Prophet Mohammad's mission comprises instituting the criteria for perfection of both individual spritual and social material lives. Prophet Muhammad's mission was not limited to rescripting the message, but it also included explaining and exemplifying it and leading the society that he was sent to and achieving a social transformation through creating a new societal model. The fact that Prophet Muhammad was the only prophet and leader in the history of mankind who achieved putting the political, legal, economic and social values that he brought into practice is a natural result of that mission of guidance and leadership. Prophet Muhammad was a human being and servant of God but the mission given to him and the incorporeal personality that his mission has brought in, distinguishes him from other human beings. On the one hand, the Quran adverts to Protphet's humane nature but on the other hand, particularly expresses his disparate status and authority. Since his mission was not confined solely to intellectual and spritiual advices but also icludes social, political and military activities to establish the Islamic ummah, obedience to him was established not only in the sphere of religious practices but also in social life. Hence, the verses revealed during the Medina period constitute the ground for realizing a rapid institutionalization in social, political, economic and military spheres as well as in religion and formation of a dynamic social structure.

It is well-known that civilizations have ?sine qua non? relations to cities. Islamic civilization has also some "exhibitionary cities", of which Buhara-Bombay-Bursa are utmost famous. The science, wisdom (irf_n), philosophy and art produced in these cities have bred and nurtured the peoples of this vast geography. An artist grown in Turkistan would arrive in Bursa through India, and sometimes a darwish from Kashgar who was educated by a Bosnian mystic would establish his dergah in Indian shores. In this article, these cultural exchanges will be addressed. In this context, how Kaside-i Bürde, which was written in the Nile valley has gained Babürşah's heart and how it shares the same love (ashq) with Delailü'l-Hayrat, which was written in the shores of the Atlantic Ocean, is discussed.

The Seikh Wafâ Külliye, after whose name a district in Istanbul is called, consists of such elements as mosque, school, hânikah, double-bath, imaret, tabhane, library, fountain and tomb. The mosque and the double-bath were built by Mehmed II. Although it has been claimed that the mosque was converted from an old church, historical documents firmly establish the construction of the mosque by Sultan Mehmed. During the time of Sultan Bayezid II, the structure was transformed into a building complex (külliye) by adding the school, kitchen and library. There is a room for the sheikh to the south of the mosque, the Ibn Wafâ tomb to the southwest, and (possibly) the school to the north of it. We know that the double-bath was to west of the mosque, but there are no remnants of it today. The mosque was ruined by the beginning of the 20th century; the attempts at reconstruction were interrupted by the World War I. It was only recently that the mosque was rebuilt. Also, only the western and northern walls of the school remained for today. In the square-shaped stone tomb to south of the mosque, Sheikh Ibn al-Wafâ and his deputies (halîfas) are buried. In the cemetery to the west of the mosque, there are remnants of a 16th -century open tomb. The Seikh Wafâ Külliye, which includes more architectural elements than a regular sufî complex, was ruined by earthquakes and fires, as a result of which most of its structures could not survive today.

Although Avicenna clearly states throughout his works that God knows everything, according to the dominant interpretation of his position, for Avicenna God does not know the particulars. In this article, I examine interpretations of Avicenna's position by two authors, al-Ghazali and Michael Marmura, who are representatives of medieval and modern thinkers, respectively. Both authors attempt to determine Avicenna's answer to the question of whether God knows particulars on the basis of his answer to the question of how God knows the particulars. Arguing that Avicenna's answer to the second question fails to show that they are included in the divine knowledge, they conclude that for Avicenna God does not know the particulars. However, I argue that the legitimate conclusion one can draw at best is that Avicenna does not provide a full explanation of how God knows particulars; not that for Avicenna God does not know particulars.

The science called "munâzara" in Islamic philosophy is comprehensive method of disputation, which has a direct relationship with logic. Also, this method (munâzara) has a connection with theology by means of the dialectic (cedel) that is important for theological dispute, and a connection with jurisprudence by means of the juridical dispute (hilâf). ?Munazara? had a central position in the Ottoman madrasa system and educational programs. Because of its central position, especially advancing through the middle (iktisâd) and high (istiksâ) levels of madrasas was based on analysis (tahlîl) and critique (tanqîd) as main criteria. Although this disputation method was established before Ottomans, studies about this method gained a vigorous and dominant character in the Ottoman period. In this context, Tercume-i Âdâb-ı Gelenbevî written by Abdünnâfî İffet Efendi is one of the most important texts that indicate the high level this method reached in the Ottoman-Turkish thought.

The history of Ottoman Athens is a neglected period in the historiography of Athens due to pyschological limitations of the national history writing. This introductory article wants to ask some questions that are originated from the consultation of a unique manuscript about the ancient history of Athens written by a judge, Mahmud Efendi, who lived in Athens between 1688-1715. The representation of the city through the eyes of an Ottoman judge is an attempt to enable us to ‘read' his The History of the City of Philosophers in light of many different aspects such as the contribution of the zımmi men of knowledge to the Ottoman intellectual life, the appropriate place of this unique text in the broader context of the fruitful 18th century, the multiple faces of homo ottomanicus and their interactions and the place of this text in the Ottoman historiography.

What this article offers is twofold. It offers, in the first place, a brief background to the history and discovery of a medieval tract entitled Epistle on Divine Knowledge, which is attributed to al-Farâbî but which in fact is a combination of the various parts of Plotinus' the Enneads. Secondly, it has as its greater portion the translation of that epistle based on the comparison of its editions by Badawi in his Aflâtûn 'inda al-'Arab and by Paul Kraus as it appears in Anawati's Études de Philosophie Musulmane, taking the edition of the former as exemplar for translation. Added to the translation are the parts of the Enneads that are parallel to those found in the Epistle for ease of comparison.

British orientalist, who dedicated his life to Rumî, Reynold Alleyne Nicholson (1868-1945), is one of the most famous orientalists in the Western world. Nicholson's greatest work was his edition, translation and commentary on Rumî's Mathnawî. He started with editing the more than 25,000 lines of the poem from a variety of medieval and early modern manuscripts. Nicholson's work was an excellent critical edition of the Persian text, and a full translation, supplemented by extensive notes and commentary intended to facilitate the scholarly study of it, particularly the theosophy of Rumî. His notes include references to earlier Sufî doctrines and poets, giving specific relevant background information to help with the understanding of Rumî's allusions. In this article, I try to present Nicholson and his work to Turkish readers, from a critical perspective.

A pioneer among Turkish authors on the Semitic languages and cultures, Abraham Galante wrote many papers in the field in French and especially in Turkish. Through the article titled “İbranî Lisanının İnkişafına Arapçanın Muaveneti”, appeared in Review of the Faculty of Letters at Darulfunun, Galante evaluates the Arabic contribution to the progress of it in the XIX. century and appreciates it, referring to ancient works in Andalus in the X.-XIII. centuries, after giving some historical information on Hebrew. In this paper, Galante's article, originally written in Arabic alphabet is transcribed into Turkish and presented with a foreword.

In this article, the political philosophy of Kang Youwei and Liang Qichao, who are the leading Chinese constitutionalists, and of the Young Ottoman thought, are presented in a comparative perspective. Being the products of modernity, the Ottoman and Chinese intellectuals tried to import the ideas and the institutions of Enlightenment philosophy to their countries as they legitimized them usually by finding an origin within their own tradition. They also introduced the concepts of “nation” and “national sovereignty” into the political literature, and tried to inject the idea of “patriotism” to the people. Although sometimes they advocated contradictory ideas, they generally pursued a similar project which inclueded the proclamation of the constitutional monarchy in order to revive the empire; trying to let the people gain a “national consciousness”, and lastly, preventing the imperialist aggression by the newly constructed strong state and conscious nation.

The interest in villages and peasants, which goes back to Constitutional Era, entered a new phase together with the establishment of village institutes and as a result of the efforts of incorporating the masses to large scale modernisation projects followed after the declaration of the Republic. In this article, the backgroud of the republican intellectuals' and political actors' increasing interest in the village institutes, the conflicts that emerged at the initial stage of these institutes, the establishment process, the implementation and the closure of the institutes are handled in a critical way. The discussions around village institutes are not limited to the period of transformation to multiparty politics and reach our day. Different approaches emerged as a result of different political positions. Village institutes consist of an important topic of interest since they reflect the period's conception of Westernisation and made its mark on Turkish intellectual world.