In conversation with the recent historiography on Confessionalization, this paper explores the sectarian repercussions of the socio-economic and political transformations in the early modern Ottoman Empire and how they affected the ongoing reconstruction of the ruling class. The expansion of trade and the growing urbanization all-over the empire during the sixteenth and early-seventeenth centuries offered opportunities for the growth of a new Muslim commercial and financial elite whose members found ways of translating their socio-economic status into political power by entering the imperial administration at various levels, which in the preceding century used to be reserved for devshirmes, or young Christian conscripts who were converted to Islam and trained to serve the dynasty. These newcomers were referred to as foreigners (ejnebis). Thus the seventeenth century clearly witnessed unprecedented upward mobility among certain segments of the Ottoman Muslim population that had, at least, some impact on the structure of the ruling class. At the same time, however, there were also many Ottoman subjects who suffered from the global Seventeenth Century Crisis. This paper suggests that the deep social tensions produced by the socially explosive combination of this upward mobility and the global crisis found expression, among other things, in the heightened level of sensitivities around religious identities. Through a detailed textual analysis of the writings of Birgili Muhammed (d. 1573), Akhisari Ahmed (d. ca. 1633), and Kadizade Mehmed (d. 1635), this study argues that the features of the Islamic tradition that the Kadizadelis (the followers of Kadizade), chose to amplify in their message at the expense of others were the ones that were the most divisive in a multi-confessional society and yet also the most conducive to mediate social tensions among the supportive recipients of their message. The Kadizadelis’ message consolidated the collective identity of Sunni Muslims by “purifying” and transforming them into a politically critical mass, a move that effectively shifted the public discourse from socio-economic questions to questions of identity. It was this feature of their voice that carried them to some of the most influential pulpits of the imperial capital. While the Kadizadelis lost credit after the disaster in Vienna (1683), the sectarian tone of their voice had a wider and longer-lasting impact on Ottoman polity as exemplified, for instance, by the complete disappearance of the devshirme practice, which practically closed the doors of the higher administration to Christian-born subjects of the empire by the early eighteenth century.

Ottoman historians have long been aware that there exist a few provincial kanunnames—dating mostly to the second half of the seventeenth century—that seemed to overturn longstanding Ottoman land policy. Abandoning the schema championed by the famous ?eyhü’l-Islam Ebussu?ud Efendi, they classified the land and the taxes due upon it using categories that recalled the early days of the Islamic community. This development has received attention because it goes to the heart of one of the great debates of the field: was the Ottoman regime turning away from the Ottoman kanun as a source of law from the late seventeenth century? Was kanun obsolete, or no longer considered legitimate? What happened to the law-making authority of the sultan after Sultan Suleyman, and what happened to the body of dynastic law itself? Based on a study of the provincial kanunnames issued between 1669 and 1790, my paper will show that this shift away from the old land regime was not confined to one or two isolated cases, but rather indicative of a systematic change in policy during the reign of Mehmed IV. During that time, the officials of the chancery introduced a new, Salafi vision of the law that persisted into the eighteenth century before it was finally overturned in the reign of Ahmed III. In the year 1717, a new kanunname for the Morea was produced that marked a return to Ebussu?ud’s vision. In the same year, a new text began to circulate that championed Ebussu?ud’s formulation and exhaustively recorded the subsequent land law based upon it. Usually referred to as the Kanun-i Cedid, this text expressed the dominant vision of land law embraced by the state into the nineteenth century. In time, this same text provided the skeleton for the 1858 Land Code. In brief, the paper maintains that the dispute between those chancery officials who championed the Salafi refashioning of land law and those who favored a law based on Ebussu?ud’s principles shows deep disagreement within Ottoman society about what constituted proper adherence to Islamic precedent, and to the Hanafi school. If we better understand these differing visions of how Islam and state power were to be properly configured, then we will better understand how much of nineteenth-century reform represented a departure or a continuation of the empire’s legal practices.

As religious life in Safavid Iran (1501-1722) took its Shi‘i form, Shi‘i religious scholars were able to expand their power within the socio-religious spheres. The ‘ulama managed to acquire and exercise considerable influence through their roles as administrators of educational, judicial and religious institutions. The more structured nature and administrative complexity of Shi‘i religious life furthered the consolidation of power in the hands of the religious scholars whose professional expertise proved to be invaluable to the Safavid court. Association with secular rulers was categorically discouraged by some of the Shi‘i Imams; hence it had been a subject of debate among Shi‘i religious scholars since the early days of the Major Occultation (941). In time, however, the majority of usuli mujtahids saw no problem in collaborating with the political power. ‘Ali Naqi Kamarehi, similar to the majority of usuli Shi‘i jurists, believed that co-operating with Safavid monarchs is not only acceptable but necessary because one can promote the religion, eradicate heretics, command right and forbid wrong with the help of a Shi‘i shah. This research examines the political views of Shaykh al-Islam Kamarehi as they appear in his Himam al-thawaqib, which is still in manuscript format. The Himam, written in the genre of advice literature or “mirror for princes,” contains his advice for Shah Safi (d.1642). One of Kamarehi’s main concerns was formulating the most legitimate and functional way of collaborating with Safavid shahs who might not have always fully followed religious rulings and observances, but who nonetheless relentlessly supported Shi‘ism. In this work, Kamarehi advocates a symbiotic relationship between the Safavid ruling elite and religious authorities. He maintains that, in order for the shari‘a to be implemented in the absence of the Twelfth Imam, Shi‘i mujtahids must embrace and support the secular power, while Safavid shahs should always seek the company of ‘ulama. Otherwise, Kamarehi warns, injustice, corruption and heretical ideas and behaviors become commonplace, thus undermining both political power and religion.