With his in-depth examination of ʿAbd al-Ghanī al-Nābulusī's (d. 1143/1731) commentaries on Muḥammad ibn Yūsuf al-Sanūsī's (d. 895/1490) Creed, Hiroaki Kawanishi argues that the eleventh/seventeenth century Ottoman period was not a time of decline but of intellectual prosperity.
Hiroaki Kawanishi sheds light on theological trends of the eleventh/seventeenth century Ottoman world, an area of research that remains understudied in existing scholarship. The author challenges the "intellectual stagnation" thesis that has often framed post-classical Islamic intellectual history as a period of decline. In particular, he argues that the eleventh/seventeenth century Ottoman period was a time of intellectual prosperity by examining in depth the polymath of Ottoman Damascus ʿAbd al-Ghanī al-Nābulusī's (d. 1143/1731) commentaries on the ninth/fifteenth century Maghribī theologian Muḥammad ibn Yūsuf al-Sanūsī's (d. 895/1490) Creed. The author focuses on Nābulusī's theological project, which synthesises Ashʿarite speculative theology (kalām) and Akbarian Sufism, while giving special attention to epistemology, cosmology, metaphysics, prophetology, and ethics.
Hiroaki Kawanishi
Born 1993; 2025 PhD, University of Tübingen.
Akbarian thought al-Nabulusi al-Sanusi Ash'arism cosmology creed commentary epistemology ethics Islamic intellectual history kalam metaphysics Ottoman theology post-classical Islam prophetology Sufism