İbn Taymiyyah and his view of metaphor in Quran in point of view of his Salafi comments

In this study, Ibn Taymiyyah and his view of metaphor in the Qur?an within the context of his Salafi comments were discussed. Ibn Taymiyyah was a versatile scholar who made great contributions to the Islamic thought with his ideas put forward in almost all branches of Islamic sciences. İbn Taymiyyah, who lived in a time of intensive political, intellectual and social mobility, has become the most important representative of Salafi thought after Ahmad b. Hanbal. According to Ibn Taymiyyah, the Salaf is the community consisting of Sahaba, Tabiun and Atbau't-tabiin , who see the approaches against the Qur?an and Sunnah as bid?a, neither accept anthropomorphism nor via negative regarding the divine attributes and believe that the Qur?an is not created. Wahhabism, which represents the Salafi thought after Ibn Taymiyyah, though claims to base its principles on him, totally deviated from his thoughts vis-a-vis shirk and bid?a. The idea of adherence to Salaf is very important in Ibn Taymiyyah?s system of understanding and interpreting the text. Thus his view of metaphor in the Qur?an was formed with that Salafi understanding. The vast majority of Islamic scholars accept the presence of metaphor in the Qur?an, whereas a group of minority rejects this idea. Ibn Taymiyyah is from the scholars rejecting the presence of metaphor in the Qur?an. It seems that his claim is based on two principles: linguistic and theological. In the light of the linguistic reasons, the explanations on the verses subject to metaphor are exactly similar to the explanations of those who accept the presence of metaphor in the Qur?an. As a result, it can be said that his theological anxieties were more effective on his stance against metaphor rather than the linguistic reasons. First of these theological concerns is the differentiation of Murji'ah in the meaning of faith as truth by the confirmation of heart and as metaphor to be put into actions. The other one is related to chiefly the claims of Jahmiya and Mu?tazila regarding to some divine attributes as metaphors. Contrary to their claims, Ibn Taymiyyah, interprets, for instance, Yad Allah- The Hand of Allah, as ?that God has two hands, specific to Him and the circumstance of which is only known by Him.? Keywords: Ibn Taymiyyah, Salaf, Wahhabism, the Qur'an, Metaphor, Habari attributes