Roots of Ottoman Scholars in Mamlūk Cairo
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 22356124 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Furkan Balahoroğlu (0000-0002-6384-4230, Istanbul University, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2026 |
| Volume | 16 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 138-170 |
| Publication date | 2026-04-09 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | İslam Tetkikleri Dergisi / Journal of Islamic Review (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 2717-6967 • E-ISSN: 2717-6967 |
| Publisher | Istanbul University (PUBLISHER • TR) |
| DOI | 10.26650/iuitd.2026.1751113 |
| OpenAlex | W7151839436 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 20 |
The eminent figures of early Ottoman scholarship, al-Sayyid al-Sharīf al-Jurjānī (d. 816/1413), Molla Fenārī (d. 834/1431), Shaykh Bedreddīn (d. 823/1420), and Ḥaci Paşa (d. 827/1424), were educated in the special atmosphere of al-Shaykhūniyya Madrasa-khānqāh in Cairo. This institution overwhelmingly embraced students and scholars coming from Anatolia and Persia and gave them a suitable environment to specialise in rational sciences and Sufism. The education they received from Mubārakshāh al-Manṭiqī (d. 775/1373) and Akmal al-Dīn al-Bābartī (d. 786/1384) determined the shaping of the early Ottoman scholarly milieu. Emphasising the special place of this institution in Mamlūk Cairo, this group is entitled in this work, the al-Shaykhūniyya Network, as a part of a larger scholarly atmosphere. However, Shāfiʿī-muḥaddith scholar-historians’ exclusionary interpretation of biographical accounts of figures al-Shaykhūniyya reveals the bias against stranger scholars in Cairo. This atmosphere provided the emergence of âlim-Sufi scholar typology: Anatolian or Persian-origin, adhering to the Ḥanafī madhhab, and mostly interested in the rational sciences according to the al-Rāzī School and tasawwuf according to the İbn ʿArabī School. This typology was going to be seen in the Ottoman province, exactly, via scholars of the al-Shaykhūniyya Network. Discovering a special Ḥanafī milieu of Cairo gives a new approach to the two questions of how the early Ottoman scholarly milieu was based on the al-Rāzī School and why it had a wide tolerance for Ibn ʿArabī’s (d. 638/1240) doctrine, unlike the dominant atmosphere in Cairo and Greater Syria at that time
Institution · Ottoman empire · Typology · Islamic Studies and History · Islamic Thought and Society Studies · Medieval and Classical Philosophy
Scholars and Sultans in the Early Modern Ottoman Empire
Intellectual Networks in Timurid Iran
The Transmission of Knowledge in Medieval Cairo
The Formation of Post-Classical Philosophy in Islam
The Second Formation of Islamic Law
The Cambridge Companion to Classical Islamic Theology
Mamluk Endowment Deeds as a Source for the History of Education in the Late Medieval Egypt
The Ḥāshiya and Islamic Intellectual History
From Cairo to Ayasuluk
Rather the Injustice of the Turks than the Righteousness of the Arabs
Sultan al-Zahir Baybars and the Appointment of Four Chief Qadis, 663/1265
| Highly cited | No |
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