Greco-Islamic Philosophy and Islamic Jurisprudence in the Ottoman Empire (1300-1600): Aristotle’s Theory of Sciences in Works on Usūl al-Fiqh

Abstract

This  essay  is  a  preliminary  attempt  to  reveal  features  of  religious  scho- larship  in  the  Ottoman central  lands  during  1300-1600.  I  analyze  the  Ottoman uŝūl al-fiqh (theoretical jurisprudence) writers’ discourse on their discipline’s nature and content. I show that the Ottoman scholars heartily adopted and developed the approach and views of the theoreticians, who used Aristotelian logic in their works. Hence, they conceived Islamic jurisprudence as a science and aspired to prove that it fulfilled all the requirements of Aristotle’s theory of sciences.