Longing for the lost caliphate a transregional history

List of Illustrations and Maps ix
Acknowledgments xi
Note on Transliteration and Dates xv
Introduction 1
Early History of the Caliphate 5
The Abbasid Caliphate 6
The Ottoman Caliphate 9
Diachronic Reflections on Symbolic Loss, Destruction, and Renegotiation 13
1 Visions of a Lost Caliphal Capital: Baghdad, 1258 CE 20
Mapping an Islamic Cultural Discourse 22
al-Subki\'s Living History: An Enduring Sense of Loss 27
Channeling Muslim Memory through History 30
Loss of the Abbasids 33
Bodily Desecration 37
Literary Dimensions of Religious Rites 44
An Altered Landscape 46
Eschatological Endings 57
The Consolation of Prophetic Transmissions 64
2 Recapturing Lost Glory and Legitimacy 66
Remembering and Recreating a Glorious Past 67
Going Beyond Baghdad 69
Commemorating the Caliphate 71
Contesting Caliphs 75
Embracing Communal Continuity 83
Enduring Salience 88
3 Conceptualizing the Caliphate, 632-1517 CE 98
Classical Articulation of the Islamic Caliphate as a Legal Necessity and Communal Obligation 99
al-Juwayni\'s Seminal Fifth/Eleventh-Century Resolution 103
Post-656/1258 Theorists of the Caliphate 108
Ghalabah, the Sultanate, and the Caliphate in Ibn Jama\'ah\'s Tahrir al-Ahkam (1241-1333) 108
Ibn Taymiyyah\'s Views on the Caliphate (1262-1328) 111
Shams al-Din al-Dhahabi\'s Polemical Treatise on the Grand Imamate (1274-1348) 115
Taj al-Din al-Subki and the Restoration of Blessings (1327-70) 118
The Inter-School Polemics of Najm al-Din al-Tarsusi (1310-57) 120
Ibn Khaldun\'s Political Entanglements and Ideals (1332-1406) 123
The Mamluk Chancery Contributions of al-Qalqashandi (1355-1418) 126
al-Shirazi\'s Metaphysical Exaltation of the Abbasid Caliph in Cairo (1386-1457) 131
Jalal al-Din al-Suyuti\'s Devotional Love of the Prophet\'s Family (1445-1505) 136
4 Manifold Meanings of Loss: Ottoman Defeat, Early 1920s 142
Notions from Afar 145
The Turkish Republic 155
The Levant 171
5 In International Pursuit of a Caliphate 184
An Internationalist Era 186
Promoting an International Conference 188
Imagining the Global Community and Its Leadership 192
A Spiritual Body 194
A Caliphal Council 199
A Traditional Caliph 202
A Global Electorate 204
Dampening Hopes 205
Unexpected Continuities 212
6 Debating a Modern Caliphate 218
Ismail Sükrü (1876-1950) 218
Mehmed Seyyid Çelebizade (1873-1925) 220
\'Ali \'Abd al-Raziq (1888-1966) 225
Muhammad al-Khidr husayn (1876-1958) 233
Mustafa Sabri (1869-1954) 236
Said Nursi (1876-1960) 244
Epilogue The Swirl of Religious Hopes and Aspirations 253
Notes 261
Bibliography 341
Index 373