Maturidi in creed, Hanafi in practice

"Ash'ari in creed, Shafi'i in practice" or "Maturidi in creed, Hanafi in practice" are stock expressions describing people's sectarian affiliation. We discussed earlier what practical value these have. We were going to continue on the subject, but then Israel's, the terror state's, attack on Gaza intervened, followed by other topics. Let us continue from where we left off, also taking into account some criticisms that have reached us.

We said that, in practice, people have no serious awareness of what difference there is between being a Maturidi and being an Ash'ari. That is the fact of the matter. In this being so, there is a significant share, on the one hand, of the fact that both expressions of affiliation are tied to the Ahl al-Sunnah, and of the fact that people attached to either school do not see a serious difference between their own beliefs or practices, or, even if they see one, do not attach importance to it.

A second reason is probably that the debates these schools conducted in the field of kalam were regarded by the masses as excessively intellectual-scholarly debates. Not all of the masses perceive every kind of creedal debate in the intellectual depths of kalam. At the simplest level possible, these debates need to be translated and expressed simply. This translation is provided by catechisms, the articles of faith, memorized lists such as the 32 obligations and the 54 obligations, but even here the deep intellectual debates that the schools conduct among themselves do not much interest the masses. The adoption of certain religious knowledge and beliefs by the masses, and their transformation into a code of behavior and ethics, is a far more complex process than is supposed.

Here, the "translation" that some people made of the discussion we conducted a while ago on Maturidism and Ash'arism turned out, for instance, to be not so much a translation as a complete distortion. There is an entirely uncomplicated meaning to our having said that Ash'arism was more influential than Maturidism in the Ottoman madrasas. My concern is not to say that Ash'arism is superior to Maturidism, or the reverse. It could have been, but it is not. I am neither someone who would pursue such a debate nor do I consider such a debate necessary. Even having said this, I could have defended the exact opposite. I could have put forward a host of arguments that Maturidism is indeed superior to Ash'arism in many respects, more reasonable, deeper and more in keeping with the spirit of the Qur'an and the Sunnah. But that was not our subject, and it is not my business.

Our aim is only to try to explain, to those who put forward Maturidism or Hanafism as the most important component of Turkish Muslimness in order to distinguish themselves from other Muslimnesses, and even to derive from this a rank of superiority for themselves, that no difference will come out of it.

Today both Hanafism and Maturidism are schools of creed and practice in force over a very wide geography. In the places where these two schools prevail there are very different levels of material development, and different social temperaments and cultures. Maturidism and Hanafism are also quite widespread in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan, but the social, cultural and material climates of these geographies are very different from Turkey's.

So, if there is a Turkey difference, what creates this difference is neither Maturidism nor Hanafism. Moreover, "Maturidi in creed, Hanafi in practice," which has now become a stock phrase, was not an expression people used in the past to describe themselves. In the insistence with which it is underlined today, "the desire to make a difference" very obviously stands out.

We have said it before. Maturidism is not that influential in the Ottoman madrasas. This of course detracts nothing from his greatness, from his being a good and serious scholar. One may dwell on the reasons why Ash'ari texts were read more even though the official view was Maturidism. There are also very valuable studies that do so. According to the conclusion drawn from the summary of these studies:

Although the Ottoman madrasas were structured in different ways from period to period, the Sahn-i Seman and Kanuni madrasas were generally named on the basis of the stipends paid. Accordingly there were the twenties, thirties, forties and fifties madrasas. In none of these madrasas were the works of the principal known Maturidi scholars included in the official curricula. For example, no work of Imam Maturidi, of Rustufaghani, of al-Hakim al-Samarqandi, of Abu al-Mu'in al-Nasafi, or of Nur al-Din al-Sabuni is seen to have been included in the official curricula.

In the Ottoman madrasas, the Creed of Umar al-Nasafi was taught together with the commentary of Taftazani, an Ash'ari scholar. In this period, of course, some scholars gave a place to the views of Abu Hanifa in particular in commentaries and glosses. But although works of Maturidi origin, such as the Hayali commentary on the Qasida Nuniyya, were included in the Ottoman-era madrasas, even in the reform period, Ash'ari works such as Sharh al-Maqasid and Sharh al-Mawaqif were also included. Therefore one cannot speak of a dominant Maturidism in the Ottoman madrasas.

The Ottoman madrasas followed the Razi tradition. Ash'ari scholars were brought to the fore as rivals of one another rather than as rivals of Maturidi scholars. For example, while in the early periods Jurjani was brought to the fore, in the last periods of the Ottoman Empire Taftazani was brought to the fore.

From this picture one may think that Maturidi was invented as the founding name of an imagined Turkish Muslimness, but the fact is that he is far from having historically played such a role. This does not prevent us from thinking that he is a figure who deserves every respect, interest, and much dwelling and thinking upon. There are many scholars and thinkers whose words can be understood and discovered only much later. Let those who wish to carry a message from him to the present do so, but let them not attribute to him a role he did not play historically and sociologically.

Of course, one purpose of the emphasis on Maturidism seems to be, by virtue of the thoughts and characteristics attributed to it, conversely, to place on Ash'arism the responsibility for our backwardness. That deserves another consideration.