Abdüllatif Harpûtî’nin İsbât-ı Vâcib Delilleri

Abstract

Abdullatif Harpūtī (d.1916) was a late Ottoman scholar who worked as a professor of "Kalām" at the Istanbul Darulfunun. Recognizing the deficiencies in the science of kalām and arguing that some changes should be made in terms of method and content, Harpūtī states that the time has come for the third compilation in the science of kalām and that this compilation is obligatory upon the scholars of the century. He himself tried to serve as a model for this period with his book Tanqīḥ al-kalām. His study, which consists of muqaddimah (preface), divinity, prophecy, sam'iyyāt, and imāmate chapters, deals with the currents of thought that emerged in the Western world by bringing evidence against them. Harpūtī states that the scientific data on matters of faith, which are put forward by rational methods, change over time. For this reason, while writing chapters such as divinity and prophecy, he used different information in light of the scientific data of his time. He also included and refuted the views of movements such as materialism, positivism, and atheism, which were newly widespread in his time. In this paper, we have analyzed the proofs used by al Harpūtī on the subject of ithbāt al-wājib. Harpūtī analyzed the proofs of ithbāt al-wājib under the subheadings of "the proofs of philosophers and muhaqqiq theologians", "the path followed by most theologians", "the path followed by the prophets and asfiyān", and "the recent theologian philosophers and ithbāt al-wājib”. These subheadings do not clearly indicate which of the classical proofs he means. By "the proof of the philosophers and the muhaqqiq theologians" Harpūtī meant the evidence of possibility (imkān); by "the path followed by most theologians" he meant the proof of existence (huduth); and by “the path followed by the Prophets and asfiyān" he meant the evidence of purpose and order. Under the title “The recent theologian philosophers and ithbāt al-wājib", he collected the proof of possibility, the proof of motion, and the proofs of purpose and order. The proof of the disposition (fıtrah) that is included in our study is not to be found in the titles. However, from Harpūtī 's explanations, we have determined that he also used this argument. This study aims to reveal the proofs of ithbāt al-wājib used by al Harpūtī . This research is significant for us to comprehend what evidence Harpūtī , who opened the door to the new science of Kalām and is considered one of the important figures of the new science of Kalām, used for proof. The documentation method was used in this research, and the data obtained were analyzed and reflected in the text. As a result of the research, it was determined that al Harpūtī used the proofs of possibility, existence, purpose and order, motion, and disposition.