What is the Concept of Islamic Studies?

Concept of Islamic Studies

Islam is practiced not only from west to east, from Morocco to Indonesia and everywhere in between, but also throughout most of Africa and, more lately, Europe and America. In northwest Scotland, there are groups of Lebanese Muslims and Gaelic-speaking Pakistanis. And Islam is the world’s fastest-growing religion. Because Muslims account for one out of every five persons on the earth, it seems sensible to understand as much as possible about them. Islamic studies is a discipline taught in the west that aims to explain what the Islamic world has accomplished in the past and what the future holds for it.

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History of Islamic Education

Since its inception, Islam has put a high value on education and has a long and illustrious intellectual legacy. Knowledge (‘ilm) is highly valued in Islam, as indicated by the more than 800 references to it in the Koran, Islam’s most cherished scripture. The significance of education is underlined throughout the Koran with numerous injunctions, such as “O my Lord! God will lift those of you who believe and have the knowledge to great heights” (58:11), “As God has taught him, so let him write” (20:114), and “As God has instructed him, so let him write” (20:115) ” (2:282). These passages serve as a powerful motivator for the Islamic community to pursue education and study. Because of the Koran’s all-encompassing influence, Islamic education is distinct from other types of educational thought and practice. The Koran is the major source of knowledge and serves as a comprehensive blueprint for both individuals and societies. For the mostly illiterate Arabian society, the arrival of the Koran in the seventh century was a watershed moment.

Islamic Education

Islamic education began in this manner. Dedicated to making the Koran’s teachings more accessible to the Islamic society, pious and scholarly Muslims (mu’ allim or mudarris) taught the faithful in what became known as the kuttb (plural, kattb). The kuttb could be held in a variety of locations, including mosques, private homes, shops, tents, and even the open air. Historians are unsure when the kattb were initially formed, but by the middle of the eighth century, they could be found in practically every section of the Islamic empire, owing to the widespread desire of the devout to study the Koran. The kuttb fulfilled an important societal function as the only vehicle for formal public instruction for primary-aged students, and it continued to do so until the introduction of Western methods of education in the contemporary period. It has shown extraordinary endurance and is still used as a primary source of religious education in many Islamic countries.

Aims and Objectives of Islamic Education

In Islam, education is viewed as a process that encompasses the whole individual, including the logical, spiritual, and social aspects. The comprehensive and integrated approach to education in Islam, as noted by Syed Muhammad al-Naquib al-Attas in 1979, is aimed at the “balanced growth of the total personality… Man’s soul, intellect, rational self, sentiments, and bodily senses are all trained in such a way that faith is instilled throughout his entire personality” (p. 158). Knowledge is learned in Islamic educational theory in order to actualize and perfect all aspects of the human being. The prophet Muhammad is the highest and most valuable model of perfection from an Islamic perspective, and the purpose of Islamic education is for people to be able to live as he did.

Conclusion

It has a long and illustrious history. The Arab conquests had built the world’s greatest empire in 732, a hundred years after the Prophet Muhammad’s death, stretching from central France to the Chinese border. The Islamic faith and Arabic, the language of the Qur’an, held it together.