Abstract: This article examines the Sufi concept of istiʿdād (preparedness, predisposition, ontological aptitude) in Ahmed Avni Konuk's (d. 1938) commentaries on Ibn al-ʿArabī's (d. 1240 CE) Fuṣūṣ al-Ḥikam and Rūmī's (d. 1273 CE) Mathnawī . Somewhat overlooked in contemporary scholarship on waḥdat al-wujūd (the unity of being), istiʿdād is used in Sufi texts in different senses. Classically, it indicates the ability of human beings to grasp divine unity ( tawḥīd ) and attain divine knowledge. As a key term in Akbarian metaphysics it gained an ontological dimension, playing a central role in explaining how the oneness of Being reconciles with the observable plurality and diversity of the universe. Ahmed Avni Konuk, a prolific Sufi thinker with a notable place in the Ottoman-Turkish commentary tradition, deploys istiʿdād throughout his commentaries on the Fuṣūṣ al-Ḥikam and the Mathnawī to explain various metaphysical dimensions of tawḥīd and human nature ( fiṭra ). Among the many topics that are explained through the concept of istiʿdād , Konuk notably employs it to articulate what this article calls a tawḥīd -centric approach to religious diversity, which forms the focus of the present study. This article begins with an overview of Avni Konuk's life and his special place in the Ottoman-Turkish commentarial tradition, followed by a brief introduction to the concept of istiʿdād and its role in understanding the diversity of religions and prophets in Konuk's Sufi commentaries. This study demonstrates the intricate relationships between the concepts istiʿdād, qābiliyya (receptivity), and tawḥīd in Konuk's paradigm of religious inclusivity and diversity. This article shows that Konuk's paradigm offers an alternative to the conventional classification of approaches to religious diversity proposed in current scholarly literature, being neither exclusive, nor pluralist, nor inclusive in any absolute sense. Rather, as this article argues, Konuk's Sufi approach can be described as a tawḥīd -centric synthesis of unity and multiplicity.
Kutucuoğlu et al. (Sat,) studied this question.