Contesting Ḥanafī Thought in a Twentieth-century Turkish Hadith Commentary

In February 1925, the Turkish parliament voted to approve funding for the translation of the Qur’an and hadith. Babanzâde Ahmed Naîm (1872–1934) was commissioned with the task of translating hadith. The resulting text, focusing on al-BukhÄrī’s collection, was Sahihi-i Buhari Muhtasarı—Tecrid-i Sarih Tercümesi (An Abridgement of á¹¢aḥīḥ al-BukhÄrÄ«, A Translation of al-TajrÄ«d al-á¹£arīḥ) (1928–1948). Babanzâde died shortly after completing a draft of the third volume in 1934, at which point Kâmil Miras (1875–1957) took over. In the end, the resulting hadith compilation was more than a translation—it was a commentary hiding behind the descriptor of translation. This chapter uses the Babanzâde/Miras BukhÄrÄ« text as a vehicle to study hadith commentary in the late Ottoman period: The articulations of religious authority in the genre of commentary and printed texts; the enduring legacy of the Ottoman tradition in pre-1950s Turkish-language religious texts; and the role of religious institutions in supporting the commentary tradition.