Agenda

Book Presentation & Talk

Verifying the Truth on Their Own Terms: Ottoman Philosophical Culture and the Court Debate Between Mollā Zeyrek and Ḫocazāde Muṣliḥuddīn
Published by Edizioni Ca’ Foscari - Venice University Press
Open Access edition fully available

Talk

An Imperial Debate in Constantinople, 1466 – Lost for Centuries
Synthesizing Graeco-Arabic Philosophy and Islamic Theology in the Ottoman Empire

Efe Murat Balıkçıoğlu
Assistant Professor, Ca’ Foscari University of Venice
Visiting Scholar, Harvard University
Respondent
Giovanni Carrera
Research Grant Holder, Ca’ Foscari University of Venice

Q&A

In 1466, at the court of Sultan Mehmed II, a high-stakes confrontation unfolded over one of the most explosive questions in Islamic thought: how to understand divine unity (tawḥīd ) in light of Avicenna’s controversial claim that in God necessity, existence, and quiddity collapse into one. For some theologians, this formulation, polemically described as an “Avicenna’s Trinity”, appeared to threaten Islam’s divine simplicity.
This lecture presents a recently recovered text of this famous debate, long thought lost and never before studied. Far from recording a marginal scholastic quarrel, the exchange reveals a defining feature of post-classical Islamic scholarship: the capacity to confront authoritative traditions critically and to forge new syntheses through taḥqīqb –  an early modern practice of intellectual verification.

The event will also introduce the book series: Knowledge Hegemonies in the Early Modern World directed by Pietro Daniel Omodeo, Professor at Ca’ Foscari University of Venice.

The series is devoted to the socio-cultural study of early modern knowledge cultures (c. 1450-1750). It explores science as a collective and contested practice, shaped by political, philosophical and religious tensions, and embedded within broader struggles for cultural hegemony and socio-economic interests.

The event will take place in a hybrid format (in person and via video call).
Registration is required here
Registered participants will receive the access link to the video call.