Ebu's-Su'ûd Efendi — Uzun Müderriszâde

In Modern English

He was a native of Amasya. He was the son of Hacı Mehmed Efendi, one of the virtuous scholars known as "Uzun Müderris" (Tall Professor), and the brother of Şeyh Mahmud Efendi. In Amasya he acquired learning from his father and from the exegete Zafer Efendi and became a ders-i âm. At the time of the events of 1099 [1687-88] he left his homeland and went to Istanbul. He taught at the Hagia Sophia Mosque; he became kürsü şeyhi (preacher) at the Atik Valide Mosque in Üsküdar, lived in Doğancılar, and passed to the eternal world in 1125 [1713]. He was one of the pious scholars.

Notes and Research

Old Words in the Text

• fuzalâ: virtuous, learned people
• birâder: brother
• vak'a: event, disturbance
• terk-i diyâr: leaving one's homeland, emigration
• tedrîs-i ulûm: teaching the sciences
• kürsü şeyhi: a preacher who gives the official sermon on Fridays in the great mosques
• rihlet: departure; here, death
• sülehâ-yı ulemâ: the pious among the scholars

The Uzun Müderris Family

Although the entry is short, his family appears often in Hüsameddin's book. His father, Hacı Mehmed Efendi, "Uzun Müderris," was among the most respected teachers of Amasya in the middle of the seventeenth century. According to the chronicle he became deputy judge (naib) of Amasya in 1062 and resigned from this post in Rebiülevvel 1063. In 1076 he was regarded as "şeyhü'l-ulemâ," that is, head of the city's scholars, and died the same year as "şeyhü'l-ulemâ, üstâdü'l-fuzalâ Uzun Müderris Mehmed Efendi bin Süleyman." In the first volume of the book, when the scholars this century produced are listed, his name is mentioned together with that of the exegete Hızır Efendi. The biographies of many people, such as Köprülü Kadızâde İbrahim Efendi, Hocazâde Ahmed Efendi and Ahmed Efendi, mufti of Köprü, known as Kara Müderriszâde, contain the note "he completed his studies under Uzun Müderris Mehmed Efendi."

The elder brother named in the entry, Şeyh Mahmud Efendi, was appointed kürsü şeyhi of the Sultan Bayezid Mosque after the death (1105) of Hızır Efendizâde İbrahim Efendi, its preacher. Another brother, Ahmed Efendi, was known as "Uzun Müderriszâde" in Amasya and simply as "Uzun" in Istanbul; after studying under his father he went to Istanbul and became müderris by examination in 1079. The family's name continues in the eighteenth century as well: Hüsameddin speaks of the hadith scholar Uzun Müderris Süleyman Efendi and of his sons as the "Uzun Müderrisoğulları." No information was found in other sources on the exegete Zafer Efendi, named as Ebussuud Efendi's teacher.

The Events of 1099

The expression "the incident of 1099" in the entry points to a crisis year that is spread over hundreds of pages in Hüsameddin's book. In other entries the same event is called "the incident of the emirs," "the incident of the sayyids," "the incident of the Türediler," or "the incident of Yeğen Osman Pasha." According to these records, that year in Amasya some scholars and sayyids were exiled or executed on the grounds that they had been involved in the affair, some went to the Hejaz to escape pursuit, and some notables went into hiding for a time. The biography of Hilmi Abdullah Efendi says that "in the incident of Amasya in Receb of the year 1099" he settled in Istanbul with his father and grandfather; Ebussuud Efendi's leaving his homeland also appears to be part of the same wave of emigration. According to the assessment in the introductory section of the book, again in 1099, in the time of Hüseyin Pasha, mutasarrıf of Amasya, a great fire that broke out in the Eski Kethüda neighborhood burned two thirds of the city.

In the first volume Hüsameddin calls this year "the dreadful incident of 1098" and writes that the event threw all the scholarly institutions of Amasya into disorder and gave rise to the practice of deputyship (vekâlet) in offices such as professorship, sheikhhood and preaching; that the events stretched from the end of 1098 into 1099 may explain this small difference. There was no calm in Istanbul that year either; the book tells that on the twenty-fifth of Rebiülahir 1099 the palace of the grand vizier Abaza Siyavuş Pasha was surrounded and plundered by soldier-brigands and set on fire, and that the pasha lost his life in this fire. No separate study devoted to the details of the disturbances in Amasya was found among external sources; for now the traces of the events can mostly be followed from Hüsameddin's scattered records.

The Atik Valide Mosque and the Office of Kürsü Şeyhi

Ebussuud Efendi's last post in Istanbul was the kürsü şeyhliği of the Atik Valide Mosque in Üsküdar. The mosque is the center of the great complex designed by Mimar Sinan for Nurbanu Sultan, mother of Murad III. The buildings are arranged in terraces on a slope in the Toptaşı district, in the neighborhood that today bears its name. The complex was at first called "Valide Sultan"; when Gülnuş Valide Sultan, mother of Ahmed III, had a new complex built in Üsküdar İskele Square, it took the names "Eski Valide," "Atik Valide" or "Valide-i Atik" (the Old Valide). Hüsameddin's saying "Atik Valide" accords with this second naming.

Kürsü şeyhs were official functionaries who preached after the Friday prayer in the great mosques and the imperial (selâtin) mosques. The khatib recited the sermon in Arabic, and then the kürsü şeyhi explained to the people the verses and hadiths in the sermon. Their appointments were made by the şeyhülislam, and the kürsü şeyhs were subject to an order of seniority among themselves. That a scholar who had come from Amasya was given this office in one of the great imperial mosques of Üsküdar shows that he was held in esteem in Istanbul as well.

Bibliography

Primary sources

• Abdîzâde Hüseyin Hüsâmeddîn Yasar, Amasya Tarihi, Amasya Belediyesi Kültür Yayınları, 2022, vol. 6, p. 83–83. amasya.bel.tr
• Abdîzâde Hüseyin Hüsâmeddîn Yasar, Amasya Tarihi, Introduction, p. 38–48; vol. 1, Mukaddime, p. 155–160; vol. 4, entry "Ahmed Paşa", p. 575–576; entry "Ferhad Paşa", p. 589–590; entry "Mehmed Paşa", p. 616; vol. 6, entry "Ahmed Efendi-Uzun", p. 176; vol. 9, entry "Hilmi Abdullah Efendi", p. 67–69; vol. 10, entry "Siyâvuş Paşa-Abaza", p. 332.

Academic studies

• M. Baha Tanman, "Atik Vâlide Sultan Külliyesi", TDV İslâm Ansiklopedisi, vol. 4, 1991. https://islamansiklopedisi.org.tr/atik-valide-sultan-kulliyesi

Books

• İlhami Yurdakul, "Kürsü Şeyhi (Cuma Vaizi)", Türk Maarif Ansiklopedisi, 2022. https://turkmaarifansiklopedisi.org.tr/kursu-seyhi-cuma-vaizi