Philosophies of Islamic Education : Historical Perspectives and Emerging Discourses

270 Pages·2015·1.512 MB·English

by  Mujadad Zaman and Nadeem A. Memon

Philosophies of Islamic Education
The study of Islamic education has hitherto remained a tangential inquiry
in the broader focus of Islamic Studies. In the wake of this neglect, a renais-
sance of sorts has occurred in recent years, reconfiguring the importance of
Islam’s attitudes to knowledge, learning, and education as paramount in the
study and appreciation of Islamic civilization. Philosophies of Islamic Edu-
cation stands in tandem to this call and takes a pioneering step in establish-
ing the importance of its study for the educationalist, academic, and student
alike. Broken into four sections, it deals with theological, pedagogic, insti-
tutional, and contemporary issues reflecting the diverse and often competing
notions and practices of Islamic education. As a unique international col-
laboration bringing into conversation theologians, historians, philosophers,
teachers, and sociologists of education, Philosophies of Islamic Education
intends to provide fresh means for conversing with contemporary debates in
ethics, secularization theory, child psychology, multiculturalism, interfaith
dialogue, and moral education. In doing so, it hopes to offer an important
and timely contribution to educational studies, as well as give new insight
for academia in terms of conceiving learning and education.
Nadeem A. Memon is Director of Education at Razi Education, Ontario,
Canada.
Mujadad Zaman is Visiting Research Fellow at the Center for Islamic
Theology, University of Tübingen, Germany.
Routledge Research in Religion and Education
Series Editor Michael D. Waggoner, University of Northern Iowa, USA
1 Religion in Education
Innovation in International Research
Edited by Joyce Miller, Kevin O’Grady and Ursula McKenna
2 Civility, Religious Pluralism, and Education
Edited by Vincent F. Biondo III and Andrew Fiala
3 International Perspectives on Education, Religion and Law
Edited by Charles J. Russo
4 Philosophies of Islamic Education
Historical Perspectives and Emerging Discourses
Edited by Nadeem A. Memon and Mujadad Zaman
Philosophies of Islamic
Education
Historical Perspectives and
Emerging Discourses
Edited by
Nadeem A. Memon and
Mujadad Zaman
First published 2016
by Routledge
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The right of Nadeem A. Memon and Mujadad Zaman to be identified as editors of
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Library of Congress Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
Names: Memon, Nadeem A. (Nadeem Ahmed), 1980– editor of compilation. |
Zaman, Mujadad, editor of compilation.
Title: Philosophies of Islamic education : historical perspectives and emerging
discourses / edited by Nadeem A. Memon and Mujadad Zaman.
Description: New York, NY : Routledge, 2016. | Series: Routledge research in religion
and education ; 4 | Includes bibliographical references.
Identifiers: LCCN 2015037836 | ISBN 9781138788541 (hbk) |
ISBN 9781315765501 (ebk)
Subjects: LCSH: Islamic education––Philosophy.
Classification: LCC LC904 .P49 2016 | DDC 371.077––dc23
LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2015037836
ISBN: 978-1-138-78854-1 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-315-76550-1 (ebk)
Typeset in Sabon
by Apex CoVantage, LLC
Contents
Foreword ix
MICHAEL D. WAGGONER
Acknowledgments xi
Introduction 1
MUJADAD ZAMAN
PART I
Theology and the Idea of Islamic Education
1 Philosophical Considerations of Islamic
Education—Past and Future: Interview with
Professor Seyyed Hossein Nasr 17
SEYYED HOSSEIN NASR
2 Education as ‘Drawing-Out’: The Forms of Islamic Reason 26
TIM WINTER
3 Islamic Philosophical Traditions: Knowledge and Man’s
Path to a Creator 43
DAVID B. BURRELL
PART II
Positioning Knowledge between the Student
and Teacher
4 Spirituality in Muslim Education 57
ABDULLAH TREVATHAN
vi Contents
5 “Your Educational Achievements Shall Not Stop Your
Efforts to Seek Beyond”: Principles of Teaching and
Learning in Classical Arabic Writings 72
SEBASTIAN GÜNTHER
6 Disciplinarity and Islamic Education 94
OMAR ANWAR QURESHI
7 The Transmission of Adab: Educational Ideals and
their Institutional Manifestations 112
TALAL AL-AZEM
PART III
Schools, Universities, and Pedagogies
8 World Conferences on Muslim Education: Shaping the
Agenda of Muslim Education in the Future 129
SHAIKH ABDUL MABUD
9 Diverse Communities, Divergent Aspirations? Islamic
Schooling in the West 144
NADEEM A. MEMON
10 An Olive Tree in the Apple Orchard: Establishing an
Islamic College in the United States 159
OMAR QARGHA
11 The ‘Hadith of Gabriel’: Stories as a Tool for
‘Teaching’ Religion 172
STEFFEN STELZER
PART IV
Contemporary Debates
12 Principles of Democracy in American Islamic Schools 187
SUSAN DOUGLASS AND ANN EL-MOSLIMANY
13 Religious Pluralism and Islamic Education: Addressing
Mutual Challenges 202
SARFAROZ NIYOZOV
Contents vii
14 Islamization and Democratization of Knowledge in
Postcolonial Muslim-Oriented Contexts: Implications
for Democratic Citizenship Education 220
YUSEF WAGHID AND NURAAN DAVIDS
15 Teaching Islam: Are There Pedagogical Limits
to Critical Inquiry? 236
FARAH AHMED AND IBRAHIM LAWSON
Contributors 251
Index 253
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Foreword
The opening years of the 21st century brought increased attention to religion
as an important dimension of culture and politics. Early in this period, the
dramatic multi-pronged attacks of September 11, 2001, came as a jolting
reminder of the potential for violent action that can have bases in religious
motivations. Over the same period, we came to see an increase in religious-
group activity in politics. In the United States we see this as an evolution
from the Moral Majority movement led by televangelist Jerry Falwell that
emerged as a force in the late 1970s as the beginning of the New Religious
Right. On further reflection, however, we can see the involvement of religion
extending much further back as a fundamental part of our social organiza-
tion, rather than a new or emerging phenomenon. We need only recall the
religious wars of early modern Europe through to the contentious develop-
ment of US church and state relations as evidence of the long-standing role
religion has played as a source of competing values and beliefs. That said,
there has been a significant upturn in research and scholarship across many
disciplines relative to the study of religion in the last decade and more. This is
particularly the case in the area of the relationship of education and religion.
While religious education—study toward formation in a particular faith
tradition—has been with us for millennia, study about religion as an aca-
demic subject apart from theology is more recent. Whereas theology depart-
ments proceeded from religious assumptions aiming to promulgate a faith
tradition, the religious studies field emerged as a discipline that sought to
bring a more disinterested social scientific approach to the study of religion.
The origins of this approach date back to the European research centers that
influenced U.S. scholars beginning in the 18th century. The formalization
of this trend, however, is a fairly recent phenomenon, as illustrated by the
1949 formation of Society for the Scientific Study of Religion with its own
scholarly journal and the creation of religious studies departments across
the United States in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court decision in 1963
that allowed teaching about religion (rather than for) in public education
institutions. It was also that same year that the American Academy of Reli-
gion was born out of a group of scholars that had since 1909 been meeting
under the various names related to biblical study.