So welcome all to this first session of a new seminar series on political thought
at which we'll have speakers working on the Middle East and Islam more broadly.
And we are really delighted. Someone asked me and myself, I still dig to welcome our first two speakers.
Lisa Alexandrian from the University of Manitoba and Hussain Yilmaz from George Mason.
And I just want to before handing over to Osama to introduce the speakers properly.
I just want to go through the procedure.
So each speaker will be speaking for 20 minutes and we'll have back-to-back presentations, followed by half an hour of Q&A.
The Q&A will be written. That is to say, if you have questions, please do write them in the question box.
And Osama or I will read them out if you don't wish your name to be read out.
Use the anonymous function as these questions will be recorded along with the rest of the session and put online.
And please do ask questions when they occur to you in the course of these talks so that
they don't all pile up towards the end and then sadly will have to miss a number of them.
So with that, let me hand over to someone. Thank you so much.
And it's really a great honour for me to be able to host to wonderful because from across the Atlantic.
And this is one of the more positive aspects of a difficult, challenging couple of years that we've experienced,
that we can have people beaming in from any parts of the world.
And I'm sure many of those attending are also beaming in from other parts of the world.
So we welcome you all as well. I'd like to just briefly actually introduce Elizabeth Alexander.
Lisa, before I introduce Hussein. Briefly, Zain, I'll be introducing you in greater detail just before you get your part of the presentation.
So Elizabeth Alexander is a scholar based at the University of Manitoba's Department of Religion, where she's been based since 2005.
She turned her Ph.D. at McGill University, and she is correct me if I'm wrong, because some of this may become dated by now.
But it says on your faculty profile that your current book project focuses on dreaming and
sleeping in 13th to 14th century Muslim society with a particular focus on of the Sufis,
Sufi texts, medical treatises and hagiographic works very different to what you're going to be talking about today.
It's also fascinating as part of this project on mediaeval Sufism in Iran, Anatolia and Central Asia.
You'll also co-edited a book with People of Colour University, and her recent book On Allah in the Islamic Traditions,
has been published by the State University of New York Press in 2017.
And that's basically one of the components of what you'll be talking about today along with
and we're delighted to be able to have a peek at your very latest cutting edge research.
You're going to be sort of branching beyond it.
So your lecture, titled Is Empire of the Entire Continent, sovereignties, in the fourth century to century CE.
So with that, I'd like to welcome you to the hot seat to the West.
Yes. Thank you so much for giving me this opportunity to share some thoughts and some of the work that I've done in the past,
as well as some of the work that I've revisited recently.
So this study is interested in how apocalyptic imaginaries established borderlines as it reconsiders.
How said, just on honest discussions of the end time resisted the messianic sovereignties implicit in 10th century,
Fatima especially thought in particular as he introduces a ology without specific reference to the Ismaili imam to explore these questions.
This study gives careful consideration to apocalyptic imaginaries in calibrated political and satirical, logical landscapes,
where the bodies of some will still be predicated as other monstrous and strange attention will be paid to
specific passages such as Sony's works to situate his through the bars where the bazaar has an intermediary,
borderline is correlated to the cyclical resurrection of the soul and the perfection of the human form.
What informs, such as Sony's understanding of the apocalyptic imaginary,
is his conception of the and as a process of its DashPass or rendering transparent the human form as the Nozaki the pure soul.
The coded symbolism of a messiness of the Questions Times timeline tells us much about the political and horizon event of the cosmos rising,
as this study argues and suggests on a subtle staging of fortement ismaili doctrines of messianism and divine guidance.
The apocalyptic plotline of returning to an original unity is suspended, as well as the images of the end times cataclysmic events are displaced.
So the story in texts in terms of the post communion 11th century ismaili tradition, as I call it,
demonstrate a concerted interest in developing the function of the imam and the dalawa within the sphere of value in building the
empire of the mosque through the Fatima's extended the dominion of their sovereignty to incorporate the end time in the afterlife.
Was this because, as DeLillo states, everybody wants to own the end of the world for the fourth time,
it's their sovereignty over the end time was not to be understood merely as a truth claim, but as the requirement of joining together.
Religio political governance was uncovering the esoteric and manifesting the court from the late 10th century onward.
The Fatima Dawa serves as a catalyst for human perfection,
where the esoteric knowledge of the end remains safeguarded rather than open to everyone in post communion smiley texts.
This implementation of hierarchical concerns bears foremost on the definition of the human being that is the realm of the human being's sovereignty.
For example, in the mass. Magnum opus of the 11th century, almost same idea on wired fitting torturers, his treatment of human beings,
potential perfection uncovers a highly structured system that speaks to the contexts
of the philosophical and theological responses to the Fortinet's political,
esoteric leadership. Conceptually, it alludes to the ways by which the knowledge of the car and as the seal of Wiltshire
is restricted within the ranks of religions of the dean as well as the Dover.
So in my earlier work, situating specific text and smiley offers, historically,
I underscored how the middle of an century fox made a similarly concerted efforts to signal its political,
esoteric sovereignty and to make public and affirm publicly through consolidated, esoteric teachings.
How the Fatimid Caliph Imams Were the heirs of a lion, the Fatima Dawa, under the guidance of Mohammed and the ruling elite,
introduced teachings on Wallowa in particular to consolidate the Fatimid claim to the caliphate as an imam at the middle of the century.
Fatima Dawa broadened the context in which will air as a pillar of practise functioned
for setting the parameters of individual initiatory experience within the cumulative.
So a logical and eschatological province of the kind that is the apocalyptic spacing of the cycles
of the prophets and the imams that mark the completion of Wiltshire by the middle of one century.
The him, the seal of forms, the seal of imams and another creation acquires multiple signification and registers of meaning in terms
of measuring prophetic history and its associated apocalyptic scales and balances in the 11th century.
Consolidation of teachings There is a shift towards the hot tub and the ethics of obedience and reliance on the imam,
as well as the dollar for salvation and redemption of the body politic.
The move towards an ismaili spiritual ethics parallels and toxic free readings and revisions of the just on his prophetic anthropology.
What Michael Bread once termed the rehabilitation and inclusion of such a stone is often controversial teachings and concepts,
which in my work as I considered it earlier,
I approach through studying exactly how this compilation of Tharwa teachings took place in the Majlis and how this occurred
at a time historically when the Fatimid ruling and elite ruling elite in particular struggled to maintain its sovereignty.
So my presentation today is taking another look through the rear-view mirror as it were at how apocalyptic imaginaries inscribe borderlines,
what is suggested by the apocalyptic as grounded in Koranic discourses and interpretations.
How did the extensive ismaili lexicon of resurrection and cosmology situate apocalyptic imaginaries in this expected future to come?
So just honest discussions of the end time resisted the messianic sovereignties implicit in 10th century Fatima.
It is least thought in particular as he introduces this emoji without specific reference to the Ismaili man.
As I mentioned before, at the end of time,
the reversal the i.e. the turning over of apocalyptic destruction surfaces as a major theme in such a astonishing works.
So we have a couple of questions. What will the coded symbolism of a messianism, the questions times timeline in particular,
tell us about the political and historical horizon event of the Cotton's rising, particularly instead just on his works?
What will it tell us about the body politic?
Introducing apocalyptic imaginaries from mediaeval Ismaily works contributes in significant ways to scholarship for showing the
malleability of Messing isms between concepts and texts in Muslim societies beyond Orientalist and Neo Orientalist frameworks.
So turning to suggest on his works in particular,
a solid dobara cut from a truck and Catawba College where he presents his ideas on the Barsa, many of these ideas.
Joel conventionality but Len familiarity in reading the Koran and Islamic traditions,
the bar's off occurring three times and Quran 23 verses 99 100 is an intermediary,
borderline or the thinnest line of separation, which is correlated and suggests unease works to the cyclical arising,
qual resurrection of the soul and the human forms perfection.
What is key to suggest Sonny's understanding of the apocalyptic imaginary is his conception of the calm as a process of DashPass
or rendering transparent the human form as the pure soul not clear on theologically mirroring transmigration of souls,
i.e. mettam.
Psychosis to Nossal suggests that he makes the case that souls remembrances are raised in souls the potential downward descent into other forms.
In fact, with the cyclical timelines of resurrection and transmigration potentially a collective generation of souls, remembrance is a feast.
Thus, as the study is going to argue and such a stunning, subtle take on Israeli doctrines of messianism,
the body politic and divine guidance, this apocalyptic plotline of returning to an original unity is held in suspension.
And as readers of such a stony, we might also be held in suspense and left with questions.
The images of the end times violence and destruction are displaced through temporal reversals.
The souls of some remain monstrous and strange.
Distinct others usher in a new creation as the final abode of pure knowledge and abiding by humanity under no law.
So while some issues will be receiving attention and what follows,
others necessarily are going to remain unresolved at the end of this particular presentation.
And I underscore here in particular at the advent of bottom IT imperial sovereignty.
What was such as Sonny's position on the politics of the identity of the.
So in terms of the historical context and development of this waylay,
doctrine suggests Tunney's works were not always in strict accordance with fortement understandings of interpretive authority.
Fatima's legitimacy is by no means the central concern of his works, along with the central themes of BOS and be off,
such as Stoney's works are concerned with the means by which the individual soul locates and obtains the complete
understanding of revelation purified of the elements of the physical world subject to generation and corruption.
While some works like the Tarball Janabi highlight the distinctions between the interpretive process of tarheel and knowledge bestowed for divine
support tied others such as Bara and if the hard work with questions related to resurrection and the aforementioned is thus far in these regards,
the central theme of boss', which can be translated loosely as arising and the time before,
as well as after resurrection shift from the linear to the cyclical and the prismatic remaining implicit on the figure of the.
So turning now to one of the major works, the six theme in the Deborah is Boss Resurrection pertains to the soul.
Soul is to be understood as the locus out of which arise all of the conditions and manifestations of end time phenomena.
That is the natural phenomena that serve as signs and indications of the events preceding the final resurrection.
So turning to such a stone, his use of this particular term and thinking about his apocalyptic imaginaries,
we have the verbal form a stash of your stature for lifting or raising of darkness.
We can note if we look at other works from a little bit before such a stunning after such a study, for example,
in the works of have been seen as the stash for pertains not only to questions surrounding soil at the time of resurrection,
but a range of other issues such as optics and eschatology.
It can be suggested here that even Ensino defines a discourse of imaginal resurrection and
eschatology grounded in an understanding of faculties in the forms of Saul's attachment to the body,
with particular attention to rational souls potential for attachment to the celestial spheres.
This term related to marginal potentiality or could Obama complicates what urban scene
presents and results in multiple questions and refutations on the parts of later thinkers?
Briefly stated, if Ensino work with a shared concern on resurrection to argue that it pertains to soul,
as is seen in the fourth and fifth chapters of Australia in particular,
suggesting that there are two categories of soul or self in experiencing death and resurrection.
Wami thus characterises inner faculties, inner content,
as well as forms of representation definitions which carry over to the works of the smile offers and other Muslim thinkers,
according to have been seen in two categories or soul or self may be demarcated in terms of experiencing death and resurrection.
How soul has perfected itself in bodily form and in the temporal world determines resurrection and afterlife experiences such as studies.
Works present an ordering of movement and time that is imaginable Swami Armia,
especially for considerations of both arising or resurrection with strong correlations to what Tariq
Joffer proposed originally as been seen as a marginal eschatology on the basis of his study of outerwear.
Consequently, reading between these terms and concepts supports further how the process of this the Shroff in minor and major cycles.
According to Esmaili, authors like Suggest Thuney culminate enough Zakia.
There's interest in subtle body arguments, which Ismaili authors understood to have been introduced in these works of him and SENER,
based on Bobbit and Lucara culminate in a range of meanings as to sole conceptions of
soul and individual so quark collective soul arising as a narsa zakia the pure soul.
Therefore, both in India are key to understanding the continuous motion of such a stoney's epistemological
frameworks from the duality and double ness of universal soul and intellect to sense the human form,
as does tied and targeting the processes of both and in the art central to such as Stoney's works, bridge creation and resurrection.
So such as disengagement and theological metaphysics and ontology stages the form of a human being at the centre of the spiritual world,
as well as between two realms.
So the natural and the spiritual and the individual souls linked to bodies perform is the fastest gradual rendering transparent of all things.
All of these things will be rendered transparent in the world of soul.
And as suggested by Boston Churchy Soul World is within the form of a human being.
Does the form that renders all forms natural or soul related transparent.
How the human form affects the soul and is entailed in the sphere is as follows.
I'm going to give a quote of Barbara and then I'm going to turn to some other points, so keep everything going on time here.
This is a very interesting quote from Barbara. If souls render the form of a sphere and its bodies transparent while they are in a condition where
the marks of nature have mastery over them and v ruination and terrifying events are produced,
which are the causes of production and destruction, have souls rendered transparent the form of the sphere and all of its bodies,
and luminous stars and conditions where emanations of the intellect have mastery over them.
Then from their influences, good fortune divinely granted talents and beings who bring advantage and nobility are produced.
So we have many different arguments that are presented then Barbara in particular,
which points to how the end time is in fact the culmination of this process of rendering transparent that occurs through the vehicle of Nozaki
the pure soul and in the completion of the human form arising as the core and rather than positing the destruction and the violence of the time.
In other words, the raising of the comb represents a reversal of destruction in the very prismatic fashion.
Passages from Kosh and Iftikhar give way to how such a stunning explicate this process as prismatic on all levels and
with respect to the major and minor cycles of ascent and descent that pertain to both individual and universal also.
So just very briefly, in terms of thinking about other types of scholarship that can be completed,
there's a lot that can be done in terms of thinking about the arguments presented by even CNN,
such as Tony on both resurrection and this more controversial question of transmigration of souls,
which both focus in many different ways on this idea of the Bazaar as the line of demarcation that separates souls,
which is then erased with the vehicle of the pure soul completing the human form at the end of time.
So in conclusion, such as stunning works with the interpretation of set verses and chapters from the Quran,
as well as Islamic traditions from which many scholars inferred the events prior to the time will be cataclysmic,
destructive and apocalyptic, rather presenting in the majority of his works of critical exposition on a, shall we say,
neo plagiarising exercise of soul, suggesting he maintains instead that in temporal suspensions,
bridging creation of resurrection, individual souls for the human form purifies soul,
world redeeming universal soul of its traces and multiplicity, and its return to the vote of confidence,
oneness and framing and esoteric sovereignty at the end time.
Thank you very much. Thank you so much.
This really sort of a fascinating journey through the works of one of the most important philosophers and bitterness aspects of the Islamic tradition.
I'm a little conscious of time, but you've been impeccable in your timing.
I'm going to now introduce Hussain Yilmaz. And for people who have questions for Lisa, please to bear in mind,
we're going to take questions collectively at the end of this and please do note down your questions and type them in in the Q&A as they occur to you,
and we'll pick them up towards the end.
So Hussain Yilmaz, in some respects, is looking at a comparable sort of dimension of the caliphate in the Sunni tradition,
a few miles north, shall we say, in the Ottoman realms.
So he holds a Ph.D. in history and medicine studies from Harvard University and his research interests focus on the early modern Middle East,
including political thought, geographic, imaginary social movements and cultural history.
His most recent publications include The Eastern Question and the Ottoman Empire, the genesis of the Near and Middle East in the 19th century.
And in a sense, today's discussion is going to look at his latest book, published in 2018 with Princeton University Press.
It isn't titled Caliphate Redefined the mystical term in Ottoman Political Thought,
and this really is the first comprehensive study of pre-modern Ottoman political thought.
So with that, Hussain, I'd like to introduce your lecture title,
which is the Ottomans and the question of the caliphate, which really seems to be addressed directly by your book.
And so the floor is yours. Thank you very much.
Also fights out and all others who made this meeting happen.
I'm very happy to be here.
And this is although the book is published still an ongoing project, I'm still continuing to unpack some of the major issue I dealt with in the book.
And in this talk, I'd like to highlight some of those issues for us to talk about those the can in session.
So I titled the talk Ask the question of the caliphate because it's not a straightforward history of the caliphate, as we have been accustomed to.
Think of the caliphate as a juristic exposition authority in Muslim society.
So in this talk, I'll emphasise from the beginning that when I talk about the caliphate,
I'm referring specifically to sophistic conception of the caliphate and the fact that the Ottomans
themselves as rulers and the dynasty as it learnt of the caliphate through their exposure to the Sufism.
And to do that, I'll first talk about the first context and then major turning points for them road and then how this
caliphate sort of became part of the imperial self-identification in the middle of the 16th century.
So we are talking about the origins of the Ottoman Empire in western Anatolia, where we can think of two major orders.
One was a basset slush Mongol order in the political order in which the apostle order was despite the
collapse of the empire itself was slowly waning because of the influence of the Mamluk state over Anatolia.
The opposite border there was still quite saleable amongst the local small dynasties.
And the second order was the spiritual order exerted by a variety of Sufi orders, often in clash with temporal rulers in western Anatolia.
Where we speak of almost depends on the precise state from 10 to 20 different small businesses competing for power,
and he received three major groups of Sufis.
One is Abdullah, who are pastoral, mostly operating in the countryside.
In most cases, originating from Central Asian forms of Sufism, of who's the primary language was Turkish, the Tajik,
let's say the western direction of the time, and they were mostly advocating illiteracy, literally saying illiteracy.
But what they meant by this epistemological autonomy, from the written transmission of knowledge, basically the defiance of the authority of Quilliam,
and they claim that they are exposed to and they have access to the truth through their own language and spiritual about sophistication.
So illiteracy for them was not a deficiency, but so of pride, a sort of distinction.
And then second group was urban, so is obviously the most important was the levees, of course, originated from Anatolia,
and they were expanding mostly amongst urban merchants and artisan groups, as well as bureaucrats and higher levels of those ruling dynasties.
And the third group was accused of his virginity from the mediaeval groups of Fithian.
They had sort of some chivalric ethos in themselves as well.
And all these groups were quite autonomous unto themselves to the extent that, for example,
in the midst of this political vacuum occurs for a while after the so-called acquired republic, in which there was no ruler.
Temporal ruler of one of the representatives of that autonomy was judged by it on video, which almost make peace in the beginning of the 15th century.
So they basically ruled the city by themselves, of which we don't know much, by the way.
But this all indicates that these Sufi groups were quite autonomous.
First of all, in the midst of this political fragmentation and decentralisation, there was no solid imperial order.
Even the Mongol order was quite loose in western Anatolia at the time.
And secondly, because of their spiritual inclinations and visions of authority,
which all come in a short while we see in their geographies, for example, the adopted royal titles.
So we. So every one of them would be known as one car. So the times force medicks and whatnot.
So their royal titular church was a lot more elaborate than those competing local rulers, such as the Ottomans Academy on this sort of itineraries.
Hamid told us, et cetera. And we thought they meant they meant that they have temporal power as well,
with a difference from what actual temporal rulers understood from temporal and
that was temporal ruler rule for them was a factor of their spiritual authority.
So they gained their spiritual status, not from their actual power onto the ground,
but they claimed that as part of their being chosen in the spiritual realm in ways which Elizabeth elaborated,
not so different in that regard from the mediaeval Fatima smiley proclamations only in more simplified vocabulary.
I would say we don't still see this deftness in the 14th century Anatolia.
Yes. Nevertheless, they consider themselves legitimate and authorities on both fronts spiritual and temporal that put them exact clash with the actual
rulers again referring to their hijack office either because had geographies or actually geographies or those of the memories,
we see numerous encounters between those sovereign dervishes and temporal rulers,
in which case the temporal rulers were made into geographies,
acknowledging the ultimate absolute authority of the Sufi dervish and being identified as their temporal arms,
their executive arms, their commander of causes, for example in those titles from that spiritual authority.
And when we see the Ottomans specifically, of course, they were quite often neglected, ignored.
One of the smallest principalities out there, we see certain transformations that the Ottomans went through to claim their presence in the region.
One was their marriage with the osmanthus marriage, with the daughter of one of the most prominent Sufi leaders in the region,
which symbolised actually the convergence of temporal and US spiritual order of authority in the pursuit of Boseman.
And secondly, they made a very good use of the political and sophisticated competition in the region.
As I said in the beginning, there was still the Mongol and opposite rulers quite present there.
So what hands the second ruler minced a coin in the back.
It mentions the name of the Apostle COTU, who was death for about a century,
which points politically that he's still operating within the sovereign order of the buses, which at the time was represented by the Monarchs.
Of course, in the meantime, he also adopts the.
Title of Khan and here it's very important how actually is claims of sovereignty negotiated in this context,
we see that there are two types of manifesting sovereignty or authority or political leadership.
One was the question of legitimacy and the other one was sovereignty, namely claim to the territory.
It's basically a real estate problem, in a sense. So for a second, they would use the same vocabulary as the sole traders exact same, whatever.
So ultimate ruler adopted names as Sultan Melik Ghazi hunkered down to guard
whatever is available from the historical literature or in currency at the time.
On the other hand, they have their sovereign pilots, so Sultan Melich and the others were just describing their form of rulership.
It's for the legitimacy, for their sovereignty.
They use the Turkish word back, which means in there, under their rule, within their territory, no one else could actually use that title.
Sultan, everybody uses. Rumi calls himself one.
Castletown Everything but Rumi could not call himself back, which is exclusive rights to the territory, and that the Ottomans as they become.
As they expanded, they adopted the Hum title.
Another secular content, codes, which has nothing to do with Islamic tradition and completes a claim of territorial independence.
A third word was shock, and thus they all form pretty much in the first century of the Ottomans,
and to the end, they stuck with these three claims of sovereignty.
Even the last autumn, when it is like that, in order for Abdel-Hamid, you could see one page long descriptive title that year for his legitimacy,
ruler of the one fourth of the world's kind of favour, etc., etc. It always ends with Abdul Hamid Hunt.
And before, of course, they might sit in comics or shop.
So these sovereign titles were never negotiated by the temple groups.
It was always a matter of flesh if there was a claim for that title.
The competition was for the legitimacy in the spiritual space, for other titles.
The most important, of course, was the caliphate.
And to do that, the Ottomans learnt of the caliphate from the Sufi language from Sufi claimants because they were the first who claimed that.
So Hodgett backstage, for example, or Rumi and others first and foremost known as.
And they describe their caliphate as God's absolute weiss resiliency on Earth.
They elaborated some of the work out of this, which was called the pillar the axis of the world, or God.
This is the hunter of of all humanity, et cetera.
But the key words in Sufi spiritual authority was the caliphate,
and the Ottomans took that caliphate before they knew anything about the juristic notions of the caliphate, which they don't for.
The only audible response, at least for the first century, was in all likelihood, because I'm saying it likely have no evidence otherwise.
They were illiterate. They were not educated. Only after the Battle of Ankara,
we see amongst the Ottomans with some interest in learning because they started to educate their princes so that we know.
So if they were only slowly being exposed to learn Islam, much of what they knew was learnt from from the environment they see in the region.
But in the meantime, we see that institutions of learning and spirituality were expanding along with and despite the Ottoman draw specifically,
I mean, madrassas and zillions more. So the Soviets were expanding with no control, of course.
They were on their own and they actually reached, for example, to the Balkans way before the Ottomans crossed the continents and then madrassas.
The Ottomans found their own madrassas and they, as they expanded out, took over business in cities.
They built their own madrassas. And here it's important that.
Very important feature of all matters that arises,
they appoint spiritually non-denominational sophistic minded ulema as motorists best known of first of all, as I said, he was a disciple of Araby.
Most of his books are on Sufism. But he was the mother of the first Ottoman madrassa and the first reportedly, as set by the Ottoman sources,
are the shareholders from the chief judge of Chief Mufti of the Ottoman Empire was Mullah.
Finaly, again, most of his books are on Sufism, and he was a distant disciple of even Arab as well.
In the meantime, the Ottoman Sultans maintain a very close relationship with Sufi leaders.
In the first century, those officers were Abdullah,
the pastoral Sufis in the countryside because the Ottoman rulers were themselves coming from nomadic pastoral origin.
So we see their very natural allies versus urban Sufis.
Malawi's were out of Ottoman space for more than a century.
They were not let in by the Ottomans rulers for other Abdullah Sufis who were competing against them
only after the Battle of Ankara and the major rebellion carried out by Sheikh bedridden again.
Another interesting figure is Sufi minded William Oland,
a scholar who was adopted as chief of the chief judge by one of the competing Ottoman princes after the Battle of Ankara.
So due to the growing presence of Sufis and power to counter that, the Ottomans actually invited other Sufi groups into their cities.
The most important of them was course the Moliere. It's the first Molavi Lodge was opened to the second in 0:46 in internet.
Before that, they were operating in all parts of Anatolia, but not Ottoman territories.
In the meantime, the Ottomans themselves maintained a very close association of Sufi leaders,
which is well reflected in those geographies and alliance,
which work both ways because the Ottoman rulers themselves acquired legitimacy in
the eyes of this touristic base to their close association with the Soviet leaders,
and those Sufi readers also claimed and maintained their own vision of legitimacy.
There is one story which is repeated in a variety of geographies almost verbatim.
So it is, I don't know, either happened once and repeated, adopted by others or simply fabricated.
We see that in the geography of Asia. For the Rumi or ActionScript, for example, the two very important Sufis of 15th century.
Both of them say that Muhammad, the second the conqueror of Constantinople,
actually came to their threshold and then back to the sheikh saying that he is the ultimate authority and they should give
up all this war on the riches and power that much let Ibrahim attempt and then just serve to reshape what the Sheikh says.
No. Your task is to maintain the order of the temporal world.
So the alliance works both ways. So in the geography is complete peaceful encounters.
We have more violent encounters as well because not every Sufi group was happy
with the administration of the Ottoman rule at the time in the 15th century.
Usman Baba, who wasn't Abdul on Sufi shake his head geography, gives so many other encounters in which amendment the second was chastised reprimanded,
punished for his failure to acknowledge the proper authority of Ottoman Baba.
Similar encounters with the Motiva. The two in their encounters with the Sultan rulers.
But. Here in this context, while the Ottomans Sultans were maintaining their close association with the sheikhs,
their own madrassa graduates, their own scholars who have a strong background in Sufism,
plus their invitation and employment of a stream of Sophistic minded scholars from the East, such as a Muslim Islamist in their court,
started to expose Ottoman rulership in exclusively its sophistic terms, which would be acceptable for a Sufi mind in Ottoman realms.
So when we come to the 16th century, the Ottoman rule actually faced two major,
almost existential threats in which they resorted to sophisticated vocabulary and worldview even more.
One was clashing with the mullahs in the south and then their clashes with the stuff.
Its especially the stuff of its conflict, was very threatening for the Ottomans because it's a Sufi house turned into an actual dynasty.
And they had that claim in Ottoman territory as well, especially Ottoman rural areas whose language was Turkish translated as poetry.
So if the cultivated enchanted that's based in that context, even Arabic, for example,
immediately having to say that there was ongoing critique or criticism of even Arab jurists.
Now we see a number of treatises were written about Arab,
and it's this futuristic news about the coming of the Ottomans, etc. So just explain to me this.
Perhaps I'll recap here how the Ottoman caliphate came to be understood and manifested in the 16th century.
Still, six major characteristics or qualities of the notion of the caliphate as exposed, but amongst the Ottomans ruling elite.
One was that the Ottoman ruler and the dynasty was chosen, so caliphate is not something to be acquired as we see in juristic literature.
There is no way no contract the artist to be chosen by Divine Providence.
Secondly, it is dynasty. It's not individualistic again.
Interestingly, the construct is wielded by individual, but here it is.
Finest was always the Ottoman house that was consecrated and chosen.
Thirdly,
the idea of caliphate became hierarchical because it was used almost across the board by the larger Sufi orders in the Ottoman Empire and elsewhere.
More elaborate notions of caliphate were developed, such as kill off attacks or kill off it.
It was not greatest caliphate, which combines a variety of other lesser forms of caliphate.
Thirdly, caliphate became a moral paradise. Why in political thought amongst the political advisers?
So they, for example, developed the notion of kill off with the rough money,
which they argued that caliphate is not just representing one manifestation of God on Earth, but it's a manifestation of God's compassion.
So unless you endow yourself with that quality, you cannot manifest divine order properly, so it becomes a moral obligation to become a creator.
And thirdly, it is or it's comprehensive and unify.
It also combines the juristic understanding we see in the treatise of the two point shot.
For example, she writes a joystick treatise claiming that the Ottomans are actually imams and caliphs,
and the crazy stipulation literature does not apply to them because 18 months, power and the Ottomans already have power and chosen ET.
But interestingly, he writes, his reasoning is drastic, but most of his sources are sophisticated sources.
And lastly, this is a strong connexion with what just gave us here.
It is eschatology.
So the Ottoman caliphate represented by the devil, so the devil is the kind of authority a term that does give it a political term the right to rule.
So until the end of time, almost all the Ottoman dynasty was to rule an ISA, for example,
that Sheikh 1040s wrote the next three thousand years of the Ottoman or the world, including the Ottomans.
He mentioned all the muftis and Sufi states and Sultans names, including women sultans.
In the meantime. But. That was the idea, it was the end of times.
So the other one dynasty was ruling as the final epoch of human beings time on Earth under the sun with helmeted shape, a very elaborate deposition.
For example, he argued that based on scriptures is of symbolic reading of the crown.
This is argued that there are three major targets in world's order.
One enters once, given that the second the first given that the by far seeming opposites.
And the third it's the time of the talks which rules the rules.
The Ottomans, and that's it. That will take humanity till the end of this.
Thank you. Thank you very much. Two wonderful presentations.
And interestingly, linked in unexpected ways, obviously through the apocalyptic,
which was saying has just returned to but also in a way, I suppose, through these ideas of the dispersal of sovereignties.
You know, whether it is what Lisa was talking about, the functionalised, if I might put it that way, the figure of the time and the focus on souls,
individual souls or what was seen was speaking about the Sufi dispersal of all the notions of sovereignty, sultan cetera and the easy availability.
And then there sort of uptick again by the early Ottomans. So a lot to think about here.
Thank you both very much for those in the audience. Please do write in your questions in the Q&A box and we we have one already of four percent.
Let me read that out. This is from Mehdi Askariya asks would Hassan expand on the tension slash conflict between the
religious establishment or Lama and the Ottoman ruling dynasty and its development through the ages?
Thank you very much. It's a very good question.
The tension was basically the William R. who got stuck to the word of the book and the Sophia who claimed that scriptures were encrypted.
So for rank and file Bulama, who studies grammar and logic and et cetera,
God's message could be extracted by rational contemplation by resorting to out the conveyed knowledge.
But Philosophy Superplex Wilson copied its solid approach.
It's an encrypted text and logic rhetoric. These don't help you need to be qualified to.
It's clear you need to be spiritually sophisticated to understand the layers and layers of meanings behind those texts.
So that was the basic point of tension between Sophia and William.
However, we see two interesting developments took place almost simultaneously.
One. An increasing number of learnt men just sympathised with sophistic.
Cosmologists could potentially visit, for example, these astronomers mathematicians.
They found Sufism more enabling, perhaps more emancipating in constructing their own scientific calculus,
offical universes or understanding of nature,
as opposed to the strict juristic writings which were normative and aiming to standardise understanding of practises across the community,
regardless of differences. And so we see this inclination from the learner.
They just became more and more sophisticated in orientation. The reasons separate a lot of discussion.
Secondly, the Saffir themselves started to master texts as well.
Of course, we have many different strains of Sufism that pastoral Sufism vehemently
continue to reject the learnt transmission of authority and maintain autonomy.
But most strains of Sufism, including malaria, started to master texts and incorporated them into their Xhosa experience.
Rumi, for example, by profession, he was a mother.
So in daytime, he would go to madrassa, teach jurists books, come back to Xavier and have ecstatic experience along the way.
This tension, of course, never waned completely but controlled by the political intrusion of the Ottoman rulers.
So whenever there is certain things that got out of control distort that balance, they intervened.
So we have, for example, the 16th century a number of shakes hands on charges of apostasy.
We also see that certain jurists for what distance for power, such as churches,
are there in the 16th century who was very critical of any kind of sophisticated interpretation of texts, and then they were just not promoted.
Perhaps the most important clash took place in the 17th century between crosses and customers orders.
So this idea just promoted that idea of pristine Islam based on juristic normative understanding of some
various sources who are still operating in sophisticated vocabulary and rituals and piety in Istanbul.
Because, as orderlies took the upper hand for a while almost terrorised Istanbul,
they started to burn mosques and minarets on charges that they are the innovations.
But then again, Ottomans leadership intervened and restored support.
So we see this clash ongoing. I would say maintained the control and balance maintained by the interference of the Ottoman religion.
Thanks very much. I have a question I know someone does as well, but I have a question for you, Lisa.
Even though this is very far from my field of expertise,
I thought it when I was listening to you that I finally understood something, but I might not have understood it at all.
And that is the following that once you as it were, as the Fatima's you say,
did absorb the apocalypse or the end of time within their form of sovereignty, or to use an anachronistic term ideology,
then in a way you're almost compelled into a secular or cyclical vision of history and of the universe that can
only repeat itself and that that then might link to the equally compelling argument of mettam psychosis or the,
you know, the rebirth or reincarnation of souls.
And it hadn't occurred to me, though those two things were connected up by very strict logic and not just,
you know, random influences from the outside, which the scholarship often tells us about.
But I wanted to ask in particular about how this, if you will, logic of the circular cyclical logic also might end up doing what you suggested,
Sistani argues, which is render the figure of the kind imam into almost a kind of intellectual.
Hinge saw that all the attention seems to be on the songs which could belong to all kinds of people, at least in your telling of it at all.
No ballpark is exactly the steps A, B and C.
The logical lengths are quite interesting to look at in terms of historical contexts.
And so we have a lot of very good and solid scholarship looking at Ismaily thought primarily as.
Intellectual history in the historical context, looking at the history of the Fatimid dynasty.
And they sent empire and imperial presence up until the middle of this century.
We see a number of the different Ismaili authors introducing arguments that essentially destabilise the authority of the Imam Caliph.
And so while such as Thuney in his day and age was not approved in terms of where the Ottomans were in the middle 11th century,
they saw his works and his arguments concerning prophetic anthropology to be just
what they needed to recapitalise through start a discussion about sovereignty.
And I find it again strange. And these are word.
I find it strange to think about this as a type of dominion that extends into end time, as well as the afterlife,
which we essentially see both such a stunning home doing in their different ways and in their different times.
Yes. Yes. How? How can you have a messianic empire, right?
One of these questions that I think comes up time and time and again, and different scholarship in different fields of research.
It's it's very hard to to maintain that over a period of time in a long duration, so to speak.
You know, it just seemed to me how once you absorb the apocalypse and it's already somehow happened,
then it's almost like it becomes the principle of movement or dynamism within the whole,
you know, it's it's fascinating how it then does this kind of work repeatedly?
Right, right? Well, at the time of Apocalypse is is no, it's always now, which can be like on a personal level, if you have a system of thought,
a system of concepts like one can find and it's an offshore issues, some and Ismaily traditions.
This is also promoting the importance of satiric logical benefits of relying on such type of sovereignty or authority.
So, yes, it's no way gives me some thoughts about what Hussein was mentioning as well, if I can ask a question.
Go ahead. So you would kind of think about the the ultimate caliphate.
And what about Sophie messianism in this time period in what later becomes the Ottoman domain?
How did the religious scholars respond to messianic Sufi claims?
Who did have one particular example that you can sure know?
Read more for sure. Well, thank you very much. That's a very good question, actually.
I will say messianism was already well manifested and embedded in sophistic thoughts.
But in general. But it all depended on how Zim was articulated.
If it was articulated as part of saintly miracles, which does not interfere with world affairs,
if it was tolerated by political rulers or simply accept it if the Soviet sheikhs were so powerful.
But in the case of Badruddin, it wasn't tolerated and he was executed in the 16th century.
We have a number of actually our office, for example, in the 15th century with similar ideals.
You know, the famous Nazi, he was skinned alive to death.
But the better known example start in the 16th century when the empire was consolidated
and there were more there was more insight because of the stuff of its threat,
all amongst the Hollywood shake. For example,
in the early decades of the 16th century who claimed to be mighty actually outwardly and asked all others to acknowledge his proper authority.
And he was executed for that. But despite political executions, these were considered as a problem of order.
Not a problem of spiritual deviation.
All these executed shakes were all of them rehabilitated in later,
Biographical Dictionary is written even by ultimate believer in they were mostly depicted as moments of ecstasy directed executed by the author,
most in later autumn sources. It was considered as a great shame.
His bodyguards, as one of the most, commented upon texts amongst Ottoman readers.
So if there is artwork's manifestation of messianism that is considered as a threat to the order, execution is not far from.
But even after the execution, they were incorporated and accepted into the mainstream of spirituality.
Thank you so much. I know we have a question.
If the grandmother, which I will read out, but Osama, do you have something to oh, I don't mind asking if it's all right?
This was the nice, actually. And I mean, just a fascinating sort of portrait of a very complex scholar and a scholar I'm thoroughly unfamiliar with.
So I've learnt a great deal. But for me, what's very interesting,
just sort of as someone with an abiding interest in intellectual history of the Islamic world writ large is
that you're looking at a relatively early period within the Fatimid caliphate and within Islamic history,
as it were. And this is before they've been out of beards before, whereas earlier, really it's before isn't Xena.
And I'm just thinking the trajectories that Hussein is talking about really require all of those characters.
And it goes and you know, you have this efflorescence within.
Obviously, a neo platonic thought with a vision is great sort of intellectual intervention.
And I wonder in particular, sort of. And then all of a sudden it goes of an out of B, and suddenly Sufism is sort of near platonic.
But Sistani was an opportunist nutritionist.
That was the philosophical discourse of the time and the time, as people like Mark Sedgwick have illustrated that.
Is this ever present figure in that era for hundreds of years?
And I just wanted to speculate or ask you to speculate, like what sort of pathways would have been possible if you could study?
I mean, your son is the early figure,
and he's not supported by a successful state in the way that earlier would've been out to be can kind of be incorporated into various states.
And in a sense, Anderson, as someone who's incorporated within and isn't completely through these kinds of figures, is to just Sonny's afterlife.
What's his afterlife like and what were his possibilities like? That's it, right?
It's a great question. And to create an outline, a very brief outline in,
we think about certain cortex that were so influential on Muslim thinkers from the late 19th century onward.
We think about certain texts that were translated into Arabic, for example,
the so-called theology of Aristotle, which is a very important source text.
If I can use that expression for a genealogy of intellectuals from Bidzina Up to Tombola Sutra.
And so with with careful texts work that some scholars have done.
So, for example, like Herman Lendl and Daniel De Smet,
you can see how particular texts and concepts were framed by my thinkers like for have been seen.
So just on a kermani and then how they have their echoes in the works of later authors and thinkers.
So for for certain ideas like going back to this idea of soul and this is
something that everyone feels the need to return to time and time again for me,
sometimes even on a daily basis, I think, like what is actually my concept of soul?
Like what is what is the nature of resurrection?
So we can see that that intellectual legacy carrying forward in terms of the work that I did in my book and then thinking about it afterwards,
and this is something that I have thought about very specifically in the context of
teaching Islamic studies and teaching undergraduate courses and graduate courses.
So there is this particular framing of this concept of life that begins with king term movie and which
we see up until the 20th century and thereafter in terms of thinking about what what does this entail?
What is the scope of Elia? And so it can see that in terms of like this, smiley thinkers like such as Sunny,
he's not mentioning that specifically, he's not using the term, but he has.
He has an idea. And there's a lot of evidence that points that these early Ismaily offers,
who may have not been so comfortable with the Fortinet's had an understanding of something like this the scope of a lie that embodies so much of.
Political, esoteric, religious spiritual guidance, but is also framing an understanding of temporality as well as spirituality.
Yeah, so that's that's why I see such a stunning in his own way,
contributing through a kind of like negative discourse by not saying certain things to this,
this idea of like, what would that be like and who would be involved in it?
And each kind of temporal setting. I hope that that helps.
I mean, I think if we look more like specifically like the texts such as sunny and other Ismaily authors,
I think there's there's a suggestion that there is, you know,
very specific arguments that then appear later in like, for example, that at the school,
this one and more such as works to two again kind of puts some kind of context on the scope of overlap.
Thank you. I'm sorry. Much so in good smiley fashion, he has been rendered into a secretive influence.
So we have a question for the both of you, actually. Iftikhar Malik for both the speakers, even before the autumn experience,
the hierarchical relationship between the caliphate and a monarch became obvious.
In the case of Muhammad, of course, now who for the first time adopted the title of a sultan in Southwest Asia.
Whatever the reason, Mahmud came down harshly on smileys of the Indus regions with Multan as their centre,
partly to please the Abbasid Caliph, along with seeking legitimacy for his rule.
Earlier this week, Iqbal was dedicated to Fatima caliphs in this part of India.
So would either or both of you care to comment on that? Well, I well, if I may,
one of the interesting things that we learnt from the history of Muslim societies and Islamic historiography regards competing authorities
and reconciliations and reaching out to individual dynastic powers to deal with Gitmo is themselves through through the caliphate.
And while I don't know the specifics of the sources for Milton and regarding Mahmoud of Karsner, when we look at, for example, the.
Ten hundreds. The early eleven hundreds, so it can you can see a lot of conflicting authorities of what is to be understood as the legitimacy of rule.
So this this again, I think, is one of the reasons why in the middle of this century in the the far too mid domain,
there was such an importance on presenting something that was very consolidated in terms of what they were as as a caliphate,
as anemometer, as an empire. Obviously think it was not sustainable, I would say, I think I can say more takes on top of your elaboration.
As you point out, I think the key here is multiple authorities or a complete competing,
conflicting or even synergy authorities in Muslim context or Islamic context.
So we always had multiple authorities at work, some in clashing with each other, some in symbiosis with each other.
And the best display point is Sufi temporal confrontations.
And here I would like to give a few examples to show the complexity of the situation.
One is the Baba Elias uprising during the siege of times and what?
Elias has a very elaborate. Hedgehogs have written by his grandson, which says in which one of the cases probably says,
I have 400 caliphs who have 400 soldiers, so from the officer's perspective, she was already ruling that area.
Regardless of the presence of such a full time and his followers had that firm faith that they are, she has full power actually work the power to.
So we have two different sovereignties at work here.
And then we also know from actual historical events.
But what it does is son more. This push up actually again uprise against the subject's defeated the subjects and fun set on
subject thorn for a very short while and then went to his village in church and Typekit was there.
But his claim was that I have the authority, but I don't.
I won't act as a temporal ruler. I would just say to my bill is still his believers thought that he had that power.
In the case of the apostle caliphs relationship with others,
in that case we are talking about the imperial order and we have to distinguish here the sovereign actual
sovereign title de jure sovereign title and then all sorts of other titles which up for grab for legitimacy,
right? And I think in the Orbost context, the one title, which is what was not up for negotiation, was a little meaning, not caliph, not immoral.
Even in later prosecutors, we know a number of other heterologous here on there used the title of caliphate,
and we know the Warriors were already using the title Kids of Fatima's.
For all the use of the existence of a single imam in the world, it was redundant or rendered dysfunctional by the myth in the 10th century,
perhaps developed by the jurists to to reclaim a oriented over the others.
But we don't see other rulers claiming under the ones under the opposite of thought that the boy hates the cousin of Islam in the central case.
We're not. We have one exception, though, and that is I don't know how juristic resolved.
Perhaps it should be. Read more critically and carefully. Total pay as you well know why Shiite power in Baghdad and what's his name?
Mexico adopts a new titles, says Kazeem. Be the partner saw a bunch of the temporal authority can do in that brief period.
Other than that, all the others, including Mahmoud and others, had to get their investiture from the chain from the union.
But on top of that, they could use other legitimised titles such as Dogmatic Shuffling, Power, etc.
Great, thank you very much. Osama, shall we? It's really empty, I mean, we technically could use the remaining seven minutes for this is a discussion,
but I'm perfectly happy for people to wrap up.
I'm very tempted, given the esteemed company to ask a couple more questions.
Perhaps they do. Thank you. I mean. And a fascinating point about the Roubaix because I wasn't aware of that.
And that's really a sort of that's a very disruptive thing pretty early on in the process of sort of copyright on American woman in.
This, of course,
is a complicated word and as far as an instance in any sort of interpreted the Andalusian behaviour as a response to the fact counter.
So there's a, I think, a report, a hadith which says, you know, if there are two caliphs,
then kill the second one, but it doesn't say anything about said so.
They waited for the pessimists to make that claim before jumping on the bandwagon in Indonesia.
But I guess my question, actually, I'm tempted to ask you both a question,
and I'm putting you in a very invidious position because there's not enough time to really do it justice.
But on the point of Sufism is very salient in your work. But in a sense, I didn't think of cities.
I don't know the percentage well enough to know how important Sufism is there.
But when you think of a word like Bosnia and the preoccupation with the sort of hidden meanings, you very often make an association with Sufism.
And one thinks, of course, of the tension between Tyco's early and the ismailis of the Puckerman era.
But I wanted to ask, is there a comparable component of Sufism in any way?
You know, even if it's a very minor component to what Hussain was talking about with respect to the Sufi metaphysics,
really imbuing the identity of the kind of caliphate in the first place?
But is there something equivalent to that in the fundamental context?
And perhaps it's ended up being really a question directly of that.
So I think in some ways my my understanding, my knowledge and my reading of historical sources has like gone elsewhere.
It's not present as much as it ought to be in my mind.
But I think if I'm going to paint things with very broad strokes,
I think for the 11th century is a very interesting time period for the development of.
Intellectual traditions. So we have, for example, under the budgets, the.
Consolidation of she hadith and different types of sources, and under the Fatima's,
we see the consolidation of other types of texts and forms of knowledge in a way that it almost becomes.
What cultural capital? For four different ruling groups, and so the development from, let's say,
the 10 hundreds to the 11 hundreds up until the time of causality is really delving into these different textual traditions.
And in a way, developing some sort of epistemology that will lend itself practically as well as theoretically.
And so I think the Fatima's in the 11th century were using a lot of cultural capital from its Nashiri,
use them, as well as other thought traditions like Sufism to recast.
The scope of temporal as well as spiritual authority as well and knowledge.
And he can go so many places once you've done that,
and I think that's what makes it so fascinating in a way for for me as a as a scholar to kind of have opportunities to to move back and forth,
working with a concept like lawyer. We can go pretty far on the Super Expressway of, you know, the Islamic textual traditions.
Thank you very much. Thank you. So I'll leave it up, Osama, to you to close,
but I just want to remind all our participants today an audience that our next session will be on the 26th of January at the same time,
and it will be dedicated to the theme of religion, specifically in Saudi Arabia.
So we're moving to the modern period, and our two speakers will be Ariel Rashid from the LSC and Pascal Minaret from Brandeis University.
So we very much hope you can join us for that. And now onto Osama to thank our two wonderful speakers.
Thank you very much. I'll just add please do remember to register for the Zoom link to be sent to you in time.
But really, it's been a wonderful evening with the two of you, of course, where you are.
It's probably the morning and thank you for making the time that we've learnt a great deal from you.
And I hope this is an opportunity also for people to learn more about your
work and please do try and get your hands on their books that sort of really
representative of the cutting edge of studies of the caliphate in the Islamic historical tradition and spread across two different periods of time.
So I just want to close by thanking both Visa and Hussein for a wonderful evening, an enlightening one,
and we look forward to having you at some point over in person at Oxford as well.
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.