional Societies in the Age of Nationalism (New York: Berghahn, 2019).

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ness and the benevolence of its ruler.41 This could imply representations of the past that were meant to flatter the local Muslim population, as the example of Habsburg Bosnia shows. The reactions of the Muslim populations to this highly ambivalent situation of imperial rule were manifold. When it came to resistance, it could result in violence, but much more often in temporal or permanent migration, mostly into the Ottoman Empire.42 Muslim reformists like Gasprinski or the founders of Behar pleaded against leaving the homeland and instead promoted making local Muslim communities progress within the framework of the possibilities that the actual political situation offered. This pragmatic stance implied a pledge of loyalty toward the imperial authorities and appropriating elements of imperial educational cultures by integrating them into the own concepts of educational reform. At the same time, this group of reformers, which will be addressed in the following as loyalist reformists, was, directly or indirectly, in contact with Muslim communities outside the polities it lived and acted in. In many cases, the Turkish language was a connecting link, as most of the Muslim populations in the Russian Empire were Turkophone, the different Turkish vernaculars being linguistically quite close and Gasprinski promoting a simplified version of Ottoman Turkish as lingua franca.43 Muslims in Bosnia-Herzegovina, like non-Turkish Muslim communities in other parts of post-Ottoman Southeast Europe, kept cultivating Ottoman Turkish as the élite language after the Austro-Hungarian occupation of 1878.44 On this basis, there existed a Turkophone sphere of communication centering on the Ottoman capital. Participating in this sphere of communication could include attending educational institutions in the capital (as was the case ˇ ausˇevic´ mentioned above), choosing Istanbul as a basis with the reformist mufti C for political and publicist activism, hoping that it would have repercussions on one’s own homeland, as was especially the case with Russian Muslims intellectuals,45 or following the Ottoman press and the newest publications of the Ottoman book market and informing the local readerships about it. It was in this trans-imperial theater of communication in which Eastern European Muslim 41 For imperial Russia, see Stefan B. Kirmse, The Lawful Empire. Legal Change and Cultural Diversity in Late Tsarist Russia (Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 2019). 42 On imperial Russia: Meyer, Turks Across Empires, 21–29; on Habsburg Bosnia: Safet Bandzˇovic´, “History in a ‘Broken Mirror’: Demographic De-Ottomanization of the Balkans and Identity Changes of the Refugees,” in Both Muslim and European Diasporic and Migrant Identities of Bosniaks, ed. Dzˇevada Sˇusˇko (Brill: Leiden, 2019), 17–56, esp. 35–41. 43 Kırımlı, National Movements, 34–35. 44 Rizvic´, Behar, 29: The official census of 1910 counted 2289 people in Bosnia and Herzegovina who knew Ottoman Turkish, and 448 who knew Arabic. 45 Volker Adam, Rußlandmuslime in Istanbul am Vorabend des Ersten Weltkrieges: Die Berichterstattung osmanischer Periodika über Rußland und Zentralasien (Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 2002); Meyer, Turks across the Empires, esp. 151–170.

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reformism was produced, articulated, and negotiated, giving it a dimension that can be described as “Transottoman”.46 This implied appropriating a state-centered Ottoman discourse on reform that partly operated with the same notions – namely isla¯h – as religious-centered Muslim reformism, but which had its own ˙ ˙ logics and tradition.47 The analytical concept of loyalist reformism that shall be applied in this chapter hints at the fact that in order to have a real impact on people’s lives, the reformists had to decide which institutions to build upon and which political partners to align with when trying to popularize their agenda. This was a problem all Muslim reformers under foreign imperial rule were confronted with since they were not provided with a power apparatus of their own. In the Bosnian Muslim case, that will be at the center of the analysis in this chapter, this problem was even more urgent as Muslims constituted only the second biggest ethno-confessional group in Habsburg Bosnia-Herzegovina, the Serbian-Orthodox population being the largest one.48 This resulted in political strategies that Xavier Bougarel has described as the “search for empire”:49 While the ‘conservative’ majority of the land-owning élites and learned men, the ulema, longed for the restauration of Ottoman rule in order to get back the privileged political and social status they had already lost before the end of Ottoman rule due to the Tanzimat, the loyalist reformists decided to make use of the Habsburg administration when pursuing their agenda. Being only a minority in multiconfessional and multiethnic Bosnia, Bosnian Muslim reformists also had to decide whether to look for political partners among the Serbian-Orthodox or Catholic élites. As both of these groups were promoting different imaginations of national belonging that also addressed the local Muslim population, siding with them implied a decision whether to identify with different varieties of Serb or Croat nationalism and, if so, whether to translate local Muslim culture in terms of concepts of Serbian or Croatian national culture.50 And finally, Bosnian Muslim reformists had to make a choice 46 For a conceptualization of a “Transottoman” approach, see Stephan Conermann, Albrecht Fuess & Stefan Rohdewald, “Einführung: Transosmanische Mobilitätsdynamiken. Mobilität als Linse für Akteure, Wissen und Objekte,” in Transottomanica: Osteuropäisch-osmanischpersische Mobilitätsdynamiken, eds. Stefan Rohdewald, Stephan Conermann & Albrecht Fuess (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2019), 47–57. 47 Kemal H. Karpat, The Politicization of Islam. Reconstructing Identity, State, Faith, and Community in the Late Ottoman State (Oxford: University Press, 2001), 74–78. 48 The Austro-Hungarian census of 1910 counted 825,418 Serbian Orthodox, 612,137 Muslim, 434,061 Roman Catholic, and 11,868 Jewish inhabitants, see Dzˇaja, Bosnien-Herzegowina in der österreichisch-ungarischen Epoche, 39. 49 Xavier Bougarel, Islam and Nationhood in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Surviving Empires (London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2018), 4. 50 Dzˇaja, Bosnien-Herzegowina in der österreichisch-ungarischen Epoche, 207–218; Edin Hajdarpasic, Edin. Whose Bosnia? Nationalism and Political Imagination in the Balkans, 1840– 1914 (Ithaca: Cornell Univ. Press., 2015).

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regarding what it meant to be a Muslim in terms of translocal loyalties and solidarities, be it toward the global community of all Muslims, the umma, or be it toward the Ottoman Sultan-Caliph, who claimed to represent this global community.51 At the same time, and this was undoubtedly the most challenging task, the reformists had to convince their addressees, in this case the Muslim population of Habsburg Bosnia, of the agenda they promoted. Narrating reform in a way that harmonized it with what was imagined as the essence of one’s own culture was one way; still, it was not enough to persuade larger parts of the population to accept a profound transformation of society and culture as this would also touch upon their individual lifestyles. There also had to be an emotional momentum: the feeling of crisis that urged far-reaching change. Recent research as well as Reinhart Koselleck’s classical study “Critique and Crisis”52 have shown that crisis is a phenomenon of perception. Crises do not just occur due to any ‘objective’ reasons whatsoever. We can only speak of crisis if a situation is experienced by contemporaries as such.53 Hence, for reformists, a main task was to make a relevant number of their countrymen share their individual feeling of crisis. In this chapter, which sums up the approaches and some first findings of a larger study, I will argue that the reformists tried to do so by implementing a script of reform. My point of depart when reconstructing such a script will be the findings of comparative investigations into the history of revolution. According to Keith Michael Baker and Dan Edelstein, there existed scripts that revolutionaries had in mind when planning and legitimizing their activities. These revolutionary scripts were based on a vision of what a revolution was (and should be). The historical model revolutionaries of the 19th and 20th centuries usually referred to was the French Revolution of 1789. Imaginations of the French revolution also played a role when scripting roles that the revolutionaries and their adversaries were to play. The precondition that the revolutionary script can be effective is that a specific situation is defined as revolutionary. According to Baker and Edelstein, defining a situation as revolutionary constitutes a performative speech act. It is this speech act that makes a revolutionary performance possible, i. e., which enables the revolutionaries (and their opponents) to act out their anticipated roles:

51 François Georgeon, Abdülhamid II (1876–1909): Le crépuscule de l’Empire ottoman (Paris: CNRS éditions, 2017), 257–285. 52 Reinhart Koselleck, Critique and Crisis: Enlightenment and the Pathogenesis of Modern Society (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1988). 53 Thomas Mergel, “Krisen als Wahrnehmungsphänome,” in Krisen verstehen: Historische und kulturwissenschaftliche Annäherungen, ed. Thomas Mergel (Frankfurt am Main: Campus Verlag, 2012), 9–27.

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To declare a particular collective political action a Revolution, to pronounce a particular situation revolutionary, to become oneself a revolutionary, to justify one’s deeds in the name of the Revolution, to insist upon, or impose, what the Revolution requires: these are all performatives – performances made possible (whether made successfully or not) within or upon the revolutionary script.54

If this speech act meets with acceptance, i. e., if it really is performative, certain scripts can “generate events” and suggest “positions to be taken, actions to be carried out, incidents to be anticipated.”55 This is a most inspiring approach which, with some modifications, I will try to apply to the analysis of Muslim reformism. Deciding to deploy such an analytical tool requires once again clarifying the differences between a revolutionary and a reformist approach to politics. This applies not only to the most obvious – and already mentioned – difference between politics of revolutionary disruption and reformist evolution, but also to the visions of the past on which both approaches are based. If 19th-century revolutionary scripts refer to the one grand revolution of 1789, such a central historical experience or model is lacking in the case of reformism. Still, reformism could imply certain visions of the past, as the example studied in this chapter will show: In their writings, Muslim reformists often referred to idealized pasts and lieux de mémoire such as the first century of Islam, the Muslim reign in al-Andalus, Baghdad during the Abbasid caliphate or the Ottoman Empire under Suleyman the Magnificent. These epochs were imagined as golden ages demonstrating the civilizational power of Islam. As will be demonstrated in the following, there can be also found references to contemporary models of reform in other Muslim societies. Another point upon which the analysis of reformism can be built is what Baker and Edelstein describe as “the definition of the situation.”56 According to them, imposing the revolutionary script – and this also implies imposing it against competing scripts – requires defining the given situation as revolutionary. As Behar’s editorial shows, with some modifications, this approach can also be applied to Muslim reformism. Here, defining the situation meant defining it as crisis. It is the situation of crisis which is to justify and legitimize the reformist intervention. Only if the scenario of crisis is generally accepted can the reformist script be imposed – and the roles of those who have to point to ways out of the crisis (the reformers) and those who have to follow (the rest of the population) can be acted out.

54 Keith Michael Baker & Dan Edelstein, “Introduction,” in Scripting Revolution: A Historical Approach to the Comparative Study of Revolutions (Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 2015), 4. 55 Baker & Edelstein, “Introduction,” 3. 56 Baker & Edelstein, “Introduction,” 3.

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Baker and Edelstein have pointed out that scripts do not only direct the course of action, but that they are themselves the subject of change.57 They can be transformed by rewriting them, adapting them to changing contexts. In our case, this dynamic momentum of transformation is enhanced by the fact that the concepts to which Muslim reformists refer have their origin outside the community on which the script shall be imposed. Therefore, reconstructing the reformist script also implies retracing trajectories of knowledge on the move.

c)

Retracing reformist knowledge on the move

Engaging with peripheral Muslim reformism implies engaging with different sites of knowledge production to which the reformist authors linked by appropriating different bodies of knowledge, merging them into their concept, narration, and script of reform, and adapting them to the contexts in which they should be applied. This process can be understood as a translation process: first and foremost, as a transfer from one language to another the spectrum of languages involved being ample, as we will see in the following. Beyond that, recent research has pointed to the possibilities of understanding processes of knowledge mobility as processes of translation.58 An approach that is inspired by multi-sited ethnography just as it is the heuristic leitmotiv of this volume – follow the knowledge – helps us, first, to reconstruct the different sites where knowledge originates, second, to understand the different logics of knowledge production being effective at these different sites, and, third, to comprehend the effort of translation when relocalizing knowledge and adapting it to new contexts. At the same time, this approach avoids teleological assumptions as concerns its object of research as it is conceptualized “as an emerging object of study whose contours, sites, and relationships are not known beforehand […].”59 However, Behar’s first editorial, to which I will refer in this chapter now and again, points at a ‘double role’ that knowledge played in the process of making Muslim reformism: as both an emphatic key-word used to promote the idea of reform and the amalgam of con-

57 Baker & Edelstein, “Introduction,” 2. 58 Doris Bachmann-Medick. “From Hybridity to Translation. Reflections on Travelling Concepts, in The Trans/National Study of Culture: A Translational Perspective, ed. Doris Bachmann-Medick (Berlin and Boston: De Gruyter, 2014), 119–136; Doris Bachmann-Medick. “Translation – A Concept and Model for the Study of Culture,” in Travelling Concepts for the Study of Culture, ed. Birgit Neumann and Ansgar Nünning (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2012), 23–43. 59 George E. Marcus, “Ethnography in/of the World System: The Emergence of Multi-Sited Ethnography,” Annual Review of Anthropology 24.1 (1995): 95–117, here 102.

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cepts, scripts, historical narrations, and rhetorical techniques the making of reformism was based on. The investigation of these processes will focus on the analysis of the journal Behar as both a knowledge reservoir60 and a hub that should disseminate knowledge and create publicity. As such, the journal not only classifies and contextualizes different bodies of knowledge, but also documents figurations of connectivity, which enables us to reconstruct trajectories of knowledge mobility. Besides that, due to the fact that Behar was a periodical, its continuous publication helps us understanding temporal dynamics in the processes of knowledge transmission under scrutiny. This will allow us to reconstruct Transottoman intellectual entanglements and to understand the making of Muslim reformism in post-Ottoman Europe as a multidirectional and polycentric process. Building upon Philipp Sarasin’s operationalization of approaching the history of knowledge, my analysis will focus on four questions: (1) I will reconstruct the milieus of mobility and investigate the materiality of knowledge on the move. This implies reconstructing the intellectual biographies of the actors of knowledge, i. e., the persons who define the bodies of knowledge to be popularized and to be appropriated by what they conceptualized in Behar as the ‘audience’. In so doing, I will also seek to understand their motives and the milieus they come from and act in and, in a last step, reconstruct the Bosnian media landscape in which they intervene by founding Behar. (2) After having reconstructed their intellectual biographies and the agendas of these individuals, I will try to reconstruct their discourses of legitimization. Like other students of processes of cultural modernization, I understand these processes as civilizing missions based on the definition of those who civilize and those who have to be civilized. In the context of this case study, the actors of knowledge claim the role of the civilizer while basically conceptualizing their addressees as the ones to be civilized (as a matter of fact, the relationship is slightly more complex, as we will see). Defining these roles was part of the reformist script. (3) Taking the example of Behar’s conceptualization of knowledge, I will analyze how concepts of different origins were translated, appropriated and merged into a reformist narrative. (4) In a last step I will investigate the narrative strategies of popularizing the concept of reform. I will try to broaden the perspective by arguing that processes of knowledge mobility and the very fact of connectivity, as they will have been reconstructed so far, not only contribute to delivering the very substance of reformist discourse, but were staged themselves and, what is more, had to be staged in order to make the concept of ‘modern Islam’ (which has never been, of course, explicitly labeled as such) acceptable to its addressees. At the same time, 60 Frank Grunert and Anette Syndikus, eds., Wissensspeicher der Frühen Neuzeit. Formen und Funktionen (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2015).

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popularizing the idea of reform implied translating the concept of ‘modern Islam’ into the local contexts of Habsburg Bosnia-Herzegovina. I will argue that the actors of knowledge tried do so by applying different techniques of biographicization.

2.

Milieus of mobility and the materiality of knowledge on the move

a)

The imperial framework: Places and institutions of intellectual socialization

The three founders of Behar belonged to the generation of Bosnian-Herzegovinian élite members who grew up and were socialized between two empires: that of the Ottomans and that of the Habsburgs.61 Their intellectual biographies integrated different forms of traditional Muslim education at home,62 elements of late Ottoman primary education63 as well as the instruction provided by new imperial institutions established after the Austro-Hungarian occupation in 1878. After their having attended similar institutions of primary education, the intellectual careers of the three publicists differ: Mulabdic´ attended the TeacherTraining College (Ucˇiteljska ˇskola) in the Bosnian capital,64 while Nuri Hadzˇic´ went first to the College for Sharia Judges (Sˇerijatska sudacˇka ˇskola) in Sarajevo before studying law in Vienna and Zagreb.65 Basˇagic´’s initiation to the in61 Cf. Leyla Amzi-Erdog˘dular, “Alternative Muslim Modernities: Bosnian Intellectuals in the Ottoman and Habsburg Empires,” Comparative Studies in Society and History 59.4 (2017): 912–943; Giomi, Fabio. “Fra Istanbul e Vienna. I musulmani di Bosnia nel periodo austroungarico (1878–1918).” In Spazio privato, spazio pubblico e società civile in Medio Oriente e in Africa del Nord, eds. Daniela Melfa, Alessia Melcangi, Federico Cresti, 459–79. Milan: Giuffrè, 2008; Fikret Karcˇic´. The Bosniaks and the Challenges of Modernity: Late Ottoman and Hapsburg Times (Sarajevo: El-Kalem, 1999). 62 This was of crucial importance in the case of Basˇagic´, who often referred to his father’s retelling of heroic tales on local history and the role Basˇagic´’s ancestors played in it or his introducing him to his abundant library of classical Islamic literature, cf. Gelez, Safvet-beg Basˇagic´, 113–117. For Mulabdic´, too, learning transmitted in a non-institutional framework was of great importance as he used to tell in picturesque anecdotes about his childhood and youth in the town of Maglaj: He was taught the Latin script by one of his childhood friends, who received private lessons from a Habsburg civil servant from Croatia, cf. Nametak, “Edhem Mulabdic´,” 214. 63 For late Ottoman educational institutions, see Benjamin C. Fortna, Imperial Classroom. Islam, the State, and Education in the Late Ottoman Empire (Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press, ´ uric´, Muslimansko 2003); for the way they operated in Habsburg Bosnian, see Hajrudin C ˇskolstvo u Bosni i Hercegovini do 1918. godine (Sarajevo: Veselin Maslesˇa, 1983), 189–241. 64 Nametak, “Edhem Mulabdic´,” 214. 65 Zgodic´, Bosanska politicˇka misao.

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stitutions of imperial élite formation took place at the gymnasia of Sarajevo and Zagreb before his studying oriental languages in Vienna.66 The Velika gimnazija (Great Gymnasium) in Sarajevo,67 from which Basˇagic´ graduated in 1895, was undoubtedly the most prestigious institution of secondary education in the whole of Bosnia, being attended by disciples deriving from all local ethno-confessional groups as well as well-off families originating from other provinces of the empire. Therefore, it counted among its graduates people declaring themselves as Croats, Serbs, Muslims, Jews (both Sephardim and Ashkenazim), Germans, Czechs, and Poles, its most prominent disciples being perhaps the future Nobel Prize Laureate Ivo Andric´ (1892–1975) and Gavrilo Princip (1894–1918), who was to kill Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife during their visit to the Bosnian capital in June, 1914.68 Not only due to the great diversity of its disciples, but also regarding its teaching program the Great Gymnasium was a unique educational institution within the Dual Monarchy. The gymnasium’s teaching program not only aimed at forming loyal élite members by providing its pupils an education considered adequate to take over leading positions in their local communities, but it also reflected the cultural diversity of the local population, whose second biggest group were Muslims. This it had in common with another prominent institution of secondary education established after the occupation of 1878, the College for Sharia Judges.69 Due to their role as hubs of knowledge dissemination and the fact that both institutions were attended by two of the founders of Behar, it is worth taking a closer look at their history and curricula. The College for Sharia Judges was founded 1887 and situated in a building imitating an architecture its Czech author believed to be Islamic.70 Its main goal was securing the education of local qadis for the sharia courts, which were in charge of treating matters of Islamic family law, inheritance law and the law of Muslim foundations as in these realms sharia law was still in effect even after the Austro-Hungarian occupation (as a matter of fact, it was only abolished in so66 Gelez, Safvet-beg Basˇagic´, 153–213. 67 A short sketch of its history in: Dzˇaja, Bosnien-Herzegowina in der österreichisch-ungarischen Epoche, 76–77, and Mitar Papic´, Sˇkolstvo u Bosni i Hercegovini za vrijeme austrougarske okupacije (Sarajevo: Veselin Maslesˇa, 1972), 101–110. 68 Michael Martens, Im Brand der Welten: Ivo Andric´, Ein Europäisches Leben (Wien: Zsolnay, 2019), 45–56. 69 Omer Nakicˇevic´, Historijski razvoj Fakulteta islamskih nauka, 1887–1998. (Sarajevo: Fakultet ´ uric´, Muslimansko ˇskolstvo, 153–154. islamskih nauka, 1998), 125–131; C 70 On orientalizing architecture in Habsburg Bosnia in general: Maximilian Harmut, “Amtssprache Maurisch? Zum Problem der Interpretation des orientalisierenden Baustils im habsburgischen Bosnien-Herzegowina,” in Bosnien-Herzegowina und Österreich-Ungarn, 1878–1918: Annäherungen an eine Kolonie, eds. Clemens Ruthner & Tamara Scheer (Tübingen: Narr Francke Attempto, 2018), 251–266.

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cialist Yugoslavia after World War II). Combining classical Habsburg middle school education with elements of teaching a madrasa would have provided, the syllabus of the College for Sharia Judges included the subjects Bosnian, or as it was called later: Serbo-Croatian, Geography (Zemljopis), History (Povijest), and Mathematics (Matematika), combining these with matters more focused on the office of a sharia judge such as the Law of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy (Pravo), Arabic (Arapski jezik) and Arabic handwriting (Arapsko pismo) and the subjects of classical Islamic jurisprudence (fiqh), focusing on the so-called Roots of Jurisprudence (usu¯l al-fiqh).71 This last subject the statute of the college ˙ translates as History of Law (Povijest prava),72 equating it to what was, due to the great influence of the German Historical School of Jurisprudence (Historische Rechtsschule), at the core of 19th-century academic law studies in the Germanspeaking countries.73 Such a strategy of integrating a subject of traditional Islamic erudition into the canon of a newly established Austro-Hungarian educational institution can be also found in the case of the Great Gymnasium. As its annual reports show, the teaching program of this institution was to a great extent inspired by 19th-century new-humanistic ideas on secondary education laying great emphasis on classics. At the same time, the Great Gymnasium also provided its Muslim disciples with training in Oriental Languages (orijentalni jezici). At the beginning, this meant instruction in what was called elsine-i sela¯se (the three languages) in Ottoman, i. e., language training in Ottoman Turkish, Arabic and Persian as the empire’s three traditional languages of administration, erudition, and poetry. However, this kind of language instruction was abandoned in 1885. Instead, in 1889 Arabic was introduced as a compulsory subject of study. What is interesting in the context of this chapter is the way in which the Arabic classes were integrated into the teaching program of the gymnasium. Arabic was not only labeled as strari (klasicˇni) arapski jezik (Old (Classical) Arabic), equating it to Old Greek as a classical language, but it also formally had the same status as ancient Greek since Muslim pupils were allowed to choose between either Greek or Arabic as their third foreign language (besides German and Latin) which, as the annual school report in 1898 states, “so far all [Muslim pupils, DD] did.”74 Editions of classical Arabic texts as well as the standard works of con-

71 Arhiv Bosne i Hercegovine, Fond Sˇerijatska sudacˇka ˇskola Sarajevo, Kut. br. 49, 3. Raspored predmeta po cˇasovima i nastavnicima sˇk[ole]. 1900–1908. god. I would like to thank Ninja Bumann (Vienna) for giving me access to this material. 72 Arhiv Bosne i Hercegovine, Fond Sˇerijatska sudacˇka sˇkola Sarajevo, Kut. br. 49, 14. Sˇkolske vijesti, statut o ustrojstvu sˇkole 1916–1917. 73 Hans-Jürgen Haferkamp, Die Historische Rechtsschule (Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann, 2018). 74 Trinaesti izvjesˇtaj Velike gimnazije u Sarajevu, (Sarajevo: Landesdruckerei, 1898), 6.

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temporary Oriental Studies were now integrated into the rich library of the gymnasium.75 This approach toward bodies of knowledge of traditional Muslim education was part of a broader strategy of integrating local Muslim élites and making them loyal subjects of the Habsburg Empire. This implied putting the local Muslim culture – or at least those parts the Habsburg administration aimed at integrating – into a new imperial framework. In so doing, a new meaning was given to these bodies of knowledge contextualizing them according to shared experiences and values of imperial élite culture. The cognitive and rhetorical techniques applied in this context not only resemble what was described some decades ago by Edward Said as Orientalism,76 which means strategies of cultural devaluation or positive exoticization (as has been extensively described for the case of Habsburg Bosnia),77 but also much more complex modes of cultural translation: Besides well-known mechanisms of othering and exoticization, the imperial administrators’ dealing with Bosnian Muslims and what they imagined to be their culture implied strategies of interpreting and classifying local social hierarchies according to the logics of societal stratification known from other parts of the empire. Such a simultaneously complex and ambivalent stance toward the Muslim population of Bosnia-Herzegovina was most impressively embodied by Benjamin von Kállay (1839–1903) 78 who, as the joint Austro-Hungarian minister of finances, supervised the provincial administration from 1882 until his death in 1903. Being a connoisseur of local culture and a fluent speaker of Serbian, Kállay had a precise vision of how to coopt local élites and how to modernize the country in a way suitable for what he identified as the needs of a “conservative great power.”79 For local Muslim élites, the new regime’s strategies of cultural integration implied basically two things: (1) the experience of being confronted with the universal features of imperial élite education (including the claim for loyalty toward the ruling house of Habsburg and the belief in the benevolence of its 75 Luka Zdunic´, “Katalog ucˇiteljske biblioteke,” in Dvadeset i trec´i izvjesˇtaj Velike gimnazije u Sarajevu. Sarajevo: Landesdruckerei, 1909), 9–40, here 14. 76 Edward W. Said, Orientalism (New York: Pantheon Books, 1978). 77 To name but two central publications: Johannes Feichtinger, Ursula Prutsch & Moritz Csáky, eds., Habsburg postcolonial. Machtstrukturen und kollektives Gedächtnis (Innsbruck, Wien, München: Studien-Verlag, 2003); Clemens Ruthner & Tamara Scheer, eds., Bosnien-Herzegowina und Österreich-Ungarn, 1878–1918. Annäherungen an eine Kolonie (Tübingen: Narr Francke Attempto, 2018). 78 For his biography, see Gerhard Seewann, “Kállay von Nagykálló, Benjamin,” in Biographisches Lexikon zur Geschichte Südosteuropas, vol 2., eds. Mathias Bernath & Felix von Schroeder (München: Oldenbourg, 1976), 322–324. 79 [Benjamin von Kállay,] Die Lage der Mohammedaner in Bosnien. Von einem Ungarn (Wien: Holzhausen, 1900), 31, 45.

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reign); (2) being provided with tools on how to translate their local social order, cultural traditions and political agendas into the language of the empire. Such an approach could become a meaningful instrument to realize their own reform agenda. Like other narratives of reform, as they had already occurred before in the Ottoman Empire and other parts of the Muslim world, it enabled them to relate themselves to broader concepts of Western culture without denying their Muslim origin. At the same time, communicating reform this way was explicitly in line with official Habsburg policies. To put it in a nutshell: Such an approach made it possible to present oneself as ‘modern,’ a good Muslim, and a loyal subject of the emperor at the same time.

b)

Reformist text production before Behar

Even before establishing the reformist journal Behar, Mulabdic´, Basˇagic´, and Nuri Hadzˇic´ had dealt with question of how to deal with modernity, and they had done so in their very own ways. Mulabdic´ did so as a belletrist. In one of his early works, the novel Zeleno busenje (The Green Bush), he described the inner conflicts of a young Muslim on the eve of the Austro-Hungarian occupation: The protagonist has to decide whether to resist the Habsburg troops or to accommodate himself to the new rulers. He decides to fight the occupation forces and is killed in action. The young girl he wanted to marry is given to another man and dies of grief.80 The experience of the occupation is depicted as traumatic, leaving people disoriented.81 Although dealing with similar questions, Safvet-beg Basˇagic´’s approach was different.82 He started publishing texts in the late 1880s when still attending the Sarajevo Great Gymnasium. Besides being praised as a promising literary talent,83 he soon made a name of himself as a connoisseur of Bosnian Muslim cultural history.84 This was due to his sophisticated knowledge of the elsine-i selase, which he deepened when reading Oriental Studies at Vienna University from 1895 until 1899, where he was also introduced to the imperial capital’s salon culture. Based on his erudition, philological training, and an ever-growing collection of oriental manuscripts the foundation of which was laid by his father Ibrahim-beg (1841–

80 Edhem Mulabdic´, Zeleno busenje. Roman iz doba okupacije Bosne i Hercegovine (Zagreb: Matica hrvatska, 1898). 81 Okey, Taming Balkan nationalism, 95. 82 Zgodic´, Bosanska politicˇka misao, 97–133. 83 Gelez, Safvet-beg Basˇagic´, 157–164. 84 Gelez, Safvet-beg Basˇagic´, 317–330.

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1902),85 he published in 1900 his Kratka uputa u prosˇlost Bosne i Hercegovine (“Short Introduction into the History of Bosnia-Hercegovina”),86 covering the period from 1463 to 1850. The monograph built on a series of public lectures Basˇagic´ had held at the Sarajevo Muslim reading hall (Kiraethane). In this book, the author’s strategy of enumerating wars, battles, as well as the biographies of rulers and ‘great men’ in many respects recalls Joseph von Hammer-Purgstall’s (1774–1856) Geschichte des osmanischen Reiches87 (“History of the Ottoman Empire”), a work Basˇagic´ cites as a source. This narratological approach is only abandoned when Basˇagic´ tells the reader about the benefits of Ottoman rule to the cultural and economic development of Bosnia, especially during the sixteenth century. In this context, Basˇagic´ also emphasizes the important role Bosnian Muslims played in the Ottoman state administration at that time. Two prominent figures the merits of whom Basˇagic´ describes in detail are the 16thcentury Ottoman governor of Bosnia Gazi Husrev Bey (1480–1541)88 and the Ottoman grand vizier Sokollu Mehmed Pasha (1505/6–1579),89 who descended from the Sokolovic´ family in Eastern Bosnia. Besides these, Basˇagic´ identifies 32 top-ranking Ottoman state officials originating from Bosnia for the period between 1544–1612, thereby depicting the Ottoman ‘golden age’ as essentially Bosnian. This strategy of detecting the ‘originally’ Bosnian components of Ottoman political and cultural history and putting them into a Bosnian Muslim narrative would become an approach that Basˇagic´ would apply in his later historical works as well. At the same time, Basˇagic´ depicts late Ottoman rule in Bosnia as a story of growing discontent and alienation. Yet another strategy of defining the place of Bosnian Muslims both in the Muslim world and the Habsburg Monarchy is to be found with Osman Nuri Hadzˇic´. In the 1890s, he published some initial short stories that he penned together with his belletristic alter ego, the Mostar born Croatian writer Ivan Milicˇevic´ (1868–1950),90 under the nom de plume Osman Aziz. Of greater importance in the context of this chapter is his polemical-apologetical monograph 85 When he published an annotated catalog of his collection in 1917, it numbered 249 titles. Cf. Safvet-beg Basˇagic´, “Popis orijentalnih rukopisa moje biblioteke. Priopc´io Dr. Safvet Beg Basˇagic´,” Glasnik zemaljskog muzeja u Bosni i Hercegovini XXVIII (1917): 207–290. 86 Safvet beg Basˇagic´-Redzˇepasˇic´, Kratka uputa u prosˇlost Bosne i Hercegovine, od g. 1463–1850 (Sarajevo: Vlastita naklada, 1900); for Ibrahim-beg’s biography, see Gelez, Safvet-beg Basˇagic´, 53–149. 87 Joseph von Hammer-Purgstall, Geschichte des osmanischen Reiches: Größtentheils aus bisher unbenützten Handschriften und Archiven, 10 vol. (Pest: Hartleben, 1827–1835). 88 For his biography, see Behija Zlatar, Gazi Husrev-beg (Sarajevo: Orijentalni institute, 2009). 89 Erhan Afyoncu, “Sokullu Mehmed Pas¸a,” Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı ˙Islâm ansiklopedisi, vol. 37 (Istanbul: Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı I˙slâm Aras¸tırmaları Merkezi, 2009), 354–357. 90 For a short sketch of his biography, see Matko Dzˇaja, “Milic´evic´, Ivan,” Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, vol. 6 (Zagreb: Izdanje i naklada Jugoslovenskog leksikografskog zavoda), 112.

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on the history of Islam, Islam i kultura (“Islam and Culture”), which he published in 1894. In this book Nuri Hadzˇic´ presents a kind of Muslim ‘catechism’ explaining the foundations of the Islamic faith and at the same time a condensed cultural history of Islam in which he portrays the life of Muhammad, the period of the “Four Rightly Guided Caliphs” during the first century of Islam, the development of the Umayyad and Abbasid caliphate, and the influence of Islam on the Turkish peoples and particularly on the house of Osman. The bodies of knowledge compiled in this book are of most different contexts and milieus: Nuri Hadzˇic´ explicitly and implicitly refers to early biographers of the Prophet, a medieval monk who converted to Islam, enlightened French philosophy, Ottoman and Indo-Muslim modernists, a BritishAmerican professor of Physiology publishing on cultural history, and the founding father of Croatian nationalism. While claiming that “[i]t goes without saying, that in this book, I could not add anything of myself: The teaching of Islam [islamka nauka] is by itself sublime and profound,”91 Nuri Hadzˇic´ presents an interpretation of Islam reflecting the specific situation of the Muslim community in Habsburg Bosnia. His modernist readings of the Quran and Muslim history are based on classical works and genres of Islamic theological literature such as hadith, tafsı¯r (exegesis of the Quran), sı¯ra (biographies of the Prophet), and Arabic historiography, writings of Muslim reformers as well as contemporary Western literature. Merging these different bodies of knowledge, he projects key concepts of the reformist discourse into remote periods of the past as was the usual practice in Muslim reformist writing at that time. How this was operationalized shows in his summary of the 14th and 15th suras of the Quran: The XIV. chapter deals with education [odgoju] and the organization of the family [o odgoju i obiteljskom uredjenju] as well as with learning and knowledge […] The XV. chapter deals with the organization of the state [drzˇavnom oredjenju] and cultural progress [kulturnom napredku].92

Other typical features of contemporary reformist discourse can be found when Nuri Hadzˇic´ talks about the affinity of Islam to science, arguing that the Quran puts forward a heliocentric cosmology.93 The same applies to Nuri Hadzˇic´’s presentations of medieval Muslim history as a genuine symbiosis of religion, culture, and progress, as his account on al-Andalus shows: The new rulers of Spain […] were devout and deeply religious Muslims following the purest form of Islam, but as such they were also upholders of civilization and culture

91 Osman Nuri Hadzˇic´, Islam i kultura (Zagreb: Dionicˇka Tiskara 1894), V. 92 Nuri Hadzˇic´, Islam i kultura, 20, emphasis added. 93 Nuri Hadzˇic´, Islam i kultura, 75.

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[nosioci prosvjete, kulture] that [in this region, DD] had not existed until then and that [now, DD] exceeded everything. […]94 There were built great canals which transformed the country into a huge, blessed garden, trade reached the highest level, and literature and music, grammar, rhetoric, poetics, medical science, philosophy, and all other branches of human knowledge developed most liberally [najliberalnije] […].95

While his approach to Islamic doctrine and history reflects global trends of contemporary Muslim reformist discourse, the context to which he adapts these interpretations is peculiar: In the introduction to this work that is, following conventions of traditional Muslim literature, entitled Mukadime, Nuri Hadzˇic´ explains his motivation when writing his book. As early as when attending the College for Sharia Judges in Sarajevo, the reader is told, he found it to be a good idea if someone of “our learned men” (“koji od nasˇih fakiha i alima”) could “explain in a popular way the teachings of Islam.”96 It came to his mind, he continues, that it was he himself who could write something “about Islam [and] how it collides with culture [kako se sudara sa kulturom] without any polemical goal whatsoever.”97 However, due to a recent publication by a Belgrade-based college professor, Milan Nedeljkovic´, in which that scholar “attacks the holy faith, Islam,”98 stating that “the Mohammedan faith […] impedes every kind of cultural progress and progressive intellectual development,”99 he felt the need to write a different kind of book. He found it to be necessary to correct such a distorted image of Islam and to tell Westerners about its true character. That such interventions do make a difference shows, he argues, the Ottoman case: “That there can be nowadays found here and there some Englishman or Frenchman who thinks differently and correctly about Islam and also writes this way is due to the fact that some Ottomans tried most successfully to defend Islam against attacks.”100 Nuri Hadzˇic´ gives the examples of Ahmed Midhat’s (1844–1912) Hik˙ met-i maddiyeye müda¯faʿa (An Apology for Materialism, 1891),101 Rahmatalla¯h ˙ al-Hindı¯’s (1818–1893) Izha¯r al-haqq (The demonstration of the Truth, 1864),102 ˙ ˙ and ʿAbdalla¯h al-Tarjuma¯n’s (ca. 1355-ca. 1423) Tuhfat al-arı¯b fı¯ al-raddʿala¯ ahl ˙ Nuri Hadzˇic´, Islam i kultura, 44. Nuri Hadzˇic´, Islam i kultura, 45. Nuri Hadzˇic´, Islam i kultura, III. Nuri Hadzˇic´, Islam i kultura, III. Nuri Hadzˇic´, Islam i kultura, IV. Nuri Hadzˇic´, Islam i kultura, 5. Nuri Hadzˇic´, Islam i kultura, IV. M. Orhan Okay, “Ahmed Midhat efendi,” Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı ˙Islâm ansiklopedisi, vol. 2 (Istanbul: Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı I˙slâm Aras¸tırmaları Merkezi, 1989), 100–103. 102 For his biography, see Abdulhamit Biris¸ik, “Rahmetullah el-Hindî,” Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı ˙Islâm Ansiklopedisi, vol. 34 (Istanbul: Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı I˙slâm Aras¸tırmaları Merkezi, 2007), 419–421.

94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101

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al-salı¯b (The Gift to the Intelligent for Refuting the Arguments of the Christians, ˙ 1420).103 Of these three authors, only the first one can be addressed as Ottoman, the second being an Indo-Muslim scholar publishing a reply to an anti-Islamic polemic penned by a Christian missionary, and the third a Majorcan monk who converted to Islam and wrote an anti-Christian polemic in medieval Tunis. What Nuri Hadzˇi refers to when he speaks of “some Ottomans” (“neki Osmanlije”) rather seems to be a kind of late Ottoman canon of apological-polemical literature104 defending Islam against the allegations of Western Orientalism depicting it as a fanatic religion that impedes any progress whatsoever. This is also what Nuri Hadzˇic´ intends to do: Only with the objective of rendering a service to Islam I, too, went to work in order to refute Nedeljkovic´’s attacks, in order to show that Islam elevates its believers, that it leads and urges them to progress [puti ih i tjera na napredak] in order to make them fully develop, and that Islam is no religion that – as Nedeljkovic´ states – kills off any spirit, and thinking, and cultural progress.105

However, it is not only Muslim authors that Nuri Hadzˇic´ refers to when defending Islam, but also Western authorities. This implies a rather selective reception of Voltaire’s Dictionnaire philosophique and more accurate references to William Draper’s (1811–1882)106 History of the Intellectual Development of Europe as well as two treatises published by the Croatian politician Ante Starcˇevic´ (1823– 1896):107 Na cˇemu smo? (“Where do we stand?”) and Turska (“Turkey”). While Voltaire serves as a source for some spicy aperçus on Byzantine Islamophobia,108 both Draper109 and Starcˇevic´110 are cited as witnesses for the civilizational power

103 His Christian name was Anselm Turmeda, cf.: C. Alvar, “Turmeda, Anselm,” Lexikon des Mittelalters, vol. 1 (München: Artemis-Verl., 1980), cols. 689–690. 104 Both works were also translated into Ottoman Turkish. The fact that Nuri Hadzˇic´ refers to Rahmatalla¯h al-Hindı¯ as “Rahmetullah efendi” (efendi being an Ottoman honorific title) and˙ to ʿAbdalla¯h al-Tarjuma¯n as “Mevlana Abdullah” (Mevla¯na being a Persian-Ottoman title for religious authorities) points to an Ottoman-Persian trajectory of knowledge mobility. 105 Nuri Hadzˇic´, Islam i kultura, IV–V. 106 For his biography see Donald Fleming, John William Draper and the Religion of Science (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1950). 107 For his biography, see Holm Sundhaussen, “Starcˇevic´, Ante,” in Biographisches Lexikon zur Geschichte Südosteuropas, vol. 4, eds. Mathias Bernath & Karl Nehring (München: Oldenbourg, 1981), 169–173. 108 Nuri Hadzˇic´, Islam i kultura, 2. Nuri Hadzˇic´ does not give the title of any of Voltaire’s works, but the passage most obviously paraphrases the article “Alcoran, ou plutôt le Koran” in Voltaire, Œuvres complètes. Tome 17: Dictionnaire philosophique (Paris: Garnier, 1878), 98– 106, especially 100. 109 See Nuri Hadzˇic´, Islam i kultura, 44. Here again, only the author, but no title is given. Still, the passage in question can be traced back to John William Draper, History of the Intellectual Development of Europe (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1863), 352.

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of Islam. What is more, their statements are contrasted with the distorted image of Islam drawn by some “Teutonic scribes” (sˇvabskim [sic!] piscima) and “the Hungarian Vámbéry.”111 Nuri Hadzˇic´ reproaches the former for insufficient knowledge of the Arabic language and the latter, Ármin Vámbéry (1832–1913),112 an internationally distinguished scholar and professor of Oriental languages at the University of Budapest at that time, for fantasizing about Muslim domestic life without ever having seen a Muslim household from the inside.113 Here we can observe how universal features of contemporary Muslim apologetic discourse are fused with elements related to the situation of Muslims in Habsburg Bosnia. Refuting the anti-Islamic polemic penned by Milan Nedeljkovic´, to whom he mostly refers as “the little Serb Nedeljkovic´” (“Srbo Nedeljkovic´”), Nuri Hadzˇic´ reproduces the ideological matrix of Starcˇevic´’s concept of the Croatian nation that was based on anti-German, anti-Hungarian, and anti-Serbian resentment. Starcˇevic´ considered the Bosnian Muslims an integral part of the Croatian people and drew a positive image of Islam and the Ottoman Empire,114 which made him an ideal reference for Nuri Hadzˇic´’s polemic apologia. The example of Nuri Hadzˇic´’s book demonstrates how Muslim reformists defined the substance of Islam: as a religion that “leads and urges” its believers “to progress.” It also shows how during the process of constructing and popularizing such a reformist vision of Islam, different bodies of knowledge originating from outside Bosnia were appropriated and fused into one single concept. Besides references to the Prophet as the highest human authority in Islam, the figure of the expert as authority on Islam played a crucial role in this process: Citing these experts aimed at justifying, legitimizing and substantiating the reformist argument. The role of the expert could be taken on by scholars from the classical age of Islam, authors who were addressed as “Ottoman”, or Western writers. Each role pattern had different symbolic meaning: The members of the first group were ascribed the authority of presenting canonical knowledge; the Ottoman defenders of Islam were described as role models for Muslims in Habsburg Bosnia; Western authors, for their part, were cited as experts witnessing the real character of Islam in spite of all of the anti-Islamic bias in the Western world – which lent an even bigger credence to their argument. In this 110 See Nuri Hadzˇic´, Islam i kultura, 57–67 with extensive citation of Ante Starcˇevic´, Na cˇemu smo (Zagreb: Dionicˇka Tiskara, 1878) and Ante Starcˇevic´, “Turska,” Hervatska I (1869): 52– 70. 111 Nuri Hadzˇic´, Islam i kultura, 8. 112 For his biography, see Klára Hegyi, “Vambéry, Ármin,” in Biographisches Lexikon zur Geschichte Südosteuropas, vol. 4, eds. Mathias Bernath & Karl Nehring (München: Oldenbourg, 1981), 384–385. 113 Nuri Hadzˇic´, Islam i kultura, 3 and 6. 114 For Starcˇevic´’s ideology, see Mirjana Gross, Izvorno pravasˇtvo. Ideologija, agitacija, pokret (Zagreb: Golden marketing, 2000).

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context the symbolic meaning of the assigned role was more important than its actual consistency with the biography of the person concerned. Authors who were perceived through an Ottoman prism were addressed as Ottomans no matter where and when they actually lived. And writers putting forward negative stereotypes of Islam were generally presented as ignorant. In the case of Milan Nedeljkovic´, this verdict was undoubtedly correct since his expertise regarding Islam was indeed debatable: He studied Mathematics and Physics in Belgrade and Paris and was professor of Astronomy and Meteorology at the Velika ˇskola (“the High School”) in Belgrade, the predecessor of Belgrade University.115 What he presented in his treatise was a simple reproduction of contemporary Orientalism, including the usual verbiage on geopolitics, civilizing missions, and ‘the white man’s burden.’ However, it is not quite clear why an author like William Draper, whom Nuri Hadzˇic´ presents as an expert on Islamic history, should be more competent than Nedeljkovic´. Like Nedeljkovic´, Draper was a trained scientist. He held a chair for chemistry at the Medical School of New York University. What he presented in his writings on cultural history was only secondhand knowledge,116 just as was the case with Nedeljkovic´ – with the single difference that Draper was in line with Nuri Hadzˇic´’s argument and Nedeljkovic´ was not. As we will see, both Basˇagic´’s and Nuri Hadzˇic´’s approaches to Islam and Islamic history were a model for Behar, especially during the first years of its publication. Before discussing this in detail, we shall have a look at the Bosnian Muslim media landscape at that time in order to understand the extent to which the foundation of Behar meant an innovation.

c)

On the mediality and materiality of reformist knowledge dissemination: Muslim periodicals in Habsburg Bosnia and Behar’s new approach

In his methodological foundation of intellectual history, Quentin Skinner pleads for conceptualizing texts as speech acts that intervene in a certain debate.117 In order to understand the meaning of the text we must, according to Skinner, also reconstruct the debate in which it is intervening. In the case of Behar, this intervention took place by establishing and publishing a periodical, which meant intervening by regularly issuing a whole composition of texts. Therefore, analyzing these texts requires reconstructing both the debate(s) in which they are 115 For his biography, see Pavle Vujevic´, “Milan Nedeljkovic´,” in Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, vol. 6, (Zagreb: Izdanje i naklada Jugoslovenskog leksikografskog zavoda, 1965), 265–266. 116 On Draper as a historian: Fleming, John William Draper, 74–94. 117 Quentin Skinner, Visions of Politics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002).

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intervening, and the intertextual connections and references made within the newspaper itself and beyond, e. g. by reacting to articles in other newspapers. This last point once again points out the importance of the materiality and mediality of knowledge in processes of knowledge transmission.118 Behar was not the first Bosnian periodical that wrote about issues of reform and addressed broader Muslim audiences. As a matter of fact, issuing periodicals in Bosnia and Herzegovina was from its very beginning connected to the idea of disseminating concepts of ‘modernization.’ This process started in the 1860s when the Ottoman administration began publishing newspapers and yearbooks. Focused on informing its readership about the activities of the Ottoman administration, issuing such periodicals was part of a far-reaching political agenda aiming at optimizing the efficiency of state institutions, increasing the productivity of local economies and redefining interconfessional relationships in terms of equality as well as the relationship toward the imperial metropolis, based on the idea of Ottoman imperial patriotism.119 This was a strategy also to be adopted by the Habsburg administration from the early 1880s when it started issuing a provincial yearbook in Ottoman Turkish.120 At the same time, the provincial administration began to sponsor local newspapers. Some of these projects were quite ephemeral, while others such as the newspapers Vatan (The ˙ Fatherland; published in Ottoman Turkish) and Bosˇnjak (The Bosniak; published in Bosnian) were more successful – at least in terms of continuous publication: Vatan was issued between 1884 and 1902 (since 1902 under the new title Rehber) ˙ and Bosˇnjak 1891–1910.121 Vatan had its heyday in the 1880s when it counted about 600 subscribers. The ˙ fact that it was published in Turkish meant a symbolic recognition of the language of Ottoman imperial élites, which was still in high esteem with members of the local Bosnian Muslim upper classes. Furthermore, it made it a means of communication with different audiences in the Ottoman Empire as well, with 132 of its 403 subscribers in 1895 living outside Bosnia-Herzegovina. Having such a wide outreach, Vatan was supposed to demonstrate the new regime’s benevolent ˙

118 Sarasin, “Was ist Wissensgeschichte,” 167–169. 119 Kemal Karpat, “Historical Continuity and Identity Change, or: How to Be Modern Muslim, Ottoman, and Turk,” Ottoman Past and Today’s Turkey, ed. Kemal Karpat (Leiden: Brill, 2000), 1–28; Maurus Reinkowski, Die Dinge der Ordnung: Eine vergleichende Untersuchung über die osmanische Reformpolitik im 19. Jahrhundert, (München: Oldenburg, 2005), 249– 253. On periodicals in late Ottoman Bosnia and Herzegovina: Minka Memija. Bosanski vjesnici: Pocˇeci ˇstampe kod bosanskih Muslimana. Sarajevo: El Kalem, 1996. 120 Bosna ve Hersek sa¯lna¯mesi (Sarajevo: Bosna postası matbaʿası, 1882–1893). Cf. Bisera ˙ Nurudinovic´, “Bosanske salname,” Prilozi za orijentalnu filologiju 10/11 (1960): 253–265. 121 Dzˇaja, Bosnien-Herzegowina in der österreichisch-ungarischen Epoche, 100.

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attitude toward Muslims in Bosnia-Hercegovina, making them refrain from emigrating into the Ottoman Empire.122 Bosˇnjak had a quite similar program. Its founder was Mehmed-beg Kapetanovic´ Ljubusˇak (1839–1902), a landowner, former Ottoman public official, and member of the first Ottoman parliament in 1876, who acted from 1893 to 1898 as mayor of Sarajevo. Besides that, he was an aficionado of both learned oriental and local oral Muslim literature, which he collected and translated, and an author of poetry under the pen name (makhlas) Muhibi.123 Kapetanovic´ was not only ˙ among the first members of local landowning Muslim élites with whom AustriaHungary got in touch on the eve of the occupation, but he was also the first one to use the new public arenas of the Habsburg Monarchy for his own purposes. Already in 1879, only one year after the occupation, he published two articles in the Viennese paper Die Presse. Both articles reacted to criticism in the South Slav press, reproaching the new occupational régime not to touch upon the sensitive question of landownership in Bosnia-Herzegovina where, according to these reproaches, a class of reactionary Muslim landowners was exploiting their Christian serfs (kmet, pl. kmeti) in a most scandalous way. In his response Kapetanovic´ argues that the Bosnian Muslim landed classes, the so-called begs and agas, formed a local aristocracy that was rooted in the pre-Ottoman Medieval ages. It had had, he argues, a legal title on its land ever since this time and kept a tradition of Bosnian statehood all during the Ottoman rule. The message of this intervention is clear: The Bosnian landed class was an aristocracy the possessions of which should not be touched; like other local aristocracies in the Habsburg Empire, too, it could be a pillar of imperial rule.124 In so arguing, he translated the late Ottoman structures of social order and ownership into the language of the new empire in order to ensure their preservation. In some way, Bosˇnjak meant a continuation of this line of argumentation, although it was more focused on the question of how to prevent Muslim emigration into the Ottoman Empire and how to adapt to what was addressed as challenges of the present.125 Bosˇnjak did so by blending elements of symbolic Westernization (the newspaper was published in the Bosnian vernacular, not in Ottoman Turkish, the script used being Latin, not Arabic) with popular hadiths and modernist concepts of late Ottoman origin. How this was done is illustrated by an article which was penned by Safvet-beg Basˇagic´ when he was still a disciple 122 Todor Krusˇevac, Bosansko-hercegovacˇki listovi u XIX. veku (Sarajevo: Veselin Maslesˇa, 1978), 181–186; Tomislav Kraljacˇic´, Kalajev rezˇim (Sarajevo: Veselin Maslesˇa, 1987), 187–189. 123 For his biography, see Zgodic´, Bosanska politicˇka misao, 39–67. 124 “Streitschrift eines bosnischen Beg,” in Die Presse 115 (27. 4. 1879): 4, and “Ein Beg wider Stambul,” in Die Presse 153 (5. 6. 1879): 1–2; cf. Dzˇaja, Bosnien-Herzegowina in der österreichisch-ungarischen Epoche, 208–209; Kraljacˇic´, Kalajev rezˇim, 196–197. 125 Krusˇevac, Bosansko-hercegovacˇki listovi, 236–261.

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of the Sarajevo gymnasium.126 It has the programmatic title Hubb-ul vatani minel iman. Ljubav otadzˇbine s vjerom je skopc´ana. Hadis (“Patriotism is connected to Faith. A Hadith”).127 In this article, Basˇagic´ appeals to Bosˇnjak’s readership not to leave Bosnia and to abstain from emigrating to the Ottoman Empire, referring both to a saying of the prophet and the concept of vatan (fatherland), which was ˙ at the core of late Ottoman patriotic discourse.128 However, Bosˇnjak never really resonated with a broader Muslim audience, one reason being its notorious allegiance to the Habsburg administration, which many Muslims still experienced as foreign rule, and another one being its Westernized outlook. The fact that the cause of the loyalist reformists was generally lacking support became most obvious in 1899 when a new Muslim movement headed by Ali Fehmi Dzˇabic´ (1853–1918), a mufti, emerged in the Herzegovinian town of Mostar. Its immediate cause was the conversion of a young Muslim woman to Catholicism. Although this incident was obviously motivated by local traditions of bride abduction and not by any strategy of converting Muslims to Christianity, it nurtured diffuse fears among the Muslim population that now, since they were brought under the rule of a Christian emperor, their faith was in danger. Local Muslim élites supported the movement in order to gain back control over local Muslim institutions, especially the religious endowments that, after the occupation, were put under the supervision of the Habsburg administration.129 As in the case of the autonomy movement of the local Serb population and their élites, whose political struggle had started some years previously, the status of Bosnia-Herzegovina as regards its international status was to play an important role: according to the resolutions of the Congress of Berlin in 1878, Bosnia-Herzegovina was still formally a part of the Ottoman Empire. Therefore, the more radical wing of the movement around Dzˇabic´ was seeking for Bosnia the status of an autonomous province under the rule of the Sultan. Beyond that, emotional bonds to the Sultan as Caliph and head of the umma were of crucial importance for the Muslim autonomy movement.130 Unlike the reformist loyalists, this movement had a considerable support with great numbers of adherents. If they did not want to be totally marginalized, the 126 Gelez, Safvet-beg Basˇagic´, 167–176. 127 S[afvet-beg]. B[asˇagic´]., “Hubb-ul vatani min-el iman. Ljubav otadzˇbine s vjerom je skopcˇana,” in Bosˇnjak 9, (27. 8. 1891): 2–3. 128 Karpat, The Politicization of Islam, 329–335. 129 Ferdo Hauptmann: Borba muslimana Bosne i Hercegovine za vjersku i vakufsko-mearifsku autonomiju (Sarajevo: Arhiv Socijalisticˇke Republike Bosne i Hercegovine, 1967); Nusret Sˇehic´, Autonomni pokret Muslimana za vrijeme austrougarske uprave u Bosni i Hercegovini. Sarajevo: Svjetlost, 1980; Robert J. Donia, Islam pod Dvoglavnim orlom (Sarajevo, Institut za historiju BiH), 83–198. 130 Bozˇo Madzˇar, Pokret Srba Bosne I Hercegovine za vjersko prosvjetnu samoupravu (Sarajevo: Veselin Maslesˇa, 1982); Kraljacˇic´, Kalajev rezˇim, 400–429.

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reformists had to find an adequate answer to this traditionalist mass movement. A new strategy was needed. Establishing Behar was part of it. This intervention into public discourse meant a novelty, as Behar was a cultural magazine, defining its role and character in its subtitle as a “paper for instruction and entertainment” (list za pouku i zabavu). There existed already three such journals in Habsburg Bosnia: Nada (Hope),131 which was issued by the Habsburg administration during the years 1895 and 1903, being the centerpiece of its civilizing mission at that time, Bosanska vila (The Bosnian Fairy), a journal established by four Serb teachers in 1884,132 and Zora (Dawn), which had been published by a group of Bosnian Serb poets and writers since 1896. Combining local literary production, both ‘modern’ and traditional, i. e. oral, literature, with historical-patriotic treatises, translations of contemporary international literature, and feuilletons about the cultural life in Bosnia and beyond, Bosanska vila, in spite of its divergent political orientation, can be, at least to a certain extent, considered a kind of model for Behar. As a matter of fact, the question whether Behar should, like Bosanska vila, focus on literature and on stimulating the domestic production of literary texts, or whether its major task was to educate the local Muslim community by focusing on popularizing a modernist interpretation of Islam, was a matter of constant dispute between the core collaborators of Behar, which, at times, turned into open conflict.133 This could be seen when Safvet-beg Basˇagic´ who was keen to keep both approaches in balance, lay down editorship in 1901 and boycotted the journal for the subsequent two years, or in 1903, when Osman Nuri Hadzˇic´, who advocated focusing on the reformist issues left the journal in protest against Basˇagic´’s return, or finally in 1906, when Edhem Mulabdic´ was removed as editor and the magazine, for the only time in its history, turned into a periodical with a clearly defined focus on politics, social questions, and the economy, a publication policy which was already abandoned by the following year.134 However, Behar never totally abandoned one of its two focuses, which meant being a literary journal and a voice of Muslim reformism, until the last year of its publication, 1909 to 1910, when it turned into a literary journal promoting the cause of Croatian nationalism.135 What is more, in spite of changing its publication policies, which will be discussed in the next section of this chapter, Behar succeeded in producing a more or less coherent narrative that reads as a story of Muslimness being a positive self-image that included, beyond feelings of reli´ oric´, Knjizˇevnohistorijska monografija, 1895–1903 (Sarajevo, Svjetlost: 1978). 131 Boris C 132 Dejan "uricˇkovic´, Bosanska vila, 1885–1914, Knjizˇevnoistorijska studija (Sarajevo: Svjetlost, 1975). 133 Rizvic´, Behar, 14–42. 134 Rizvic´, Behar, 119–242. 135 Rizvic´, Behar, 370–375.

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gious commonality, imaginations of a shared local and global Muslim history. Presenting a glorifying imagination of this shared history, advocating for cultural and societal progress, portraying Muslim societies as dynamic when reporting about their cultural production, and talking about the ongoing expansion of Islam – also in terms of new believers embracing it, especially in Western countries – were at the core of producing Muslimness as a concept of commonality. This image of dynamic Muslim societies all around the globe aimed at showing the potentials and possibilities of societal and cultural development in terms of reform. At the same time Behar – and this will be also analyzed in the following – did not spare critique of what it identified as cultural and economic backwardness. The bodies of knowledge Behar’s concept of Muslimness included, integrated, and, in so doing, reinterpreted were taken from different contexts: local Muslim tradition, Ottoman history as well as recent discourses within the Ottoman Empire, Islamic tradition and global Muslim history, and current works of writers and thinkers who could be either labeled as ‘Muslim’ or ‘Western.’ As we will see in the following, each of these was given a particular role when constructing the narration of Muslimness. This focus implied presenting and popularizing the program of Muslim reformism in a way that was different from reformist journals that were published in other parts of the Muslim world such as al-Mana¯r in Egypt136 or Shu¯ra¯ in the Russian Empire137 that clearly had a religious focus and reproduced texts belonging to the traditional genres of Muslim theological literature, mainly tafsı¯r and fatwa – which Behar did not. This as well as the fact that two of Behar’s three founders had a clearly secular background and that, in the moment Behar was founded, the idea of loyalist reformism was lacking public support, meant serious challenges for making the reformist agenda acceptable to its addressees. At the same time, this publicist endeavor found favor with the imperial administration of Bosnia-Herzegovina: When the founders of Behar sought the Provincial Government’s (Landesregierung, Zemaljska vlada) obligatory approval to establish this new periodical, the Habsburg governor (Chef der Lan-

136 Kosuyi Yasushi, “Al-Mana¯r revisited: The ‘Lighthouse’ of the Islamic revival,” in Intellectuals in the Modern Islamic World, eds. Stephane A. Dudoignon, Komatsu Hisao & Kosugi Yasushi (London: Routledge, 2006), 3–39. 137 Stéphane A. Dudoignon, “Echoes to al-Mana¯r among the Muslims of the Russian Empire: a preliminary research note on Riza al-Din b. Fakhr al-Din and the Sˇu¯ra¯, 1908–1918,” in Intellectuals in the Modern Islamic World, eds. Stephane A. Dudoignon, Komatsu Hisao & Kosugi Yasushi (London: Routledge, 2006), 85–116.

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desregierung), Johann Baron Appel (1826–1906, acting governor 1882–1903),138 pointed out Behar’s planned topical focus on the positive side: According to the sketch of the program that was added to the application, this journal will be dedicated to instruction and entertainment [Belehrung und Unterhaltung]. However, “Behar’s” focus will be on moral-religious education of the Mohammedan element [die sittlich-religiöse Ausbildung des mohammedanischen Elementes]. A political tendency of the paper is out of question; daily and world events [Tages- und Weltreignisse] will be simply registered without any comment just as chroniclers do.139

Also, the orientation of the editor Safvet-beg Basˇagic´ and the publisher, Ademaga Mesˇic´ as well as the material situation of the latter (Mesˇic´ was a well-off merchant) were positively highlighted: The financial circumstances of Mesˇic´ […] are favorable. For this reason and for he is intelligent, liberal in his views, and progressive [weil er intelligent, in seinen Anschauungen liberal und fortschrittlich gesinnt ist] the interested party [i. e. the initiators of the periodical, DD] decided to let him take the lead of this undertaking.140

As regards Basˇagic´, Appel concludes that his previous conduct and activities as a writer could be considered a guarantee that the journal would indeed take the apolitical and loyalist direction the journal’s program promised. Besides that, Appel points out Basˇagic´’s excellent education and his belonging to the loyal part of the Muslim élite, his father Ibrahim-beg being the head of the institution administering the Muslim pious endowments (Arabic waqf, Bosnian vakuf) in Bosnia-Herzegovina: Basˇagic´, the son of the president of the Vakuf Commission, was educated at university and undoubtedly belongs to the most well-read and most exact writers among the younger local Mohammedans [besitzt Hochschulbildung und zählt unstreitig zu den belesensten und gründlichsten Schriftstellern unter den hierländigen jüngeren Mohammedanern].141

Both the emergence of the traditionalist Muslim autonomy movement and the Habsburg administration keeping the media under strict control defined the reformists’ scope when putting forward their agenda. Behar’s topical focus was an answer to both these challenges: Focusing on ‘culture’ and ‘Islamic topics’ was in line with the aim of moderate modernization without political emancipation as was pursued by the Habsburg administration. This strategy had also been 138 For his biography, see “Appel, Johann,” Österreichisches Bibliographisches Lexikon, 1815– 1950, vol. 1 (Graz: Böhlau, 1956), 26. 139 The governor’s letter to the Austro-Hungarian Joint Ministry of Finance is published in the source edition: Risto Besarovic´, ed., Kultura i umjetnost u Bosni i Hercegovini pod austrougraskom upravom. (Sarajevo: Arhiv Bosne i Hercegovine, 1968), 151. 140 Besarovic´, Kultura i umjetnost, 151. 141 Besarovic´, Kultura i umjetnost, 151.

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adopted by the Bosnian cultural magazine Bosanska vila mentioned above. The model of Bosanska vila also showed that ‘culture’ could be a field to negotiate political matters without transgressing the boundaries set by the regime of ‘preventive censorship’ that was applied until 1907 and which implied having all texts be checked by the Habsburg administration before publishing them.142 As regards the Muslim readership, the new emphasis on Islamic topics could help to argue that the reformist agenda was in line with the teachings of Islam and, what is more, that it was in fact Behar defending Islam by reforming it – and not the autonomists holding firm to their traditionalist agenda. However, the editors and contributors to Behar avoided confronting the autonomy movement, but rather adopted a strategy of ignoring it. They did not want to write something negative about the autonomists, but could not write anything positive, so they simply decided not to write anything, explained the former editor-in–chief Edhem Mulabdic´ when reminiscing about Behar’s beginnings forty years later.143 As Appel’s report on Behar shows, the loyalist reformists’ strategy of adapting to the situation of imperial rule in order to be able to put forward their agenda worked. From the governor’s point of view, Behar’s publisher and its editors met the requirements of the Habsburg administration: He describes them as loyal, competent and well-educated, for they had attended imperial educational institutions. The terminology used by Appel to qualify their orientation was identical to the terms the reformists used in their publications themselves: progressive (fortschrittlich, napredan) and liberal (liberal, liberalan). Still, as already mentioned, the main task was to convince the addressees of the reform agenda: the Muslim population in Bosnia-Herzegovina. This was a much more difficult task. Here, the reformist script came into play.

3.

Scripting reform: Behar’s approach to Muslim reformism

As already outlined, scripting reform was a complex process. It meant translating the reformists’ analysis of society and culture into an agenda that was understandable and acceptable to its readers. It was most visible as a technique of communication during those periods when the reformist orientation of the journal was at the core of its agenda (even though its content being a controversial issue between the editors and collaborators).144 142 "uric´kovic´, Bosanska vila. 143 Edhem Mulabdic´, “Behar: Prilikom 40-godisˇnjice njegova pokretanja,” Narodna Uzdanica. Kalendar za godinu 1940, 99–111. 144 Unfortunately, there is a lack of archival sources that would allow reconstruction of such controversies in detail. However, in the collection of Basˇagic´’s correspondence in the Municipal Archive of Sarajevo there can be found some hints, for example a letter by certain

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As we have already seen when analyzing Behar’s first editorial at the beginning of this chapter, besides outlining social roles, the reformist script included the definition of the present situation as crisis. The discursive making of crisis was the precondition for legitimizing the reformist intervention into everyday life, aiming at an adaption of culture and society to what was described as the cultural, social, and economic needs of the present. Behar usually did so by contrasting the situation of the local Bosnian Muslim population to what was addressed as the “civilized nations” (“kulturni narodi”) outside Bosnia. Constructing crisis gained a new quality when Behar’s publication changed ˇ ausˇevic´ (1870– drastically in 1906 and the Muslim scholar (ʿalı¯m) Dzˇemaludin C 1938) replaced Edhem Mulabdic´. ˇ ausˇevic´ outlines once again what he considers the mission of In this editorial C Behar from its very beginning: When we established Behar six years ago, we did so with the good intention to start a noble enterprise that can be really useful and beneficial [biti od velike koristi i hajra] for our Islamic people [nasˇ islamski narod] and its progress [napredak] in these lands. It was our only wish that “Behar”, as a purely Islamic paper [cˇisto islamsko glasilo] will be the center of our cultural life and efforts [sredisˇte nasˇeg kulturnog zˇivota i nastojanja], a benchmark and mirror of our cultural strength – to put it briefly: that it will be a paper around which will gather all who are noble and good, all who are willing and able to act for the benefit and prosperity of our Islamic element, especially as regards its religious education [vjerski odgoj]. Its program can be summed up in two words: Islam and culture [Islam i prosvjeta]; this means to work on Islamic religious education [rad za islamski vjerski odgoj] and the cultural rebirth of our Islamic people [prosvjetni preporod nasˇeg islamskog naroda].145

ˇ ausˇevic´ argues, also demands Such cultural progress, C that we secure the material basis. However, to be honest, our economic situation is not really to be called ideal: our trade is nowhere near the level on which it should be, and there is no such thing as industry among us – our economic situation is just horrible. Our people somehow got lost, they do not know how to orient themselves in this modern world, and they are not able to use what they have.146

That is why Behar, the editorial continues, will also publish articles on economic matters, especially the agrarian question. This in no way meant abandoning Behar’s programmatic basis; on the contrary, the editorial argues:

Ibro from Mostar from June 1902, in which he expresses his regrets that the relationship between Basˇagic´ and the editors deteriorated (Historijski arhiv Sarajevo, Fond Ostavsˇtina Safvet-bega Basˇagic´a, Kut. 1, Godina 1885–1928.). Such tensions can be also seen by Behar’s changing publishing policy, cf. Muhsin Rizvic´, Behar, 156–442. ˇ italjima na pocˇetku sedme godine,” in Behar 7,1 (1906/1907): 1–2, here 1. 145 “C ˇ italjima na pocˇetku sedme godine,” 2. 146 “C

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The precondition of a people’s cultural progress and spiritual development is – as we have already mentioned – its material wealth [materijalno dobrostanje]; a people – the same holds true for individuals – that has to struggle for its survival [boriti za svoj opstanak] and its daily bread cannot think of any spiritual development whatsoever. Such a people is not to remain an important and esteemed member of the human community, but it is condemned to vegetate as a slave before finally perishing.147

ˇ ausˇevic´ develops here is no simple connection between economic prosWhat C perity and cultural progress. It is sharp criticism of what is presented as the current state of the Muslim community in Bosnia. The economic situation is depicted as miserable and the Muslim population as disoriented. The editorial not only paints a gloomy picture of the present, but it also contains a clear warning: If the Bosnian Muslims are not able to reform their cultural and social life, if they do not improve their economic performance in order to match up with other peoples, they are to go under. This is perhaps the most obvious appropriation of Social Darwinist thought in Behar; still, it describes Behar’s general approach to the ideas of crisis and reform. At the same time, evoking crisis never went without showing ways out of it. This rhetorical technique of carrot and stick was already applied in the first issue of Behar published in 1900 as a programmatic article penned by Osman Nuri Hadzˇic´ illustrates: “[…] the guide [putokaz, literal translation: signpost] that is to lead us on the road to culture [da nas vodi na putu prosvjete] and how to adapt [da udesimo] our life in general, as individuals and hopefully also as families, is our holy faith: Islam.”148 According to Nuri Hadzˇic´, this capacity of Islam is grounded in its quality of being both a reasonable and progressive religion: “Islam is the faith of reason, its foundations contain the principles of progress, improvement, kindness, and mercy [nacˇela napredka, usavrsˇenja, dobrostivosti i milosrdja].”149 Therefore, the reason for stagnation and backwardness is not, as Western and local critics argue, Islam, but quite the contrary: it is the insufficient knowledge of its teachings and true character that causes the current crisis of the local Muslim community, Nuri Hadzˇic argues: And because of this very fact that we have not immersed ourselves in the basic truths of our faith, that we do not understand the ethical dimension of Islam as we should, we see in everyday life horrible examples of how our people neglect to live the way Islam demands. While everybody else takes care of educating himself and how to improve his material situation, we neglect both without any remorse. However, in so doing, we sin against Islam and its teachings [protiv Islama i islamske nauke] that do not confine

ˇ italjima na pocˇetku sedme godine,” in Behar 7,1 (1906/1907): 1–2, here 2. 147 “C 148 Osman Nuri Hadzˇic, “Nacˇela Islama i nasˇ zadatak” in Behar 1.1 (1900/01): 6–9, here 6 [emphasis added]. 149 Nuri Hadzˇic, “Nacˇela Islama i nasˇ zadatak,” 7.

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themselves to formalities, but teach men how to improve spiritually and to become useful members of the community [koristan cˇlan ljudske zajednice].150

This is what is indeed at the core of the eulogy on knowledge analyzed at the very beginning of this chapter: to learn about the true character of Islam and to apply this knowledge to everyday life. And this is what Behar considered an essential aspect of its mission: disseminating knowledge on Islam – or to be more precise: to popularize knowledge on what its editors believed to be the true essence of Islam. This implied publishing treatises on the theological foundations and the teachings of Islam, but also small pieces on its history. Many of these texts were short biographies. Another programmatic article from 1900 emphasizes the educational benefits of such biographical reading: The great men from the Islamic past [Veliki muzˇevi islamske prosˇlosti] and the immortal deeds inspired by their genius are lasting monuments and eternal proof of the civilizing mission Islam accomplished on three continents [dokaz civilizatorne misije, koju je Islam vrsˇio u tri djela svijeta]. And just as the gentle spring sun warms and reanimates nature after the lethargy of winter, such healthy and useful reading [about them] refreshes human feelings, warms the heart, sharpens the intellect, and ennobles the soul. […] This is why Behar’s intention to familiarize, based on sources, our people with Islam’s glorious past and [thereby] to give them an understanding of their exalted faith is most noble and, so God will, also most useful for our Islamic people in BosniaHerzegovina [za nasˇ sviet [sic] u Bosni i Hercegovini]. If the Arabs, Persians, and Ottomans [za Arabe, Persijance i Osmanlije] who are closer to and more familiar with the sources of Islam and its past [vrela Islama i islamske prosˇlosti] need such papers and books, we need them even more.151

The cited passage sheds a light on the question of how knowledge is defined and evaluated and at the same time transmitted and appropriated during the process of scripting reform. The anonymous author – very likely Osman Nuri Hadzˇic´ again – identifies the models for such biographical writing: literature, both monographs and periodicals, from the Ottoman Empire and other regions of the Arabic and Persian speaking world. And finally, the author shows a way of understanding the ‘true character’ of Islam that differs from traditional Islamic methods of knowledge transmission: The latter would imply reading and internalizing canonical texts, in the first place the corpora of the Quran and sunnah, which, as a technique of knowledge acquisition, is not mentioned in this article. Instead, the author focuses on historicizing Islam in order to understand its cultural and ethical dimensions. This approach was, as we will see, to become a 150 Nuri Hadzˇic, “Nacˇela Islama i nasˇ zadatak,” 8. 151 [Osman Nuri Hadzˇic´], “Zadac´a ‘Behara’. Pismo urednisˇtvu,” in Behar 1.13, 206–208, here 206.

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point of harsh controversy between the local Islamic hierarchy and the editors of Behar. Writing about the educational use of the biographies of the “great men from the Islamic past,” the author seems to have thought of figures from the first centuries of Islam and the Muslim medieval ages, which both Muslim modernists and contemporary Western scholarship considered the heyday of Muslim cultural history. Biographies from this period that Behar presented to readers were, e. g., the life of the historiographer Ibn Khaldu¯n or the lives of the ‘founders’ of the four ‘legal schools’ (madhhab) of Sunni Islam. When Nuri Hadzˇic´ pays tribute in one of these biographies to the religious scholar Abu¯ Hanı¯fa and “his ˙ morality, his virtue, his exemplary life [uzorni zˇivot], his willingness to make sacrifices [pozˇrtvenost] and his efforts for the common good [nastojanje za opc´e dobro]”152 it becomes apparent that these biographies also intended to popularize role models. Still, such role models were not only taken from remote periods of history, nor were all the biographies selected referring to people of a past which can be first and foremost addressed as ‘Islamic.” This is most obviously the case with biographical accounts on non-Muslims like Johannes Guttenberg or Christopher Columbus, but it also holds true for figures from recent Ottoman history like Midhat Pasha (1822–1884),153 who was introduced to Behar’s readers as “statesman” (drzˇavnik) and “reformer” (reformator). As one of the leading political figures during the Tanzimat era, he indeed embodied the role model of reformism par excellence, however, in a sense centering on the state, not on religion. He began his political career as a promoter of cultural and economic modernization during his mandate as governor of several Ottoman provinces, and it was during his tenure as Grand Vizier that the Ottoman constitution was introduced in 1876. At the same time, his life reflects the struggle for reform, the main obstacles to which the biography identifies as the resistance of reactionary circles in the capital and pan-Slavic scheming inside and outside the empire. In the case of Midhat Pasha, his efforts for the “common good” ended badly: After having been exiled, then returning to the Ottoman Empire and restarting his political career, he fell out of favor again. He was arrested, accused of the murder of the sultan’s predecessor, and sentenced to death. As Midhat had become a popular media figure and the face of Ottoman reformism during his exile in Western Europe, British diplomatic intervention tried to prevent him from a

152 Nuri Hadzˇic´, “Zadac´a ‘Behara,’” 207. 153 For his biography, see R.H. Davison, “Midhat Pas̲h̲a”, Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition, Edited by: P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, ˙C.E. Bosworth, E. van Donzel, W.P. Heinrichs. Consulted online on 2 October 2020 .

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violent death, but the intervention only succeeded for a short time. In 1884 Midhat Pasha was killed while being in custody. The short description of his eventful life that Behar published twenty years later was based on the biography written by his son Ali Haydar Midhat (1872– 1950) and published in London one year earlier.154 In the introduction of the article, the Bosnian compiler talks about his motivation for presenting such a text to a local audience: He lived in a time of high spirits, thought about how to elevate his Turkish fatherland morally and materially, how to lift it up to a European level, and paid for this effort with being first outlawed, then killed. This is why it is useful to present a short sketch of his achievements on the realm of the culture of his fatherland to our readers.155

In this text, Midhat is presented as the embodiment of an Ottoman patriot’s sense of duty and compared to “the great men of Turkish history [velikane Turske]”, the sultans “Osman, Orhan, Suleyman, Bayezid, [and] Mahmud […].” The conclusion of Ali Haydar’s introduction that is given in quotation is fully in accordance with the rhetoric of self-empowerment as it was part of Behar’s reformist script: “Each nation [or people, the Bosnian term narod meaning both] has to live by itself [treba svojom vlastitom snagom da zˇivi] and must not depend in any way on other nations [peoples].” The biography spells out what this means: First, being willing to garner knowledge as Midhat did when he attended educational institutions in Northern Rumelia and the imperial capital where he grew up, but also when he traveled to the capitals of Western Europe. Second, to apply this knowledge for the sake of the fatherland, placing the nation’s interests above one’s own: “They say, he talked little about himself. He neither liked showing off or overreaching, nor was he interested in pleasing others, on the contrary: only what he thought to be good for people and fatherland – he did.”156 Talking about his achievements as governor in the Ottoman Balkans, the biography exemplifies what this meant concretely in terms of good governance: He succeeded in establishing good relations with the [local] representatives of the people, invigorating the banking sector, establishing communal saving banks [sˇtedionice], founding schools and hospitals, and building bridges and roads because of which he enjoyed high esteem with the people irrespective of confession.157

Or, as he did during his mandate as governor of Bagdad:

154 Ali Haydar Midhat, The Life of Midhat Pasha (London: John Murray, 1903). 155 H. Fazlagic´, “Midhat Pasˇa. Kratka slicˇica iz njegovog zˇivota i rada,” in Behar 5,4 (1904/1905): 53–55, here 53. 156 Fazlagic´, “Midhat Pasˇa. Kratka slicˇica iz njegovog zˇivota i rada,” 55. 157 Fazlagic´, “Midhat Pasˇa. Kratka slicˇica iz njegovog zˇivota i rada,” 53.

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He settled the agrarian relations and created transport infrastructure. With the help of machines that he got from France, now fields could be irrigated and thereby he increased the sources of income; he built rigs, established some newspapers, built mektebs (schools), hospitals, and other places of refuge [druga utocˇista].158

This conceptualization of Midhat as “statesman” and “reformer” merges elements of traditional Ottoman and Islamic rule – namely the idea of the of the wise and just ruler and the Circle of Justice159 an educated reader was likely to identify – with the reformist discourse. The narratological technique applied in this text can be found in many other places in Behar: In the context of this chapter, this technique shall be addressed as the biographicization of the reformist discourse. This narratological technique basically implies three things: First, a graphic description of what reform means concretized by describing the merits of the person concerned. In the case of Midhat, these were infrastructure measures such as building roads and bridges, economic actions such as strengthening the bank sector and agriculture as well as the exploration of natural resources, and efforts on the field of culture and education like opening schools and establishing newspapers. Second, being biographies of men from the contemporary Muslim world like Midhat Pasha or from more remote periods of Muslim history, such biographies should prove that the ideas of progress and reform were in line with Islam so that Muslim societies could also reach the peaks of culture. This is an argument that we already came to know when analyzing Osman Nuri Hadzˇic´’s apologia “Islam and Culture.” And, finally, as already mentioned above, the technique of biographicization generated simple stories of ‘great men’ which were meant as role models for orienting everyday actions. The origins of the concepts merged in the narrative of the “educator of the people,” including its semantics of work160 and, closely connected to them, the cult of the fatherland, can be detected in Western bourgeois culture, yet the examples Behar reproduces are, as in the case of Midhat Pasha, taken from an Ottoman or broader Muslim context. Most obviously linking local reformist discourse to imaginations of the ‘Muslim world’ had a symbolic meaning. This also implied the question of how to present basic concepts of reformist Islam. In this context strategies of translation played a crucial role.

158 Fazlagic´, “Midhat Pasˇa. Kratka slicˇica iz njegovog zˇivota i rada,” 53. 159 See Barbara Henning’s chapter in this volume. 160 Jörn Leonhard & Willibald Steinmetz, eds., Semantiken von Arbeit. Diachrone und vergleichende Perspektiven (Köln: Böhlau, 2016).

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Translating reformism and the figure of the ‘expert’

When communicating the reformist agenda, different processes of translation were in play. In the first place, this implied appropriating textual bodies of knowledge that were considered to be at the core of religious tradition and interpreting them in a way that was in line with the reformist argument. When doing so, Behar’s contributors took quite some license, as once again the example of Behar’s editorial analyzed at the beginning of this chapter shows. While spending great effort on putting their approach in an Islamic framework both as regards terminology (the key-concept is introduced as ‘ilm, a Quranic notion) and its narrative contextualization (by quoting a hadith), the editors give little attention to philological detail: The canonical version handed down by Islamic tradition is not “al-‘ilmu farı¯datun ʿala¯ kulli muslimin wa-muslimatin – knowledge ˙ is a duty of every male and female Muslim” as the hadith is quoted in Behar, but “talabu ’l-ʿilmi faridatun ʿala¯ kulli muslimin – seeking knowledge is the duty of ˙ ˙ every Muslim” (without explicitly mentioning female Muslims). Whereas addressing women was very much in line with Behar’s reformist agenda, the reason for changing the beginning of the hadith remains unclear. Beyond that, the editorial only quotes the first part of the hadith. The canonical version continues as follows: “wa¯dʿu ’l-ʿilmi ʿinda ghayri ahlihi ka-muqallidi ’l-khana¯zı¯ri ’l-jawhara ˙ wa-l-lu¯ʾlu¯ʾa wa-l-dhahab – and he who imparts knowledge to those who do not deserve it is like one who puts a necklace of jewels, pearls and gold around the neck of swines,”161 which gives the hadith as a whole a different meaning: the focus is not on knowledge as such, but on its responsible use and dissemination. And what is more: the editorial’s author keeps silent on how traditional scholarship assesses the authenticity of this hadith, a question Islamic theology generally attaches great value to. As concerns the cited hadith, the degree to which it is valued is not is not very high: of the three possible categories, the hadith is ranked within in the lowest one, daʿı¯f, meaning “weak.” So, while the authors of ˙ the editorial aim to functionalize the authority of the Prophet when popularizing their reformist agenda, they show little interest in the exact wording, context and assessment by Islamic theology when referring to theological bodies of knowledge. Creating an image of the origin was more important than the historical context in which the appropriated knowledge had emerged and was handed down. This is an approach that can be often found in processes of diachronic and synchronic knowledge appropriation as they took place in Behar. It was not so much accuracy that mattered, but the capacity of making audiences believe in the 161 Arabic text and English translation in: Abu Tâhir Zubair ʿAli Zaʾi (ed.). English translation of Sunan Ibn Mâjah (Riyadh: Darussalam, 2007), 222 (Hadith 224).

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authority and authenticity of what was presented as Islamic tradition. In this context, staging the expertise of the author interpreting and translating tradition played an important role. Two other texts that were also published in the first issues of Behar give an impression how this was done. The first text is a collection of Muslim wisdom compiled by the Bosnian grand mufti Mehmed Teufik Azabagic´ (Znameniti izreci, i. e., “Famous Aphorisms”),162 the second one a theological treatise entitled The Directions of Instruction to the Right Way (“Mesaliki irsˇad. Pravci upuc´ivanja na pravi put”)163 by the Ottoman alim and future ¸seyhülislâm Musa Kâzım Efendi (1858–1920).164 Both texts can be read as an explanation of what the acquisition of knowledge that Behar’s introducing editorial pleads for was to mean concretely, the first text being a translation of Arab and Ottoman proverbs, quotations by learned men, and parables advocating for people’s responsibility to educate themselves and to take responsibility for their own lives, and the second a short treatise on the question of how to preach Islam in the age of modern science. Beyond that, and this is of crucial importance as regards the discursive production of expertise, publishing both texts had a symbolic dimension, as the ways in which both authors were presented shows: Musa Kâzim was introduced as a “religious scholar [muderris] at [the] Fatih [madrasa] in Istanbul”165 and Mehmed Teofik Azabagic´ as “our outstanding champion [odlicˇni nasˇ prvak], the head of the ulema-medzˇlis166 – His eminence Reis-ul-ulema H. Mehmed Teofik ef[endi] Azabagic´,”167 pointing out both their expertise and their rank in the religious hierarchy. The message of both texts and their framing is clear: Behar’s interpretation of Islam was based on the opinions of eminent authorities. Making audiences believe in the theological foundation of Behar’s conception of society and culture was part of the reformists’ effort to prove that their agenda was in line with the teachings of Islam. This could be made plausible by referring to concepts that were labeled as Islamic because they derived from Quran and sunnah. More difficult was the case with concepts taken from contemporary 162 H. Mehmed-Teufik ef. Azabagic´, “Znamenite izreke,” Behar 1,1 (1900/1901): 3–4; Behar 1,2 (1900/1901): 21–22. 163 [Musa Kâzım Efendi], “Mesaliki irsˇad (Pravci upuc´ivanja na pravi put.) Turski napisao ´ azim, muderris na Fatihu u Cargradu, preveo Fehim Spaho,” Behar 1,2 (1900/1901): Musa-C 24–26. The text was first published under the title Mesalik-i ˙Irs¸ad in the Istanbul newspaper Tercüma¯n-ı Hak¯ıkat in 1896. ˙ habitual ˙ ˙ 164 He is, due to phonetical transformations of Turkish in Bosnian, introduced as ´ Musa-Cazim. For his biography, see Ferhat Koca, “Mûsâ Kâzim Efendi,” Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı ˙Islâm Ansiklopedisi, vol. 31 (Istanbul: Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı I˙slâm Aras¸tırmaları Merkezi, 2006), 221–222. 165 Azabagic´, “Znamenite izreke,” 3. 166 A council of local Muslim scholars headed by the grand mufti. 167 Urednisˇtvo, “Od urednisˇtva,” Behar 1,1 (1900/1901): [i].

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Muslim societies outside Bosnia. Although Behar’s contributors never explicitly argued this way, a major motivation for referring to such concepts seems to be that these concepts, too, could be imagined as Muslim – at least to a certain extent. One prominent example in this context is the notion of medeniyet – or in its Bosnian wording medeniyet: civilization. As Kemal Karpat has described in its groundbreaking studies on the late Ottoman Empire, medeniyet was a key notion of Ottoman state-induced reformism being both an appropriation of the French concept of civilisation as it emerged in the 18th century and an expression “reflecting the political experiences and cultural aspirations of the Ottoman elites.”168 In Behar we can find direct references to the concept connecting it to ʿilm.169 In another case, a treatise entitled “The influence of Islam on the foundations of culture”170 penned by Muhammad Farı¯d Wajdı¯ (1878–1954),171 refer˙ ence to this concept becomes more complex: The original text both translates the Ottoman notion of medeniyet into Arabic and reprojects it into a remote period of Muslim history.172 This process is revealed to be even more intricate than it initially appears when we reconstruct the route the textual knowledge took in the Transottoman sphere of communication: The text was not only translated by Bosnian Muslim reformists into the local vernacular, but also by Russian Muslim jadidists into Tatar.173 The main reason for the complexity of knowledge mobility through translation, and especially its multidirectional character, was the extensive language skills of Behar’s contributors who were able to translate texts from the elsine-i sela¯se (in particular Arabic and Ottoman Turkish) as the languages of classical 168 Karpat, “Historical Continuity and Identity Change,” 5. 169 “Ilum i medenijjet (Znanje i kultura). Preveo Music´ Muhamed Sami,” Behar 2,20 (1901/02): 319–320, an urgent appeal to parents to prevent their children from “the terrible consequences of ignorance” (“strasˇni plodovi neznanja”). 170 Muhamed-Ferid Vedzˇdi, “Primjena islama na osnove culture,” Behar 5,1 (1904/1905): 1–2; Behar 2,5 (1904/1905): 17–18; Behar 5,3 (1904/1905): 33–35; Behar 5,4 (1904/1905): 49–51; Behar 5,5 (1904/1905): 65–66; Behar 5,6 (1904/1905): 81–83; Behar 5,7 (1904/1905): 97–99; Behar 5,8 (1904/1905): 113–115; Behar 5,9 (1904/1905): 129–131; Behar 5,10 (1904/1905): 145–146; Behar 5,11 (1904/1905): 161–162; Behar 5,12 (1904/1905): 177–178; Behar 5,13 (1904/1905): 193–195; Behar 5, 14 (1904/1905): 209–211; Behar 5,15 (1904/1905): 225–226; Behar 5,16 (1904/1905): 241–242; Behar 5,17 (1904/1905): 257–259; Behar 5,18 (1904/1905): 273–275; Behar 5,19 (1904/1905): 289–291; Behar 5,20 (1904/1905): 305–306; Behar 5,21 (1904/1905): 321–323; Behar 5,22 (1904/1905): 337–338; Behar 5,23 (1904/1905): 353–355; Behar 5,24 (1904/1905): 369–371. 171 For his biography, see Yusuf S¸evki Yavuz, “Ferîd Vecdî,” Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı ˙Islâm Ansiklopedisi, vol. 12 (Istanbul: Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı I˙slâm Aras¸tırmaları Merkezi, 1995), 393–395. 172 Cf. the Arabic titles under which it circulated: Tatbı¯q al-diya¯na al-isla¯miyyaʿala¯ nawa¯mı¯s almadaniyya (Cairo: al-Matbaʿa al-ʿUtma¯niyya,˙ 1316 [1899]) and Madaniyya wa-l-isla¯m. ˙ (Cairo: Hindı¯ya, 1330 [1911]). 173 Cf. the Tatar translation Mädänı¯yät vä-isla¯m (Kazan: Urnäk, 1911).

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Ottoman and post-Ottoman Muslim higher education, and besides that, German as the élite idiom of the Habsburg Empire, French as the lingua franca of educated 19th-century Europe, and English and Russian as important languages of two empires with considerable numbers of Muslim population. The fact that bodies of knowledge were taken from different linguistic contexts that could be linked to the symbolical geographies of ‘the Muslim world’ and the ‘West’ suggests the existence of specific strategies when selecting texts for translation. Referring to medeniyet instead of the French concept of civilisation or its German counterpart of Kultur, with whom the Muslim reformers were more familiar, can be understood as a deliberate decision between conceptual and linguistic alternatives. However, there was also a great deal of coincidence in play, as an episode from the beginnings of Behar’s publication might illustrate. It was described vividly by Fehim Spaho some thirty years later in an obituary on Behar’s first editor, Safvetbeg Basˇagic´. Shortly after the Habsburg administration consented to the publication of the new journal, Spaho tells the reader, he met Basˇagic´ on the streets of Sarajevo, where he shared with him the news about the government’s decision. He told him that the first issue was scheduled for the first day of the Muslim year, Muharram 1st, which was May 1st, perfectly fitting into Behar’s allusion to spring and awakening. As time was advancing, Basˇagic´ was in need of articles to be published in the new magazine and urged Spaho to write a text, but Spaho hesitated: I expressed my concerns and asked him to give me some time in order to get prepared for such a task as I was only a beginner. However, he did not give up. Suddenly, he took out of his coat pocket some Turkish newspaper. Here you have, he said, a beautiful article on the construction of a mosque in Liverpool. Translate it […].174

According to Spaho translating or paraphrasing newspaper articles, especially from Ottoman papers, was a means of producing content when texts penned by domestic authors were not on hand.175 Besides that, there is another fact one should keep in mind when trying to reconstruct strategies of translation: As a cultural magazine, Behar covered a wide range of topics, which implied translating all kind of different texts, and not only those which could serve as illustrations of the reformist agenda. A closer look makes this evident. For the period from 1900 till 1908, Behar’s contents can be roughly divided into four categories: First, treatises on the teachings and 174 Fehim Spaho, “Uspomene iz prve godine ‘Behara,’” Novi Behar 7.19–21 (1933/1934): 281– 282, here 281. The translation was published as: F[ehim]. S[paho]., “Dzˇamija u Liverpoolu,” Behar 1.1 (1900/1901): 17. 175 Rizvic´, Behar, 55–56.

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history of Islam as well as on the current state of Muslim societies and issues they had to address; second, literary compositions both of local authors and of writers from abroad; third, a section called narodne umotvorine (literally: “the people’s intellectual works of art”) that contained collections of local oral literature; and, fourth, another section called listak (“the culture pages”), being a translation of the French term feuilleton. Except for the section narodne umotvorine, which only contained domestic literature,176 other segments of the journal presented a considerable number of translated texts. Besides translations of treatises on the teachings of Islam, history, and current social issues, or articles from newspapers, namely Ottoman ones, among the translated texts counted works from classic Arabic literature such as the life of Muhammad taken from the chronicle of Abu¯ ’l-Fida¯ʾ (1273–1331), a Mamluk historian and geographer,177 or One Thousand and One Nights, an oeuvre that had profoundly shaped Western imaginations of the ‘Orient’ since its first translation into a Western language by Antoine Galland in the early 18th century; pieces from recent Ottoman literature such as the Namık Kemal’s (1840–1888)178 patriotic drama Vatan ya¯hud Silistre ˙ (Fatherland or Silistra) that depicted an episode from the Crimean War, the Bosnian translation being entitled Domovina (Fatherland), or the novel Muha˙ z˙arat (Conversation) by one of the first Ottoman female writers and women’s rights activists, Fatma Aliye (1862–1936), as well as poems by the lesser-known Ottoman female poet Makbule Leman (1865–1898). At the same time, Behar also presented to its readers works from modern Western literature such as Henrik Ibsen’s (1828–1906) drama En folkefiende (An Enemy of the People).179 While all these texts fit into the profile of a cultural magazine addressing a Muslim audience, some of them undoubtedly contributing to shaping a modernist image of Muslim societies (even if that might not have been the major reason why they were translated), too, one can still find texts one would not have expected to be published in such a journal. One example is the Bosnian translation of Arthur de Gobineau’s (1816–1882) short story Les Amants de Kandahar

176 As a matter of fact, the use of this section, which was inspired by South Slav romanticism’s high esteem of folk culture reflecting the Herderian imagination of the Volksgeist (‘national spirit’) and that imitated similar sections in Serb and Croat periodicals, in a journal focusing on religion and education was debated from the very beginning. During the editorship of ˇ ausˇevic´ in 1906/07 it was abandoned. Dzˇemaludin C 177 For his biography, see H.A.R. Gibb, “Abu ’l- Fida¯,” Encyclopaedia of Islam, Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition, Edited by: P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, C.E. Bosworth, E. van Donzel, W.P. Heinrichs. Consulted online on 04 December 2020 . 178 Ömer Faruk Akün, “Nâmık Kemal,” Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı ˙Islâm Ansiklopedisi, vol. 32 (Istanbul: Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı I˙slâm Aras¸tırmaları Merkezi, 2006), 361–378. 179 Amzi-Erdog˘dular, “Alternative Muslim Modernities,” 925–926.

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(The Lovers from Kandahar).180 A text by an author who is considered one of the founders of modern racism and an important source for inspiration for white supremacists all around the globe, including the defenders of slavery in the Antebellum South, Gobineau’s German friends and admirers Richard and Cosima Wagner as well as the supporters of French colonialism during the Third Republic (to name but a few examples),181 seems somehow out of place in a journal advocating for the idea of Muslim self-empowerment. Still, in the translated story, Gobineau’s imaginations of chivalry and his obsession with the idea that beauty was based on racial purity created a portrait of a young Afghan hero that obviously had some affinity to local epic traditions as well as imaginations of masculinity and patriarchal virtues as they were reproduced by contemporary Bosnian Muslim writers. What is more, the heroic picture of a Muslim protagonist and the picturesque description of an oriental setting seems to have been in line with the positive self-image of Muslimness Behar promoted. That such a picture was drawn by a ‘Westerner’ seems to have given it even more importance. This last observation points to another phenomenon when it came to translating texts: the construction of the figure of the ‘Western expert’ that in some ways echoed the figure of the ‘Muslim expert’ already discussed, but which mostly was to play a role different from the latter. As we have seen when analyzing Osman Nuri Hadzˇic´’s work Islam i kultura, the reformists’ stance toward nonMuslims writing about Islam was ambivalent: It oscillated between sharp reactions when it came to the reproduction of images depicting Islam as primitive and hostile to culture and progress and enthusiastic appraisal when the Western outsider drew a picture that was in line with the reformist argument. This pattern of reaction can be also found in Behar. Due to his unchallenged talent for writing polemics that were likewise sharp and entertaining, Nuri Hadzˇic´ continued to play the role of defending Islam against what he judged to be an inaccurate and distorted image. His polemics such as the series “The Paper Crusaders” (“Papirnati krizˇari”)182 were undoubtedly motivated by lifelong experiences of frustrating prejudices about Islam reproduced by authors claiming expertise where they were utterly ignorant, but his predilection for such texts written by Serb authors also seems to be driven by the motivation to discredit any alignment with Serbian political circles inside and outside Bosnia. This image of the ignorant 180 Arthur de Gobineau, Nouvelles asiatiques (Paris: Didiers et cie., 1878), 301–379. The first part of the Bosnian translation was published in Bosnian as: “Kandaharski ljubavnici,” Behar 1.2 (1900/01), 28–30. 181 On Gobineau’s ideology and its impact: Michael D. Biddiss, Father of Racist Ideology: The Social and Political Thought of Count Gobineau. London: Littlehampton Book Services 1970. 182 The first article of this series was published as: Vamik [Osman Nuri Hadzˇic´], “Papirnati krizˇari,” Behar 2.18 (1901/02): 278–280.

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Islamophobe was contrasted with the figure of the ‘Western expert’ who knew about the true character of Islam. A telling example of how this figure was made and used is a series of texts translated from German that was published in the first numbers of Behar.183 The translator’s pen name Nazim points to Safvet-beg Basˇagic´. The text focuses on Wahabism and Babism as current religious movements in the contemporary Muslim world, comparing the first one to Protestantism, but judging both of them quite negatively, especially as regards their potential of contributing to the cultural progress of the societies in which they emerged. In the conclusion, the author generally discusses the potential for contemporary Muslims to reform themselves, a point on which the Bosnian paraphrasis lays much more emphasis than the German original.184 Although the translator claims that the text was penned by a “famous German scholar” (“glasoviti njemacˇki ucˇenjak”),185 he does not give any further information on the author, and he most obviously did not provide of it. However, the person who wrote this article, J.T. von Eckardt, can be identified as the author of another article on contemporary Muslim societies, also published in the cultural magazine Deutsche Rundschau (German Review),186 and a travelogue.187 Since the author only used the initials of the given names when publishing texts, the fact that these texts were most probably penned by a female writer was obscured to their readership, obviously because of anticipated gender bias: As the Tunesian Germanist Mounir Fendri speculates, J.T. von Eckardt was the daughter of the journalist and diplomat Julius von Eckardt (1836–1908), who served some time as German consul in late-Ottoman Tunis.188 If this really was the case, the author would have been a person who had a personal experience of living in a Muslim country, but neither her social standing nor the character of her publications would have corresponded to what one might have expected of a “famous scholar.” However, in the eyes of the translator and compiler, such biographical details were not important. What mattered for him was how the text could be used, and that was, first, to criticize those ulema who were depicted as being hostile to “any progress of mankind, and the idea of

183 “Vehabije i Babije: Po I.T. pl. Eckahardtu,” in Behar 1.6 (1900/01): 91–94; Behar 1.7 (1900/01): 101–102; Behar 1.8 (1900/01): 122–123; Behar 1.9 (1900/01), 136–138. 184 J.T. von Eckhardt, “Die Islamitische Reformbewegung der letzten hundert Jahre,” Deutsche Rundschau 104 (July/August/September 1900): 38–60. 185 “Vehabije i Babije,” 91. 186 J.T. von Eckardt, “Panislamismus und die islamitische Mission,” Deutsche Rundschau 98 (January/Ferurary/March 1899): 61–81. 187 J.T. von Eckhardt. Von Carthago nach Kairuan. Bilder aus dem Orientalischen Abendlande (Berlin: Wilhelm Hertz, 1894). 188 Mounir Fendri, Kulturmensch in “barbarischer” Fremde. Deutsche Reisende im Tunesien des 19. Jahrhunderts (München: Iudicium, 1996), 108.

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modern education,”189 and, second, to present recent efforts of modernization among Muslim reformists in a positive light. Presenting both not as his own words, but those of a “famous scholar” gave the compiler the opportunity of criticizing religious conservativism which he otherwise might have had negative consequences, as another example shows. The negative consequences that occurred when expertise was put into question or denied might illustrate the reception of a series of articles penned by Safvet-beg Basˇagic´: In the year 1322 AH (1903/1904 CE) he published a modernizing interpretation of hadiths the title of which – One Hundred and One Noble Hadiths190 – alluded to One Thousand and One Nights, the first Bosnian translation of which Behar published parallelly to Basˇagic´’s series in the very same issues. In his quite free interpretation of sayings attributed to the Prophet – again, paying little attention to the question of how their authenticity was assessed by scholarly Islamic tradition – Basˇagic´ treats the hadiths he presents as a source of worldly wisdom. This and the fact that this article was written by somebody who – despite his profound knowledge of Arabic and Arabic literature, considering the fact that Basˇagic´ was a trained orientalist – was no religious scholar provoked reaction by the religious establishment, the ʿilmiye. After the ulema’s interceding with the Habsburg administration, Behar was put under double censorship: From this moment, texts to be published in this journal not only had to be approved by the Habsburg administration (as was the case with all other texts printed in Bosnia-Herzegovina till 1907), but also by the ulemamedzˇlis.191 This once again shows the precarious situation of the loyalist reformists when trying to popularize their vision of Islam and modernity: they had not only, as already mentioned, to try to convince a broader audience of their reformist agenda, but also to compete with the religious establishment – its representatives either being coopted to the local imperial power apparatus or being opposed to it – that felt challenged by competing interpretations of Islam and claimed a monopoly on the interpretation of religious knowledge. The narrative of reform had to be adapted to this delicate situation. How this was done shall be analyzed in the following. 189 “Vehabije i Babije,” 137. 190 [Safvet-beg Basˇagic´], “Sto i jedan hadisi sˇerif. Sakupio i protumacˇio po muteber kitabima i protumacˇio: Mirza Safvet,” , Behar 4,1 (1903/1904): 1–3; Behar 4,2 (1903/1904): 17–19; Behar 4,3 (1903/1904): 33–36; Behar 4,6 (1903/1904): 81–83; Behar 4,7 (1903/04): 97–100; Behar 4,8 (1903/1904): 113–116; Behar 4,9 (1903/04): 129–132; Behar 4,10 (1903/04): 145–147; Behar 4,11 (1903/1904): 161–163; Behar 4,12 (1903/1904): 177–179; Behar 4,13 (193–194); Behar 4,14 (1903/1904): 209–211); Behar 4,15 (1903/1904): 225–227; Behar 4,16 (241–243); Behar 4,17 (1903/04): 257–259; Behar 4,18 (1903/1904): 273–276; Behar 4,19 (1903/1904): 289–291; Behar 4,20 (1903–1904): 305–307; Behar 4,21 (1903/1904): 321–323. 191 Mulabdic´, “Behar,” 102. Cf. Gelez, Safvet-beg Basˇagic´, 384–391.

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Narrating reform: Imagining Muslim globality, staging connectivity, and localizing knowledge

If the reformers wanted their message to be understood and accepted, they had to communicate a coherent narration of reform that corresponded to the experiences, values, and convictions of their addressees. As we have already seen, two such narrations were an essential part of the reformist script: the story of crisis and reform, the latter being presented as a remedy for overcoming the former, and the story of a golden age, i. e., the story of cultural heyday, social harmony, and economic prosperity that was presented as being at the core of the history of Islam. What shall be analyzed now is another part of the reformist narrative: the narration of Muslim globality and the role it played when framing processes of knowledge mobility. In the first place, reproducing the narrative of Muslim globality implied popularizing mental maps and hierarchized representations of space, i.e, imaginations of centrality and peripherality. The fact that Behar focused on reporting on Muslim societies and topics that could be identified as ‘Muslim’ or relevant to Muslims created a vision of the world through a Muslim prism. This transformed the abstract idea of Muslim globality into a mediatized experience everyone could have when reading Behar. Besides reporting on events and new publications in Istanbul and Cairo, Behar kept its readers informed of the social and cultural development of Muslim communities in what was imagined either as the peripheries of the ‘Muslim world,’ such as the Dutch East Indies, or as diasporic Muslim communities, such as Western Europe. One such report was the previously mentioned article on the construction of a mosque in Liverpool with which Fehim Spaho premiered as a contributor to Behar. Among these peripheral communities, Muslims in imperial Russia attracted Behar’s special attention: From the very beginning it informed its readers about the opening of new schools of the jadidists, with special emphasis on girls’ education, and about new releases of prominent jadidist authors, such as Ahmet Ag˘aog˘lu (1869–1939),192 whose programmatic text Zhenshchina po islamu i v islame (“The Woman according to Islam and in Islam”)193 Behar published in a Bosnian translation.194

192 Behar introduces him as “Akhmed-Bek’ Agaev” using the Russian version of his name in contemporary Cyrillic script. 193 Akhmed-Bek Agaev, Zhenshchina po islamu i v islame (Tiflis: Skoropech. M. Martirosiantsa, 1901). 194 Ahmet Ag˘aog˘lu, “Muslimanska zˇena. Женщина по исляму [sic] и въ исламѣ. Od АхмедБек Агаева,” Behar 2,17 (1901/1902): 261–263. For Ag˘aog˘lu as an activist, see Meyer, Turks Across the Empires.

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Often, the flagship of the Russian Muslim reformist press, Tercüma¯n, was cited as a source.195 It was also Tercüma¯n from which Behar adopted a text entitled Pocˇetak civilizovanja ruskih muslimana (“How the Russian Muslims began to get civilized”),196 describing the development and goals of djadidism, paying special attention to institutional aspects such as schools, cultural associations, printing shops, and the theater. The introduction of the Bosnian translation presents Russian Muslim reformism as an “important phenomenon in the Islamic world” (“vazˇna pojava u Islamskom svijetu”) during the last two decades. That was why, the translator of the text (again Fehim Spaho) explains, he decided to publish the text in its entirety as “it can be a useful guideline for us Muslims in BosniaHerzegovina.” At the same time, he states, he decided to abstain from “any comment; everybody can see what can be done in such a short period of time if only one works.”197 This strategy of narrative framing changed in 1903 when Behar published a letter it received from Crimea. Its author was a Crimean Tatar who studied at alAzhar. It was introduced as follows: Here we present another letter we have received from a Muslim brother from far away. The modern Muslim press, and especially the Arab press, works incessantly in order to bring Muslims from all parts of the world together and to acquaint us to each other. This is also our aim, and this is why we got in touch with a great number of excellent Muslim journals in Egypt. Now a distinguished Muslim, Smail Fuad from Liman in Russia, who went to Egypt in order to study, learned about us and sent us this brotherly letter in Russian. We found it right to publish it in translation.198

After this introduction, it is the author of the letter itself who himself speaks: Dear Mr. Editor! Elmunimune ihvetun,199 saith Allah, exalted be He, in the most Holy Quran. Why do we not obey the wise command of the Creator of the World, especially on this day and in this age, in which we are so much in need of mutual and brotherly solidarity and broad social action for the benefit and for the protection of our unhappy brethren? Let us at least take notice of the fact that we exist as Muslim brethren and get to know each other; if we cannot change our lives and our situation, we can at least alleviate our suffering when we share joy.

195 On Tercüma¯n: Alexandre Bennigsen & Chantal Lemercier-Quelquejay, La presse et le mouvement national chez les musulmans de Russie avant 1920 (Paris: Mouton), 1964, 37–42, 138–141; Tuna, Imperial Russia’s Muslims, 117–122. 196 Fehim Spaho, “Pocˇetak civilizovanja ruskih muslimana,” Behar 2,16 (1901/1902): 249–251; Behar 2,17 (1901/1902): 267–268. 197 Spaho, “Pocˇetak civilizovanja ruskih muslimana,” 249. 198 Smail Fuad, “Pismo urednisˇtvo,” Behar 4.6 (1903/1904): 84–86. 199 Quran 49.10: Innama¯ al-muʾuminu¯na ikhwatun, i. e.: “The believers are but one brotherhood.”

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Getting to know each other broadens our horizon, fosters and strengthens our piety, makes our hopes for the future grow, and gives us hope in times of need.200

According to him, the fact that Muslims from different parts of the umma do not know enough or even anything about their brethren in other parts of the Muslim world was most regrettable. This was even more true as they were all facing the same problem: To defend Islam and to educate the illiterate masses. It would be of great help to learn about examples from other parts of the Muslim world. Therefore, he explains, he was delighted to find out that some Egyptian journals had started to tackle this problem and spent a great effort to bring Muslims together. This was how he learned of the Bosnian journal Behar. He would like to take the opportunity to tell the readers of Behar of the Egyptian journal alMana¯r. Al-Manar fights all kinds of fanatism and by doing so, it heals all our wounds; you will find in it a lot of fine articles concerning this matter, as well as treatises defending Islam and Muslims against attacks by the enemies of Islam. Al-Manar is the journal which can free us from ignorance. While being firmly grounded on the Sharia, it gives helpful advice to solve current problems of vital importance.201

If we interpret writing and publishing this letter as speech acts, then these speech acts connected three regions of the Muslim World and their reform movements symbolically: Crimea, Egypt, and Bosnia-Herzegovina, two of them being at the peripheries both of the Muslim and post-Ottoman world, and one, Egypt, being at the very center. What is more, as regards flows of knowledge, this speech act seems to have had a lasting impact: in the catalogue of Sarajevo’s most important Muslim library, the Gazi Husrev-begova biblioteka, issues of al-Mana¯r can be found from this moment.202 At the same time this most obviously was not the starting point of an intellectual network based on direct transboundary communication. At least concerning Behar, we have no such evidence. The same holds true for al-Mana¯r, the flagship of Muslim reformism in Egypt. It only started reporting about Bosnian matters during the Annexation Crisis in 1908 and published a fatwa concerning the new situation of Muslim believers in Bosnia in 1909.203 What seems to be more important is the symbolic meaning of this intervention and its staging in Behar: It symbolizes Muslim connectedness and commonality. 200 201 202 203

Smail Fuad, “Pismo urednisˇtvo,” 84. Smail Fuad, “Pismo urednisˇtvo,” 85. https://ghb.ba/ [last accessed 04 October 2020]. “al-Hijratu wa-hukmu muslimı¯ al-bu¯snati fı¯ha¯,” Al-Mana¯r 12 (1327H/1909CE): 410–415. Cf. ˙ ammad Rasˇid Rida¯ (1865–1935.) i tematiziranje Bosne i Hercegovine i Enes Karic´, “Muh ˙ ˙ Balkana u cˇasopisu “Al-Mana¯r” (1898–1935.),” Godisˇnjak Bosˇnjacˇke zajednice kulture “Preporod” 9.1 (2009), 223–238.

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Equating the reform efforts in Egypt and Bosnia, this letter penned by a Russian Muslim could be understood as legitimizing Behar’s reformist agenda. And this was undoubtedly where the editor aimed when publishing this letter: showing that what Bosnian Muslim reformists did and demanded was exactly what their Muslim brethren did and demanded in the very heart of Islamic learning: Egypt. This once again shows the importance of how to frame reform: by giving it an Islamic outlook – either by tying it to authorities in Muslim history or in other parts of the contemporary Muslim world, especially in the cultural and political centers Cairo and Istanbul. This ‘symbolic Islamization’ of reformist discourse gained a new quality when ˇ ausˇevic´ (1870–1938) became editor of Behar in 1906. C ˇ ausˇevic´ Dzˇemaludin C belonged to those Muslim learned men in Habsburg Bosnia who kept intellectual bonds with the Ottoman Empire. Unlike Osman Nuri Hadzˇic´ who exclusively ˇ ausˇevic´ opted for attended educational institutions in the Habsburg Monarchy, C a classical theological education in Istanbul and Cairo, where he met Muhammad ˙ ʿAbduh. Likewise acquainted with the late-Ottoman modernity and the tradiˇ ausˇevic´ wanted tions of Ottoman-Muslim erudition from personal experience, C 204 ˇ auto combine both. Within the high-ranking ulema in Habsburg Bosnia (C sˇevic´ became grand mufti of Bosnia-Herzegovina in 1914) he met with harsh resistance to his reform agenda; at the same time, he was keen to prevent what he considered an exaggerated symbolic Westernization of Bosnian Muslim culture. For him, a crucial issue was the highly symbolical question of what script to use. While the editors of the Bosˇnjak and Behar had opted deliberately for the Latin script instead of using Bosnian in Arabic letters as was the common Muslim practice during Ottoman rule and among Bosnian ulema even after the occuˇ ausˇevic´ promoted a reformed orthography for Bosnian in Arabic script pation, C (Arebica). Another issue of highly symbolical meaning was the question in which language to publish. While during the first two-and-a-half decades of the Habsburg administration the regional government had respected the Bosnian Muslim élite’s predilection for Ottoman Turkish and supported the publication of periodicals in this language, the reformist loyalists had decided to publish their periodicals in the local vernacular: Bosnian. When acting as editor of Behar in ˇ ausˇevic´ did not abandon this practice, but he decided to add four 1906 and 1907, C pages with texts in Ottoman Turkish that he mostly authored himself. This decision met with enthusiastic reactions in other parts of the Ottoman and PostOttoman world. Tercüma¯n wrote, for example: ˇ ausˇevic´’s program on reform, use of script and language, and “print cosmopolitism” 204 For C see Buljina, Harun. Empire, Nation, and the Islamic World: Bosnian Muslim Reformists between the Habsburg and Ottoman Empires, 1901–1914 (Ph.D. Dissertation, Columbia University, 2019)..

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[Behar] is an Islamic newspaper which was established with the aim to raise religious education and Islamic feelings, and to promote Islamic enlightenment. ‘Behar’ has already been issued for six years and is made in a very tasteful way, yet only in the language of the local Muslims. From now on it will be also published in Turkish. Bosnian Muslims, who belong to the Hanafi madhhab, are really fervent adherents of their faith, and as they are near the center of European civilization, they have, concerning their behavior, also become a civilized people. Their capital is Sarajevo where they have, besides other institutions, a beautiful printing house. The works published by this printing house show how much Bosnian Muslims have progressed in printing matters. Concerning its design, this journal matches with the most excellent European papers. It contains most instructive articles and treatises on Islam and politics. […] As it also comprises a Turkish part, we warmly recommend our Muslim brethren in Russia to subscribe it and to read it.205

Also, the Istanbul newspapers Sabah and ˙Ikda¯m as well as the Turkophone ˙ ˙ ˙ Bulgarian newspaper Tuna wrote about Behar’s new language policy.206 Sabah ˙ ˙ also printed the Turkish version of one article by Fehim Spaho on the Hijaz railway and published it in its section Akla¯m-i ˙Isla¯m (“Islamic writing”). It was ˙ introduced it as follows: For quite some time in all parts in the world there have manifested beautiful examples of literature and science penned by Muslims. If one takes a closer look at these splendid and progressive works [bu a¯sa¯r-i fa¯hire-yi terakkiye] one cannot help to be proud of ¯ ˙˙ them. Today, in every part of the educated world [ʿa¯lem-i medeniyetiñ] our true faith has many voices spreading its word in a civilized and moderate way: Words about the glory of Islam written by the [paper] El-Hilal that is published in one of England’s biggest cities are echoed in the most distant areas of India, and it is through reporting that the good news on the Russian Muslims’ creation of cultural institutions reaches the Muslims in Liverpool. As it is the goal of such writing to demonstrate the truth of our holy faith of Islam that is based on the noble features of progress and the perfection of the education of men, it is quite natural that these developments are met everywhere with gratitude. The reason why we write these lines is the contents of a journal named Behar that is published in Sarajevo. This paper has already been published for six years in Bosnian. Now we proudly notice that its last issue contains a part in Turkish. In its editorial it demonstrates beautifully the importance of gathering all Muslims around the caliphate and the Turkish language, a statement that has to be highly appreciated.207

Both Tercüma¯n and Sabah frame the news of Behar’s new publication policy in a ˙ ˙ way that is consistent with their own agenda, Tercüma¯n highlighting the Bosnian Muslim reformists’ efforts in the realm of culture, Sabah representing Behar’s ˙ ˙ decision to publish articles in Turkish as accepting the leading role of both the 205 Tercüma¯n No. 44 (28. 4. 1906 O.S.): 2. 206 Behar 7.2 (1906/07): 22; Behar 7.3 (1906/07): 33. 207 Sabah, No. 5951 (10. Rebiʽ ül-evvel 1324 [3. 6. 1906]): 1. ˙ ˙

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Hamidian caliphate and Ottoman Empire in the Muslim world. In both cases the imagination of transboundary Muslim connectivity was crucial. As we have already seen, such imaginations also played a prominent role in Behar from its very ˇ ausˇevic´’s editorship this imagination was underpinned by a beginning. During C narrative that was introduced by a series of articles penned by Fehim Spaho and published under a most programmatic title: Pan-Islamism (“Panislamizam”). It was not the first time that this notion was used in Behar, but it was the first time that it was presented as a coherent narrative of global Muslim connectedness based on religious practices deeply rooted in Islam.208 In his articles Spaho embeds the concept of pan-Islamic solidarity in the historical narrative of reformism as has already been described in this chapter: According to him, pan-Islamism was the effort of restoring the greatness of the Muslim world during the reign of the first four Caliphs in the seventh century or of the Ottoman Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent in the 16th century by reforming its political, social, cultural, and economic institutions and fighting the ignorance of backward imams who hindered Muslim societies from progressing. Pan-Islamic solidarity, which was, as he argues, an integral part of the Koranic tradition, and which was renewed by Yavuz Sultan Selim in the 16th century and by SultanCaliph Abdul Hamid II. in the present, could help to rediscover what he considered the authentic foundations of Islam. At the end of his article Spaho cites his sources: Central works of reform literature penned by authors like Muhammad ʿAbduh, Muslim periodicals, especially from Istanbul (among others ˙ Sabah and ˙Ikda¯m), Egypt (inter alia al-Mana¯r), and the Russian Empire (Ter˙ ˙ ˙ cüma¯n, Vakt), and, finally, Western periodicals such as Deutsche Rundschau.209 ˙ While this article can be read as a paratext contextualizing Behar’s reporting on the Muslim world and putting in the framework of a consistent narrative, there can be also identified strategies of localizing reformist discourse. An article that Fehim’s brother Mehmed (1883–1939)210 published in Behar in the very same year illustrates how this was done: a biography of an Ottoman governor in Bosnia in the 16th century, Gazi Husrev-beg. In this article Husrev-beg, who was inter alia the founder of Sarajevo’s biggest mosque, a hospital, several educational in208 Fehim Spaho, “Panislamizam,” Behar 7.1 (1906/07) 3–5, Behar 7.2 (1906/07): 14–15; Behar 7.3 (1906/07): 25–26, Behar 7.4 (1906/07): 38–40; Behar 7.5 (1906/07) 51–52, Behar 7.6 (1906/ 07) 62–63, Behar 7.7 (1906/07) 75–76, Behar 7.8 (1906/07): 85–86, Behar 7.9 (1906/07): 98–99, Behar 7.10 (1906/07): 110–112, Behar 7.11 (1906/07): 121–122, Behar 7.12 (1906/07): 133–134, Behar 7.13 (1906/07): 145–147, Behar 7.14 (1906/07): 158–160, Behar 7.15 (1906/07): 169–170, Behar 7.16 (1906/07): 181–182, Behar 7.17 (1906/07): 193–194, Behar 7.18 (1906/07): 205–206, Behar 7.19 (1906/07): 217–218, Behar 7.20 (1906/07): 229–230, Behar 7.21 (1906/07): 241–242, Behar 7.22 (1906/07) 277. 209 Spaho, “Panislamizam,” 277. 210 For his biography, see Husnija Kamberovic´, Mehmed Spaho, 1883–1939: Politicˇka biografija (Sarajevo, Vijec´e Kongresa Bosˇnjacˇkih Intelektualaca: 2009).

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stitutions, a library, and a soup kitchen, seems to be the local embodiment of all the virtues attributed to Suleiman the Magnificent, the just ruler who was able to face the challenges of his present, making both historical role models of reformism.211 ˇ ausˇevic´’s publication policy was abandoned in 1907 when he was However, C replaced as editor. After a short period of reorientation, Behar transformed into a pro-Croat literary journal in 1909 and ceased to be published in the following year. It was only in the 1920s when it was to reappear as Novi Behar, gathering some of its former contributors who revived the idea of a cultural journal that advocated for shaping the local Bosnian Muslim community according to what they considered to be ‘progressive.’

Concluding remarks This chapter aimed at understanding processes of knowledge mobility at the turn of the 20th century in a Transottoman perspective. Taking a periodical issued by a group described as reformist loyalists as a starting point, the chapter asked how local debates on reforming culture and society became entangled with modernist thinking in the globalizing late-imperial world. The approach of follow the knowledge made it possible to detect different trajectories of knowledge mobility both in terms of temporality and spatial relationality. Besides reappropriating Muslim tradition and making it part of the reformist argument, the reformists adapted bodies of knowledge from contemporary Muslim and Western contexts. The examples under scrutiny showed that it was a deliberate decision to which context to refer and how to frame referring to it. This was due to the specific context in which Muslim reformists were acting. Unlike in the case of intellectual mobile actors in the Russian-Ottoman borderlands, Bosnian Muslim reformists were no ‘identity free-lancers’ (Charles Meyer) but acted in the framework of Austro-Hungarian rule, and, what is more, often as a part of the imperial state apparatus. After the shift of imperial rule in 1878 this could cause them to be suspected of too closely collaborating with the new rulers and neglecting their duties as Muslim believers, which would have discredited their reform agenda. The reformist loyalists were well aware of their precarious situation. On the one hand, they used the framework of Habsburg rule (in some cases also its financial and institutional support) to promote their

211 Mehmed Spaho, “Gazi Husrevbeg. Slika iz bosanske prosˇlosti,” Behar 7.9 (1906/07): 99–101, Behar 7.10 (1906/07): 112–114, Behar 7.11 (1906/07): 124–125, Behar 7.12 (1906/1907): 135– 137, Behar 7.13 (1906/07): 148.

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reform agenda. On the other hand, they gave their reform agenda a more Islamic outlook in order to prove its legitimacy. It was in this framework that knowledge became mobile. The chapter tried to understand these processes of knowledge mobility by identifying a set of techniques that were applied when communicating the reformist agenda to a broader audience: scripting social roles in the process of making reform, translating bodies of knowledge to the new contexts in which they should achieve impact, and, finally, both popularizing the idea of transboundary Muslim commonality and localizing the concept of progress and reform. While the reformists succeeded in communicating a strikingly coherent narrative of reform, linking it both to Islamic history and social practices in what was imagined as the contemporary ‘Muslim world’, the concrete contents of the concepts they promoted often remained vague. They merged concepts such as state-centered Tanzimat reformism, the theological concepts of reform, and the practice of authoritarian modernization policies in the Hamidian era with ideas taken from Western contexts, namely the concept of Kultur. In those cases, in which patterns of connectivity can be described as Transottoman, these figurations of exchange were not simply based on existing ˇ ausˇevic´ structures but had to be reactivated. While in the case of Dzˇemaludin C traditional networks linking the Bosnian ulema to the Ottoman Empire played a crucial role, in most other cases such patterns of connectivity had to be reforged. This becomes most obvious in those cases when Russian instead of Ottoman Turkish became a means of transboundary communication between Muslim communities in the post-Ottoman world.

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Figure 1: Behar, cover page from 1906 (copy from the Gazi Husrev-beg Library Sarajevo, call number 191/1906–190b)

Figure 2: Osman Nuri Hadzˇic´ and Ivan Milicˇevic´, date unknown, Wikimedia commons

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ˇ ausˇevic´, 1915, Wikimedia commons Figure 3: Dzˇemaludin C

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Evelin Dierauff

The Appropriation of Political Concepts in Halı¯l as-Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s ˘ ‘Orthodox Renaissance’ (1908–14)

1.

Introduction

This chapter explores Halı¯l as-Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s discussion of the Arab Orthodox ˘ Renaissance from 1908 until 1914 from a transottoman perspective, and how he appropriated political concepts for his cause that derived from other contexts. The ‘Orthodox Renaissance Movement’ (harakat an-nahda al-urtu¯duksı¯ya) ¯ ¯ ˙ ˙ was a local reform movement of Arab Palestinian Christians of Greek Orthodox confession in opposition to the clergy in the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem (al-kursı¯ al-uru¯ˇsalmı¯) that was at that time under the reign of Patriarch Damianos (1897–1931).1 This movement emerged in the end of the nineteenth century in Jerusalem as a cultural reform movement, but spread into quite a radical rebellion against the clerical leadership all over today’s Palestine and Jordan during the era of the Young Turks (1908–14), striving for local participation in the administration of the Patriarchate, which was ruled by Greek clerics who excluded local Arab Orthodox from having a say in its affairs. In principle, it demanded access for local Orthodox to all clerical hierarchies, to have a say in the distribution of its financial resources, and to Arabize the character of the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate in line with the agenda of the Arab nahda. ˙ 1 For this jargon in Arabic, see Filast¯ın, 6 November 1912: 186/4/1–2. The Greek Orthodox Patriarchate stretched from Palestine˙ to the eastern bank of Jordan. Reports on the number of its dioceses differ slightly. In 1912, Bliss mentioned Caesarea, Beisan, Petra, Acre, Nazareth, Lod, Gaza, Nablus, Samaria, Tabor, Jordan, Bethlehem, Tiberias, Philadelphia, Pella, Kerak, Sepphoris and Madaba; which amount to eighteen dioceses. See Frederick Jones Bliss, The Religions of Modern Syria and Palestine: Lectures Delivered before Lake Forest College on the Foundation of the late William Bross (New York: AMS Press, 1972), 54, 55, 339. Hu¯rı¯ mentioned ˘ ta¯rı¯h kanı¯sat that it had seventeen dioceses. See Hu¯rı¯ Sˇahha¯da and Hu¯rı¯ Niqu¯la¯, Hula¯sat ˙˙ ˙ aʿan˘ ta¯rı¯h al˘ Hu¯rı¯ wa-Niqu ˘ ¯ nubd ¯ rusˇalı¯m al-urtu¯duksı¯ya: Taʾlı¯f Sˇiha¯da U ¯ la¯ H˘u¯rı¯ bi-l-ida¯fa ila ¯ ¯ ¯ ˘ ˘ wa 1992˙ bi-qalam Raʾu qad¯ıya al-urtu¯duksı¯ya fı¯ Filast¯ın wa-l-Urdun bayna 1925 ¯ f Saʿd ˘Abu¯ ¯ ¯ ˙ to Filast¯ın, the Patriarchate included only fourteen dioceses. ˇ a¯˙bir (n.p., 1992), G 265. According ˙ Filast¯ın, 22 October 1913: 282/4/1. ˙

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The Orthodox intellectual, teacher and journalist Halı¯l as-Saka¯kı¯nı¯ (1878– ˘ 1953), a born Jerusalemite, was one of its pioneers and most rebellious activists. By definition of the Arab Palestinian newspaper Filast¯ın, he was ‘one of the leaders ˙ of the Orthodox Renaissance’ (wa¯hid zuʿama¯ʾ an-nahda al-urtu¯duksı¯ya).2 From ¯ ¯ ˙ ˙ 1908–14, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ devoted most of his writings to the ‘Orthodox cause’ (almasʾala al-urtu¯duksı¯ya), striving to establish a public discourse on the ‘rights of ¯ ¯ the Orthodox community’ (huqu¯q al-milla al-urtu¯duksı¯ya) in Palestine.3 As one ¯ ¯ ˙ of the pioneers of this movement, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ articulated its main theoretical arguments, integrating Ottoman reform ideas and political concepts that were fashionable around the globe – more or less so and to different extents in different regions, of course – and were reflected in reform debates in the Middle East. Local translations, adaptions and appropriations of these concepts are rather unexplored, specifically with regard to the Orthodox Renaissance. This is particularly relevant since these appropriations took shape during a ‘saddle period’ in the Arab East: an era of fundamental change of intellectual concepts and political ideas, to use Koselleck’s definition, taking place under the Young Turks’ Rule in the Middle East (1908–14), I state. Specifically, this study discusses Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s discussion of the Orthodox Renaissance as local adaptions of larger Ottoman debates that I frame here as ‘translations of late Ottoman modernity’ in Palestine. This translation of ‘late Ottoman modernity’ in the Arab East in general is not to be considered as a response to ‘Western modernity’ but was rather part of global intellectual and political thought, which is to be explored as local ‘varieties’ of modernity, as Schmidt says, and from the perspective of locals actors as Pappé suggests.4 Looking at ‘concepts in translation’, Bachmann-Medick has stressed, requires 2 Filast¯ın, 17 January 1912: 103/3/2. 3 Filast˙ ¯ın, 4 May 1912: 133/3/5–4/1. ˙ 4 On ‘multiple’ modernities or ‘varieties’ of modernity, see Shmuel Eisenstadt, “Multiple Modernities,” Daedalus 129 (2000): 1–29 and “Multiple Modernities: Analyserahmen und Problemstellung,” in Kulturen der Moderne: soziologische Perspektiven der Gegenwart, ed. Thorsten Bonacker and Andreas Rechwitz (Frankfurt am Main: Campus Verlag, 2007), and Volker Schmidt, “Multiple Modernities or Varieties of Modernity?” Current Sociology 54 (2006). Asking ‘whose modernity?’, Pappé suggests better exploring what modernity meant in different regions from the perspectives of local actors and how it changed their lives, rather than examining their version of modernity in comparison with European concepts of modernity. See Ilan Pappé, ed., The Modern Middle East (London: Routledge, 2005), 1–13. For links between globalization and modernity, see Christopher Bayly, The Birth of the Modern World 1780–1914: Global Connections and Comparisons (Oxford: Blackwell, 2004). For comparisons on the impact of global modernity from the Mediterranean to the Indian Ocean in a connecting world of Empires, see Leila Fawaz and Christopher Bayly, eds., Modernity and Culture: From the Mediterranean to the Indian Ocean (New York: CUP, 2002). On expressions of the ‘first modern globalization’ in the Middle East, see the volume of Liat Kozma, Cyros Schayegh and Avner Wishnitzer, eds, A Global Middle East: Mobility, Materiality and Culture in the Modern Age, 1880–1940 (London and New York: I.B: Tauris, 2015).

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profound historical contextualization as these concepts become ‘settled’ in new regions and social surroundings.5 The present volume asks when and why certain types of knowledge appeared, how it was translated, and what were the patterns and trends linked with this translation. Picking up these questions, this chapter illustrates how Saka¯kı¯nı¯ borrowed from prevailing and popular concepts of his age – ideas on ‘constitutionalism’, ‘legitimate rule’, ‘civic rights’ and ‘self-governance’, as well as proto-nationalist terms that infiltrated Arab thought prior to World War I. In doing so, he wrote a script that was in its nature a ‘transottoman script’, but was tailored to fit local reform needs, and it was supposed to push a far-reaching Orthodox rebellion in the Jerusalemite Patriarchate. Further, the chapter contextualizes Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s approach as a response to existing power imbalances in the Patriarchate and the increasing fragmentation of the Orthodox Movement. It is mainly based on Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s diaries from 1908–1914, his articles in the Arab Palestinian newspaper Filast¯ın, published between 1911–1914, and a ˙ political pamphlet entitled ‘The Orthodox Renaissance in Palestine’ (an-Nahda ˙ al-Urtu¯duksı¯ya fı¯ Filast¯ın), which was published in autumn 1913 and in which ¯ ¯ ˙ Saka¯kı¯nı¯ appealed to the Orthodox youth to overthrow the clerical leadership.6 This chapter is divided into four parts: In the first part, I will outline central historical developments regarding the emergence of the Orthodox Renaissance in Palestine, and the greater ‘communicational space’ in which Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s writings emerged: that is, the prevailing debates in the Ottoman Arab East during the post-revolutionary era (1908–1914) that provide overreaching discursive elements in his discussion. Then, I explain the relevance of this study in the context of today’s scholarship and its central theoretical preconceptions and methods. In the second part of this chapter, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ will be introduced against the background of his personal development his socio-political networks and activities in Jerusalem. In the third part, I will treat a political pamphlet that Saka¯kı¯ni published in autumn 1913 as a case study. I will outline the main topics in the pamphlet – how Saka¯kı¯nı¯ defined the Orthodox crisis, and what he suggested to give a ‘kick start’ to the Orthodox movement and reform the leadership in the Patriarchate – and on what arguments he based that. Furthermore, I will filter out Ottoman and global political concepts that Saka¯kı¯nı¯ ‘appropriated’ in his discussion so as to legitimize his arguments, and what images, central meanings, ideological inclinations and terms were linked with these arguments. In the fourth and latter part, I will trace the reception of his publication, as far as this is 5 Bachmann-Medick speaks of ‘concepts in translation’ rather than of ‘traveling concepts. See Doris Bachmann-Medick, “From Hybridity to Translation: Reflections on Travelling Concepts,” in The Trans/National Study of Culture: A Translational Perspective, ed. Doris Bachmann-Medick (Berlin and Boston: De Gruyter, 2014), 132–133. 6 I here would like to thank Prof. Johann Buessow from whom I have received the copy of this pamphlet that is held at the Jewish National and University Library of Jerusalem.

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traceable from the sources explored, and the consequences that derived for Saka¯kı¯nı¯ from it. It also should be stressed that this contribution on Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s translation and appropriation of concepts mainly deals with the production of a ‘discourse’ on the Arab Orthodox question during a ‘saddle period’; thus, contributing to a ‘history of concepts’ in a specific context of the modern Middle East. Yet, there is limited information about the precise echo of this text among its readers. Thus, this chapter can trace the connections between a ‘public discourse’ on the Orthodox cause, as it is established in the pamphlet, and its concrete impact on the Orthodox Movement on the grounds of ‘reality’ only to a limited extent. ‘Discourse’, as a certain category of knowledge, has been defined as a specific ‘understanding of reality’ by Foucault that is produced by the selection, organization and channeling of knowledge according to certain regulations, and expresses itself through language forms. Based on power relations, an ‘order’ concerning what and how something is to be said, or not to be said, in a debate, is the setup which shapes the content and form of the perception of reality. In so far as ‘discourse’ – the production of reality through a ‘structured and organized communication’ that is linked to power – is used here, it refers to the ‘order of what to say or not to say’ in a debate.7

2.

Frame of the Chapter and Preconceptions

Historical Frame As mentioned, the power in the Patriarchate concentrated in the hands of Greek clerics who were members of ‘the Fraternity of the Holy Grave’ (ahawı¯yat al-qabr ˘ al-muqaddas).8 This monastic order, based in the Old City of Jerusalem, controlled Orthodox holy sites, churches, monasteries, shrines, pilgrim accommodations, endowments (waqf, Pl. awqa¯f), landed properties and the revenues deriving from them, and it owned more land than any other church in the Holy Land.9 The Fraternity maintained educational, social and welfare institutions in 7 See Michel Foucault, Die Ordnung des Diskurses (Frankfurt am Main: Fischer, 1991); Siegfried Jäger, Kritische Diskursanalyse: Eine Einführung, 4th ed. (Münster: Unrast, 2004) and Peter Ullrich, “Diskursanalyse, Diskursforschung, Diskurstheorie: Ein- und Überblick,” in Kritik mit Methode? Forschungsmethoden und Gesellschaftskritik, ed. Ulrike Freikamp et al. (Berlin: Karl Dietz Verlag, 2008), 19–31. 8 Filast¯ın, 9 September 1911: 67/3/5; 10 August 1912: 161/2/5; and 30 October 1912: 184/4/2–3. 9 Until˙ today, the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate constitutes the largest non-governmental landowner in Israel and Palestine. Katz and Kark investigated Greek Orthodox property distribution and acquisitions in Palestine during the nineteenth and twentieth century, being able to locate 355 properties, amounting to at least 36,779 dunam; yet they could only locate about

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Palestine such as schools, hospitals and poorhouses, it defined the cultural agenda in the Patriarchate, and it excluded Arab Orthodox from access to the Convent – which was, according to Bliss, restricted to ‘Greeks in race and language’ – and from higher episcopal ranks.10 In the aftermath of the Young Turk Revolution (1908) and in the context of the reinstallation of the Ottoman Constitution of 1876, the exclusion of locals from power evoked the fierce resistance of the Palestinian congregation. While the slogans of the Revolution ‘liberty, equality, fraternity’ (hurrı¯ya, musa¯wa¯t, iha¯ʾ) ˙ ˘ were chanted by elites of all confessions in Jerusalem, Haifa, Jaffa, Nazareth and other cities during the summer of 1908, Orthodox community leaders used the post-revolutionary moment and approached the Holy Synod in Jerusalem to demand participatory rights. A new generation of Arab Orthodox had watched how Sultan Abdülhamid II was deprived of power. Relying on the ‘spirit of the new age’ (ru¯h al-ʿasr al-gˇadı¯d), as they called it, the age of the Constitution, they ˙ openly compared the Convent with absolutist rule and demanded to have a say in the Patriarchate’s administration on the ground of their citizen rights. Since the Patriarchate did not respond to these demands, an anti-clerical rebellion spread from Jerusalem to the other dioceses in summer 1908 and Orthodox activists mobilized the congregation to march in the streets against the leadership, with quite some violent outbreaks. Through a series of delegations and protest letters, the activist movement entangled the local government and the Grand Vizier in Istanbul into their internal conflict with the Patriarchate, much more than the government wished.11 In 1910, and so as to settle the intra-Orthodox conflict, the central government released a resolution that stipulated the formation of an Orthodox ‘Mixed Council’ (al-magˇlis al-muhtalat); a forum that was supposed to negotiate reforms ˙ ˘ in the Patriarchate and consisting to equal parts of clerics and laymen.12 The Mixed Council, enacted in December of 1910, was the first legal platform giving voice to Orthodox lay delegates in Palestine to put forward the reform needs of half of Greek Orthodox properties. Itamar Katz and Ruth Kark, “The Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem and Its Congregation: Dissent over Real Estate,” Journal of Middle Eastern Studies 37 (2005): 385. The British report of 1921 named about 631 Greek Orthodox properties in Mandate Palestine. Anton Bertram and Harry Luke, Report of the Commission appointed by the Government of Palestine to inquire into the affairs of the Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem (London: Oxford University Press, 1921), 195sq. 10 For the Convents’ organizational structures and members, see Bliss, The Religions of Modern Syria and Palestine, 61–64, 114sq. 11 For the Orthodox rebellion in 1908, see the descriptions of Bertram and Luke, Report of the ¯ rusˇalı¯m al-urtu¯duksı¯ya, 260sq. Orthodox Patriarchate, 255f and Hu¯rı¯, Hula¯sat ta¯rı¯h kanı¯sat U ¯ ¯ ˘ ˘ ˙ see ibid., ˘ 262–274, and ‘Appendix 12 For the Arabic text of the 1910-Resolution, I’ in Evelin Dierauff, Translating Late Ottoman Modernity in Palestine: Debates on Ethno-Confessional Relations and Identity in the Arab Palestinian Newspaper Filast¯ın (1911–1914) (Göttingen: ˙ Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2020.

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their communities. Basically, it was supposed to supervise reforms in Orthodox educational, social and welfare institutions (schools, churches, poor houses, etc.) in the dioceses for which it was to receive one third of the Patriarchates’ revenues, or at least 30,000 lira which was quite a sum.13 From December 1910, the Mixed Council gathered bi-weekly until the outbreak of World War I. It was the first legal platform for the local Arab Orthodox in Palestine to negotiate their demands with the clergy, and it should be noted that it was of high symbolic value for the Renaissance Movement, and its debates were met with very high expectations by the congregation. Against this background, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ formulated his theoretical arguments of the movement during the Second Constitutional Period, and he worked on a strategy to mobilize the Arab congregation.

The Wider Communicational Context of Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s Discussion Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s Discussion of the Orthodox Renaissance during these transitional years took place in a wider communicational context, meaning the regional and international debates that had a direct or indirect impact on his writings that shall be briefly outlined. The Orthodox Movement was part of a greater transOttoman debate per se since it translated ideas that had become an integral part of political debates in the Ottoman center in Palestine as Ottoman periphery: specifically, ideas on Enlightenment and western political philosophy, Ottoman constitutionalist thought and competing ‘national questions’ circulating throughout the Ottoman realms. The Orthodox Movement also adapted global techniques of mobilization to push their cause, by picking up the trend toward ‘social organization’ in social associations, clubs and political parties. Further, it quickly and effectively applied the political ‘culture of protest’ of the Young Turk’s Era, expressed through open letters to the governmental authorities in the press and the practice of petitioning. First, in line with an agenda for a cultural Arabization of the Patriarchate, the reform activists named their movement ‘Orthodox Renaissance’ in compliance with the nahda, the Arab Renaissance. This was a broader network of intellectuals ˙ in the Arab provinces striving for a revival of the Arabic historical heritage and the modernization of Arabic language and literature – in short, an Arab movement for Enlightenment (tanwı¯r) and modernity – and Palestinian Orthodox

¯ rusˇalı¯m al-urtu¯duksı¯ya, 266. 13 See Hu¯rı¯, Hula¯sat ta¯rı¯h kanı¯sat U ¯ ¯ ˘ ˘ ˙ ˘

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leaned strongly towards this movement’s agenda, especially in the field of education.14 Second, and even more important, the Orthodox Movements’ leaders applied a set of political meanings imported from Ottoman constitutionalist thought and (western) liberation discourses that circulated in the aftermath of the Young Turk Revolution (1908) in Arab intellectual thought. The emergence of these discourses in the Arab press has been studied before with reference to the Egyptian magazines al-Muqtataf, al-Mana¯r and al-Hila¯l and the Damascene al-Muqta˙ bas.15 After the restoration of the Ottoman Constitution and the overthrow of the

14 The nahda was neither a centrally organized nor a mass movement but initiated by intellectual˙ urban elite networks, Muslim and non-Muslim, who mostly concentrated in Beirut, Damascus and Cairo. Their interest was to reform Arabic, previously the language of Islamic literature and scholars (ʿulama¯ʾ), according to modern standards. As part of this, the movement sought to secularize local education and initiated the translation of modern sciences from other languages, European modern literature and political philosophy into Arabic. Its pioneers were Syrian-Lebanese teachers, translators, publishers and the journalists of the young Arab press who often had received education in foreign schools or missionary institutions, most of all the Syrian Protestant College, predecessor of the American University of Beirut (AUB), as a ‘think tank’ of the Syrian-Lebanese elites who forwarded the nahda. For ˙ Muthe thought of important pioneers of the Arab nahda – such as Muhammad ʿAbduh, ˙ ¯ n, Farah Antu¯˙n and others, see the ˇ urgˇ¯ı Zayda hammad Kurd ʿAlı¯, Butrus al-Busta¯nı¯, G ˙ ˙ classical work of Albert Hourani, Arabic Thought in the Liberal Age 1798–1939 (London: Oxford University Press, 1962) on Arab ‘liberal thought’ of Arab modernity as a response to Western modernity, further developed approaches by Dyala Hamzah, “From ‘Ilm to Sihafa or the Politics of the Public Interest (Maslaha): Muhammad Rashîd Rida and his Journal alManar (1898–1935),” in The Making of the Arab Intellectual, 1880–1960: Empire, Public Sphere and the Colonial Coordinates of Selfhood, ed. Dyala Hamzah, (London: Routledge, 2013), Stephen Sheehi, Foundations of Modern Arab identity (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2004) and many others and, as a revised study of the nahda, Jens Hanssen and Max Weiss, eds., Arabic Thought beyond the Liberal Age: Towards an˙Intellectual History of the Nahda (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016). 15 For instance, Dupont has studied the reformist spirit in al-Hila¯l and al-Mana¯r after the Revolution of 1908, see Anne Laure Dupont, “The Ottoman Revolution of 1908 as seen by alHila¯l and al-Mana¯r: The Triumph and Diversification of the Reformist Spirit,” in Liberal Thought in the Eastern Mediterranean: Late 19th Century until the 1960s, ed. Christoph Schumann (Leiden: Brill, 2008). Hamzah, “From ‘Ilm to Sihafa” has investigated the politics of the public interest (maslaha) in al-Mana¯r from 1898–1935. Thomas Philipp, “Participation ˙ ˙ and Critique: Arab Intellectuals Respond to the ‘Ottoman Revolution’,” in Arabic Thought beyond the Liberal Age: Towards an Intellectual History of the Nahda, ed. Jens Hanssen and Max Weiss (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016) has outlined intellectual responses to the 1908 Revolution in al-Muqtabas and al-Hila¯l. Khuri-Makdisi has illustrated conceptions of ‘the social’ and socialism in al-Hila¯l and al-Muqtataf. See Ilham Khuri˙ the Construction of Makdisi, “Inscribing Socialism into the Nahda: al-Muqtataf, al-Hila¯l, and ˙ a Leftist Reformist Worldview, 1880–1914,”˙ in The Making of the Arab Intellectual (1880– 1960): Empire, Public Sphere and the Colonial Coordinates of Selfhood, ed. Dyala Hamzah (London: Routledge, 2013) and “The Conceptualization of the Social in Late Nineteenth- and Early Twentieth-century Arabic Thought and Language,” in Global conceptual history: a

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Hamidian regime in the aftermath of the Young Turk Revolution (1908), this thought became popularized through a widespread rhetoric on ‘civil rights’ (huqu¯q al-muwa¯tinı¯n) and the ‘public good’ (al-maslaha al-ʿa¯mma) in the post˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ revolutionary Arab press. Arab journalists had lively discussions on the ‘freedom 16 of the press’ (hurrı¯yat as-siha¯fa). They established a widely spread dichoto˙ ˙˙˙ mous discourse of the ‘liberty’ of ‘the new age’ and the Constitution versus the ‘despotism’ (istibda¯d) of the Hamidian era; they helped generate a new protest culture through controversial discussions, ‘open letters’ and petitions to officials in the press; and they openly presented themselves as ‘watchdogs’ of the government and the ‘mouthpiece’ of the public.17 These discursive innovations provided Palestinian Orthodox activists from 1908 onwards with the necessary discursive frame, and shaped their arguments tremendously. As much as their movement in its essence was cultural, and practically aimed at accessing the economic resources in the Patriarchate, their theoretical arguments were political, and fitting the rhetoric of the Young Turk era so as to equip their cause with legitimacy.18 In the aftermath of the Young Turk’s Revolution, Arab Orthodox activists from different Palestinian cities initiated a rebellion in Jerusalem, staging their movement as a small version of an Ottoman Constitutional Revolution in Palestine. Applying a very combative rhetoric, they presented their movement as an apocalyptic battle between Ottoman Constitutional ‘just rule’ (hukmʿa¯dil) and Greek ‘despotic rule’ (hukm mustabidd) that did not represent ˙ ˙ the indigenous Orthodox. Third, the Arab Orthodox activists borrowed political meanings and terms, such as ‘nation’ (sˇaʿb), from proto-nationalist terminology that, by 1913, started to gain popularity in the Arab press. In Filast¯ın, the term ˇsaʿb was used inter˙ reader, ed. Margrit Pernau and Dominic Sachsenmaier (London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2016). 16 Al-Ahba¯r, 19 November 1913: 496/3/4. ˘ ‘sacralization’ of liberty in Palestine after 1908, see Michelle Campos, Ottoman 17 On the Brothers: Muslims Christians and Jews in Early Twentieth Century Palestine (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2011), 20–58. On the role of Arab journalists in government critique, see Campos, “‘The Ottoman Sickness and Its Doctors’: Imperial Loyalty in Palestine on the Eve of World War I,” in World War I and the End of the Ottomans: from the Balkan Wars to the Armenian Genocide, ed. Hans-Lukas Kieser, Kerem Öktema and Maurus Reinkowsky (London: I. B. Tauris, 2015), 93f. See Yuval Ben-Bassat, Petitioning the Sultan: Justice and Protest in Late Ottoman Palestine (London: I.B. Tauris, 2013), “Bedouin Petitions from Late Ottoman Palestine: Evaluating the Effects of Sedentarization,” Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient (JESHO) 58 (2015): 135–162 on the culture of protest in late Ottoman Palestine as reflected in petitions, sent from Arab villagers, Zionist settlers and Bedouin tribes to Istanbul. 18 For the embedment of the Orthodox Movement into the Ottoman Constitutionalist discourse, see selected articles in Filast¯ın, 14 August 1912: 162/4/1–2; 19 August 1911: 61/1/1–4. ˙ by the Orthodox movement, see also paragraph 4 in For language forms and themes used chapter III in Dierauff, Translating.

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changeably for ‘confession’ (milla), the ‘public’ or ‘people’ in the sense of nation,19 and Saka¯kı¯nı¯ also used it synonymously for the Orthodox community. In general, the free and almost random application of this kind of vocabulary in Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s writings of 1913 testifies that these terms were widely accepted in Arab public discourse, interpreted quite freely and could take on several meanings at the same time. The precise circumstances of how these terms infiltrated local Arabic debates remain unclear; however, it occurred under the impact of arising political threats in the Empire and at the Balkans: During the years of 1912 and 1913, the Young Turk’s regime lost all of its European territories in the Balkan Wars, which left a deep impression on the Arab elites who sought to prevent the political destabilization of the region by all means. Further, the regime was unable to defend its interests against the interference of imperialist powers through military operations and the Capitulation treaties (imtiya¯za¯t) that had a long tradition in the Empire.20 Simultaneously, the Empire faced the rise of ‘national questions’: the ‘Armenian Question’ in Anatolia and the ‘Zionist Question’ in Palestine along with the growing influence of ‘Arab Decentralization’ (al-la¯ markazı¯ya) in Beirut and Damascus: a movement driven by Arab elite networks that opposed Ottoman centralization and the promotion of the Turkish element in state bureaucracy, which culminated in the organization of the Arab Congress in Paris in July 1913, and became the predecessor of an early Arab proto-nationalism after World War I.21 ˇ urgˇ¯ı al-Hu¯rı¯ 19 See for instance, an article in Filast¯ın on school reforms from the teacher G ˙ ‘the Orthodox people in Palestine’ (asˇ-sˇaʿb al-urtu¯duksı ˘ ¯ Yaʿqu¯b from Bayt Sahour, addressing ¯ fı¯ Filast¯ın). Filast¯ın, 24 July 1912: 156/3/5sq. ˙ 20 Historically, the˙Capitulations (imtiya¯za¯t) were treaties between the Empire and European powers that allowed the latter to intervene in Ottoman internal politics and act as protectors of non-Muslims and, since the nineteenth century, had expanded far beyond their original framework. For development and extension of the imtiya¯za¯t and their abuse as capitalist instruments, see J. Wansbrough, et al., “Imtiya¯za¯t,” in Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed, ed. P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, C.E. Bosworth, E. van Donzel, and W.P. Heinrichs, accessed October 08, 2019.http://dx.doi.org/10.1163/1573-3912_islam_COM_0371. 21 The supporters of Arab Decentralization formulated a political agenda for an administrative autonomy in the Arab provinces; however, under the political umbrella of the Empire. In 1912, they established in Beirut the Arab Reform Committees and in Cairo the Decentralization Party. Their central demands were the introduction of Arabic as the official language in the Arab provinces, the replacement of Turkish officials by locals, an independent budget and the stationing of Arab soldiers near their provinces. The decentralists were not very numerous but were ambitious activists and driven by a principle conflict between themselves as Arab Ottomans and a central power that derived its legitimacy from the restoration of equality between all citizens but favored the Turkish element. See Hasan Kayalı, Arabs and Young Turks: Ottomanism, Arabism, and Islamism in the Ottoman Empire, 1908–1918 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997), 13f. The activities of the Arab ‘decentralists’ in Beirut and Damascus and the First Arab Congress in Paris in July 1913 stimulated heated press debates in Palestine, as mentioned in chapter I under the paragraph ‘Central Concepts and Terminology in Filast¯ın’s Discourse’ in Dierauff, Translating. However, the aims of this ˙

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Fourth, Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s free and quite random application of political and protonationalist meanings on the Orthodox Renaissance, which was a cultural reform movement and certainly not a ‘national question’, reflects on the wide politicization of Arab societies prior to World War I, and the increasing trend for ‘social organization’ in the Middle East. The organization of the urban middle classes in ‘groups of shared interests’ was an extremely popular thing, and the engagement of these middle-classes as ‘architects of community’, as Watenpaugh pointed out,22 heavily increased in the Arab East after the Young Turk Revolution. The history of social organization in Ottoman Palestine in cultural and patriotic societies, charity, early Arab feminist activism, freemasonry lodges, literary societies and sports clubs is still rather unexplored in today’s scholarly research, and this chapter seeks to contribute to that field.23 In this sense, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ devoted most of his writings during the years 1908–14 to generating mass support for the Orthodox cause and mobilizing the congregation to establish effective political

movement before World War I should not be confused with ‘political separatism’. Unfortunately, research has often missed the distinction between cultural Arabism, Arab Decentralization and Arab nationalism as an ideology or fully developed popular movement at a later stage. Kayalı highlighted that during 1908–14, Arab nationalism was not yet formulated, despite the circulation of proto-national terminology in Arab discourse. See Kayalı, Arabs and Young Turks, 15. However, the persecution of Arab decentralists as ‘separatists’ by the regime pushed the transition of the Movement into a proto-nationalist movement only during World War I, but not before. This produced the first ‘Arab martyrs’ that left a deep impression on the collective memory of the Arab populations. For the early politicization of Arabism during the Young Turk era, and the emergence of Arab proto-nationalism during World War I, see Kayalı, Arabs and Young Turks. For the persecution of Arab ‘separatists’ during the War in Beirut, Damascus and Jerusalem by Camal Pasha, Turkish military governor of Syria, see Talha Çiçek, War and state formation in Syria: Cemal Pasha’s governorate during World War I, 1914–1917 (London: Routledge, 2014) and “Martyrs/Separatists, Syrian and Lebanese,” in 1914–1918-online: International Encyclopedia of the First World War, ed. Ute Daniel et al., issued by Freie Universität Berlin, last modified April 10, 2015. DOI: 10.1546 3/ie1418.10609. 22 Keith Watenpaugh, Being Modern in the Middle East: Revolution, Nationalism, Colonialism, and the Arab Middle Class (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2006) has investigated social development in Aleppo during the years 1908–46. 23 In this respect, see for instance the survey of Campos on the activities of the Ottoman Palestinian Freemasonry as a ‘social club’, (Michelle Campos, “Freemasonry in Ottoman Palestine,” Jerusalem Quarterly 22/23 (2005): 37–62), the reconstruction of intercommunal and Jewish relief organizations in War time Jerusalem by Jacobson (Abigail Jacobson, From Empire to Empire: Jerusalem between Ottoman and British Rule (New York: Syracuse University Press, 2011), 22–52), and Dierauff ’s survey of civil society activities in the sectors of public culture, entertainment and leisure activities in Pre-World War I Jaffa, framed as ‘performances of late Ottoman modernity’. Evelin Dierauff, “Performances of Late Ottoman Modernity: Culture, Entertainment and Leisure Activities in Pre-World War I Jaffa,” in From the Household to the Wider World: Urban Governance in Late Ottoman Bilad al-Sham, ed. Yuval Ben-Bassat and Johann Buessow (Tuebingen: University of Tuebingen Press, 2021 (forthcoming)).

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party-like structures and organizations, and he also practically worked for the establishment of such organizations.

Relevance of the Study, Methodology and Preconceptions The intra-Orthodox conflict in Palestine during the Second Constitutional Era has hardly received scholarly attention, and if so, it was explored via Greek sources or official British correspondence, merely reflecting the colonial perspective on the conflict. For instance, Kechriotis and Vatikiotis have explored the effect of the restoration of the Ottoman Constitution on the strategies of the Greek Orthodox in the aftermath of the 1908 Revolution through Greek sources or British reports.24 Roussos and Kuruvilla relied on British reports during the early Mandate by arbitrary commissions, such as the Bertram-Luke commission in 1921 and the Bertram-Young commission in 1925.25 Further, Katz and Kark studied the acquisition of land and property in the Orthodox Patriarchate under Ottoman and British rule through the Patriarchal archives and correspondence between the Patriarchate and the Greek government.26 Apart from that, the valuable account of Niqu¯la and Sˇahha¯da al-Hu¯rı¯, originally published in 1925, is one ˙˙ ˘ of the rare local Arab Palestinian sources that gives essential insights into the historical development of the Arab Orthodox Movement in Palestine, its emergence during the Hamidian era and its first eruptions as a violent rebellion against the clerical establishment in the aftermath of the 1908 Revolution, the release of the 1910 Resolution and the establishment of the Mixed Council in December 1910,27 which is the end of Hu¯rı¯’s account. ˘ 24 See Kechriotis, Vangelis, “Greek-Orthodox, Ottoman Greeks or just Greek? Theories of Coexistence in the Aftermath of the Young Turk Revolution,” Études Balkaniques 41 (2005) and P. J. Vatikiotis, “The Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem between Hellenism and Arabism,” Middle Eastern Studies 30, no. 4 (1994). 25 See Sotiris Roussos, “The Greek Orthodox Patriarchate and Community of Jerusalem: Church, State and Identity,” in The Christian Communities of Jerusalem and the Holy Land: Studies in History, Religion and Politics, ed. Anthony O’Mahony, (Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 2003), “Patriarchs, Notables and Diplomats: the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem in the Modern Period,” in Eastern Christianity. Studies in Modern History Religion and Politics, ed. Anthony O’Mahony (London: Melisende, 2004), and “Eastern Orthodox Perspectives on Church–State Relations and Religion and Politics in Modern Jerusalem,” International Journal for the Study of the Christian Church 5, no. 2 (2005); and Samuel Kuruvilla, “Church–State Relations in Palestine: Empires, Arab Nationalism and the Indigenous Greek Orthodox, 1880–1940.” Holy Land Studies 10, no. 1 (2011). 26 Kark and Katz “The Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem” , “The Church and Landed Property: The Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem,” Middle Eastern Studies 43, no. 3 (2007). 27 My reference here is the edition of Hu¯rı¯’s version in Arabic from 1992, a reprint of the original ˘ Abu¯ G ˇ a¯bir. Jerusalem edition of 1925, edited by

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However, local Arab Palestinian perspectives on the Orthodox Movement during its crucial phase, from 1910–14, have been missing so far, including the coverage of the Arab Palestinian press on the issue. This is surprising since the Jaffa newspaper Filast¯ın, one of the most successful journalistic enterprises in ˙ late Ottoman Palestine, was from its inception a leading actor in the movement. In January 1911, Yu¯suf and ʿI¯sa¯ al-ʿI¯sa¯, Arab Palestinian Christians of Greek Orthodox confession from Jaffa, started the publication of their newspaper Filast¯ın so as to promote, first and foremost, the Orthodox cause, designing it as a ˙ platform and a ‘mouthpiece’ (lisa¯n) for Arab Orthodox interests in Palestine.28 Yu¯suf al-ʿI¯sa¯ was a partner of Saka¯kı¯nı¯ and a leading actor in a very polemic anticlerical campaign. From 1911–13, he represented the Orthodox of Jaffa in the Mixed Council, and published the minutes of each session in Filast¯ın, which ˙ allows insight into the negotiations between clerics and Arab lay Orthodox as the first practical experiments with political participation in the Patriarchate of Jerusalem, as I have explored earlier in a study on group relations in late Ottoman Palestine.29 A corpus of studies has shown how different communities in Palestine have dealt with the production of these discourses during this phase and how they appropriated it to serve their own cause, a process that I define here as translations of late Ottoman modernity into specific contexts. Der Matossian has looked at the impact of the Ottoman Constitution on the administration of the Jewish, Armenian and Greek Orthodox communities in Jerusalem in the context of an emerging concept of the ‘public’. On the level of inter-communal relations, Ben-Bassat has investigated through petitions from Palestine to Istanbul how a ‘protest culture’ was practiced in the Palestinian context through petitions against the background of Ottoman policies. On the intra-communal level, Campos has explored how Ottoman identity was negotiated in the Hebrew press in Palestine and Istanbul: specifically, how the ideal of ‘Ottoman Brotherhood’ was translated by Jewish elites. Buessow has analyzed interrelations between imperial and local politics in the Jerusalem District during the era of Sultan Abdülhamid II (1872–1908), showing how Ottoman political structures and innovations were translated into the Palestinian context and how this affected local society. Tamari has investigated the translation of an Ottoman modernity into the urban context of Jerusalem during a period of transition from imperial to Mandate rule, and how this affected local inter-confessional relations. Earlier, I have explored how Arab Palestinians of different confessional and ethnic back28 Filast¯ın, 15 July 1911: 51/1/3. ˙ explored the role of Filast¯ın in the Orthodox Renaissance in detail, as well as the 29 I have ˙ a ‘history of escalations’. See chapter III in Dierauff, disputes in the Mixed Council as Translating.

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grounds negotiated in Filast¯ın over relations between different groups in Pales˙ tine during the last years of Ottoman rule (1911–14): specifically, how they defined the rules for cohabitation under the premise of the ‘modernization and progress’ of Palestine, and through the spectacles of Ottoman unity and civic equality as promoted ideals.30 Returning to the Orthodox movement in Palestine during the Second Constitutional period, the absence of local perspectives in research on this movement is remarkable since, during these years, it faced fundamental transformations in concepts and terms with remarkable effects on local cultural and political identities that have not systematically been explored. This chapter seeks to contribute to closing this gap by exploring the appropriation of concepts in Halı¯l ˘ as-Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s discussion of the Orthodox Renaissance during this era of fundamental transformations that was a specific ‘saddle period’ of its own, I claim. In Koselleck’s understanding, ‘saddle period’ means the fundamental conceptual and social change that took place in Europe between 1750 and 1850 or 1870, marked by the era of Enlightenment before and after the French Revolution. Along with political and social ruptures, this era witnessed rapid transformations of key concepts in modern political thought. Linguistic innovations that occurred during this period are taken as indicators for historical change, whereas conceptual and social change are interrelated, since the definition of ‘modern’ terms such as ‘democracy’ or ‘liberty’ as ‘ideal standards’ contain an anticipation of

30 See Bedross Der Matossian, “The Young Turk Revolution: Its Impact on Religious Politics of Jerusalem (1908–1912),” Jerusalem Quarterly 40, vol. 4 (2009/2010): 18–33, “Administrating the Non-Muslims and the ‘Question of Jerusalem’ after the Young Turk Revolution,” in Late Ottoman Palestine: The Period of Young Turk Rule, ed. Yuval Ben-Bassat and Eyal Ginio, (London and New York: I. B. Tauris, 2011) and “Formation of Public Sphere(s) in the Aftermath of the 1908: Révolution among Armenians, Arabs, and Jews,” in “L’ivresse de la Liberté”: la Révolution de 1908 dans l’Empire Ottoman, ed. François Georgon (Leuven: Peeters, 2012); Ben-Bassat, Petitioning the Sultan and “Bedouin Petitions” ; Johann Buessow, Hamidian Palestine: Politics and Society in the District of Jerusalem, 1872–1908 (Leiden: Brill, 2011); Campos, Ottoman Brothers and ‘The Ottoman Sickness’; Salim Tamari, “Jerusalem’s Ottoman Modernity: The Times and Lives of Wasif Jawhariyyeh,” Jerusalem Quarterly 9 (2000), “City of Riffraff: Crowds, Public Space, and New Urban Sensibilities in War-Time Jerusalem, 1917–1921,” in Comparing Cities: The Middle East and South Asia, ed. Kamran Asdar Ali and Martina Rieker (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009) and “Confessionalism and Public Space in Ottoman and Colonial Jerusalem,” in Cities & Sovereignty: Identity Politics in Urban Spaces, ed. Diane E. Davis (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2011); Evelin Dierauff, “Global Migration into Late Ottoman Jaffa as Reflected in the Arab-Palestinian Newspaper Filast¯ın (1911–1913),” in A Global Middle East: Mobility, Materiality and ˙ 1880–1940, ed. Liat Kozma, Cyrus Schayegh and Avner Wishnitzer Culture in the Modern Age, (London and New York: I. B. Tauris, 2015) and Translating.

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future conditions, creating expectations towards the realization of these standards.31 In the Middle East, the reinstallation of the Ottoman Constitution and the Young Turk Revolution pushed such rapid shifts with regard to political concepts and rhetorical practices, which constituted a ‘saddle period’ of its own, and applies in particular to the Orthodox Renaissance in Palestine during the Second Constitutional Era, I claim. It was during these years that leading Orthodox activists – in the front Saka¯kı¯nı¯ and the editors of Filast¯ın, Yu¯suf and ʿI¯sa¯ al-ʿI¯sa¯ – ˙ reframed the movement, articulated its main theoretical arguments and presented it mainly through the filter of Ottoman constitutionalism and the premise of ‘modernity and progress’. These arguments became decisive for the establishment of a public discourse on the Orthodox cause that was carried on to the Mandate era. It was also during this ‘Orthodox saddle period’ that Orthodox leaders generated mass public support for their cause by steering up ‘the street’ against the clergy, organizing demonstrations, mobilizing community leaders, and occupying Orthodox churches and schools. Yet, these ruptures have not been fully understood in the light of the last moments of a Transottoman modernity and the approaching Ottoman Cataclysm, a decade of ‘catastrophic change’ that led to the end of the Ottoman World after World War I.32 This study can, to a certain extent, identify such terminological innovations that indicate historical change, and the functions and strategies underlying the appropriation of concepts in Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s writings. 31 Historical experiences have transformed these ideas towards a ‘future-oriented’ perspective, thus becoming concepts in motion, Koselleck argues: a process that he named the ‘future in the past’. See Reinhart Koselleck, Geschichtliche Grundbegriffe, vol. 1, ed. Otto Brunner, Werner Conze and Reinhart Koselleck (Stuttgart: Klett Cotta, 1979), XV. On the ‘space of experience’ and the ‘horizon of expectation’ as interrelated historical categories, see Reinhart Koselleck, Futures Past: On the Semantics of Historical Time (New York: Columbia University Press, 2004), 255f. With regard to the German-speaking area, Reinhart Koselleck, Begriffsgeschichten: Studien zur Semantik und Pragmatik der politischen und sozialen Sprache. Mit zwei Beiträgen von Ulrike Spree und Willibald Steinmetz sowie einem Nachwort zu Einleitungsfragmenten Reinhart Kosellecks von Carsten Dutt, 1st ed. (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp), 2006 explored the emergence, application and reception of concepts such as ‘progress and decline’ (pp. 159–181), ‘crisis’ (pp. 203–217), ‘patriotism’ (pp. 218–239), ‘revolution’ (pp. 240–251), ‘Enlightenment’ and ‘tolerance’ and its limits (pp. 340–362), and the concept of ‘citizen’ since Aristoteles (pp. 387–461). See also Friedrich Wilhelm Graf, “Saddle Period. In: Religion Past and Present,” accessed June 13, 2019, http://dx.doi.org/10.1163/1877-5888_rpp _SIM_025223 . 32 ‘Ottoman Cataclysm’ is a term introduced by the Research Foundation Switzerland-Turkey, a research cluster currently exploring the end of the Ottoman world during the 1910s as a decade of ‘catastrophic change’. Hans-Lukas Kieser, Kerem Öktem and Maurus Reinkowsky, eds, World War I and the End of the Ottomans: from the Balkan Wars to the Armenian Genocide (London: I. B. Tauris, 2015), 16. See also the Ottoman ‘Cataclysm’ Project at the University of Basel: https://nahoststudien.unibas.ch/forschung/projekte/laufende-projekte/ ottoman-cataclysm (accessed August 17, 2017).

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How can these conceptual ruptures and terminological innovations be grasped? Here, Steinmetz’ approach seems promising. First, one should zoom into the communication process by observing repeated communicational situations between selected actors, or authors, as far as possible from the texts, since this allows one to identify the different stages in the alteration of conceptual change. Second, this process should be put in context of historical action by moving the focus of analysis from the how to the why; this means, to ask for the causes and strategies underlying semantic change, and the reality of power relations on the ground that have an impact on the actors’ lives and their articulated arguments. Further, Steinmetz has argued that one should look at conceptual change by collecting several meanings and terms that are forwarded in texts to describe collective groups, territorial concepts, states of order and disorder, ideas on reform and images of ‘progressiveness’, ‘backwardness’, standards for political representation and good governance, etc. This way, one can establish terminological clusters and make the connection between them.33 This approach moves the analysis from the introduction of new terms to the context of the introduction in case studies and micro-history. It is especially relevant in the beginning of conceptual changes while one and the same term can be used in a flexible manner and take on several meanings in different communicational situations, which applies specifically for Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s texts. Saka¯kı¯nı¯ forwarded a range of proto-nationalist terms that reflected already-articulated political concepts in other contexts but took on floating meanings in his specific context. In this respect, he simultaneously applied a variety of terms to describe the Orthodox community, and to describe just or unjust political representation and governance. Here, the meaning of terms might be different from context to context, but their application proves that Saka¯kı¯nı¯ simply had to use them if he wanted to be taken seriously and make the Orthodox Renaissance look like a mature movement with a legitimate cause. For instance, when referring to the Orthodox congregation, he applied terms such as ‘confession’ (milla), as ‘compatriots’, ‘nationals’ or ‘citizens’ (watanı¯yı¯n) but also as a ‘people’ or ‘nation’ ˙ (sˇaʿb). This was not an understanding of the Orthodox Renaissance movement as a separatist movement, but served to stage it as a mature emancipatory movement with a collective agenda; this, in the context of the growing importance of social and political organization of Middle Eastern urban societies. With regard to political representation and ‘governance’, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ heavily relied on the 33 See Willibald Steinmetz, “40 Jahre Begriffsgeschichte – State of the Art,” in Sprache – Kognition – Kultur: Sprache zwischen mentaler Struktur und kultureller Prägung, ed. Heidrun Kämper and Ludwig Eichinger (Berlin and New York: Walter de Gruyter, 2008), 174–197. Compare with the article of Kathrin Kollmeier “Begriffsgeschichte und Historische Semantik, Version: 2.0,” in Docupedia-Zeitgeschichte. published October 29, 2012, last accessed October 8, 2019. http://docupedia.de/zg/kollmeier_begriffsgeschichte_v2_de_2012.

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constitutionalist discourse on Ottoman unity, brotherhood and equality. Specifically, he staged the Orthodox Renaissance as an emancipatory movement, striving for liberty and ‘equality’ (musa¯wa¯t) in the administration of the Patriarchate, as an Ottoman body in the heart of the ‘fatherland’ or the ‘homeland’ (watan) which was the nonnegotiable territorial and political reference in his ˙ texts, as it was the case in public Arab discourse during the Second Constitutional Era. Considering the prevailing Constitutionalist discourse in the Arab press, in the light of the emerging threats to Ottoman unity and the arising ‘national questions’ in the Empire, competing with the concept of Ottomanism, as mentioned before, these terms had taken on powerful meanings, and already possessed a sacred dimension in Arab public debates. Although an Arab proto-nationalism only emerged during World War I, its political meanings and terminology left traces in Middle Eastern intellectual thought, and gained acceptance in Arab public discourse already prior to World War I, specifically since 1913. This is reflected in the writings of Saka¯kı¯nı¯ and other Arab Orthodox activists who, pretty randomly, played with several of these meanings. Filast¯ın defined the ˙ Orthodox Renaissance as a ‘reformist, patriotic renaissance’ (nahda isla¯h¯ıya ˙ ˙ ˙ watanı¯ya),34 and Saka¯kı¯nı¯ ascribed the Arab Orthodox Renaissance to be a ‘na˙ tional body’ (sˇaʿb watanı¯) and or even qawmı¯, which means ‘national’, but could ˙ take on in Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s context several other meanings, which I will pick up in the third part of the chapter. This ‘playing’ with proto-nationalist terms in Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s texts should not be confused with the promotion of the Orthodox Renaissance as a movement of national character since these terms took on several meanings simultaneously. Their application simply proves that they were already equipped with a powerful meaning and one had to use them in debates if he wanted to be taken seriously. What Saka¯kı¯nı¯ really intended with the application of these terms was to present the Orthodox Renaissance as a professional movement that had a collective agency and a mature level of organization. Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s diaries reveal that he dedicated a major part of his energy from 1908–14 to accessing already-established and building new political networks in Jerusalem, and he constantly motivated his Orthodox co-fighters to install professional networks, as will be pointed out in the coming section on ‘Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s activities and networks’. These efforts should be seen in the context of growing middle-class engagement in social clubs, relief work and political organizations. The growing passion among Arab intellectuals to articulate and discuss ‘political programs’ and ‘statutes’ for all kinds of purposes is clearly seen, since the end of 1913, in Filast¯ın and in ˙ 34 Filast¯ın, 7 October 1911: 75/3/5. ˙

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Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s pamphlet that emphasized the role of the youth in progressive forms of social organization.

Staging the Orthodox Renaissance as a ‘Constitutional Revolution’ The arguments and terms applied in Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s discussion of the Orthodox Renaissance much echoed the specific variation of ‘late Ottoman modernity’ in Palestine, which is understood here as a ‘modernist mind set’ and shall be briefly outlined in the following. This mind set was in general shared by Arab Palestinian intellectuals, as an analysis of Filast¯ın from 1911 until 1914 has shown. In the ˙ press, this ‘mind set’ was often subsumed under the slogan ‘the spirit of the new age’ (ru¯h al-ʿasr al-gˇadı¯d). The ‘new age’ addressed was the post-revolutionary era ˙ ˙ under the Young Turks’ regime, which had ended the so-called ‘despotism’ of Sultan Abdulhamid and reinstalled the Constitution of 1876; meant by the ‘spirit’ were the ideals of ‘liberty, Constitution, brotherhood and equality’ (hurrı¯ya, ˙ dustu¯r, iha¯ʾ, musa¯wa¯t, iha¯ʾ).35 To a great extent, this mind set put discourses on ˘ ˘ modernization and liberation at the center of the debate, picked up typical reform demands of the Tanzimat era and integrated elements of the Arab nahda. ˙ At the top level of this mind set were surely the ideals of ‘modernization and reform’, ‘Ottoman unity’, and a strong notion of a Palestinian ‘public’. These components of late Ottoman modernity were commonly accepted among Arab Palestinian intellectuals regardless of their faith and absolutely predominant in their writings; this is clear from Filast¯ın.36 ˙ First, the agenda for the modernization of Palestine was underscored with persistent calls for ‘progress’ and ‘growth’ (taqaddum, tarqiya, raqy, taraqqin) in all aspects of life by contemporary intellectuals.37 Here, the declared problem of Palestinian intellectuals was the ‘decline’ (inhita¯t) and ‘backwardness’ (tahalluf) ˙˙ ˙ ˘ of ‘Oriental society’ (asˇ-sˇarqı¯yı¯n) in comparison with Europe. This motive was much used by a range of established authors in Filastin to complain about the 35 See Filastin, 15 July 1911: issue 51/2/3–3/4. 36 In my earlier study on ethno-confessional relations in Pre-World War I Palestine, I analyzed Filast¯ın as a medium for public debate and ‘educator of the nation’. For Filast¯ın’s structure, ˙ focus, central agendas, terminology, rhetoric and images, see paragraph ˙ 3 in chapter content I, in Dierauff, Translating. 37 See also Freitag’s study of Middle Eastern thought on modernity during the Tanzimat, and the terminology ascribed to modernization processes by the terms isla¯h (reform), hada¯ra, ˙ ˙growth). See˙ Ulrike ˙ madanı¯ya, tamaddun (civilization) and taqaddum or taraqqin (progress, Freitag, “Arabische Visionen von Modernität im 19. und frühen 20. Jahrhundert: Die Aneignung von Universalien oder die Übernahme fremder Konzepte?” in Selbstbilder und Fremdbilder: Repräsentation sozialer Ordnungen im Wandel, ed. Jörg Barberowski, Hartmut Kaelble, and Jürgen Schriever (Frankfurt: Campus Verlag, 2008), 89–117.

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state of infrastructure, agriculture and education in late Ottoman Palestine and urge for modernization and developing measures by the state.38 The motive of decline and backwardness was often linked to the motive of oriental lethargy. In the perspective of many authors, the ‘new youth’ (an-na¯ˇsiʾa al-gˇadı¯da) was the main target group with which to design a progressive future, and thus, the modernization of local education, also female education, was a central demand of Palestinian modernists.39 In this respect, a ‘template’ of European modernity was much propagated, and especially, the American and British education systems were popular references in Filast¯ın.40 ˙ Further, the idealization of the Ottoman ‘homeland’ (al-watan al-ʿutma¯nı¯) ¯ ˙ and ‘Constitutionalism’ (ad-dustu¯rı¯ya), ‘Ottoman unity’ (al-ittiha¯d al-ʿutma¯nı¯) ¯ ˙ and ‘brotherhood’ (al-iha¯ʾ) was nonnegotiable in the Palestinian press. In˘ troduced in the Edict of Gülhane (1839) and spread by Ottoman bureaucrats during the Tanzimat, the idea of the Ottoman watan as the nonnegotiable ref˙ erence had become an integral part of the political vocabulary of Arab Muslims 41 and Christians alike. Also Palestinian intellectuals and elites considered the homeland as the only political frame that was able to meet the needs of the age, and the concept of ‘patriotism’ (al-watanı¯ya) was a flying word in the post˙ revolutionary Arab press. Further, only a representative government, operating within the frame of the Constitution and granting ‘equality’ to all citizens regardless of their ethnic and confessional background, was seen as a political rule that could implement ‘justice’ (ʿadl). In contrast to this, the pre-revolutionary rule of Abdulhamid was staged as a synonym for political ‘oppression’ (zulm) ˙ and ‘despotism’ (istibda¯d). Any other national model based on confessional, lingual or ethnic bonds was stigmatized as fanaticism (taʿassub) or extremism ˙˙ (tatarruf); tendencies that were even complained about as being a ‘national ˙ 42 disease’ in Filast¯ın. ˙ On the third level of the prevailing modernist mind set was an ideal of active ‘citizenry’ (muwa¯tana) and the notion of the ‘public’ and the ‘public opinion’ (ar˙ raʾy al-ʿa¯mm) as a power in society towards which governments were to be held 38 See for instance, Filastin, 27 March 1912: 123/3/4, 19 April 1913: 231/3/1–3. 39 As an example, see an editorial written by the female student Muhı¯ba al-ʿI¯sa¯, a relative of the ʿI¯sa¯’s, in which she bitterly complained that the backwardness in her country was rooted in ‘the laziness and the lethargy that is upon my brothers, the Orientals’ (al-kasl wa-l-humu¯l sa¯da¯ ˘ ʿala¯ ihwa¯nı¯ banı¯ asˇ-sˇarq). Filast¯ın, 29 March 1913: 225/1/1–3. ˙¯sa¯’s article praising the ‘total liberty’ in the American edu˘ instance, the Yu¯suf al-ʿI 40 See for cation system. Filast¯ın, 22 February 215/1/3–4. ˙ Michel, Arab Nationalism: A History: Nation and State in the Arab 41 See Choueiri, Youssef World (Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 2000), 70–72. One of the first Arab prominent figures who introduced the concept of the Ottoman Empire as the ‘beloved homeland’ (al-watan al˙ mahbu¯b) was the Egyptian scholar Tahta¯wı¯. ˙ ˙ ˙ 42 Filast¯ın, 10 May 1913: 235/1/1f. ˙

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accountable. Here, the lifting of press censorship in the course of the 1908 Revolution pushed Arab journalism to a new level of debating, to a political culture of protest as part of ‘the new freedom’ (al-hurrı¯ya al-gˇadı¯da) of the age, as ˙ was pointed out before. Although the majority of Palestinians were in practice excluded from access to education and power, the Palestinian elites and intellectuals were well aware of the concept of the ‘public’ as a political actor. The existence of a ‘public opinion’ was simply considered as a feature of modern civil society, and usually underpinned their demands with the claim to serve the ‘public interest’ (al-maslaha al-ʿa¯mma) or the ‘public benefit’ (al-manfaʿa al˙ ˙ ʿa¯mma): terms that acquired tremendous popularity in the contemporary press .43 discourse It is seen from many letters of Arab Orthodox activists published in Filast¯ın, ˙ that their arguments were built up in accordance with this discursive matrix mentioned above to stage their cause as legitimate and in compliance with the ‘spirit of the age’. The theoretical arguments of the Orthodox Movement were deeply shaped by this overarching discourse on modernization, Ottoman Constitutionalism, unity and citizen rights, but also by vocabulary on ‘liberty’ and ‘revolution’ that circulated in the Arab press. Accordingly, the Orthodox activists in Palestine defined their cause as a ‘Constitutional revolution’ (tawra dustu¯rı¯ya) ¯ and as a ‘reformist, patriotic Renaissance’ (nahda isla¯h¯ıya watanı¯ya).44 In ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ practice, these activists aimed to stage their cause as a repetition of the Ottoman Constitutional revolution of 1908 on a small scale in Palestine. Also Saka¯kı¯nı¯ relied on the Ottomanist and constitutionalist discourses, and heavily applied the popular rhetoric on civic equality, presenting the Orthodox cause as a struggle of indigenous Ottomans (muwa¯tinı¯n) for ‘citizen rights’ (huqu¯q al-muwa¯tinı¯n) in ˙ ˙ ˙ opposition to the ‘Greek monks’ (ar-ruhba¯n al-yu¯na¯n).45 Those represented in his writings an absolutist rule of strangers in Palestine, which was to be equated with ‘despotism’ (istibda¯d), and a ‘violation’ (ig˙tisa¯b) of Ottoman ‘just rule’ ˙ (hukmʿa¯dil).46 ˙

43 44 45 46

See for instance Filast¯ın, 17 April 1912: 128/1/1–3 and 6 September 1913: 269/3/4–4/2. ˙ 75/3/5. Filast¯ın, 7 October 1911: Filast˙ ¯ın, 26 June 148/3/3. ˙ jargon in Filast¯ın, 23 September 1911: 71/3/3–5. See the ˙

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Saka¯kı¯nı¯ in Context

Biography, Memory and Research Context Halı¯l as-Saka¯kı¯nı¯ (1878–1953), son of an Orthodox carpenter from Jerusalem’s ˘ Old City, received his education in different institutions, among them the ‘Anglican Bishop Blyth School’ and the ‘Zion English College’ in Jerusalem.47 He was a dazzling and very complex personality, and one of the most famous and influential Palestinian intellectuals, writers, pedagogues and activists during the late Ottoman and British Mandate period, and passionately devoted to humanism, the Arab Nahda and, at times, also to early Arab nationalism. Saka¯kı¯nı¯ also ˙ underwent several painful turning points in his life as well as massive shifts in his political views, and he changed his spheres of engagement accordingly. Moreover, he suffered from frequent economic crises, and was a man of heavy personal and psychological dissonances, as becomes clear through his diaries. From 1908 until 1914, he devoted his time to the Orthodox cause, which went hand in hand with his passion for Ottomanism: a principle he stayed loyal to until World War I. Only after his break with the Orthodox Movement in 1914 did he focus on Zionist migration as an issue and shifted to Pan-Arab identity under Mandate rule. He was personally acquainted with Zionists and until the war, taught Arabic to Ashkenazi immigrants in Jerusalem with whom he controversially discussed the impact of Zionism on Palestine.48 In 1917, he hid an American Jew of Polish origin, Alter Levine, who was wanted by the Ottoman authorities. Since Levine refused to eat food cooked in Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s house, his wife brought him kosher dishes every day to his hiding place until she was discovered by the police. Levine and Saka¯kı¯nı¯ were arrested a couple of days before the Ottoman defeat and the British occupation of Jerusalem and brought to a prison in Damascus from which Saka¯kı¯nı¯ managed to escape in 1918.49 Then, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ joined Emir Faysal, son of the Sharif of Mecca and leader of the Arab revolt, in Damascus, where he worked for unity between Arab Muslims and Christians, and the integration of Palestine into an Arab state in Greater Syria.50 Since 1918, PanArab identity had become a fashionable trend visible in Palestinian post-war intellectual writings, which needs to be investigated more. Apart from being a Pan-Arabist, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ was also a Palestinian nationalist. During the first Mandate 47 Emanuel Besˇka, “Khalil al-Sakakini and Zionism before WWI,” Jerusalem Quarterly 63/64 (2015): 40. 48 Among them were Zionists like Benjamin Ivri and Iliyas Faragˇi, both learning Arabic in order to deal on behalf of the JCA with Arab landowners. See Besˇka, “Khalil al-Sakakini,” 43–48. 49 Tom Segev, Es war einmal ein Palästina: Juden und Araber vor der Staatsgründung Israels, 4th ed. (München: Pantheon, 2007), 21–40. 50 Besˇka, “Khalil al-Sakakini,” 40–53.

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years, he was active in working out a Palestinian political representation to be recognized by British rule, and in 1922, he was elected to the ‘Arab Executive Committee’ (al-lagˇna al-ʿarabı¯ya al-ʿulya¯). In the middle of the 1920s, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ gave up his political activities for good. Yet, he never gave up his passion as a pedagogue and did not cease his educational activities during the Mandate.51 From 1918 until 1926, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ was active in the ‘Vagabond Party’ (hizb as˙ ˙ saʿa¯lı¯k); a literary circle of intellectuals associated with a literary café, the ‘Vag˙ abond Café’ (maqha¯ as-saʿa¯lı¯k), situated outside Jerusalem’s Jaffa Gate as a ˙˙ meeting point.52 In 1925, he published the ‘Manifesto of the Vagabond Party’ (firma¯n as-saʿa¯lı¯k), a philosophy of pleasure and hedonism, declaring idleness, ˙˙ social equality and pleasure to be the party motto.53 During the Mandate, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ took over a post as inspector general for education under the British rule, and his visits in the Vagabond Café ceased.54 Over a period of 45 years, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ produced a large collection of diaries that were edited in a shortened version by his daughter Hala Sakakini and in the extended version by Akram Musallam.55 Scholarly research mostly remembers Saka¯kı¯nı¯ as progressive educator and modernist as portrayed in these editions. In today’s public discourse, he is also labeled as a devoted Palestinian anti-Zionist and a Pan-Arabist and a Palestinian nationalist in the Palestinian national narrative, as seen in a museum dedicated to Saka¯kı¯nı¯ in Ramallah.56 Criticizing the dominant perspective on Saka¯kı¯nı¯ as a modernist and Arab Palestinian nationalist in scholarly literature, Bawalsa focused on Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s psychological and personal dissonances.57 Yet, so far, research has not paid attention to the fact that 51 For his political engagement, see Kamal Moed, “Educator in the Service of the Homeland: Khalil al-Sakakini’s Conflicted Identities,” Jerusalem Quarterly 59 (2014): 69–71. For his educational activities during the Mandate, see ibid. 72–80. 52 Salim Tamari, “The Vagabond Cafe and Jerusalem’s Prince of Idleness,” Jerusalem Quarterly 19 (2003): 23. 53 According to Tamari, this manifesto was based on the ‘Philosophy of Pleasure’ (Falsafat asSuru¯r) he had written in 1907–08 together with Farah Anton. The party neither accepted titles nor concepts of master and servant, made every man and woman natural members of the party and postulated a working day of two hours and indulging in eating, drinking and socializing. Tamari, “Vagabond Café,” 31–32. 54 Tamari, 34–35. 55 In Kada¯ ana¯ ya¯ dunya¯ (‘Such am I, oh World’), his daughter Ha¯la as-Saka¯kı¯nı¯ composed a ¯ selection of his diaries (1982). Later, the Khalil Sakakini Cultural Centre in Ramallah published his collected diaries in eight volumes, edited by Akram Musallam (2003–2010). 56 In Ramallah, the Palestinian Authorities dedicated a street to Saka¯kı¯nı¯, describing him as an icon of Palestinian nationalism and Anti-Zionism, constructing him as a marker of a contemporary national identity. The street is situated near the Khalil al-Sakakini Cultural Centre that includes a little exhibition of Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s personal belongings and manuscripts. 57 Linking Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s conflicting identities during the early Mandate with the ‘structured social reality’ around him, Bawalsa drew on the dissonances in his character by applying Bourdieu’s theory of ‘habitus’ to his self-description in the diaries. However, I could not see how framing

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Saka¯kı¯nı¯ devoted a major part of his energy before World War I to the Orthodox cause. Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s passionate engagement for the Orthodox Renaissance in Palestine is only briefly mentioned by Besˇka who investigated Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s attitude towards Zionism.58 Since his engagement in the Orthodox Renaissance was left aside in research, this article seeks to contribute to the study of that aspect.

Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s Networks and Activities in Post-Revolutionary Jerusalem The following section is an attempt to present Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s intellectual and political developments during the Second Constitutional Era, and show, based on empirical evidence, how this fit into the wider communicational context that was outlined before. In 1907, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ traveled to Brooklyn, New York to pursue a living, but failed to make one. After a rather unsuccessful working stay, he returned in 1908 after a ‘miserable year’ to Palestine.59 During his stay in America, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ frequently wrote to his loved ones at home, especially to his fiancé Sulta¯na ʿAbduh, the ˙ daughter of an Orthodox from Jerusalem, and he suffered from economic and emotional hardship, living as a stranger in the West, and far from his beloved Sulta¯na.60 After Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s return to Palestine in 1908, he completed a full switch, ˙ as it is presented in his diaries. As soon as he was back home, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ entered the stages of local politics in Jerusalem. He jumped into brand-new political organizations that symbolized for him the new age, and all of a sudden, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ hardly referred to Sulta¯na anymore in his diaries.61 In line with the new political ˙ culture mentioned before, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ adopted the discourse on Ottoman patriotism, liberty and civic equality, and Arab Orthodox reforms in particular. As if he

58 59 60

61

Saka¯kı¯nı¯ within the concepts of Bourdieu’s ‘habitus’ helped to reach a deeper understanding of his personality. See Nadim Bawalsa, “Unpacking the Modern, National Self: The Diary of Khalil al-Sakakini,” (Master’s thesis, Georgetown University, 2010); Bawalsa, “Sakakini Defrocked,” Jerusalem Quarterly 42 (2010): 10–13. Besˇka, “Khalil al-Sakakini,” 40–53. See Salim Tamari, “A Miserable Year in Brooklyn: Khalil Sakakini in America, 1907–1908,” Jerusalem Quarterly 17 (2003): 19–40. In his writings to her, he indulged into seemingly endless frustration, and felt trapped between lovesickness, exile and alienation. See the chapter ‘Between New York and Jerusalem: A Story of Exile and Alienation’, in Halı¯l as-Saka¯kı¯nı¯ and Akram Musallam, Yawmı¯ya¯t Halı¯l as¯ Saka¯kı¯nı¯: Yawmı¯ya¯t, rasa¯ʾil, taʾammula¯t, ed. Akram Musallam, vol. 1, New York. Sult˘a¯na. AlQuds. 1907–12 (Ramallah: Khalil Sakakini Cultural Center, 2003–2010), 53–274. ˙ Now, he mentioned Sulta¯na only in short passages, for instance, when describing that he ˙ passed by the American Colony, hoping to find the gate to Sulta¯na’s school open (entry from ˙ a¯ ana¯ ya¯ dunya¯ (Beirut 1982), 24 October 1908, in Halı¯l as-Saka¯kı¯nı¯ and Ha¯la as-Saka¯kı¯nı¯, Kad ¯ ¯ 43), or short references that he had dinner with Sulta¯na and undertook Sunday trips with her ˙ (entry from 07 and 08 November 1908, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 45).

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was infected by the politicized atmosphere in Jerusalem in the aftermath of the 1908 Revolution, he now dedicated a major part of his diary entries to building political networks, and to the Orthodox Renaissance.62 From 1908 onwards, he focused on the establishment of influential social and political networks. In his diaries, he documented his relations and meetings with local intellectuals and politicians in detail so as to present himself as being a part of the networks of influential figures. The way Saka¯kı¯nı¯ described his daily routines was designed to stage him as a man of the new age with a progressive lifestyle. To recall a typical day, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ started the morning with physical exercise,63 and after breakfast, took a stroll through Jerusalem’s Old City up to Jaffa Gate to meet friends and acquaintances from various backgrounds on the way, among them Orthodox teachers and shop keepers and Ottoman officials, ˇ alla¯l Effendi from the police station at Jaffa gate, or a Muslim such as officer G Sheikh he was acquainted with, Sheikh Tawfı¯q Tanbag˙a¯.64 He enjoyed contacts ˙ with a wide network of Orthodox Jerusalemites who had key positions in the local community and were active in the Orthodox Renaissance: above all, Nahleh ˘ Zurayq (1861–1920) who was a teacher and earlier, Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s Arabic tutor,65 Aftı¯m Masˇbak, the medical doctor Ilya¯s al-Halabı¯,66 Miha¯ʾil Talı¯l,67 Mitrı¯ Ta¯drus,68 ˙ ˙ ˙ ˘ Hana¯ Yasmı¯neh,69 Nahleh Kuttun,70 Yaʿqu¯b al-Hu¯rı¯,71 and others. He enjoyed ˙ ˘ ˘ established contacts with local intellectuals from other denominations, such as the Muslim Jerusalemite poet Isʿa¯f an-Nasˇa¯sˇ¯ıbı¯ (1885–1948),72 and was acquainted with local politicians, such as Ru¯h¯ı al-Ha¯lidı¯ (1864–1913), a prominent ˙ ˘ Muslim notable and Member of the Ottoman Parliament, and the ʿAlamı¯ family who had important posts in the Ottoman administration and served as mayors of Jerusalem, in particular, Mu¯sa¯ al-ʿAlamı¯ (1870–?) and Fayd¯ı al-ʿAlamı¯ (1865– ˙ 1925).73

62 A major part of Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s diary entries between 1908–14 focus on the late summer and autumn after the 1908-Revolution that obviously had a deep impact on him and his intellectual thought prior World War I while he devoted relatively little time on the years 1912– 14. 63 For instance, see the entries on 13 October 1908 and 24 November 1908, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, Kada¯ ana¯ ¯ ya¯ dunya¯, 40, 49. 64 Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 38, 39, 42f, 45. 65 21 September 1908, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 38. 66 16 October 1908, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 41. 67 See entry of 13 October 1908, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 40. 68 6 November 1908, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 44,45. 69 16 November 1908, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 47. 70 10 September 1908, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, Yawmı¯ya¯t, 1: 287–288. 71 15 September 1908, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 1: 290–291. 72 21 November 1908, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, Kada¯ ana¯ ya¯ dunya¯, 47–48. ¯ 73 12 November 1908, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 46.

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Upon his return to Jerusalem, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ tried to activate his networks to find job opportunities, ‘but how, since I am an Orthodox?’ (wa-la¯kin kayfa as-sabı¯l wa-ana ru¯mı¯), he asked his friend Nahleh Zurayq.74 Due to monetary problems, ˘ but also because he had multiple talents and interests, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ engaged in various professions and worked as a teacher, but also as a journalist and editor, picking up the opportunities since the lifting of the press censorship in the aftermath of the revolution. In 1908, he collaborated with Hana¯ al-ʿI¯sa¯, the elder ˙ brother of Yu¯suf al-ʿI¯sa¯, in the publication of the short-lived journal al-Asma¯ʿı¯, ˙ ˇ u¯rgˇ¯ı Habı¯b Hana¯niya¯ in the publication and started assisting the Orthodox G of ˙ ˙ his newspaper al-Quds.75 In October 1908, he became employed to teach Arabic several times a week in the school of the American Colony.76 At the same time, he founded an ‘evening school’ (madrasa laylı¯ya) to teach Orthodox children and soon, he found up to twenty students per night in the class room.77 During the summer of 1908, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ also became a political activist on various fronts, and, being an emotional character, was set ablaze by the postrevolutionary euphoria and protest culture. He strongly believed in the importance of setting up professional foundations that were to develop a program and a collective agency that attracted the middle classes, and generated finances. As he extensively documented in his diaries, he passionately discussed with his friends how to establish modern associations and institutions in ‘the new style’ (al-asa¯lı¯b al-gˇadı¯da) that fostered Ottomanism among the young generation, among them the foundation of a Muslim-Christian Foundation to ‘fight the old spirit and feed the people with the constitution and make them drink the new spirit’.78 Saka¯kı¯nı¯ recorded his involvement in the foundation of a range of organization firstly, so as to show to the reader the diversity of his networks, and secondly to stress the importance of civic middle class organization in party-like structures. For instance, together with Isma¯ʿı¯l al-Husaynı¯, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ founded the ˙ 74 21. 09. 1908, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 38. ˇ u¯rgˇ¯ı Hana¯nı¯ya¯ urged Saka¯kı¯nı¯ several times to assist him in the foundation of his 75 Obviously, G newspaper al-Quds˙ that should finally become a successful enterprise. According to Saka¯kı¯nı¯, Hana¯nı¯ya¯’s way of working was ‘chaotic’ (qa¯ʾima qa¯ʿida) and he, Saka¯kı¯nı¯, admonished his ˙ friend that he needed to be better organized and prepared for such a project. Finally, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ agreed with Hana¯nı¯ya¯ that he would engage daily from 4–7 pm to review articles for the issues ˙ that he himself was responsible for writing the editorials. For that, he should of al-Quds and receive a monthly salary of 5 lira. He was not amused that Hana¯nı¯ya¯ – whom Saka¯kı¯nı¯ described as a distracted personality who was, ‘as usual, busy as if he was the mother of the groom’ (umm al-ʿarı¯s), and ‘shouting at this one, joking around with that one, and slamming that one’ – did not give him the impression to act more professional. See the entries on 9/10/12 and 14 September 1908, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, Yawmı¯ya¯t , 1: 287–290. 76 21 October 1908, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, Kada¯ ana¯ ya¯ dunya¯, 42. ¯ 77 16 and 22 October 1908, Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 41, 42. 78 ‘Li-muha¯rabat ar-ru¯h al-qadı¯ma wa-tatʿı¯m an-na¯s bi-d-dustu¯r wa-isˇra¯bihim ar-ru¯h al-gˇa˙ September 1908, ˙ ˙ ˙ dı¯da’. 21 in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 38.

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ˇ amʿı¯ya¯t al-Iha¯ʾ alJerusalem branch of the ‘Arabic Brothers’ Association’ (G ˘ 79 ʿArabı¯). However, the beginnings of organization were not easy. The first step of the Association was to elect ‘the action committee’ (al-hayʾa al-ʿa¯mila) of 15 persons, among them Hana¯ al-ʿI¯sa¯ and Nahleh Zurayq. Then, the members did ˙ ˘ not know how to practically proceed and became lost in meaningless speeches, 80 Saka¯kı¯nı¯ noted. Saka¯kı¯nı¯ also believed in physical exercise as a modern means to shape the ‘new youth’ (an-na¯ˇsiʾa al-gˇadı¯da). As founder of the ‘Association of Fine Arts and Culture’ together with friends, he thought that, ‘in the sports field, the youth will learn how to progress and… how to march forward and be firm’, he recorded in his diary, after having watched a football match between the English and the Jewish school.81 In 1908, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ also joined the CUP branch in Jerusalem, and was very proud to become invited by Ru¯h¯ı al-Ha¯lidı¯. In a secret ceremony, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ swore on the ˙ ˘ Bible to protect the Constitution and to work for the elevation of the Ottoman Homeland. During one night, he was taken by Sheikh Tanbag˙a¯ to the club house ˙ where he was received by a group of CUP officers, taken into a small chamber with blindfolded eyes. Saka¯kı¯nı¯ described it as follows: Sheikh Tawfı¯q was leading me by the hand… He put my right hand on the bible and my left one on a pistol (fa-wadaʿa yaddı¯ al-yamanı¯ ʿala¯ ingˇ¯ıl wa-yaddı¯ al-yasarı¯ ʿala¯ mu˙ saddas), and said: ‘This is for you to swear upon and that is for you defend with.’ Then he began to read the oath, word by word, and I repeated the oath after him. I swore to protect the Constitution and give effort to lift the homeland and to do what is obligatory to the CUP and to keep its secrets and to defend the homeland and the Constitution until death (uda¯fiʿ ʿan al-watan wa-d-dustu¯r hatta¯ l-mawt). ˙ ˙˙ ˙ At the end, he said: ‘God is my witness and the three brothers’. Then, he lifted the bandage from my eyes and I said: ‘Where are the three brothers?’ He said: ‘There they are!’ And he pointed at three chairs; and on them there were three (persons) sitting who were wrapped up into sheets, so that I could only see the edge of their eye bandages. Then they went out, and the Sheikh went out with me. And I said to him: ‘Since I exist, I have been swearing with that right hand. But tonight, it has become a new right hand’.82

From Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s diaries, it is obvious that this moment left a deep impression on him, and soon after, when he began to study the documents released by the CUP branch in Jerusalem that contained files that complained about government officials, which made him conclude that the Jerusalemite CUP ‘is like a High Court’ (mahkamaʿulya¯).83 ˙

79 80 81 82 83

12 and 14 November 1908, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 46–47. 21 November 1908, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 48. 21 November 1908, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 48. 23 October 1908, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 43. 24 October 1908, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 43.

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For Saka¯kı¯nı¯ as a passionate pedagogue, the foundation of the ‘Constitutional National School’ (al-Madrasa ad-Dustu¯rı¯ya al-Watanı¯ya) in Jerusalem in 1909 ˙ was a cornerstone in his career and was accomplished with the financial support of Ru¯h¯ı al-Ha¯lidı¯. The school very strongly fostered multi-confessional Otto˙ ˘ manism in late Ottoman Palestine as the only acceptable political frame. Apart from lessons in history, geography, Arabic, Turkish, English and French, there was education in fine arts: photography, music, and sports and physical exercises in the open air. The school was open for students of all communities and ‘teaches each one the roots of his confession’ (tuʿallim kull tilmı¯d usu¯l madhabihi), as ¯ ˙ ¯ reported the newspaper Filast¯ın, and Saka¯kı¯nı¯ banned physical punishment from ˙ 84 his institution. Indeed, pupils had to study equally the holy scripts of Christianity and Islam in school, and Saka¯kı¯nı¯ himself motivated the Christians among ˇ awharı¯ya in his them to read the Quran as documented by ‘story teller’ Wası¯f al-G diaries, an Orthodox Jerusalemite, who was student in the Constitutional School and an admirer of Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s teaching methods.85 In the beginning of 1911, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ recalled, he had thoroughly studied and embodied ‘the new principles’ (al-maba¯dı¯ʾ al-gˇadı¯da), claiming that I have freed myself from the old and low customs and beliefs and cultures. The love I have towards life and my new joy, and the Constitutional School that has refreshed my hopes, all of this makes me begin this year happy and joyful.86

Also his school needed the setting up of something of a ‘constitutional script’ that reflects Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s translation of late Ottoman modernity in Palestine. He worked out a program, similar to the statute of a party as its foundation. Saka¯kı¯nı¯ recorded the guidelines of the teaching in his school as follows: 1. I gathered students regardless of their different confessional affiliations (ʿala¯ ihtila¯f mada¯hibim wa-n-nahl), and this is for the first time in the history of ¯ ˙ ˘ our country that the sons of the different communities are collected in one single school on one and the same bench (ʿala¯ maqa¯ʿid wa¯hida) without ˙ being exposed to their religious confession. 2. The principle that the school is based on is to strengthen the student and not to humiliate him (iʿza¯z at-tilmı¯d la¯ idla¯lahu), it is to enlarge his self-con¯ ¯ fidence and not make it smaller (takbir nafsaha la¯ tasg˙¯ıraha¯), it is to support ˙ his affections and talents and not to fight or neglect them, it is to set him free 84 Filast¯ın, 2 October 1912: 176/3/4–5. ˙ ¯ya was, in particular, proud of his pronunciation qualities when reciting the Su¯rat alˇ awharı 85 G Baqara, the first chapter of the Quran, although being an Orthodox. See Wasif Jawhariyyeh, The Storyteller of Jerusalem: The Life and Times of Wasif Jawhariyyeh 1904–1948, ed. Salim Tamari and Issam Tamar, transl. Nada Elzeer (Northampton, Mass.: Olive Branch Press, 2014), 76. 86 1 January 1911 in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, Kada¯ ana¯ ya¯ dunya¯, 51. ¯

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and not to put him into chains. Therefore, the (school’s) most important condition is that there is no (physical) punishment (la¯ qasa¯s fı¯ha¯) and no ˙ ˙ rewards (wa-la¯ gˇawa¯ʾiz) and no marks (la¯ ʿalama¯t). This is because punishment, rewards and marks have a damaging impact on the student’s soul and on his affections and morals… 3. Education in our school shall be according to the latest methods (ahdat al˙ ¯ asa¯lı¯b) while the aim of teaching shall be to widen the understanding and to strengthen the mind… through primary and secondary sciences… otherwise he will stay low. 4. The school has chosen its teachers from among the young men who are full of life and energy and loyalty, and under the condition for them to dress elegantly and shave daily and to join the students in playing. Every teacher shall be places where he can be useful (haytu yastat¯ıʿ an yufı¯d), and every ˙ ¯ ˙ student (shall be placed) where he can benefit (haytu yastat¯ıʿ an yastafı¯d). ˙ ¯ ˙ 5. The School is chosen to be at a healthy place with a lot of room for playing games (ard wa¯siʿa li-laʿb). ˙ 6. I take playing sports to be important as well as military exercises (al-alʿa¯b arriya¯d¯ıya wa-l-haraka¯t al-ʿaskarı¯ya), and I have appointed an officer to take ˙ ˙ care of that. Indeed, it is intended to integrate also wrestling and boxing and the methods of handling of weapons (al-musa¯raʿa wa-l-mula¯kama wa˙ stiʿma¯l as-sila¯h fı¯ minha¯gˇiha¯) in the near future if God is willing (inshallah). ˙ 7. I founded an association for support. 8. I founded an association for the higher classes in school that the men and women call for the students to get acquainted with the culture of organization (a¯da¯b al-igˇtima¯ʿ) and I assigned it to them to establish a school publication (gˇarı¯dat madrası¯ya) that is open for committees from among them. 9. It will be chosen literature from (different) languages that would motivate the souls of the students, raise their passion and spread their hopes, that let their souls grow and make them love life, and not the kinds of literature that… make them despaired, sluggish and make them resign from life. 10. Touristic visits and the outgoing to nature shall be increased. The visits shall be undertaken to make them know their country and study its archaeological sites. The outgoing to the fields and the climbing of mountains shall be undertaken to make them breath the fresh air for gaining a good health, and to keep them active and revitalize their affection, joy and love of nature. 11. Music will be played and patriotic passionate hymns.87

87 1 January 1911, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, Yawmı¯ya¯t , 1: 347–348.

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This ‘Constitution’, as seen, constituted the principles of Ottoman patriotism and civic equality, and fostered concepts of active citizenry and individual freedom. Moreover, it promoted interactive didactic methods and low hierarchies to give students the space to develop their talents. It supported self-empowerment, and motivated students to get organized and articulate their opinions in a modernstyle publication. Finally, the school tried to raise awareness for physical health and establish a good connection between students and their bodies and with nature. The Constitutional School also was ‘inclusive’ apart from the integration of different confessions on one bench. It addressed students beyond school age, offering pre-primary classes for children between four and six, and evening classes for adults who had not have the chance to gain a basic education to teach them reading and writing.88 This forwarded ‘program’ indeed equipped Saka¯kı¯nı¯ with prestige and the reputation of being the most progressive educator in Palestine, and Filast¯ın often urged the locals to send their sons to it since ‘classes are ˙ compatible with the latest (teaching) style’ (ʿala¯ ahdat uslu¯b).89 Palestinian elites ˙ ¯ considered this school as almost the only local progressive educational institution in late Ottoman Palestine, and the guidelines of its ‘program’ are to be found again in Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s discussion of the Orthodox Renaissance.90 Interpreting the Orthodox Renaissance as a ‘popular movement’ (harakat asˇ˙ ˇsaʿb),91 Saka¯kı¯nı¯ stressed its collective agenda, trying to elevate it to a new level of cooperation. Upon his return to Jerusalem in summer 1908, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ described the situation of the ‘congregation’ (at-ta¯ʾifa) as being ‘chaotic’ (qa¯ʿima qa¯ʿida) ˙˙ and disoriented. The community, he complained, ‘wants to establish associations but has no idea what to do’ (turı¯d insˇa¯ʾ al-gˇamaʿı¯ya¯t wa-la¯kinaha¯ la¯ taʿrif ma¯da¯ ¯ taʿmal).92 Immediately, he became involved in heated debates with the leaders of the Jerusalemite community, and pressed for the foundation of an ‘Inquiry Committee’ (lagˇna li-l-baht) that was supposed to work out the reform agenda ˙¯ for the Jerusalemite community and consisted of ten elected members, among them himself.93 Together with other activists, he discussed the foundation of an Orthodox association with branches in the other dioceses to collect money for the Orthodox Movement, and a newspaper that should act as ‘mouthpiece of the 88 Filast¯ın, 8 February 1913: 211/3/2–3. 89 Filast˙ ¯ın, 15 February 1913: 213/3/5. ˙ 90 Nevertheless, the school was constantly in financial difficulties in Ottoman times, and it had to be temporarily closed several times due to this, but was reopened again thanks to Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s initiatives and the help of prominent donors; for example, Ru¯h¯ı al-Ha¯lı¯dı¯, who was also in the ˙ ˘ schools’ executive board. Filast¯ın, 11 May 1912: 135/3/4. ˙ 91 Filast¯ın, 9 April 1913: 228/1/4–2/2. 92 Entry˙ of 9 September 1908, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, Yawmı¯ya¯t, 1: 287. 93 12 September 1908, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, Kada¯ ana¯ ya¯ dunya¯, 37; entry of. ¯

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dioceses’ (lisa¯n al-abrasˇ¯ıya).94 Further, he motivated the foundation of the ‘Orthodox Brothers’ Association’ (gˇamʿı¯yat al-iha¯ʾ al-urtu¯duksı¯) that should me¯ ¯ ˘ diate between the congregation and the ‘Orthodox Council’ (al-magˇlis al-milalı¯); that was an elected committee of forty notables from Jerusalem that, in summer 1908, forwarded Orthodox reform demands to the Patriarch.95 Saka¯kı¯nı¯ indulged in the emerging ‘protest culture’ of the Second Constitutional Era and was an efficient networker. Yet, he also became involved in conflicts with established community leaders about the agenda of the Orthodox ˇ u¯rgˇ¯ı Zaharı¯ya¯, the delegate for Jerusalem in the Renaissance, especially with G ˘ Mixed Council from 1910–11. While these leaders belonged to the ‘traditional party’ and preferred to negotiate with the Patriarchate about payments for Orthodox schools, hospitals and churches, Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s ‘activist’s party’ pleaded to work out a new agenda on ‘Orthodox rights’ (huqu¯q at-ta¯ʾifa) that was based on ˙ ˙˙ official legal documents and regulations as defined in the Constitution, so that ‘we have the legal right on what we demand’ (li-naku¯n muhiqqı¯n fı¯ ma¯ natlub), ˙ ˙ Saka¯kı¯nı¯ stressed.96 The articulation of civil rights based on law content was a new field for Jerusalem’s Orthodox activists who were not experienced in democratic processes or jurisdiction. During night gatherings, they explored the Ottoman Fundamental Law (Ar.: al-qa¯nu¯n al-asa¯sı¯, Tur.: kanu¯n-e esa¯si) of 1876,97 in its original Turkish version, ‘so as to become the men of our policy’ (li-naku¯n mitla ¯ rigˇa¯l siya¯satina¯), Saka¯kı¯nı¯ said, and stressed, it was important to ground arguments on Ottoman law. He told his comrades: ‘Is the school reform of the schools required as a good deed from the monastery or as a claim (mitla fadl min ad-dayr am mitla haqq)?’ They said: ‘As a claim.’ I said: ‘On what ¯ ¯ ˙ ˙ shall we base it (ʿala¯ ayy sˇayʾ nastanidd)?’ They said: On the rights that we have (ʿala¯ ma¯ lana¯ min al-huqu¯q).’ I said to them: ‘So, we have to know these rights and demand ˙ them.’… I realized that it would take much time and money to demand our rights…98

The existing ambiguities and contradictions in Ottoman law were not helping in this respect. Of special importance for the articulation of Orthodox rights was article 111 of the Fundamental Law that Saka¯kı¯nı¯ discussed in detail with other activists. This article regulated the administration of waqf, classified as ‘local’, by elected Orthodox councils in the different districts.99 While the above mentioned 94 95 96 97

13 October 1908, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 41. 24 October 1908, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 43. 13 September 1908, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 37;.and Saka¯kı¯nı¯, Yawmı¯ya¯t, 1: 289. For an English translation of the Ottoman Fundamental Law issued on 23 December 1876 and reaffirmed in 1908, see http://www.anayasa.gen.tr/1876constitution.htm (17 November 2017). 98 15 September 1908, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, Yawmı¯ya¯t, 1: 291. 99 Precisely, a local council in each district was assigned to supervise 1. ‘the administration of revenues from immovable property and capital subject to waqf according to the directions of the founders and agreeably to the customs observed from old’, 2. the ‘use of properties

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‘Orthodox Council’ insisted on treating waqf in Jerusalem as stipulated in article 111 as ‘local’, the clerical side argued that all Orthodox sites in Jerusalem, classified as waqf – Holy places, churches, places of pilgrimage, social institutions, houses, real estate and other properties – were ‘universal’ in character, belonging to Ottoman Orthodoxy on the whole and were subject to control of the Convent.100 Although the Ottoman government confirmed the privileges (imtiya¯za¯t) of the Patriarchate over Holy places and never admitted local demands over Orthodox sites in Jerusalem, the contradicting interpretation of Jerusalemite waqf as ‘local’ or ‘universal’ remained a fundamental conflict between the congregation and the Patriarchate from 1908.101 Saka¯kı¯nı¯ was not only active in the articulation of ‘Orthodox rights’ based on Ottoman civic law, affirming that he was not satisfied with reforming Orthodox institutions, but that he really was behind kicking this Fraternity out of the country and cleaning the Jerusalemite Patriarchate from their corruption and influence (tard ha¯dihi al-ahawı¯ya min al-bila¯d wa-tathı¯r al¯ ˙ ˙ ˘ kursı¯ al-uru¯sˇalı¯mı¯ min mafa¯sidihim wa-a¯ta¯rihim). My goal that I am aiming at is to ¯ shake off the yoke of the Greek (halaʿ nı¯r al-yu¯na¯n) since they do not have the right to ˘ the rule, neither in church matters nor in politics nor in culture (la¯ haqqa lahum fı¯ r˙ riʾa¯sa la¯ kanası¯yan wa-la¯ siya¯sı¯yan wa-la¯ adabı¯yan).102

Saka¯kı¯nı¯ was also among the activists taking part in an anti-clerical rebellion that unfolded in Jerusalem in summer and fall 1908. While turmoil broke out in the streets, Orthodox rebels announced that ‘in front of us will be only war’ (laysa ama¯mna¯ illa¯ l-harb), he recorded in his diary.103 Demonstrations were held in ˙ front of the Patriarchate and the governors’ house, Greek delegations arrived in Jerusalem, and armed soldiers patrolled in the Old City to prevent an Orthodox uprising and to protect the Convent. Saka¯kı¯nı¯ watched the scene while his ‘blood

100

101

102 103

appointed for philanthropic objects agreeably to the conditions prescribed in the testaments relating thereto’, and 3. the ‘administration of the property of orphans in harmony with the special regulations on this subject’. These councils were to be elected by the communities, according to ‘special regulations, which will be drawn up’ in the future. Importantly to note, since the ‘special regulations’ were not drawn up, these councils did not exist in practice. The article also stipulated that these Orthodox councils were subject to the local authorities and provincial councils. See Bertram and Luke, Report of the Orthodox Patriarchate, 250–1. ˇ u¯rgˇ¯ı Zaharı¯ya¯ who got involved in heavy fights with the Among the Councils’ members was G ˘ Holy Places as local or universal. See Hu¯rı¯, Patriarch about the character of Jerusalem’s ¯ ˇ Hula¯sat ta¯rı¯h kanı¯sat Urusalı¯m al-urtu¯duksı¯ya, 279 and Bertram and Luke, Report of˘ the ¯ ¯ ˘ ˙ ˘ Orthodox Patriarchate, 253–4. Moreover, the local Orthodox ignored the fact that the enactment of article 111 depended on ‘special regulations’ to be enacted ‘in the future’, which had not happened. So, the validity of article 111 was merely nominal, but not legally enforced. See chapter III in Dierauff, Translating. 11 October 1908, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, Kada¯ ana¯ ya¯ dunya¯, 39. ¯ 13 October 1908, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 40.

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began to boil’.104 To pressure the monastery to hand over to them their rights over waqf properties and the churches they considered ‘local’, Orthodox activists occupied Kanı¯sat Ma¯r Yaʿqu¯b, the church of St. James, during summer 1908.105 St. James was only a small chapel but a strategically important place since it was situated in the heart of the Patriarchal headquarters and directly connected the Convent with the Holy Sepulcher. This church was held by Orthodox rebels from summer 1908 until the beginning of 1914, and it was an important base for Orthodox rebels, and of high symbolic value for the Orthodox Movement. During these years, the Patriarch was cut off from a corridor that led from the Convent to the Holy Sepulcher through St. James, but instead, he was forced to walk around it through the Old City alleys.106 Meanwhile, lay people conducted the Sunday sermons in St. James, among them Saka¯kı¯nı¯ and Yu¯suf al-ʿI¯sa¯, and afterwards, they held inciting speeches in front of the congregation against the clergy and reported the ‘Orthodox news’ from the Mixed Councils’ bi-weekly sessions.107 After the service, demonstrations took place and the congregation paraded through the Old City to the governor’s house where rebellious speeches continued.108 Saka¯kı¯nı¯ was one of the main activists in St. James over the years. He recalled a Sunday in 1911: On Sunday, a delegation of people from the congregation filled the church of St. James despite their different factions (ʿala¯ ihtila¯f ahza¯bihim). We recited to them the news˙ ˘ paper Filast¯ın; then there were alternating speeches from myself and Dr. Halabı¯ [cur˙ rently the delegate for Jerusalem in the Mixed Council], which threw (even) frozen natures into a dither. They (the people) started screaming and roaring; they burst into threats until their shouting reached the sky.109 The monks heard that and sent to the government to say that we became furious. Yet, we did not pay attention… but continued our gathering, holding sermons without mumbling or doubting while the crowd was growing and it swore to act as one hand (wa-qsamu¯ ʿala¯ an yaku¯nu¯ yaddan wa¯hi˙ datan). Then, someone spoke up and said: ‘Let’s carry black flags through the streets!’ Another one said: ‘Let’s close off the churches!’… From here, our gathering gained importance so that the whole community, the elderly ones and the young ones, despite their different factions joined. Then it was decided to head to the governor, and they said: ‘Everyone shall go.’ But we convinced them to send a delegation while the rest of the people should wait in the church. So, we went while the priests were preceding ahead. But we could not find the governor 104 4 November 1908, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 44. 105 6 November 1908, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 45. 106 See Bertram and Luke, Report of the Orthodox Patriarchate, 252–3, and Hu¯rı¯, Hula¯sat ta¯rı¯h ˘ ˘ ˙ ˘ ¯ rusˇalı¯m al-urtu¯duksı¯ya, 279. kanı¯sat U ¯ ¯ 107 See examples in Filast¯ın 2 August 1911: 56/1/1–4; 30 August 1911: 64/3/4–5; 2 September ˙ 1911: 65/3/3–4; 30 September 1911: 73/3/4 and 13 April 1912: 127/3/2. 108 Filast¯ın 2 August 1911: 56/1/1–4. 109 Filast˙ ¯ın 2 August 1911: 56/1/2–3 – mulhaq (supplement). ˙ ˙

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because Sunday is a holiday. Instead, we found the commander of the gendarmerie. He approached us with kindness and support. When he heard what happened, he headed to the center at Jaffa gate and called the governor in his private home. It did not take long until he came to the House of Government and we had an intensive meeting with him, for five and a half hours.110

After a sequence of little escalations between the clerics and Saka¯kı¯nı¯ since he was firm not to return the church of St. James, the ‘priests of Jerusalem formed a coalition against him’ (iʿtasaba kahanat al-Quds diddahu) and prohibited his ˙ ˙ wedding with Sulta¯na in winter 1911/12.111 With support of the ʿI¯sa¯’s, his wedding ˙ was moved to Jaffa, and conducted there by a ‘kidnapped’ priest, as Filast¯ın ˙ reported about the case: Some of them (the priests) tried hard to convince him that, if he gave in to open the church of St. James… they would obtain for him a Patriarchal absolution (hallan ˙ batrı¯yarkı¯yan) and conduct his wedding ceremony as he wished, but he refused. First, ˙ the opening of the church belonged to the millas’ rights (haqq min huqu¯q al-milla). ˙ ˙ Second, he does not want his wedding to depend on any condition or restriction (muʿallaqan bi-sˇart aw qayd). Last Saturday, he came with his bride, Lady Sulta¯na ˙ ˙ ʿAbduh, to Jaffa and was married to her on the evening of the same day in a… festivity by the hand of three priests. On Sunday morning he drove to Jerusalem after it was allowed for him in Jaffa what was prohibited in Jerusalem.112

Saka¯kı¯nı¯ also had several personal confrontations with Patriarch Damianos. In fall 1912, he was forced by him out of an Orthodox school board to which Saka¯kı¯nı¯ had been elected, and that should work out educational reforms under the supervision of the Mixed Council.113 Filast¯ın wrote that Saka¯kı¯nı¯ had fallen ˙ prey to an intrigue and the Patriarchate declared him a ‘heretic’ since he worked for the Arabization of education. Around the same period, his Constitutional School was temporarily closed due to financial difficulties, and Saka¯kı¯nı¯ even negotiated with the Jerusalemite Orthodox over the status of his institution and the question of whether it should be turned into an Orthodox school. But in the end, he did not accept a syllabus in which ‘sixteen teachers were teaching in Greek

110 ‘Natiq bi-l-huku¯ma al-markazı¯ya kull at-tiqa. Wa-amma¯ l-huku¯ma al-mahallı¯ya fa-qad ¯ ¯¯ ˙ taʿallamna¯ ˙bi-l–ihtiba¯r an la¯ natiq biha¯ li-anna al-Quds mufassadat al-hukka¯˙ m’. Filast¯ın, 2 ¯ ˙ ˙ ˘ – mulhaq (supplement). August 1911: 56/1/3 ˙ 111 See Filast¯ın 17 January 1912: 103/3/2; Salim Tamari, “Issa al Issa’s Unorthodox Orthodoxy: ˙ Jerusalem, Permitted in Jaffa,” Jerusalem Quarterly 59 (2014): 16–36, 28–29 and Banned in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, Yawmı¯ya¯t , 1: 351–352. 112 Filast¯ın, 17 January 1912: 103/3/2. 113 Filast˙ ¯ın, 14 September 1912: 171/3/4–4/1; 28 September 1912: 175/3/4–4/1; and 23 October 1912:˙ 181/3/4/1–4/3; and 182/4/3.

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and (only) three in Arabic’, and he reopened his school as a ‘constitutional institution for all religious groups’ (dustu¯rı¯ya li-gˇamı¯ʿ al-milal).114 The climax of Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s personal conflicts with the Patriarchate was reached in autumn 1913 when he published his political pamphlet. The precise circumstances of its publication remain in the dark since there are no diary entries from the year 1913 preserved. However, it was surely linked with the legitimacy crisis that the Mixed Council faced in 1913. Due to the boycott policy of the Patriarch, who had the casting vote and prevented every decision that would limit the clerical privileges, the Council could not implement something substantial and it was debated on the same key issues of conflict in the bi-weekly sessions over and over again.115 Simultaneously, internal rivalries between Orthodox leaders from Jerusalem and the lay delegates from the dioceses in the Council were growing. All of this turned the Council into a stage for hostile disputes, ruined the Councils’ reputation in the eye of the Orthodox public, and led to an increasing fragmentation of the Orthodox Movement. In this demoralizing climate, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ wrote: the nation is now (stuck) between two powers: one pushes it forwards, and the other one pulls it backwards. Every nation has to pass this phase in the beginning of its renaissance… through this, the feelings of solidarity among the people will become strong (yasˇtaddu fı¯hi tada¯mun asˇ-sˇaʿb)… and it will march forwards on the path of history.116 ˙

The intra-Orthodox conflict escalated in summer 1913, when the Patriarch unilaterally annulled the Mixed Council in spite of the protest of the lay delegates. Through many letters that were published in Filast¯ın, it is clear that, by late ˙ summer 1913, the Arab Orthodox congregation was about to lose faith in their leaders. Although Damianos was forced by the government, to reopen the Council in January 1914, the autumn of 1913 marked a severe climax in the

114 Filast¯ın, 23 October 1912: 182/4/2–3. With disappointment, the author criticized that the ˙ combative spirit in Jerusalem, the ‘mother of the renaissance’ (umm an-nahda), had lapsed, ˙ placed ‘obthe ‘illness of lethargy’ (da¯ʾ al-humu¯l) was taking over, and the Patriarchate ˘ stacles’ in Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s way. See Filast ¯ın, 23 October 1912: 182/4/2. Saka¯kı¯nı¯ did not forget ˙ Ru¯h¯ı al-Ha¯lidı¯ died, who traditionally supported his Damianos’ humiliation. In 1913, when ˙ ˘ its intention to take over the annual donConstitutional School, the Patriarchate declared ation of 30 lira for the school and Saka¯kı¯nı¯ refused it for ‘moral reasons’, he declared in Filast¯ın, 22 February 1913: 215/3/4. 115 The ˙key issues of conflict were: 1. The election of local councils in the dioceses to supervise the distribution of the social budget assigned to the communities by the Council; 2. The reformation of Orthodox education, in specific, the school management in the dioceses; 3. The distribution of the annual social budget to the dioceses, one third of the Patriarchal revenues or at least 30.000 lira; 4. The rotation system of the lay delegates in the Council and the election of new delegates in the dioceses. See paragraph 7 in chapter III, in Dierauff, Translating. 116 Filast¯ın, 9 April 1913: 228/4/1–2. ˙

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history of the intra-Orthodox conflict.117 While the Council had completely lost its credibility in the eyes of the public, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ published his pamphlet, from which he hoped to initiate a new ‘kick start’ to the fragmented movement and reunite Orthodox interests.

4.

Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s Arguments and Political Concepts

Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s pamphlet can be understood as an attempt to write somewhat of a ‘revolutionary script’ for the Arab Orthodox in Palestine, so as to write an ‘Orthodox Constitution’ of its own. In the following, I illustrate its main content and concepts, and how this is reflected in the language forms and terms that Saka¯kı¯nı¯ applied. The pamphlet was, in its first part, a reflection of a crucial moment of crisis, and a severe attack on the clerical leadership. Saka¯kı¯nı¯ predicted that the rule of the Greek in the Jerusalemite Patriarchate was on the verge of ruin, for three reasons. First, it was an illegitimate rule of ‘strangers’ (g˙uraba¯ʾ) and a ‘minority’ (aqallı¯ya) over the indigenous majority of local Arab Orthodox and Ottoman citizens. Second, the clergy was corrupted and abused their spiritual ranks to access political power, and therefore, it was a despotic rule. Third, due to financial mismanagement, the Patriarchate was in heavy debt and came close to a collapse. In the second part, the pamphlet was an urgent appeal to the Orthodox youth to establish regional networks and professional party-like organizations that would enable them to push the breakdown of the clergy’s rule, and form a ‘new leadership’ with new principles in line with the ‘new age’.

Predicting the Fall of the Clerical ‘Despotic’ Rule The main references in Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s discussion were to the ideals of Ottoman citizenship and the Constitution that guaranteed civic rights for the minorities of the Empire. During the post-revolutionary years of 1908–1914, Arab intellectuals used the relative political freedom after the restoration of the Constitution and the lifting of censorship on the press in 1908, which led, as mentioned before, to a new culture of controversial debating and protesting, and went along with the beginnings of modern political organization in the urban centers of Palestine. Like the other authors of these years, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ applied a very dichotomous worldview in his writings, contrasting the ‘spirit’ of the Constitution to the era of Abdulhamid that was described as a dark age of ‘oppression’ (istibda¯d). Translating this dichotomy on the Orthodox case, he described the Orthodox Ren117 See paragraph 7 in chapter III, in Dierauff, Translating.

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aissance as befitting the spirit of Ottoman modernity, and condemned the Patriarchal leadership and as a ‘relict’ of this ‘dark age’ that eventually must fall. He predicted: (those) who comprehend the spirit of the age (ru¯h al-ʿasr) can only conclude that the ˙ ˙ future belongs to the people (anna al-mustaqbal li-sˇ-sˇaʿb) and that this leadership (ha¯dihi ar-riʾa¯sa), as powerful as it might be, will be destroyed stone by stone, and not a ¯ single… trace will be left from it.118

It is not surprising that Saka¯kı¯nı¯ exploited these images from Ottoman political discourse to equate the clergy’s power with despotism and portray the Arab Orthodox agenda as a Constitutional movement in Palestine. However, he also freely mixed these images with proto-nationalist motifs and terms that circulated in the Arab East. For instance, he spoke about ‘the Orthodox people’ (asˇ-sˇaʿb alurtuduksı¯). Here, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ did not mean to define the Palestinian Orthodox as a ¯ ¯ ‘nation’ in the political sense, based on their affiliation with the Orthodox faith. What he meant to stress was the indigenous status of the Orthodox community, and their citizen status as Ottomans. Saka¯kı¯nı¯ per se refused national identities that grounded on religious affiliation. He affirmed: The times are over in which confessional affiliations (al-mada¯hib ad-dı¯nı¯ya) were ¯ considered as nations (gˇinsı¯ya¯t) – who can be composed of populations (sˇuʿu¯b) despite their diversity in ethnicities and origins (ʿala¯ ihtila¯f qawmı¯ya¯tihim wa-ʿana¯sirhim) and ˙ ˘ unite their interests despite of the divergence in their mentalities, morals, habits and styles. And although religious bonds are strong in this age, they are not able to swallow the nationalisms (tabtaliʿ al-qawmı¯ya¯t) or to make one group out of two (tagʿal min ʿunsurayn ʿunsuran wa¯hidan).119 ˙ ˙ ˙

Saka¯kı¯nı¯ lived in an age of awakening ‘national questions’ that competed with the idea of the Ottoman Homeland, and that he indirectly referred to here. He wrote this text during the ongoing war at the Balkans and while he witnessed the emergence of ‘confessional nations’ in Eastern Europe, such as the Serbs, as a transottoman phenomenon. For him, the only acceptable national model was the multi-confessional Ottomanism that he forwarded in his Constitutional School. Following that ideal, he believed that national communities could unite people of diverse ethnic origins and believes, but ethnicity or confessional bonds alone could not constitute a ‘nation’ (here: gˇinsı¯ya what today means ‘nationality’ or ‘citizenship’). In the above quote, he compared the Greek clergy with folks that behaved like a ‘confessional nation’ but stressed that this fashion was not to put up with the needs of the new age.

118 Halı¯l as-Saka¯kı¯nı¯, an-Nahda al-Urtu¯duksı¯ya fı¯ Filast¯ın (Jerusalem 1913), 2. ¯ ¯ ¯ ˙ 119 Saka¯kı¯nı¯, An-Nahda, 2. ˙ ˙

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As can be noticed in the above quote, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ applied a hodgepodge of terms for ‘collective group’ that appear here in ‘clusters’, to recall Steinmetz’ approach. In today’s context these terms would stand for ‘citizenships’ (gˇinsı¯ya¯t), ‘nations’ (sˇuʿu¯b), and ‘ethnicities’ (ʿana¯sir), a term that meant in the late Ottoman context ˙ simply ‘group’, and ‘nationalisms’ (qawmı¯ya¯t). In other contexts, these terms had taken on ready-articulated proto-nationalist concepts, but Saka¯kı¯nı¯ presented them through the filter of Ottoman thought. The term qawmı¯ya – deriving from qawm which refers to a tribal group, either in a genealogical sense or mythologically depicted – spread since the 1930s to the whole Arab world as an expression that described Arab nationalism, and was highly promoted by the Baʿt ¯ party, founded in 1943, and during the 1950s taken up by Egyptian president 120 ˇ ama¯l ʿAbd an-Na¯sir. During Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s age, we have seen that the term had G ˙ begun to circulate, but it was used by Saka¯kı¯nı¯ and other Arab Orthodox activists in different meanings. For instance, the Orthodox Renaissance was ascribed to be a ‘national movement’ (haraka qawmı¯ya), and a movement with a ‘national life’ ˙ (haya¯t qawmı¯ya). However, importantly to note, I would translate qawmı¯ here ˙ rather as ‘collective’ than ‘national’ in a political sense.121 Interestingly, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ identified the status of the Patriarchal leadership as being ‘strange’ in Palestine, in the sense of ‘alien’ (g˙arı¯ba), as the ‘main factor’ (awwalʿa¯mil) for the soon expected ‘doom of this leadership’ (hara¯b ha¯dihi ar¯ ˘ riʾa¯sa), since ‘it does not belong to the people and the people do not belong to it’ (laysat min asˇ-sˇaʿb wa-la¯ asˇ-sˇaʿb minha¯), he explained. Saka¯kı¯nı¯ further specified that, due to this reason, the leadership ignored the interests of the local indigenous congregation and that it was difficult to bring ‘patriotism’ (al-wata˙ nı¯ya) in compliance with ‘strange leadership’ (ar-riʾa¯sa al-g˙arı¯ba), even if it was ‘a just and loyal one’ (ʿa¯dila muhlisa), but even more if it was ‘tyrannical and ˘ ˙ despotic’ (gˇa¯ʾira mustabidda);122 such as ‘the Greek clergy’ (al-aklı¯ru¯s al-yu¯na¯nı¯). In the following, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ elaborated on what he staged as intrigues of the clergy. He claimed that it [= the clergy] has spoiled (the reputation of) the nations’ patriotism (watanı¯yat asˇ˙ sˇaʿb) in the eyes of the government… by drawing on it the suspicion that it might serve through it foreign interests (yahdim biha¯ ag˙ra¯dan agˇnabı¯ya). Further, it has fooled the ˙ ˘ global Christian public opinion (ar-raʾy al-ʿa¯mm al-ması¯h¯ı fı¯ l-ʿa¯lam) by pretending ˙ 120 See: Vatikiotis, P.J., Brett, M., Lambton, A.K.S., Dodd, C.H., Wheeler, G.E. and Robinson, F., “Kawmiyya”, in Encyclopaedia of Islam, 2nd ed., ed. P. Bearman, Th. Bianquis, C.E. Bos˙ worth, E. van Donzel, W.P. Heinrichs, accessed February 04, 2020. http://dx.doi.org/10.116 3/1573-3912_islam_COM_0470. 121 This in a statement by an anonymous Christian author who stressed the positive effect of the Orthodox Renaissance as a stimulating force for the reform agendas of the ‘Muslim brothers’ in Jerusalem. Filast¯ın, 24 January 1914: 301/1/1–3. 122 Saka¯kı¯nı¯, An-Nahd˙a, 2–3. ˙

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that those who stick to it [= the Orthodox Movement] are godless (bila¯ dı¯n) and intend to… destroy the Orthodox Church (hadam al-kanı¯sa al-urtu¯duksı¯ya)… ¯ Moreover, it [= the clergy] thinks… that it can exchange our patriotism with a patriotism of another kind, claiming that the Orthodox people in Palestine was actually of Greek origin (yaddaʿı¯ anna asˇ-sˇaʿb al-urtu¯duksı¯ fı¯ Filast¯ın yu¯na¯nı¯ al-asl). And that, if it ¯ ¯ ˙ ˙ wasn’t Greek, so the language of its religion still must be Greek since it is trying to impose a Greek character upon us… In the future, they will not be successful with it anymore since patriotic feelings have been growing with the time, thanks to God.123 Tomorrow, the arm of this leadership will be pushed to the corner by the new youth (bin-na¯sˇiʾa al-gˇadı¯da) who have been raised in accordance with the principles of patriotism (tatabara¯ ʿala¯ l-maba¯dı¯ l-watanı¯ya). Tomorrow, the (Orthodox) migrants will return ˙ from America, and in this progressing country (fı¯ tilka al-bila¯d ar-ra¯qiya), they will learn what it means to love the homeland (kayfa taku¯n mahabbat al-watan). Tomorrow, a ˙ ˙ great party (hizb kabı¯r) will be established whose members will be the Orthodox milla ˙ on the whole. A party of righteous principles, sincere patriotism, strong administration (ida¯ra qawı¯ya), of a strong soul (sulb an-nafs) and a brave mind (muhaddab al-fikr), of ¯¯ ˙ illuminated eyes and mutual words, grown together and in solidary. And it will shout out to this leadership as if coming out of one throat: ‘You are a stranger, so get out of here’.124

Saka¯kı¯nı¯ wrote all this to portray the clerical leadership as the opposite pole to the ‘nations’ patriotism’ (watanı¯yat asˇ-sˇaʿb), the Ottomanism of the Orthodox in ˙ Palestine, to stage the Orthodox Renaissance as a ‘young’ movement that was raised according to the principles of the new age, and that was about to get organized in ‘a great party’, and was actually capable of building up progressive organizations and administrational structures. As can be observed from this quotation, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ focused in this paragraph on the status of the Greek clergy as ‘foreigners’ and ‘strangers’ in terms of citizenhood, but also in terms of ethnicity, so as to portray their rule as illegitimate. Interestingly, he also played with the term ‘minority’ (aqallı¯ya), saying that the Greek monks tried by all means to bribe the influential elites of the country in order to draw them to their side and secure their power position in the Patriarchate as a ruling ‘minority’. Usually, the term ‘minorities’ (aqallı¯ya¯t) was used in reference to non-Muslim confessional groups in the Empire. It was a concept, forwarded by the Europeans and part of the agenda of imperialist powers, providing them with a reason to interfere in Ottoman internal affairs by the argument of protecting minority rights. Local Arab Palestinian Christians, this is clear from my former readings of Filast¯ın, strictly refused to apply the ‘minority ˙ outlook’ on their status in a Muslim society since it undermined the concept of citizenship which should make all Ottomans equal, which they persistently in123 Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 3. 124 Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 4.

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sisted on. However, it is also seen from Filast¯ın, that, under the impact of growing ˙ conflicts between the Young Turks and the Arab Decentralization Movement, new talk of ‘Arabs’ versus ‘Turks’ was slowly introduced in the press. From the summer of 1913 onwards, the term ‘minority’ (aqallı¯ya) started to be applied and ‘minority rights’ were discussed, for instance, when debating the proportional confessional quota in the councils in the Arab provinces.125 The second reason why the clerical leadership was according to Saka¯kı¯nı¯ about to fall was ‘its corruption’ (fasa¯duha¯), and its greed for worldly pleasures and a luxury lifestyle. According to Saka¯kı¯nı¯, it was not only a betrayal to their spiritual mission as monks who were in charge for Jerusalem’s Holy Places: it was simply not a behavior that people in the modern age would accept from religious authorities. He continued, explaining that, in this age, there was no space anymore for corrupted spiritual authorities: If you protest against the trickiness of the monks they will tell you: ‘We are not monks but soldiers to protect the Holy Places (gˇund li-l-muha¯faza ʿala¯ l-ama¯kin al-mu˙ ˙ qaddasa)…’ Are you actually protecting the Holy Places, and then desecrating their holiness (tumma tantahiku¯na hurmataha¯)? You claim to be spiritual leaders (ruʾasa¯ʾ ¯ ˙ ad-dı¯n) and then, you trample religion with your feet? However, you clerics, the age in which we have respected religious men just because they are religious men (li-mugˇarrad kawnihim rigˇa¯l ad-dı¯n), or ( just) because of their black robes, their flowing garments, their long trains, or because their wrinkled faces, their massive and bloated bodies – this age has past… The age has past, in which, if we saw trickiness in spiritual men, we had been whitewashing it… or put down our eyes… The age of the Pharisees, the old Greek and Romans… is over. We live now in an age in which, if the hearts are not pure and sincere, customs are not progressive, personal characters are not developed, and the lifestyle is not clean and useful, there is no more need for your robes and trains… and your religious look from the outside. For the people of this age, there is nothing more hateful than religious men if they are corrupted, if they demand the authority over the religious foundations and revenues and [they demand to] deal with it in the way they want to.126

The above quotation testifies how much effort Saka¯kı¯nı¯ put into staging the clergy as a relict of a dark age, and even of paganism when he referred to the old Greek and Romans, and to clarify that the new generation of Orthodox citizens in Palestine would not accept corrupted spiritual leaders anymore. He declared that 125 See for example, Filast¯ın, 19 April 1913: 231/1/1–4. – This observation runs contrary to ˙ Benjamin White’s suggestion that a discourse on minorities only appeared under the impact of the colonial and Mandate regimes and since the 1920s onwards, the exact application of new minority concepts in the Arab press during 1913–1914 needs much further contextualization, which cannot be accomplished here. See Benjamin Thomas White, The Emergence of Minorities in the Middle East: The Politics of Community in French Mandate Syria (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2011). 126 Saka¯kı¯nı¯, An-Nahda, 5. ˙

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the clergy soon would be deprived of its prestige and its legitimacy, inside Palestine and outside. Referring to the competition between the Russian Orthodox Church and the Greek Orthodox Church for control over the holy sites in Jerusalem and the payments that came from Moscow to the Patriarchate, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ predicted: You cannot be a beloved and respected leadership as long as you keep on turning piety into a lie and your life is corrupted (ma¯ da¯ma tadayyunukum ka¯diban wa-haya¯tukum ¯ ˙ fa¯sida). You might say: ‘Let the people think about us what they want to; as long as the Russians are only respecting the Holy Places and support us with their donations; and on this, we can count.’ However, one day… the Russians will not donate (to you) anymore and thousands of visitors (= pilgrims) will return home each year and they will carry with them their news about you that will make the souls shiver… The time will come in which you are deprived of… donations. The time will come in which your name… will be an insult in the countries of the East and the West, and your reputation will be spoilt; even among your own nation (hatta¯ bayna qawmikum) (the ˙ ˙˙ Greek). In the whole Christian world, one single voice will rise, saying: ‘You are devious 127 (muʿawwigˇa), oh you leadership, so resign (iʿtazilı¯)!

Saka¯kı¯nı¯ continued, the third factor why the clerical leadership must soon be deprived of its power was its internal ‘disruption and mismanagement’ (ihtila¯luha¯ wa-suʾ ida¯ratiha¯). Indeed, this argument had heavy weight. Although ˘ the Patriarchate received large amounts of revenues due to its control over Holy Places, visitors’ hostels, etc., and it owned many assets and was the largest landowner in Palestine,128 it was in heavy debt. By the beginning of the war, the debts of the Patriarchate amounted to 221,792 lira. During World War I, it was cut off from revenues from properties outside Palestine and the pilgrims ceased to come, and at the end of the war, its debts added up to 555,887 lira.129 According to Saka¯kı¯nı¯, the Patriarchates’ revenues got lost in ‘secret channels’, meaning, corrupted clerics. Since the clerical leadership was ‘foreign’ and did not have the support of the local population, and moreover, ‘it fears the patriotic sensations’ (taha¯f al-ʿa¯tifa al-watanı¯ya), ‘the public opinion’ (taha¯f ar-raʾy al-ʿa¯mm) and ‘the ˙ ˙ ˘ ˘ new youth’ (taha¯f an-na¯ˇsiʾa al-gˇadı¯da), it was forced to ‘waste a great part of its ˘ money to stay in power’ (tunfiq gˇa¯niban kabı¯ran min tilka al-amwa¯l fı¯ sabı¯l taʾyı¯d riʾa¯satiha¯), Saka¯kı¯nı¯ claimed, by bribing government officials and local sheikhs.130 To gain money, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ continued, the clerical leaders sold more and more property from awqa¯f, considered by the locals as Orthodox collective property. 127 Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 6. 128 The Patriarchate owned extensive properties inside and outside Palestine. See Katz and Kark, “Church and Landed Property,” 385. ¯ rusˇalı¯m al-urtu¯duksı¯ya, 279–280. 129 Hu¯rı¯, Hula¯sat ta¯rı¯h kanı¯sat U ¯ ¯ ˙ ˘ ¯ kı¯˘nı¯, An-Nahd ˘a, 7–8. 130 Saka ˙

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Indeed, during the years prior to World War I, the Patriarchate sold off assets to private investors; and it maintained institutions for the higher education of Greek students in several European countries, yet, it neglected Arab Orthodox schools in Palestine. While Saka¯kı¯nı¯ wrote this pamphlet, many Orthodox schools and charity institutions in Jerusalem, but especially in the periphery, were cut off from money from the Patriarchate, or eventually even shut down.131 The Orthodox, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ predicted, would not accept the state in the Patriarchate anymore: The nation (asˇ-sˇaʿb) looks at its leadership, realizing that they are foreigners and intruders (ruʾasa¯ʾahu wa-hum g˙uraba¯ʾ duhala¯ʾ), and realizing that they work to hu˘ miliate it and kill its culture (yaʿmalu¯n ʿala¯ idla¯lihi wa-qatlihi qatlan adabı¯yan)… And it ¯ has realized that it [the leadership] strives as to replace it [the people] with another people of their (own) kind (yastaʿı¯du¯n ʿanhu bi-sˇaʿb a¯hir min abna¯ʾ gˇinsihim), cut them ˙ ˘ off their foundations, and take away from them their income.132

It should be noted from this final quote that the main argument that Saka¯kı¯nı¯ used was the domination of an indigenous people by an ‘alien’ leadership that had ‘intruded’ into local Orthodox culture and financial resources, and that it sought to ‘drive out’ local leaders.

The Principles of the New Leadership After having explained the factors for the near decline of the Patriarchal leadership, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ elaborated the principles of the Renaissance on which the Arab Orthodox should build its new leadership: patriotism, sincerity, effective organization and order. He explained: The (current) leadership is a strange one (g˙arı¯ba), so the new one must protect the civil rights (tura¯ʿı¯ huqu¯q al-muwa¯tinı¯n). The (current) leadership is devious/tricky (muʿaw˙ ˙ wagˇa), so the new one must be sincere (mustaqı¯m). The (current) leadership is in chaos (fawda¯), so the new one must be well organized (munazzam).133 ˙˙ ˙

Saka¯kı¯nı¯ thought that the current crisis of the Orthodox Renaissance Movement could even be advantageous (fawa¯ʾid), affirming that ‘the innovations of the age’ (hada¯tatʿahdiha¯), transottoman modernity, pushed a change for three reasons. ¯ ˙ First, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ explained, the change of the leadership would be pushed by the new patriotic emotions that created a kind of solidarity among the people (taʿa¯ruf asˇ-sˇaʿb wa-tada¯manuhu), and, as he hoped, new dynamics of collective mobi˙ 131 This is clear from many protest letters sent from the dioceses to the Patriarch or Orthodox delegations approaching the governor. See Filast¯ın, 3 August 1912: 159/3/5–4/1. ˙ 132 Saka¯kı¯nı¯, An-Nahda, 10. ˙ 133 Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 10.

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lization.134 Before, Orthodox communities were isolated from each other, he said, but since the Orthodox Renaissance had arisen, they started to get connected across Palestine, emphasizing the transregional dynamics of the movement. People nowadays became organized in associations (gˇamʿı¯ya¯t), he stressed, and the Arab Orthodox now accessed ‘a new life, that is, a collective life’ (haya¯t gˇadı¯da ˙ hiya al-haya¯t al-qawmı¯ya).135 The application of the term qawmı¯ deserves at˙ tention once more since it shows that terms can take on flexible meanings especially in the beginning phase of conceptual shifts, and its use needs to be seen in context with historical developments, as Steinmetz has pointed out. In my opinion, qawmı¯ is here not to be translated as ‘national’ – as it would be in a contemporary context – since Saka¯kı¯nı¯ is not talking about the Arab Orthodox as a ‘national group’ that seeks for political separatism. I have translated haya¯t ˙ qawmı¯ya as ‘collective life’ instead, since Saka¯kı¯nı¯ understood this concept as the ability to articulate a ‘collective agency’, and to get organized, and as a sort of political maturity – which reflected the tendencies for a politicization of urban societies as part of a global fashion. Second, the near decline of the old Patriarchal leadership was supported by a new sense of self-authorization or self-empowerment of the people that had emerged since the ‘new age’, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ predicted. He contrasted the idea of a ‘representative authority’ to ‘despotism’, and the concept of ‘the sovereignty of the people’ or ‘popular sovereignty’ to arbitrary rule, following here the contemporary dichotomous discourse in public debates. Specifically, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ also highlighted the avantgarde character of the Orthodox movement. The Orthodox Renaissance had risen ‘as a response to the proclamation of the Constitution’ (ʿala¯ atr iʿla¯n ad-dustu¯r), Saka¯kı¯nı¯ stressed, and since the ‘spirit of liberty’ (ru¯h al¯ ˙ hurrı¯ya) now blew into the faces of the people (asˇ-sˇaʿb), it did not want to be ˙ commanded anymore by someone else, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ said and concluded that thus, ‘the Renaissance has turned into a popular movement in the full sense of the word’ (fa-asbahat an-nahda ˇsaʿbı¯ya bi-kull maʿna¯ l-kalima).136 ˙ ˙ ˙ Third, the old leadership came close to its end, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ argued, since the Orthodox movement had turned into ‘a Renaissance of the public opinion’ (nahdat ar-raʾy al-ʿa¯mm), a movement supported by the Orthodox collective, ˙ which made it in his view a legitimate movement and meant a real threat to the Patriarchal leadership. Obviously, since the Orthodox Renaissance was about to win over the ‘public opinion’, the Greek clergy responded with a campaign that should spoil the Orthodox Renaissance in the eyes of the congregation, the government and global Christianity, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ claimed. According to him, the 134 Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 10. 135 Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 11. 136 Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 11.

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clergy undertook massive efforts to portray the Arab Orthodox movement at the Ottoman government as a political separatist or even national movement. Saka¯kı¯nı¯ complained, the monks were claiming that the Orthodox Renaissance served ‘foreign interests’ in the Empire, and that the nahda activists acted as ˙ ‘avantgardes of an Arabic movement that is striving for the independence of Palestine’ (tala¯ʾiʿ harakaʿarabı¯ya yaqsid biha¯ istiqla¯l Filast¯ın). On top of that, the ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ Greek clergy was spreading rumors (tuham) in the Christian World, that the Orthodox Renaissance had emerged out of ‘the cells of the freemasons, protestants and Zionist intrigues’, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ said, and by this, the clergy tried to prove that the Orthodox Renaissance was not a popular movement supported by the masses, but only a ‘small faction’ (fiʾa sag˙¯ıra).137 ˙ It is seen from this paragraph that Saka¯kı¯nı¯ strongly emphasized the collective character of the Orthodox Renaissance in order to stress its legitimacy, and its avantgarde character for other groups as well. He confirmed that the sense for collectiveness in the movement had led to the establishment of various Orthodox associations that he interpreted as a sign of progressiveness. The following quote highlights how important the mobilization of the Palestinian middle classes was for Saka¯kı¯nı¯, while he claimed that it had a domino effect on other groups as well. The Orthodox nahda, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ explained, ˙ has left an echo in the hearts of its (other) citizens regardless of their different confessions (ka¯na laha¯ sada¯ fı¯ qulu¯b muwa¯tinı¯hi ʿala¯ ihtila¯f al-mada¯hib). So they started to ¯ ˙ ˙ ˘ sympathize with it and to stand at its side, as if the country on the whole had become Orthodox or (as if) the Renaissance (Movement) was a general one (hatta¯ kaʾanna al˙ bila¯d bi-asriha¯ ka¯nat urtu¯duksı¯ya aw kaʾanna an-nahda ka¯nat ʿumu¯mı¯ya).138 ¯ ¯ ˙

There are really indicators that the activities of the Orthodox rebels in Jerusalem had effects on other communities as well. An article in Filast¯ın, written by an ˙ anonymous Christian, stressed that the nahda of ‘the Christian compatriots in ˙ Palestine’ (asˇ-sˇaʿb al-ması¯h¯ı l-watanı¯ fı¯ Filast¯ın) did result from a kind of ‘a ˙ ˙ ˙ collective vitality’ (haya¯t qawmı¯ya) that, as the author claimed, ‘has spread in the ˙ body of the umma’. He explained further that ‘our Muslim brothers’ in Jerusalem ‘have been motivated by the blessed and glorious infection (ʿadwa¯) that has spread from us to them’, and he claimed that, under the impact of the Orthodox Renaissance, the Muslims of Jerusalem were about to work out an agenda for reforming the Islamic awqa¯f.139 Whether this was true or not, it has been made clear that it was part of the Orthodox activists’ agenda to highlight the legitimacy of the movement by the fact that it was born out of a collective will of indigenous people, and that it was 137 Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 12 138 Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 12. 139 Filast¯ın, 24 January 1914: 301/1/1–3. ˙

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not only an elite movement but that there was a high grade of organization within the movement that included the congregation on the whole; at least, this was the ideal: to make the Orthodox Renaissance a popular phenomenon that build its legitimacy to formulate reform demands with mass support.

On the Relevance of Political Organization In the latter part of his pamphlet, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ discussed the factors that he defined as necessary for the success of the Orthodox Renaissance, and presented a program for the transregional organization of the movement that seemed like the statutes of a political party. In the presentation of Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s life in pre-World War I Jerusalem through his diaries, we saw how much effort he put into establishing political networks and party-like associations. How fashionable ‘political organization’ had become among the middle classes in Palestine is also seen in the contemporary press, as shall be demonstrated briefly with a few examples: starting in the end of the year 1913, Filast¯ın put a new focus on ˙ translations and reprints of ‘programs’ of international organizations and ‘resolutions’ of political movements, which took considerable space on its pages. The ʿI¯sa¯s were very much interested in learning from the structures of these organizations, and it can be suggested that this trend reflected on a minor Arabic translation movement in Palestine: a little version of the Arab nahda in a nutshell. ˙ In this respect, and due to increasing rivalries between Zionist settlements and Palestinian landowners and traders since 1913, the strategies of the World Zionist Organization (WZO) were closely observed.140 As much as the Zionist movement was criticized, it was admired for its effective organization. In 1913, editor Yusuf al-ʿI¯sa¯ admitted that he was fascinated by this ‘vital community’ that ‘is frightening in its mutual solidarity’, and concluded that ‘we wish to see such a sense for cooperation and solidarity (ha¯da¯ t-tada¯fur wa-t-tada¯mun) also at our end’.141 ˙ ˇ ibra¯n al-Matar¯ from ˙Beit Jala defined The Orthodox G the sense for collective˙ ness and unity as a premise for progress, and recalled the ‘strong associations’ (gˇamaʿı¯ya¯t qawı¯ya) of Jewish and European immigrants as examples of effective cooperation – what he missed among the Palestinian communities.142 Also in Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s “party statutes”, the establishment of transregional networks and communicational structures were defined as pre-conditions for pushing a successful collective agenda. 140 For example, a lengthy translation of Menachem Ussishkins Zionist program was published in several issues. See Filast¯ın, 15 July 1914: 336/3/3f; Filast¯ın, 18 July 1914: 337/3/3f; Filast¯ın, ˙ ¯ın, 25 July 1914: 339/3/3f; and ˙ Filast¯ın, 01. 08. 1914: 341/3/3f. ˙ 22 July 1914: 338/3/3f; Filast ˙ ˙ 141 Filast¯ın, 9 August 1913: 261/2/2. 142 Filast˙ ¯ın, 31 August 1912: 167/2/1. ˙

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First, he demanded the establishment of a network of associations (gˇamʿı¯ya¯t) in every place ‘to revive patriotic feelings’ (ihya¯ʾ al-ʿa¯tifa al-watanı¯ya), and to ˙ ˙ ˙ ‘publish the Renaissance principles’ (nasˇr maba¯diʾ an-nahda). Second, he ˙ called for the annual conduction of a ‘general congress’ (muʾtamarʿumu¯mı¯) to which each association should sent its delegates in order to resume its actions and announce the agenda (taqrı¯r hitta) for the new year. Third, he defined the ˘ ˙˙ establishment of a ‘financial department’ (sundu¯q iqtisa¯d) in each association ˙ ˙ for the acquisition of membership fees, donations and other sources as necessary, which should finance a public relations branch, meaning the printing and distribution of publications (newspapers, telegrams), the deployment of delegations, etc. Finally, he called for the dissemination of a ‘spirit of independence among the [Orthodox] community’ (batt ru¯h al-istiqla¯l fı¯ l¯¯ ˙ milla).143 Saka¯kı¯nı¯ ended his essay with a very emotional and mobilizing speech in which he addressed the Orthodox, especially the young generation, why they should become independent from this old leadership and represent themselves. He wrote: Yes, the community must fight this leadership as long as there is the pulse of blood in its veins, since it is a shame (ʿa¯r) for the community that its leadership is alien, tricky, corrupted, tyrannical and despotic (g˙arı¯ba muʿawwigˇa fa¯sida gˇa¯ʾira mustabidda)… What right is it, that bestows it upon this alien group [of clerics] (hadihi at-tug˙ma al¯ ˙˙ g˙arı¯ba) to rule over you and treat you so badly?144 Is it a political right (haqq siya¯sı¯)? As if they had conquered the country with the blade of ˙ the sword… and you gave over [to them] the reins and submitted to their rule (an-nuzu¯l ʿala¯ hukmiha¯), knowing that they are a gang of highwaymen and outlaws on the ho˙ rizons (sˇardama min an-nuzza¯ʿ at-turuq wa-sˇudda¯d al-a¯fa¯q) who came to your country, ¯ ¯¯ ¯ ˙˙ hungry and naked (gˇa¯ʾat bila¯daki gˇa¯ʿiya ʿa¯riya). And so, it did not take long until they became the ruling authority over you (sa¯hibat as-siya¯da fı¯ki). ˙ ˙ Or is it a religious right (haqq dı¯nı¯)? It is not postulated in your Holy Book that the ˙ spiritual leadership should be limited to the Greek clergy and that the language of your religion and your prayers should be Greek. Or is it a moral right (haqq adabı¯), the right for [providing] charity and taking care of ˙ you? While you know that they have made a trading market out of your Holy Sites, demand the revenues from it and waste it for all kind of things. If they could, they even would deprive you of the air and wrap up the sunlight [from your sight]… while neither piety nor their fear of god would prevent them [from doing so]… Is it not a shame on you that you keep quiet in front of this leadership and make yourself weak in front of them?… Yes, you must fight them until they either become moderate or resign (ila¯ an taʿtadil aw taʿtazil)… And on the other hand, you must now think about [how to reach] independence for yourself (bi-l-istiqla¯l bi-nafsiki) and how to rely on it. This is not a very 143 Saka¯kı¯nı¯, An Nahda, 13. 144 Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 14.

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difficult thing. On the contrary, you are [already] now almost independent (tuka¯dı¯n taku¯nı¯n mustaqilla)… Your children study in foreign schools, and all of them receive fees, and not just a few, which the poor cannot afford for their children. Would it not be easier to establish an association for that purpose? And your parish priests… cannot live from the low salary that they receive from this leadership, in a submissive and humiliated manner (sa¯g˙irı¯n ˙ munkasirı¯n)… whereas they [the leadership] postpone their payment (for another) two or three months… and humiliate their souls. Or do you need this leadership to take care of your poor people and widows?… But what does this care mean?145 To make it short: You don’t need this leadership and it should not be difficult for you to obtain independence through yourself (al-istiqla¯l bi-nafsiki) and to rely on it in all your affairs. It will be your honor and your life, if you will comprehend… This is the way we have to follow if we want to avert the danger and lift the shame (from us) and escape [our] cultural death (nangˇu¯ min al-mawt al-adabı¯), which has been approaching us… There is no doubt that there are many among us who did not prostrate themselves to the Baal of the Greek clergy and who are receiving my message here with relief and interest, if god will.146

It is seen from this translated paragraph that the practical aim underlying the theoretical discussion in Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s pamphlet was the establishment of progressive organizations and party-like structures, in which the Orthodox youth should play the decisive role. The application of the terms mustaqilla and istiqla¯l in context with the Orthodox Movement, meaning independence, is interesting here, although it is not meant to be understood in a national sense. The right to political (self-)representation is an outstanding concept in Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s argument that required the creation of a branch for ‘public relations’ and transregional networks in the Orthodox Movement, for instance, through the organization of an annual general congress, in accordance with the practices of international associations and political parties. All of this demonstrates that political organization was considered as highly relevant for the progress of the Orthodox Movement.

5.

The Reception of Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s Pamphlet and his Withdrawal from the Orthodox Renaissance

Many things about the circulation and reception of Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s pamphlet among the Arab Orthodox in Palestine remain in the dark. What is clear is that it caused a scandal in the Orthodox community in Jerusalem. Filast¯ın made advertisements ˙ for it and urged the readers to contact Saka¯kı¯nı¯ who had it printed – it is not 145 Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 15. 146 Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 16.

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ˇ u¯rgˇ¯ı Habı¯b, editor exactly known where, but supposedly in the printing shop of G ˙ 147 of the newspaper al-Quds – and he himself distributed it. From Haifa, the Orthodox Halı¯l Nasr reacted and expressed his wish that ‘in every city of Pal˙ ˘ estine five individuals like al-ʿI¯sa¯ and Saka¯kı¯nı¯ were to be found who consolidate the defense of this milla’.148 From Chile, the Arab Palestinian Orthodox immigrant Hana¯ Abu¯ as-Sawf responded. He called Saka¯kı¯nı¯ ‘one of the pillars and ˙ ˙ ˙ free (pioneers) of the renaissance’ (ahad arka¯n an-nahda al-ahra¯r) and asked ˙ ˙ him to invest all of his ‘intellectual powers’ and ‘continue his jihad’ (an yazulla ˙ ʿala¯ gˇiha¯dihi) for the Orthodox Renaissance.149 But there were also hostile reactions. A counter-pamphlet circulated in the churches of Jerusalem in which the Patriarch accused Saka¯kı¯nı¯ of being an apostate and an infidel (yarmı¯ bihi… bi-lilha¯d wa-l-kufr), Filast¯ın reported.150 Saka¯kı¯nı¯ responded that he did not fear the ˙ ˙ monks and would publish a sequel in the pages of the Jerusalemite newspaper alQuds.151 At this point, the Orthodox Mixed Council had been annulled by the Patriarch, and the church of St. James was still occupied by Orthodox activists. In December 1913, the central government in Istanbul sent the former Jerusalem governor, ʿAzmı¯ Bek, to Jerusalem, to negotiate the reopening of the Council. He asked the Orthodox rebels to return the church of St. James to the Patriarch. Saka¯kı¯nı¯ knew that St. James was a key for the resolution of the conflict, and that the Patriarchate would only reopen the Mixed Council and approve the election of Orthodox local councils in the dioceses if the rebels returned St. James. The following paragraph illustrates that Saka¯kı¯nı¯ was torn and faced increasing resistance against his rebellious course by other community members who longed to reach a peace: I cannot imagine cooperating with the monks without my soul being detested of myself, and [it would] tell me to beg for forgiveness and cut all of my relations with the monks and the milla. Indeed, my soul told me to refrain from the Orthodox Church, and finish with the Renaissance… especially since the Renaissance has become [a movement] that blocks [reforms] and is affected by [personal] interests. Many members of the milla have started to urge me to reconcile, to pretend to cooperate, and to be pragmatic after everything that has happened… until the circumstances change, and we can pick up the ball again after we will have recollected our powers…152

Saka¯kı¯nı¯ pushed his limits. After some rounds of negotiations between the local Orthodox and the Patriarch under the supervision of the governmental com147 148 149 150 151

Filast¯ın, 4 October 1913: 277/3/3. Filast˙ ¯ın, 12 November 1913: 288/4/1. ˙ ba¯r, 15 November 1913: 495/3/5–4/1. Al-Ah Filast˘¯ın, 12 November 1913: 288/4/1 and al-Ahba¯r, 19 November 1913: 496/3/3. ˙ that G ˘ made space in his newspaper for Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s ˇ u¯rgˇ¯ı Habı¯b, the editor of al-Quds It seems ˙ reaction on the Patriarchs’ leaflet. See Filast¯ın, 12 November 1913: 288/4/2. 152 11 January 1914, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, Kada¯ ana¯ ya¯ ˙dunya¯, 56. ¯

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mission, the rebels returned St. James to the Patriarchate in January 1914, and the Patriarchate reopened the Mixed Council. Directly involved in the negotiations ˇ u¯rgˇ¯ı Zaharı¯ya¯, the former Jerusalem delegate in the was Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s rival G ˘ 153 Council. Saka¯kı¯nı¯ was frustrated, and with a lot of doubts in his mind, he agreed to attend a reconciliatory meeting between the Patriarch and Orthodox community leaders in the Convent. He described his situation as follows: We went to the Patriarchate and entered the saloon. There were the bishops and a great number of monks, and they started with mendacious flatteries. The Patriarch asked after the health of this one and that one until he approached me and said: how is your health? I said: like iron. My soul was in turmoil (ta¯rat nafsı¯). I understood that I cannot be anymore in this ¯ Orthodox milla after today, and I cannot be anymore under the leadership of those corrupted monks, and not from this congregation. I said: here, my work is completed. I have to cut off every relation with this Orthodox Church. Then they got up to conduct a first session for the Mixed Council. I got out before anyone had departed… I do not know what happened afterwards. And I do not want to know. I am not an Orthodox after today. Staying in this church will suffocate me. I do not benefit anything from it, nor will anybody else benefit from it… For five years, I have served you, oh Renaissance, and I have dedicated my time (to you) and fought the heroic jihad (gˇa¯hadtu gˇiha¯d al-abta¯l). But we have arrived to where we ˙ have arrived now, and this is the end of my bundle with you (fa-ha¯da¯ a¯hir al-ʿahd biki). I ¯ ˘ am not an Orthodox, I am not an Orthodox…. I agreed with Sulta¯na to ask the Anglican bishop to have us baptized in his church in ˙ secret and as soon as possible… If I had left the Orthodox Church and the Renaissance before that day, they surely would have said: ‘you escaped from your duty and you have betrayed the Renaissance’. But now, since they opened the Mixed Council, elected church representatives, disparaged their schools and reconciled with the Patriarch and the monks, and since I have pressured myself… and went with them to the monastery and shook their Patriarch’s hand, I cannot be blamed if I refrain from this work… So, my resignation from the church and my withdrawal from the Renaissance during these times, a time of internal partition, means [to have] honor and pride (ʿayn asˇ-sˇaraf wa-ʿanwa¯n al-fahr). My withdrawal of today is a faithful remnant of (my) determination ˘ and resolution, better for my future and more in line with my principles. Because, if I remained in the church, I would work for the sake of this Renaissance with people who do not understand me, and whom I do not understand either, who do not agree with my principles and ethics, and I do not agree with theirs which would pull me backwards and doom me to decline, and suffocate my life and leave me in emotional pain (a¯la¯m nafsa¯nı¯ya) that I would not be able to bear. After all, if I thought that there would be only the slightest benefit (aqall nafaʿ) from giving effort toward the revival of the Orthodox Church and the reformation of its affairs… I might force my soul to continue working [for it]. But I came to believe today and after a long time of experience, that the Orthodox Church ended up in exaggerated 153 11 January 1914, in Saka¯kı¯nı¯, 56.

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arrogance and reached the closest point to demise so that it is impossible to rise/ resurrect/be revived and follow the other churches. So, better than trying to reform it in vain (hayr min muha¯walat isla¯hiha¯ ʿala¯ g˙ayr gˇadwa¯) is that people separate from it, one ˙ ˙ ˙ ˘ after the other, until nobody is left in it, apart from declining leaders (ruʾasa¯ʾ sa¯qitu¯n) ˙ and an ignorant and sluggish people (sˇaʿb gˇa¯hil ha¯mil), and it will not be long until it ˘ 154 disappears…

The above quoted paragraph describes Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s feeling of alienation amongst his people, and his inner dissonance, an emotional state that should follow him during different stages of his life. It is clear from this that Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s pamphlet not only did not bring another uniting ‘kick start’ for the Orthodox movement in Palestine that he had so badly hoped for, but its publication even contributed to a final escalation that led to Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s denouncement of Orthodox Church on the whole, and his complete withdrawal from the Orthodox movement when other Orthodox community leaders, in rivalry with Saka¯kı¯nı¯, reconciled with the Patriarchate and compromised for St. James. This step, to refrain from participation the Orthodox cause, marked a central switch in Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s public role in Jerusalem prior World War I.

Concluding Remarks The present volume in general asks when, why and how certain types of textual knowledge appear and are translated, and what are the patterns and trends linked with. In particular, this contribution has illustrated how Saka¯kı¯nı¯ borrowed from prevailing and popular contemporary concepts so as to establish a ‘public discourse’ on the Orthodox cause that befitted the political discourse of his age; specifically, ideas on ‘constitutionalism’, ‘legitimate rule’, ‘civil rights’ and ‘selfgovernance’, as well as proto-nationalist terms that were about to infiltrate Arab political and intellectual thought during the years 1908–14. The starting point for a public debate on Orthodox civil and rights in Palestine, and on the participation of locals in the power structures of the Patriarchate was the aftermath of Constitutional Revolution. In his publications of the Second Constitutional Era, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ tried to legitimize the political agenda of a local reform movement that was cultural in character and not a separatist movement. Specifically, his political pamphlet, which was published in fall 1913 and has been treated here, was an approach to writing a ‘transottoman script’, as I have claimed, in which he aimed at provoking a transregional Orthodox rebellion and overthrow of the clerical 154 Saka¯kı¯nı¯, Yawmı¯ya¯t, vol. 2, al-Nahda al-urtu¯duksı¯ya, al-harb al-ʿuzma¯, an-nafı¯ ila¯ Dimasˇq, ¯ ¯ ˙ 1914–1918 (Ramallah: Khalil Sakakini Cultural Center, ˙2004), 47–48. Compare also with Saka¯kı¯nı¯, Kada¯ ana¯ ya¯ dunya¯, 57–58. ¯

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leadership in the Patriarchate. The types of political knowledge that Saka¯kı¯nı¯ has borrowed to legitimize his cause were taken from Ottoman Constitutionalist thought and global discourses on liberty, modernization and progress. These were prevailing and overreaching political discourses deriving from the Ottoman center that circulated in the Turkish and Arab press, became popularized and were picked up by reform movements in the Ottoman periphery, or even exploited so as to legitimize specific local political needs, as we have seen. With regard to the transformation process of concepts in Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s case, this means that the ideas promoted in his writings had moved in one direction from the center to the periphery. However, in the process, this also left an echo in the opposite direction, since Palestinian Orthodox activists forced Ottoman bureaucrats in the center to receive delegations and complaints, and to send arbitrary commissions from Istanbul to Jerusalem as to work out a reconciliation between the conflicting parties. Several underlying social and political factors accompanied and pushed this transformation process. The heavy debt burden affected the Orthodox communities in the Patriarchate, and the political threats that the Empire faced created a climate of an approaching catastrophic change in the perception of the Arab elites, and found expression in the stigmatization of the Greek clerics as ‘strangers’, as we have seen – together with arising national questions. An increasing politicization occurred in Arab societies during the preWorld War I years. Here, the greater trend toward social and political organization in Arab cities is clearly reflected in Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s arguments. It was part of an overwhelming need for reform and progress and found expression in the creation of political statutes and programs; and in his pamphlet, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ articulated such a program for the Orthodox Renaissance as a civil rights movement in Palestine. The conceptual inclinations transferred here circled around the establishment of a discourse on ‘collective rights’ that the Renaissance activists appropriated and then transmitted on the Orthodox movement. This discourse can be grasped through a range of proto-nationalist terms that circulated in Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s writings while the Orthodox milla was described as watanı¯yı¯n – ‘compatriots’, ‘nationals’ ˙ or ‘citizens’ in the Ottoman sense of the concept – but also as ˇsaʿb – ‘people’ or ‘a nation’. In certain contexts, the Orthodox Renaissance was even ascribed to be a haraka qawmı¯ya, a movement with a ‘national life’ (haya¯t qawmı¯ya), which is to ˙ ˙ be interpreted here as a movement with a collective agenda, not a separatist agenda. Having summarized Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s agenda and arguments, what were the results of his campaign for the exchange of the clerical leadership with a young, modernized and secularized Orthodox leadership? As outlined, the publication of Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s political pamphlet left quite an echo in Palestine’s Orthodox activist circles, raised a scandal and marked the high escalation point between Saka¯kı¯nı¯ and the Patriarchate. In consequence, it also culminated in Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s total

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withdrawal from the Orthodox Movement. This was pushed by the greater intraOrthodox crisis in Palestine that had reached a new climax by the end of 1913 and the annulment of the Mixed Council, which had required intervention by the central government. To reach the reopening of the Mixed Council as the main institutional instrument for Orthodox reforms in Palestine, the Orthodox activists compromised. They left Saka¯kı¯nı¯’s rebellious path – and gave the church of St. James, an important symbol of Orthodox resistance, back to the Patriarchate. Having pushed his limits, Saka¯kı¯nı¯ suffered from tremendous disappointment over the failure of his struggle that he still had demonstrated in the most combative spirit in his political pamphlet, and – maybe finding himself at his wits’ end – left the Orthodox struggle for good.

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Index of Names

ʿAbduh, Muhammad 163–165, 208 ˙ ʿAbduh, Sulta¯na 244 ˙ Abdul Hamid II // Abdülhamid II (Ottoman sultan) 116, 137, 139, 210, 227, 234, 239f., 256 Abu¯ Saʿı¯d Bardaʿı¯ 61 Adıvar, Adnan 132, 135 Agallianos, Theodoros 84f. Ag˘aog˘lu (Agaev), Ahmet 205 Ahmed b. Hız˙ıru l-Üskübı¯ el-ʿAlevı¯ 56 ˙ ˙ Ahmed Vefı¯k Pas¸a 134f. ˙ ˙ Ahmed Midhat 180 Aksüt, Ali Kemalî 137, 144, 146f. al-ʿAlamı¯, Fayd¯ı 245 ˙ al-ʿAlamı¯, Mu¯sa¯ 245 ¯ lı¯ Emı¯rı¯ 138–140, 143 ʿA Almosnino, Moses 74–77 Anvarı¯ 47 Arsenios (of Elasson) 95 Asadı¯ Tu¯sı¯ 47–50 ˙ Ashkenazi, Jonah ben Yaacov 93 Asjadı¯ 47 ʿAzmı¯ Bek 268 Balaban, Gedeon 97 Basˇagic´, Safvet-beg 158, 173–178, 185–191, 200, 203–204 Ba¯yezı¯d II // Bayezid II (Ottoman Sultan) 42, 54, 57, 195 ˇ ausˇevic´, Dzˇemaludin C 208, 212, 214

164, 191f., 201,

Damianos (Patriarch of Jerusalem) 223, 254, 255 Dositheos (Patriarch of Jerusalem) 84 Dzˇabic´, Ali Fehmi 186 Farrukhı¯ 50 Fedorov, Ivan 95–97 Feodor Gramatik 102 Fevrı¯ b. ʿAbdulla¯h 46 Firdausı¯ (Firdawsı¯) 47 Galland, Antoine 126, 129f., 201 Gasprinski, Ismail 165, 167 ˇ awharı¯ya, Wası¯f 248 al-G Gobineau, Arthur de 201f. Hadzˇic´, Osman Nuri 157f., 165, 178–183, 187, 192–194, 196, 202f., 208, 213 Ha¯fiz 47 ˙ ˙ Ha¯fizu l-Dı¯n-i Nasafı¯ 61 ˙ ˙ Hakı¯m-i Katra¯nı¯ Urmavı¯ (Hakı¯m-i Qatra¯nı¯ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ Urmawı¯ // Qatra¯n Tabrı¯zı¯) 48–50 ˙ al-Ha¯lidı¯, Ru¯h¯ı 245, 247 ˙ ˘ Halı¯mı¯ Lutfulla¯h bin Abı¯ Yu¯suf (Halı¯mı¯) ˙ ˙ ˙ 45, 49–51, 54, 58, 63 Hammer-Purgstall, Joseph von 124, 128, 131–134, 142, 178 ˇ u¯rgˇ¯ı 246 Hana¯nı¯ya¯, G ˙ Hat¯ıb Rüstem Dede bin ʿAbdulla¯h el˘ ˙ Mevlevı¯ 46 Heza¯rfen, Hüseyin Efendi 121, 129, 131f. ˙ Hindu¯sha¯h Nakhjawa¯nı¯ (Hindu¯¸sa¯h Nahcava¯nı¯) 48–50, 52 ˘ Hüda¯yı¯ Dede 57 ˘

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Hüsa¯m b. Hasan el-Konevı¯ 39 ˙ ˙ ˙ Husrev-beg // Husrev Bey (Ottoman governor of Bosnia) 178, 207, 210f. I˙bn Kema¯l or Kema¯lpas¸aza¯de 47, 51, 54– 56, 60f. I˙bra¯hı¯m Dede S¸a¯hidı¯ (S¸a¯hidı¯) 46, 57 I˙bra¯hı¯m Sˇina¯si Bey 135f. I˙bra¯hı¯m Pasha (Grand Vizier) 56, 58 al-ʿI¯sa¯, ʿI¯sa¯ 234, 236 al-ʿI¯sa¯, Yu¯suf 234, 236, 240, 246, 253 Jakob, Georg 138, 141–143 Jakubovicˇ, Israel 96f. Jeremias II Tranos (Patriarch of Constantinople) 97f. Kantakuzenos, Michael 76 Kapetanovic´ Ljubusˇak, Mehmed-beg 185 ˇ elebi 122, 129 Ka¯tib C ¯ lı¯ Efendi 120, 122–124, 127, Kınalıza¯de ʿA ˙ 132f., 135 Kocˇi Beg 125, 127, 129–132, 134–136, 143– ˙ 147 Konstantin (Vasilij) of Ostrog 99 Kowalski, Wictorino 96 Loukaris, Cyrill // Kyrillos (Patriarch of Constantinople) 85, 89, 94, 99, 101 Lupa, Vasilie 100 Lütfi Pasha 121f., 127f., 134, 138–142, 146f. Mahmu¯d b. Edhem 46, 58f. ˙ Mahmu¯d b. ʿOsma¯n b. ʿAlı¯ al-naqqa¯¸s b. ¯ ˙ I˙lya¯s (La¯miʿı¯ Çelebi) 46, 57f. Mahmud Pasha 54 Marcus, George E. 10, 41, 117, 171 Margounios, Maximos 85, 94 Marsili, Luigi Fernando 131 Maxim the Greek 102 Maximos of Peloponnese 87, 89, 94 Mehmed the Conqueror // Mehmed II ˙ (Ottoman Sultan) 54, 73 Mehmed Çelebi 57 ˙ Mehmed Tevfı¯k Ebüz˙z˙iya¯ 135–137, 143 ˙ ˙

Metrophanes III (Patriarch of Constantinople) 74–76 Metzapetos, Manuel 87, 94, 98f. Mulabdic´, Edhem 157, 173, 177, 187, 190f. Musa Kâzım Efendi 198 ¯ lı¯ Gelibolulu 123–125, 135 Mustafa¯ ʿA ˙˙ Mutahhar b. Ebı¯ Ta¯lib-i La¯dik¯ı 39, 49 ˙ ˙ ˙ Naʿı¯ma¯ 123 Namık Kemal 201 an-Nasˇa¯sˇ¯ıbı¯, Isʿa¯f 245 Nasi, Yoseph 74–76 Nedeljkovic´, Milan 180, 183 Nikon (Patriarch of Moscow) 101 Niʿmetulla¯h ibn Ahmed al-Ru¯mı¯ ˙ (Niʿmetulla¯h) 47, 52, 56f., 61 ʿOsma¯n Çelebi ¯

57

Paisios I (Patriarch of Jerusalem) 101f. Pegas, Meletios (Patriarch of Alexandria) 26, 71f., 80, 86–96, 98–105 Pétis de la Croix, Alexandre 130 Pétis de la Croix, François 129 Pletho, Gemistus 83 Rohoza, Michael 95–98 Romanov, Aleksej Mixajlovicˇ (Russian Tsar) 100–102 Romanov, Mixail Fedorovicˇ (Russian Tsar) 80, 100f. Ru¯dakı¯ 47 Ru¯mı¯ 47 Saʿdı¯ 47 as-Saka¯kı¯nı¯, Halı¯l 223f. ˘ Sˇayhu, Louis (Louis Cheikho) 138, 141 ˘ Scholarios, Gennadios (Patriarch of Constantinople) 26, 71–73, 77–85, 88, 90, 93 Selı¯m I // Selim I (Ottoman Sultan) 211 Selı¯m II // Selim II (Ottoman Sultan) 74, 144 Shams-i Fakhrı¯ Isfaha¯nı¯ (Shams-i Fakhrı¯ // ˙ S¸ams-i Fahrı¯) 47–50, 52 ˘ Sheikh Tawfı¯q Tanbag˙a¯ 245, 247 ˙

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Spaho, Fehim 198, 200, 205f., 209f. Spaho, Mehmed 209f. Süleyma¯n the Magnificent // Suleyman I // Suleiman I (Ottoman Sultan) 58, 74f., 121f., 130, 132, 170, 195, 210f. Süßheim, Karl 137f., 143 Suxanov, Arsenij 80f.

Vámbéry, Ármin 182 Vlasios, Gabriel 100–102 Vlora, Mehmed Ekrem Bey

Tietze, Andreas 40, 44, 124f. Tschudi, Rudolf 139, 141–143

ˇ u¯rgˇ¯ı 251, 269 Zaharı¯ya¯, G ˘ Zurayq, Nahleh 245–247 ˘

ʿUnsurı¯ 47 ˙

Wagˇdı¯, Muhammad Farı¯d ˙

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146f. 199

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Index of Places and Subjects

Adrianople (Edirne) 55 Ahawı¯yat al-qabr al-muqaddas (Fraternity ˘ of the Holy Grave) 226 al-Ahba¯r (newspaper) 230, 268 ˘ ahla¯k (morality, ethics) 119, 122f. ˘ ˙ Alexandria 26, 30, 71f., 86f., 98f., 101, 103 Amasya 45f., 54 aqallı¯ya (minority) 256, 259f. attendants (müla¯zım) 55

discourse production 159f., 162–173, 179f., 182, 187f., 196, 208, 210

Bahru l-g˙ara¯yib (Ocean of Subtleties) 45, ˙ 51, 58f. Behar ( journal) 157–162, 165, 167, 170– 174, 177, 183–212 Belgrade 180, 183 Beirut 138, 141 belles-lettres 47 bidʿa (innovation) 140 Bosˇnjak (newspaper) 184–186, 208

farhangs (glossaries, dictionaries) 47, 143 Filast¯ın ( journal) 223f. ˙ Fuente Clara (Clear Fountain) 91–93

Cairo 124, 135, 199, 205, 208 “Circle of Justice” 120, 123, 145, 196 civilizing mission 166, 172, 183, 187, 193 civil rights 230, 251, 263, 270, 271 constitutionalism (dustu¯rı¯ya) 236, 240, 241, 270 converso 88, 91 Crete 75, 86 Daka¯yiku l-haka¯yik (Subtleties of the True ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ Things) 45, 47, 51f. Damascus 123 Darwinist 192 decline, Ottoman 117, 132, 140, 143–145

elsine-i sela¯se (the three languages; Turkish, Persian, Arabic) 175, 177, 199 enderu¯n mektebi (palace schools) 45 expert 23, 56, 82f., 99, 182f., 197, 202–204 expertise 15, 23f., 56, 72, 90, 183, 198, 202, 204

gˇamʿı¯ya (association) 247, 250f. genre 42, 48, 57, 73, 83, 115f., 118f., 126– 128, 132–135, 179, 188 Güls¸en-i Esra¯r (Garden of Secrets) 57 Gymnasium 174–177, 186 hadith 61, 122, 150, 160, 179, 185f., 197, 204 al-Hila¯l ( journal) 229 historiography 140, 142, 177–179 Hizb as-Saʿa¯lı¯k (Vagabond Party) 243, 270 ˙ ˙ Holy Synod 227 hukmʿa¯dil ( just rule) 230, 241 ˙ hukm mustabidd (despotic rule) 230, 256 ˙ huqu¯q al-muwa¯tinı¯n (civil rights) 230, 262 ˙ ˙ hurrı¯yat as-siha¯fa (press freedom) 230 ˙ ˙˙˙ Ias¸i (Jassy) 30, 72, 84, 100, 103 iha¯ʾ (Fraternity) 226f., 252 ˘

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I˙kda¯m (newspaper) 209 ˙ ʿilm (science, knowledge) 60–63, 158–161, 197, 199 imtiya¯za¯t (Capitulation treaties) 231 inhita¯t (decline) 239 ˙˙ ˙ intellectual 3, 7, 11, 13, 16, 18f., 21, 26, 29f., 43f., 74, 77, 82–84, 86, 88f., 91, 103, 115–117, 124, 128, 132, 134, 157, 161, 164, 172f., 180f., 183, 201, 207f., 211, 224, 229, 238, 242, 244f., 268, 270 introductions (dı¯ba¯ce) 30, 40, 45, 48, 52, 54, 118 Istanbul // Constantinople 8, 19f., 26, 30, 46f., 57, 71f., 74, 77–80, 85–88, 91, 93f., 96–99, 101, 103, 121, 123f., 126–129, 131, 135–139, 142–147, 150, 167, 173, 198, 205, 208–210, 227, 230, 234, 268, 271 istibda¯d (despotism) 230, 240f. istiqla¯l (independence) 264, 266f. al-Ittiha¯d al-ʿutma¯nı¯ (Ottoman unity) 240 ¯ ˙ I¯z˙a¯h-ı bahru l-g˙ara¯yib (Explanation on ˙ ˙ Ocean of Subtleties) // S¸erh-i bahru l˙ ˙ g˙ara¯yib (Commentary on Ocean of Subtleties) 45 Jerusalem 31, 78, 80, 84f., 101f., 223, 225– 227, 230, 232–235, 238, 242–248, 250– 255, 257f., 261f., 264f., 267–271 ka¯d¯ı ( judge of Islamic canon Law, repre˙ ˙ sentative of authority) 54f., 123 ka¯d¯ıʿasker (chief millitary judge) 55 ˙ ˙ kafiye (rhyme) 48 Kanı¯sat Ma¯r Yaʿqu¯b (church of St. James) 253f., 268, 270 Ka¯sımiyye or Ka¯ʿime (Qa¯simiyya-i Lutful˙ ˙ ˙ la¯h Halı¯mı¯) 45, 51 ˙ Kazan 199 kitʿa (strophe; piece of poetry of two or ˙˙ more couplets) 44 Kita¯b-i Müsteta¯b (anonymous) 122 ˙ kızılbas¸ 55 ˙ Korçë (Görice), Albania 125, 146 al-Kursı¯ al-uwru¯sˇalmı¯ (Greek-Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem) 223, 252

Late Ottoman modernity 28, 208, 224, 232, 234, 239, 248, 274 al-La¯ Markazı¯ya (Arab Decentralization) 231f., 260 legitimate rule 225, 270 liberal, liberalism 164, 180, 189f., 227, 230 liberty (hurrı¯ya) 227, 239, 241, 263 ˙ library 4, 29, 42, 45–47, 62, 64, 71, 77, 79, 86f., 94, 102f., 116, 122, 124, 126f., 129– 131, 135, 137, 141f., 144, 147, 173, 176, 207, 211, 213, 225 lingua franca 41, 167, 200 Lüg˙at-i Halı¯mı¯ (Halı¯mı¯’s Dictionary) 45, ˙ ˙ 48, 51, 64 Lüg˙at-i manzu¯me (Dictionary in Verse) ˙ 45f., 52 Lüg˙at-i Niʿmetulla¯h (Niʿmetulla¯h’s Dictionary) 45, 47, 51 Lughat-i furs (Dictionary of Persian) or Mushkila¯t-i furs (Difficulties of Persian) 48f. Lughat-i Qarahisa¯rı¯ 51 ˙˙ Lviv 30, 71f., 86f., 94–100, 102f. al-Madrasa ad-Dustu¯rı¯ya al-Watanı¯ya ˙ (the Constitutional National School) 248 al-Magˇlis al-muhtalat (the Orthodox Mixed ˙ ˘ Council) 227 al-Mana¯r ( journal) 164, 188, 207, 229, 274 al-maslaha al-ʿa¯mma (the public good) ˙ ˙ 230 medeniyet (civilization) 199, 209 mektep (school) 159 medrese // madrasa (Muslim theological school; high school; college of a university) 55, 57, 123f., 126, 139, 175, 198, 246, 248 megˇmu¯ʿa (collection, manuscript with mixed contents) 117, 127 mesnevı¯ (a long epic poem written in ¯ rhyming couplets) 44, 58 Mevlevı¯ (Sufi order) 45, 57, 60, 62 Mifta¯hu l-edeb (Key of manners) 39, 49 ˙ Mifta¯hu l-lüg˙at (Key of words) 45f., 48, ˙ 51f., 58f.

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Index of Places and Subjects

Mifta¯hu l-meʿa¯nı¯ (Key of meanings) 45f., ˙ 48f., 61 milla (community, confession) 224, 231, 237, 254, 259, 266, 268, 270f. Miʿya¯r-i Jama¯lı¯ (Jama¯lı¯’s touchstone) 48, 52 modernization 138, 162f., 172, 184, 189, 194, 204, 212, 228, 239, 240f., 271 Moscow // Muscovy 30, 72, 91, 95, 97, 100– 103, 261 Mostar 178, 186, 191 müderris (religious scholar) 55, 198 Mug˘la 57 Muntakhab-i Hakı¯m Qatra¯n (Selected by ˙ ˙ Hakı¯m Qatra¯n) 48 ˙ ˙ al-Muqtabas ( journal) 229 al-Muqtataf ( journal) 229 ˙ musa¯wa¯t (equality) 227, 231, 238f. an-Nahda al-ʿarabı¯ya (the Arab Renais˙ sance) 229, 274f. an-Nahda al-urtu¯duksı¯ya (the Orthodox ¯ ¯ ˙ Renaissance) 223–225, 238, 268, 272 Nak¸sibendı¯ (Sufi order) 46f., 57f. ˙ an-na¯ˇsiʾa al-gˇadı¯da (the ‘new youth’) 240, 247, 259, 261 nas¯ıhatna¯me (advice literature) 118–120, ˙˙ 126 national questions 166, 168, 182, 228, 231f., 238, 271 Nisa¯rü l-mülk (Dissemination of Posses¯ sion) 45f., 48, 54f. Orthodox Brotherhood (Lviv) 94–99

24, 71, 87,

Padua 86 pan-Islamism 164, 210 pa¯rsı¯, darı¯, pahlawı¯ 61 patriarch 26, 71, 73–77, 81–86, 94, 96–99, 101f., 223, 233, 251–255, 262, 268f. patronage 13, 25, 42f., 58, 94, 116, 121, 124 Persian court culture 120 prestigious language 42 printing press // printing house 71, 93f., 96f., 99, 135f., 139, 209

al-qa¯nu¯n al-asa¯sı¯ (Ottoman Fundamental Law) 251 qawmı¯ (national) 238, 257f., 263f., 271 Al-Quds (newspaper) 246 Quran 164f., 179, 193, 197f., 206 rabbi 74, 76, 83, 93, 102 ar-raʾy al-ʿa¯mm (the public opinion) 241, 258, 261, 263 reading hall 178 reform 32, 157–212, 223–229, 231f., 237– 241, 244, 250–252, 254f., 258, 264, 268– 272 – reformism as a political approach and social concept 161–169 – scripts of reform 169–171, 190–196 Rightly Guided Caliphs (al-Khulafa¯ʾu ar-Ra¯shidu¯n) 179 , 210 Romaniote 79, 85, 88, 91 ru¯h al-ʿasr al-gˇadı¯d (the ‘spirit of the new ˙ age’) 227, 230, 239, 244f., 256, 259, 263 ˇsaʿb (people, nation) 230, 237f., 255, 257– 259, 262 Sabah (newspaper) 209f. ˙ ˙ Saddle period 224, 226, 235f., 274 Salonica 74–77, 91, 93 Samanid dynasty 41 Sarajevo 29, 45f., 64, 158, 173–178, 180, 185f., 200, 207, 209f. Seljuq state 41 ¸sevahitli (with examples) 47 Sheikhü l-Islam 55 Shiraz 48 sibya¯n mektebi (primary schools) 45 ˙ Siha¯h al-furs (Correctness of Persian) 48 ˙˙ ˙ Siha¯h-iʿAjam-i Dı¯rı¯na-i Mukhtasar 51 ˙˙ ˙ ˙ Siha¯h-iʿAjam-i Jadı¯d-i Kabı¯r 51 ˙˙ ˙ social organization 228, 232, 239 Sofia 57 St. Petersburg 77, 102, 131, 144 Sufi 24, 42f., 45, 47, 57f., 62, 123f., 127 Tabriz 48 tanwı¯r (Enlightenment) 228 Tanzimat 162, 168, 194, 212, 239f.

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286

Index of Places and Subjects

taqaddum (progress) 239 Ta¯rı¯h-iʿOsma¯nı¯ Engˇümenı¯ (Society for ˘ Ottoman history) 138 Tercüma¯n (newspaper) 206, 208–210 translation 116–119, 142, 171, 176, 187, 197–204 Transottoman script 225, 270 treatises (risa¯le) 55, 57–60, 62 Tuhfe-i Hüsa¯mı¯ (Gift of Hüsa¯mı¯) 39, 52 ˙ ˙ ˙ Tuhfe-i S¸a¯hidı¯ (Gift of S¸a¯hidı¯) 45f., 52, 60 ˙ Uknu¯mu l-ʿAcem (Uqnu¯m-iʿAjam) ˙ (The Basis of Persian) 39, 51 ‘varieties’ of modernity 224, 276 Vatan (newspaper) 184f. ˙ Vesı¯letü l-meka¯sıd ila¯ ahseni l-mera¯sıd ˙ ˙ ˙ ˙ (Appliance [to reach the] objectives and the best of the Observatories) (Wası¯latu l-maqa¯sid) 45f., 51, 62 ˙

Venice 87, 93, 144 Vienna 128, 133, 173f. – University of Vienna 173f., 177 Vilnius 73, 77, 94, 99, 103 waqf (Pl. awqa¯f) // bosn. vakuf (religious endowment) 126, 186, 189 watan / vatan (Homeland) 186, 201, 238, ˙ ˙ 240 al-Watanı¯ya (patriotism) 258f. ˙ watanı¯yı¯n (nationals, citizens) 237, 271 ˙ Young Turk Revolution (1908) 227, 229f., 232f., 235f., 273, 275 Young Turk Regime (1908–14) 140 Zagreb 173f. – University of Zagreb

173

Open-Access-Publikation im Sinne der CC-Lizenz BY 4.0 © 2021 V&R unipress | Brill Deutschland GmbH ISBN Print: 9783847111856 – ISBN E-Lib: 9783737011853