Hostname: page-component-7c8c6479df-xxrs7 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-03-26T16:11:52.852Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

ALTERNATIVE APPROACHES TO MODERNIZATION IN THE LATE OTTOMAN PERIOD: İZMİRLİ İSMAİ L HAKKI'S RELIGIOUS THOUGHT AGAINST MATERIALIST SCIENTISM

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 March 2007

M. Sait Özervarli
Affiliation:
M. Sait Özervarli is Associate Professor at the Center for Islamic Studies, Baĝlarbaşi caddesi, 40, 34662 Uskudar, Istanbul, Turkey; e-mail: ozervarli@yahoo.com.

Extract

The aim of this article is to explore the distinctiveness of İzmirli İsmail Hakki (1869–1946) in the context of late Ottoman intellectual history and to suggest several implications of his thought on our understanding of debates on religion and modernization among Ottomans in the modern period. Studies on modern Islamic thought in the 19th and 20th centuries are mostly limited, especially in Western literature, to works dealing with a few well-known figures in the Arab world, such as Jamal al-Din al-Afghani and Muhammad Abduh. However, a close investigation into several mostly neglected or yet uncovered thinkers of the Ottoman capital, Istanbul, can provide us with more interesting aspects of this period. The earlier interest of Istanbul ulama in modernization, their closer and more direct contact with Europeans, and the long historical experience of central Ottoman intelligentsia in similar reviving attempts are some of these aspects. This article aims to demonstrate that central Ottoman studies can make significant contributions to the current knowledge of the period, not only in political history, as has been the main focus so far, but also in religious and intellectual thought. It will show how a contact was established between modern European and Ottoman religious thought, in which ways the issue of modernization became an important topic in religious circles, and what kind of perceptions took place among them about its content and limits.

Type
ARTICLES
Copyright
© 2007 Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)