A Critical Approach to the Views of Orientalist Alfred Guillame Regarding the Location of al-Masjid al-Aqsa

ALTUN İ.

ILAHIYAT TETKIKLERI DERGISI-JOURNAL OF ILAHIYAT RESEARCHES, sa.52, ss.287-310, 2019 (ESCI, TRDizin)

Özet

Al-Masjid al-Aqsa is considered by the Muslims to be one of the three great mosques on earth. Also, its importance and merit have been mentioned and emphasized in religious texts. There is a consensus among classical Sunni scholars that it is located in the Jerusalem region. It could be said that -excluding the Shiites-, there has been no debate among Muslims regarding the place of al-Masjid al-Aqsa, until the second half of twentieth century. However after that, various claims have been set forth regarding its place; whether it is located in Jerusalem, based on diverse reasons. As far as we could find out, the first person to launch these debates is the British orientalist Alfred Guillaume, with his article published in 1953 regarding the issue. Based on some reasons, he alleged that al-Masjid al-Aqsa is not located in Jerusalem, but in a region called Ci'rane (a place near Mecca). Afterwards, some contemporary researchers in Turkey shared the same idea with Guillaume, -in consequence-, despite having partially different reasons. It is of great importance to determine to what extent those debates are realistic, and also to evaluate them in a healthy manner; with a view to understanding some certain historical events in an accurate manner, especially the event of Isra. Therefore, this article investigates critically diverse views and approaches of Guillaume related to the place of al-Masjid al-Aqsa.