Despite Orientalism's dismissive remarks, the nineteenth century was one of great scholarly activity. The Ash’ari-Sunni tradition continued to produce scholarship right through the nineteenth century.
Some of these scholars include:
- Hasan al-‘Attār (d. 1250 AH/ 1835 CE),
- Muhammad b. ‘Arafa al-Dusuqi (d. 1230 AH/ 1813 CE),
- Isma’il al-Hāmdi (d. 1316 AH/ 1898 CE),
- Ibrahim al-Bajuri (d. 1276 AH/1860 CE) and
- Muhammad ‘Ileysh (d. 1299 AH/ 1882 CE).
Other scholars authoring works in kalam and logic were Abdul-Qadir al-Sanandji (d. 1304 AH/1886 CE), famous for his extensive commentary on Taftāzāni’s Tahdhib al-Kalam, Abdurrahman al-Panjiyuni (d. 1319 AH/1901 CE) and Umar b. Muhammad Amin al-Qaradaghi (d. 1936 CE).
Other notable authors from the twentieth century include Mahmud Abu-Daqiqa, whose three-volume work on kalam, al-Qawl a-Sadid (c. 1930), was a standard teaching text at al-Azhar for undergraduate students, and yet today it cannot be understood by many scholars speaking about metaphysics. It contains a relatively concise and readable summary of the central questions taken from the main kalam canon, works like Sharh al-Maqasid, Sharh al-Mawaqif, Sharh al-‘Aqaid al-Nasafiya, Sharh al-‘Aqaid al-‘Adudiya, Tawali’ al-Anwar and their commentaries.
Other scholars of the twentieth century who engaged deeply with the rational tradition were the likes of Muhammad Zahid al-Kawthari and the last Shaykh al-Islam of the Ottoman Empire, Mustafa Sabri Efendi. The latter’s four-volume work on kalam, Mawqif al-‘Aql completed circa 1950, is one of the great intellectual feats of the age which critically engaged with the Islamic and Western philosophical traditions.
