Honored by the Glory of Islam. Conversion and Conquest in Ottoman Europe

42 honored by the glory of islam

Summing up the state of the empire in the 1 650s, Karaçelebizade turns

to the “circle of justice” concept, a favorite theme of Ottoman writers of advice

literature. The production of an Ottoman service class created a group self-

conscious of its identity, privileged place, and history, whose members saw

themselves as the bearers and articulators of the Ottoman way.^9 This led to the

birth of the literary genre of the advice to kings. The political and social com-

mentary assumed that life was golden during the time of Mehmed the Con-

queror and Suleiman I, between 1451 and 1 566, when there was an equitable

system of taxation and distribution of positions, a rational organization of the

administration and military, and order in the empire. It posited that the em-

pire was ruled with justice, war was effective, and the spoils of war went to the

production of magnifi cent mosques benefi ting the public. Writers complained

that statutes were no longer followed, that long-standing custom was violated.

Karaçelebizade continued the line of critique begun by earlier writers, such

as Mustafa Ali and Karaçelebizade’s contemporary Katip Çelebi.^10 In toto, these

were the violations of the Ottoman system that they witnessed: infi ltration of

elite orders, military ineffi ciency, and corruption, especially of the timar sys-

tem of military land grants, since they were no longer always given to actual

sipahi, but to others who passed them on to their sons, and the auctioning of

positions, which had ethical as well as fi nancial implications. People on the im-

perial payroll were given offi ces higher than their deserved status. The sultan

could no longer meet his obligations to all these people on the rolls. Changing

the relation between the sultan and those in the provinces disrupted the elite

structured society. The military class was infi ltrated by commoners and for-

eigners, allegedly bad and unworthy folk who swelled its ranks: the size of the

elite Janissary corps and of the sipahi group each quadrupled.^11 Claim to their

share in imperial largesse led to the elites’ believing there was an erosion of

justice, military ineffi ciency, and corruption.

Mustafa Ali began his Counsel for Sultans by arguing that it is essential

that servitors who proved their worth gradually increase in rank and posi-

tions. In his notion of fairness, the palace-educated, Istanbul-appointed

servitors would be rewarded, not disloyal Kurds and Turks on the fringes

with independent sources of power, who would acquire more power when

given higher status. Mustafa Ali and others complained that the established

path of ascension to the top regulated relations with peers and maintained a

smoothly operating administration, but it could not be relied on when peo-

ple wanted to enter the military class just to gain power. He posited that in

the past there were clearer relations between people. But new entry paths to

power emerged; there were new ways to be “in.” When Anatolian Muslim

commoners shared in the privileges of the sultan’s servants, shattering the