Abstract
The secularizing reforms of Kemal Atatürk, wrote Count Leon Ostrorog (1927: 14,70) in 1927, constitute “one of the most considerable events that has happened in the history of the East since fourteen centuries,” “a revolution that the world of Islam had never seen.” This statement remains true even today. Although a substantial degree of secularization has taken place in the Islamic world in general in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries,1 nowhere has this trend gone as far as in Turkey where it has become one of the pillars of the state. In fact, the constitutions of practically all Muslim states make some reference to Islam, often declaring it as the religion of the state. Two of the most secular Arab states, Tunisia and Syria, for example, state in their constitutions that the chief of state has to be a Muslim. The Egyptian Constitution (Art. 2) stipulates that “Islamic law is a principal source of legislation.” Furthermore, in all Islamic countries, the Shari‘a occupies a more or less important place in the legal system, especially in such areas as family law, inheritance and personal status (Ryex and Blanchi, 1980).
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Notes
Albert Hourani (1970: 250) observes, for example, that throughout much of the Arab world the Shari`a was abandoned “with astonishing speed and completeness. The process begun in the early nineteenth century withthe adoption of codes on the European model was by now almost complete. In the realm of law, civil and criminal, commercial and constitutional, secular codes had replaced the religious, everywhere except in the most withdrawn parts of Arabia, and this had happened no less completely in a country such as Egypt, where it had taken place almost imperceptibly, than in Turkey, where it had been the product of revolution.”
For a general survey of the resurgence of political Islam, see Martin Kramer (1980). The most comprehensive account of the Turkish NSP is by Jacob M. Landau (1976).
Zartman (1980: 6) summarizes this position succinctly. According to the classical Islamic theory of state, he writes, “the ruler cannot be but the judge and the administrator; his power can be executive, administrative, and judicial, but not legislative.... God alone is the Great Legislator, since he has already given the Law (Shari`a), divine, perfect, suffıcient, unchangeable, written in the Koran for eternity in the last revelation necessary for humanity. Therefore, there is neither place nor need for a legislating State, and governing is not a process of legislation, but of administration and interpretation.... The ruler is neither the creation nor the creator of the Law, but its instrument.”
In fact, the Ottoman ulema viewed the claims of the sultans to enact laws outside the scope of the Sharia as a legacy of the Mongol period, which they considered barbaric and pernicious for the Turks (Georgeon, 1980: 52).
For the Tanzimat period, see Davison (1963); the best account of the historical development of secularism in Turkey is that of Berkes (1964).
At least theoretically, a third possible focus of identity for the Ottoman Empire was Ottomanism. Ottomanism implied freedom and equality for all subjects in the Empire and was supposed to be based, regardless of race, religion and language, on a common loyalty to the common homeland. This concept was fostered throughout the Tanzimat period and was the basis of the nineteenth-century legislation establishing equality before law and equality in taxation, military service, government employment and political rights for all the subjects of the Empire. It appears, however, that Ottomanism was not taken seriously by any community except the Turks. After the loss of nearly all European provinces, populated largely by non-Muslim elements as well as Muslim Albanians at the end of the Balkan War, Ottomanism lost much of its appeal, although it was never repudiated officially by the Young Turks.
In fact, Afghani spent the last years of his life in Istanbul. Mehmet Akif, himself a leading Turkish Islamic modernist, translated into Turkish ‘Abduh’s pamphlet defending Islam against the attack of the French historian Hanotaux: Hanoto’nun Hücumuna Karşi Şeyh Muhammed Abduh’un Islâmi Müdafaasi (Darülhilâfe, 1331).
This article was first published in the periodical Türk in Cairo in April–May 1904, Nos. 24, 25, 27). It has recently been reprinted by the Turkish Historical Society with an analytical introduction by Enver Ziya Karal (Ankara, 1976: Türk Tarih Kurumu Yayinlari). For the French translation, see Georgeon (1980: 95–112).
It should be noted that Gökalp wrote this article in connection with the Congress of the Union and Progress: “Ittihat ve Terakki Kongresi Münasebetiyle,” Islâm Mecmuasi, IV, no. 48 (1916); V, nos. 49–50 (1917). The ideas contained in this article were suggested in a memorandum submitted to the government. The party Congress accepted these proposals, thereby leading to the transfer of the Shari‘a courts from the office of the Şeyhülislâm to the Ministry of Justice. See Gökalp-Berkes, 1959: 319.
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© 1984 Leske Verlag + Budrich GmbH, Opladen
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Özbudun, E. (1984). Antecedents of Kemalist Secularism: Some Thoughts on the Young Turk Period. In: Evin, A. (eds) Modern Turkey: Continuity and Change. Schriften des Deutschen Orient-Instituts. VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, Wiesbaden. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-663-01177-4_2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-663-01177-4_2
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