Khaldunist Philosophy: Innovation Justified 289
The rest is a reiteration of earlier topoi on good government: Good politick-
ing (siyaset) is the prerequisite for the longevity and well-being of a state, and
it can emanate either from reason (aklî), in which case it is a branch of philoso-
phy, or from the Sharia. The latter has no need of the former; a Muslim king
will either follow God’s guidelines and gain this world and the next or succumb
to his whims, become a tyrant, and inevitably be punished. Whenever infidel
rulers govern their states successfully, this is due to them following govern-
mental rules based on reason, which is the essence, observes Kâtib Çelebi, of
the “Turkish proverb: the world is destroyed not through infidelity, but through
oppression”.27 A government based on neither reason nor the Sharia is doomed
to collapse. Here, Kâtib Çelebi hastens to add some more concrete examples
and cases of bad government, namely: the interference of women in state
affairs;28 a ruler who does not spare his subjects’ blood; a ruler who tends to
cut off his subjects’ daily bread; and a prince who kills his father to gain the
throne. All this is given in the form of “laws of history” of sorts. For instance:
a patricide has never survived more than a year in power; viziers or chieftains
who opened a ruler’s way to the throne have very often found their death at
the latter’s hands; and the sixth ruler in every dynasty lost his throne (which
in the Ottoman case would relate to Murad II’s abdication in favor of his son,
Mehmed II).
As mentioned, Kâtib Çelebi’s most celebrated political work, Düstûrü’l-amel,
was composed some four years after Takvîmü’t-tevârîh. Perhaps because of the
more general audience he intended it for, he now chose to present a simplified
version of Khaldunist sociology. The references to “zeal and mutual assistance”
(i.e. Ibn Khaldun’s famous asabiyya) and the detailed descriptions of the laws
of decline and the time-spans of societies are missing, as are the universal
laws of history Kâtib Çelebi had tried to explore in his chronicle. Instead, in
Düstûrü’l-amel, again perhaps due to his need to explain things to an audience
of statesmen, Kâtib Çelebi adds some elaborate explanations that complete his
vision of society and politics: most importantly, the identification of the rising
and declining entity, devlet, to society as a whole and his sophisticated medical
simile on the basis of the four humors rather than the four elements.
At the beginning, the usual eulogy of God and the Prophet refers, somewhat
misleadingly, to the
27 We have seen this proverb (which goes back to Nizam al-Mulk; see Fodor 1985, 219, fn 5)
quoted many times before.
28 Kâtib Çelebi also dedicated a special chapter of his Fezleke to this issue: Kâtib Çelebi
1869–1871, 2:309–310.