Abstract
This article concerns the Sufi debate in Ottoman Istanbul during the Ḳadızâde period in the seventeenth century. The purpose of this study is to examine Sufi Hadith usage during this period. For this purpose, it analyzes al-Ṭarīqa al-Muḥammadīya (Muhammandan Way) of a sixteenth century thinker, Mehmed Birgivî (d. 1573). “The Muhammadan Way” was the ideological foundation of the Ḳadızâde movement. Birgivî’s purpose is that in theology, ethics, and morality, Sufi practices must strictly follow the Prophet’s practices. His work consists mostly of quotations from Hadiths, and he never discusses the spiritual dimension when it comes to Sufism. On the other hand, pro-Sufi scholar Ismâ’îl Anḳaravî (d. 1631) says in his Forty Hadiths that the practice of the Mevlevī Order does not contradict the Prophet’s practice by quoting and interpreting Hadiths. He argued that the ideology and practice of the Mevlevī Tariqa is the manifestation of “the Muhammadan Way.” Birgivî’s “Muhammadan Way” has a broad view of society as a whole, and corruption is solved by reviving the Prophet’s Sunna with Sufi morality. While Anḳaravî also relies on the Hadith as a source of inspiration, he advocated that the Mevlevī Tariqa is the one that is suited to “the Muhammadan Way.” Their interpretations of the Hadith and “the Muhammadan Way” differed according to their interests, and the Ḳadızâde movement era was a time when thinkers debated “the Muhammadan Way” amid the Sufi controversy.
