Abdal Hakim Murad - The Cambridge Companion to Islamic Theology

The social construction of orthodoxy 105
was the Ottoman Empire’s continuous need for uniformly trained and
loyal administrators for its immensely complex and highly centralised
bureaucracy. However, although the formal training of the ‘ulama’ was
oriented towards a likely career as civil servants, a minority of scholars
and students continued to follow the traditional paradigm based on the
personal teacher–student bond.
the ‘ulama’ and discourses of orthodoxy
Within the informal and decentralised institutional framework of
the pre-Ottoman period, several divergent discourses of theological
orthodoxy could emerge and flourish, both competing and overlapping
with one another. Two of these, the discourses of the traditionists
(muh _
addithun) and the dialectic theologians (mutakallimun), stood at
the heart of the debate that eventually yielded an extent of common
ground between Sunnı theologians of all persuasions. This shared
understanding formed the theological core of what is commonly termed
the ‘‘Sunnı consensus’’.
The discipline of the traditionists rested on a shared methodology,
an accepted body of material, and a minimum set of doctrines that
together rendered the discourse remarkably stable and cohesive. Extensively
travelled and cosmopolitan, the traditionists formed a transnational
network of like-minded scholars whose focus was on gathering
and then ascertaining the authenticity and accuracy of reported prophetic
traditions. The emerging corpus of agreed-upon hadith and the
conclusions drawn from these regarding correct belief and action formed
the theological core of the traditionists’ discourse. This core was
articulated in the form of succinct credos (‘aqa’id, sing.‘aqıda), which
were designed for easy memorisation by students and served as
important pedagogical tools. The universally accepted methodology that
was developed for the evaluation of prophetic traditions and their
transmitters (‘ilm al-rijal, literally ‘‘the science of men’’), and its application
to a finite body of material, provided a centripetal force that
ensured the cohesion and integrity of the discipline.
The discourse of the early dialectic theologians, and particularly
those who adhered to Mu‘tazilism, was in many ways diametrically
opposed to that of the traditionists. The theologians focused not on a
substantive set of materials but rather on a formal methodology of reasoning
and debate. As a consequence, a student of kalam who attached
himself to a teacher could not simply adopt and internalise authoritative
statements regarding belief from his teacher in the way that students of
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