Ahmed Cevdet Pasha and his understanding of Islamic history in particular Kısas-ı Enbiyâ

After a certain period of time has passed since the events in the life of humanity, it becomes history and has been written to be passed on to future generations. While some historians are based on giving information to people, others have tried to convey the historical information written before them as it is. In the Qurʾān, the stories of many prophets are included. In order to illuminate these stories more broadly, a large number of such works have been copyrighted in the history of Islam. This understanding of copyright continued during the Ottoman period and many works were written on this subject. One of them is perhaps the most famous work of Ahmad Cevdet Pasha (d. 1313/1895), the law, history and statesman of the period, called Qisas al-Anbiyā and Tavārikhi Khulafā. Although Ahmad Cevdet Pasha did not specify the sources he used in the work, while telling the stories of the prophet, ıt has been observed that he respects the information in the Qurʾān and Sunna. In the work, after the stories of the Prophet, he adhered to the classical understanding and dealt with the history of Sīrah, Rashidūn Khalifa, Umayyads, Abbasids and Turks. When the information he gives is examined, it is understood that he made use of the sources of early Islamic history. He went to the first sources and thought that the work would be more reliable and robust. In particular, he relied on Ibn al-At̲h̲īr (d. 630/1233) in terms of observing chronology and based on al-Kāmil, He also used other sources [such as the historical works of al-Ṭabari (d. 310/923) and Ibn Hisham (d. 218/833)] as sources, albeit to a lesser extent. The research was carried out in the form of general screening and content analysis on the texts required by human and historical examinations. It is expected that this work written by Ahmad Cevdet Pasha on Islamic history will contribute to today's studies and especially to research in the field of Islamic historiography/understanding/attitude.