Treatise on the Meaning of the Term Zindīq

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to present a hitherto unpublished Arabic treatise on the etymology and meanings of the term zindīq. The work is entitled Risāla fī taṣḥīḥ lafẓ zindīq and was most likely penned by the 16th century Ottoman scholar and shaykh al-islam Ibn Kemal. The manuscript of this work is held at Suleymaniye Library as part of Esad Efendi Collection, number 3646, and it consists of four folios. The authors herein give an annotated Bosnian transla­tion of the work accompanied by a study of the crucial issues of the term’s etymology and various usage in Pahlavi and Arabic. A brief overview of the socio-political context and scholarly milieu of the Ottoman State in the 16th century within which the work arose is likewise given. The presumed author of this treatise, Ibn Kemal, held several significant posts in that period, and this accords additional gravity to the text which is at the focus of this paper.