FromTemeddün to Civilisation: An Essay on the Change of Ottoman Perspective to Human, Society and State

Throughout the course of history, the question of what the nature of humans is has always been asked and the answer that it is civilized or societal has been given. This acceptance has been the source of action regarding ideas about humans from Platon to Aristo, Farabi to Ibn Haldun, and Tursun Bey to Kınalı-zâde Ali Çelebi. However, they have established their own way of thinking via their differences in details. This starting point affected from ancient Greece and pre-Islam Turkish traditions and which has been taken as a referance point in establising the traditional Islamic-Ottoman perspective towards human, society, leader and state has become a dogma over time. To express this idea the synonomous words ictimâ‘ and temeddün have been used. However, with the decline of the Ottoman Empire, the thinking system and vocabulary used for it changed. The Ottoman Empire which turned its face completely to Europe in the 19th century, traditional terminology was tried to be adapted to western style or new terminology was created; western terminology was used to meet new developments. In this period the French word civilisation whose Turkish equivalent is medeniyet which changed the classical perception of people, society and state was used instead of the classical term temeddün. The history of the word Civilisation in Turkey began with Mustafa Reşit Paşa and after a short while was replaced by medeniyet. Thus medeniyet has been one of the key notions of the modernization period of Turkey beginning with the Ottoman times. New terminology brought new ideas and completely changed the ontological references of the Ottoman intellectuals. The aim of this study is to examine the period of change from temeddün to medeniyet with the help of the meanings and duties civilisation has undertaken thruoghout the course of history