Aslah theory has a central importance in understanding the Mu’tazila thought. The Mu’tazila tried to give a rational explanation for the relationship among Allah and nature and man. The Aslah theory has laid the groundwork for many debates affecting Islamic thought so far. Those who argue and criticize the Aslah theory are not only the ones opposed to the Mu’tazila like Ahl al-Sunnah. The very ones with Matazila thought have also participated in the discussion and questioned the theory. In this study, after the aslah theory is explained in detail, the course of the discussion in Mu’tazila will be analyzed. Finally, in the study, based on the efforts of Basra Mu’tazila to ground the aslah, the possibility of developing an idea of grace based on the circumstances will be questioned. In this context, the main argument of the study is that instead of the idea of an aslah that obliges Allah, the idea of grace which is based on the Qur’an and concretized as conditions can form a more appropriate framework.

Mehmed (Muhammed) Sefik Bey (d.1880) was the most loved and succesfull student of Kazasker (Kadiasker) Mustafa Izzet Efendi, a most famous of all calligraphers musicians in 19th century of Istanbul. Mehmed Sefik Bey after acquiring his licence (ijazat) from his master to practice and teach the art of Islamic callgraphy, out of his love and respect he did part from his master and carried on practising calligraphy (meshk) under guidance and advice of his much loved master until his death and helped him producing his materpeices commisioned by Sultan Abdulmejid. His master also admired his talent and helped him to move to be a calligraphy teacher at the special Ottoman state colleges called Andarun inside the royal palace in Istanbul. Mehmed Sefik Bey worked as a part of the team, made up of his master Mustafa Izzet Efendi and his close friend and famous calligrapher Abdulfettah Efendi. They as a team produced many great and unpresidented calligraphic masterpieces at the portal of Istanbul University and Great Mosque of Bursa (1857-1860) as well as in many mosque buildings suponsored by Ottoman Sultan Abdulmajid and Abdulaziz. Mehmed Sefik Bey always wished to produce as beautiful and grand masterpieces (like his master did) and went through great strugle and sacrifices to achieve this. In this article, we will look into how he managed to achieve his ambition through his famous calligraphies in Istanbul, Great Mosque of Bursa and Kubbetu’s-Sakhra in city of al-Quds (province of Ottoman Empire then). We will also discuss the issues around how his fortune changed following the death of his master in 1876 and how he was treated badly by his employers against his loyalty, as well as calligraphy art circles of Istanbul not caring about his artworks being reproduced through removing his signature, and not taking the necessary steps to stop his grave (located in the cemetry of Yahya Efendi Dargah in Istanbul) from being dismantled and lost.

In this study Scale of Perception About Theologians’s (SPAT) reliability and validity analyses are presented. SPAT has been developed in order to determine the perspectives of people to the theology faculty teachers, students and alumni. Two main applications were carried out in the study except the pretests. The data of the first study on 519 people over the age of 18 were subjected to factor analysis and as a result a 5-item two-dimensional scale structure was obtained. The obtained 15-item and 2-sub-dimensional structure were subjected to confirmatory factor analysis. This second study was performed on 198 adults over 18 years of age. By the confirmatory factor analysis, the following fit scores were obtained: X2 / df = 2.61, RMSEA = 0.079, RMR = 0.054, NFI = 0.95, NNFI = 0.96, CFI = 0.97, IFI = .97, RMR = 0.078, SRMR = 0.054 ve GFI = 0.89. The 1* reliability coefficients of the scale (Cronbach’s Alpha) were .862 for the first sub-dimension, .865 for the second sub dimension and .905 for the whole scale. And the correlation between the two subdimensions (Pearson Correlation) is .62. The values revealed show that the SPAT is a highly reliable and valid scale.

Al-Ka‘bi is a theologian of the Baghdad Mu?tazila School, who lived mostly in Khorasan after being in the scholarly circles of Basra and Baghdad. Being one of the eminent scholars of Mu‘tazila, he travelled to Khorasan as a mission to spread theMu‘tazili views in the region. For, al-Maturidi’s general criticism on the Mu‘tazila usually targets al-Ka‘bi. On the other hand, the most important work of al-Ka?biamong many, Kitab al-Maqalat, was also among the sources ofal-Ash‘ari’s Maqalat. Authored primarily as a separate work, ‘Uyun al masa’ilwa’ljawabat is on the theological polemics that soon incorporated as the fifth chapter of his Kitab al-Maqalat. Though it mainly holds discussions on existence, it also includes different topics on knowledge and divine attributes. In his work, al-Ka‘bi examines the Mu‘tazila perception of tawhid by framing the understanding on divine attributes and explaining his proofs on it. In this article, al-Ka‘bi’s method of Kalam in general, his principal views and his role in the Mu‘tazila have been taken into account and his elaboration of the tawhid principle has been analysed in accordance to his work ‘Uyun al-masa’ilwa’l-jawabat.

Muhammad b. Idris al-Shafi’i , (d. 204/819). Who known for his scientific, religious, primitive, hadith, linguistic also he is a good poet. We learn his poetry, from especially his “Divan.” In his “Divan”, which has an important literary work, many subjects are mentioned in terms of both Islamic sciences and social life. Shafi’i expressed his admiration for the hadith in his “Divan” work: “When you see a man from the living with hadith,You’re going to see one of companions from the Prophet Holy Muhammad. May Allah bless them. Because they have kept us the origin of religion.They gain advantage over us with these features.” After expressing his feelings in this respect with these expressions, he continued with poems with the same feelings. In Shafii’s poetry there are two main foundations of science, those are Qur’an and Sunnah. The others is an empty work but he expressed with in a literary style. As a matter of fact, this issue has been mentioned by Prophet Holy Muhammad in many hadiths. In addition, in many of the other poems in the “Divan” of Imam al-Shafi’i, we are witnessing hadith traces. For example, in a hadith of Prophet Holy Muhammad, Someone who says, “Show me the way to gain the love of God and people.” and he said: “Be an devotee to the world, God will love you and be a devotee against the people, people will love you.” Imam al-Shafi’i, in the sense of the hadith culture and he has writte poems related asceticism and piety. In this work, we will focus on these and similar poems reflecting the hadiths, as the view of Imam al-Shafi’i especially in the “Divan.” The hadiths that we will deal with, by identifying their place in hadith sources, we also will analyze them in terms of text and sened.

Tafsir (Qur’an exegesis) is the name of the Islamic Ummah’s efforts to understand the Qur’an. The recording and introduction of this effort is the subject of Tafsir History. Although there are many in number, it is not possible to say that the works related to the history of Tafsir have comprehensively discussed the knowledge and culture of the past fourteen centuries. The development of many different styles in tafsir over time necessitated to categorize the studies of tafsir. When we look at the works written in the field of tafsir, it will be seen that the classifications, which are not very different from each other, are made and these classifications are united in a common denominator. The first period tafsirs were examined under the main headings such as Narration (Rivayah) and Dirayah (Reason) Tafsirs” and later they were categorized as “Fiqhi (Judicial), Lugawi (Linguistic), Madhabi (Denominational), and Ishari (Symbolic) Tafsirs”. Considering the nomenclature differences in the contemporary tafsir classifications and the classification of the tafsir in the first period, it is seen that the studies of tafsir in the first period were in the shadow of the social turbulences and political divisions, but in the contemporary period, the classifications are subject-centered. In our article, it will be emphasized that the history of tafsir should be written in the face of new developments. Also it will be underlined that the developments in the field of tafsir should be included in the historical works which will be written at the present time.

Abu Mansur al-Maturidi (v. 333/944) is one of the sect-leaders of muslims in doxastic field. His important book Tavilatul-Quran is considered the first dirayet example in Quran exegesis. Tavilat -assumed not draw the considerable interest- its manuscripts in the several Ottoman libraries has showed that this tafseer aroused seriously interest in academese. The spesific books, academic dissertations, articles, antologies and symposiums on Tavilatul-Quran are the obvious indicaters to the interest in the last decades about al-Maturidi and his tafseer. The one of the pleasing developments in this context are the five edition-critics of Tavilat. In this article, the meaning of edition-critic and its methodology are summarised firstly, then these five edition-critics are defined with several aspects, mentioning above-cited academic studies on Tavilat. Consequently, the most succesful edition-critic between these five studies is one that prepared by Bekir Topaloglu and his workmates is concluded and justificated with many examples.