The Missing Link in the History of Quranic Commentary: The Ottoman Period and the Quranic Commentary of Ebussuud/Abū al-Su‛ūd al-‛Imādī (d. 1574 CE) Irshād al-‛aql al-salīm ilā mazāyā al-Kitāb al-Karīm

ABSTRACT Ottoman legacy of Quranic commentary is highly understudied, if not entirely neglected, in the Muslim and Western scholarship alike. The current study is two-pronged in orientation: in part one, we have striven to explore the current situation in the history and historiography of Quranic commentary and attempted to underline and identify some of the misconceptions and clichés with which the current research is imbued. This first part is complemented, in separate appendix, with a historical study of a verifiable output of Quranic commentaries authored by Ottoman scholars and/or composed during the Ottoman era and under their suzerainty. We have also surveyed Ottoman exegetical attempts and medieval studies undertaken by the Ottomans and associated with the history and historiography of Muslim exegetical studies, all for the purpose of presenting some identifiable features of Ottoman exegetical mindset. The second part of this study focuses on a particular Quranic commentary that was authored by an eminent Ottoman scholar and man of state, namely the Irshād al-‛aql al-salīm ilā mazāyā al-Kitāb al-Karīm [Guiding the sound mind to the distinguishing features of the Noble Book] of Ebussuud/Abū al-Su‛ūd al-‛Imādī (d. 1574). Our primary goal is to present a case study of a famous Ottoman exegetical work and pave the way for further studies of other Ottoman exegetical outputs in order to contribute to forming a comprehensive view on the Ottoman trajectory of Quranic commentary. Ebussuud’s commentary led us to determine the exegetical artery of knowledge to which the Ottomans viewed themselves heir. Though the Ottoman efforts in Quranic exegesis can broadly be categorized as reason and linguistic-based efforts, the presence of tradition-based approaches cannot be dismissed as negligible. The study of Irshād thus allows us to analyze a sample of how the tradition and reason-based approaches can be synthesized. Dynastic presence and political orientations are also more glaringly manifested in Ottoman scholarly and exegetical efforts. Irshād is also significant in terms of assessing the history of variant Quranic readings and represents a post-classical exegetical work by virtue of which we are better able to demonstrate how the field was still being contested between the exegetes and the specialists in Quranic readings. Ebussuud’s Quranic commentary furthermore is a study of previous exegetical corpus and it provides exceptional research tools for us to evaluate and assess other exegetical works. Irshād is a work of verification that aimed to determine concise exegetical implications of a given Quranic expression and winnow out innumerous propositions with which the previous exegetical corpus is teemed.Ph.D