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Latest Updates: Muslim education RSS

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  johnpi 11:18 pm on February 6, 2010 | 3 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: al Shabaab (39), al Shabab (43), education (70), Extremism (166), girls schools (6), Muslim education, women (80), women in Islam (22), women's education (4), Women's Rights in Islam (9)

  Al Shabab launches new effort to drive girls out of schools in areas it controls.

  The Al-Shabab movement in Somalia has issued directives in schools located in areas under its control, in an effort to instill Islamist ideology in the younger generation.

  Islamist authorities in Merca, located some 70 kilometers (43 miles) southwest of the capital Mogadishu, have ordered that boys and girls learn in separate classrooms and that the Somali national flag be replaced with the movement’s flag in schools, according to the London-based A-Sharq Al-Awsat.

  Observers and human rights activists are concerned that the new directives will help the Islamists spread a radical ideology among impressionable schoolchildren.
  ….

  Analysts suspect the directives are a sign the movement is trying to push girls out of the school system in moves reminiscent of the Taliban’s attacks against girls’ schools in Pakistan, since imposing separate schooling for boys and girls is logistically and financially impossible.

  “Al-Shabab has already demonstrated its clear need to subjugate women, and the expulsion of girls from schools fits into this,” Roque said, “in the same way that the Taliban separated men and women, their roles, their rights, and their role in the public and private spheres.”

   

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  abunoor 12:50 pm on December 31, 2009 | 6 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: Abdul Malik Mujahid (2), India (174), madrasas (5), Muslim education, Pakistan (569)

  Abdul Malik Mujahid, founder and president of Sound Vision), former Chairman of Council of Islamic Organizations of Greater Chicago, long known for his work with the interfaith and peace communities here in Chicago, creator of Radio Islam, and as johnpi mentioned earlier, about to be Chairman of Parliament of the World’s Religions, graduate of a Pakistani madrasah himself…has a cover article in the current Islamic Horizons magazine titled “Mad About Madrasahs” about the differences between the mythic madrasah in the minds of those who read western media and the reality of madrasahs.

  Unfortunately I don’t believe it is available online.

   
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  johnpi 8:06 am on December 31, 2009 | 3 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: bengal (2), education reform (2), madrassas (3), Muslim education, Pakistani madrassas (3), religious education (3)

  West Bengal madrassas draw non-Muslim students.

  In the eastern Indian state of West Bengal, many government-sponsored madrassas have become so successful that they attract large numbers of non-Muslim students. In some institutions, non-Muslims outnumber Muslims.

  The Brookings Doha Center, located in Qatar and sponsored by the Brookings Institution of Washington, cites West Bengal madrassas as models for modern education and has suggested that Pakistan emulate them.
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  Seventeen percent of the pupils studying in madrassas across West Bengal are non-Muslims, according to Abdus Sattar, West Bengal’s minority development and madrassa education minister.

  Unlike traditional madrassas, Bengal’s state-run versions follow a mainstream school curriculum. Their students are being groomed to become engineers, doctors, scientists and other modern professionals.

  West Bengal state’s ruling Communist Party government is happy to receive accolades from abroad, which it says it merits because it has ensured quality and progressiveness in madrassa syllabuses.

  “Our good work in Bengal’s madrassas is being recognized today. It’s heartening to note that the study advises Pakistan to emulate the Bengal model,” Mr. Sattar said.

   
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  johnpi 2:15 pm on November 11, 2009 | 14 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: 'Islam under siege', education (70), Extremism (166), Muslim education, NWFP (10), Pakistan (569), Pakistani Taliban (126), Pashtuns (11), predator drones (11), Punjab (8), religious education (3), Salafis (17), salafism (24), saudi arabia (135), shia (32), shia islam (6), sufi (9), Sufis (10), sufism (24), taliban (260), Terrorism (399), US foreign policy (62), US military (60), wahhabi (7), wahhabism (14), women in Islam (22)

  Pakistani magazine article: The Saudi-isation of Pakistan.

  Soldiers, policemen, factory and hospital workers, mourners at funerals and ordinary people praying in mosques have all been reduced to globs of flesh and fragments of bones. But, perhaps paradoxically, in spite of the fact that the dead bodies and shattered lives are almost all Muslim ones, few Pakistanis speak out against these atrocities. Nor do they approve of the army operation against the cruel perpetrators of these acts because they believe that they are Islamic warriors fighting for Islam and against American occupation. Political leaders like Nawaz Sharif and Imran Khan have no words of solace for those who have suffered at the hands of Islamic extremists. Their tears are reserved exclusively for the victims of Predator drones, even if they are those who committed grave crimes against their own people. Terrorism, by definition, is an act only the Americans can commit.
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  Villages have changed drastically; this transformation has been driven, in part, by Pakistani workers returning from Arab countries. Many village mosques are now giant madrassas that propagate hard-line Salafi and Deobandi beliefs through oversized loudspeakers. They are bitterly opposed to Barelvis, Shias and other sects, who they do not regard as Muslims. The Punjabis, who were far more liberal towards women than the Pukhtuns, are now beginning to take a line resembling that of the Taliban. Hanafi law has begun to prevail over tradition and civil law, as is evident from the recent decisions of the Lahore High Court.
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  Pakistan’s self-inflicted suffering comes from an education system that, like Saudi Arabia’s system, provides an ideological foundation for violence and future jihadists. It demands that Islam be understood as a complete code of life, and creates in the mind of a school-going child a sense of siege and embattlement by stressing that Islam is under threat everywhere.

   
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  johnpi 1:13 pm on October 4, 2009 | 2 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: basic education (2), education (70), evolution (28), gender segregation (16), islamic science (4), Muslim education, Orthodox Islam (3), orthodoxy (8), saudi arabia (135), science (70), science and religion (5)

  Saudi cleric who denounced new mixed-gender university and who said evolution is an “alien ideology,” resigns.

  A top Saudi cleric resigned from the board of the Council of Senior Clerics Sunday in the wake of controversy over his statements opposing gender mixing at the first co-ed university in the Kingdom.

  Sheikh Saad bin Nasser al-Shethri’s resignation from the senior ulema came just days after he appeared on the Qatar-based al-Majd satellite channel and lashed out at the newly-opened King Abdullah Science and Technology University for offering co-education.

  Shithri was one of several clerics who objected to the mixed gender university, which is outside the purview of the conservative cleric-dominated education ministry.
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  The senior cleric said religious scholars should vet the curriculum to prevent alien ideologies such as “evolution” and set up a committee to ensure it does not violate sharia, or Islamic law.

  “We are looking at some of the sciences that have included some irregular and alien ideologies, like evolution and such other ideologies,” the daily al-Watan newspaper quoted Shithri as saying last week in response to a viewer’s question.

  Two comments from TI contributors apply:

  Shams: “Heresy against orthodoxy in science is how advances are made.”

  Razib: “i think there’s a reason that the IQs of fundamentalists in the USA is so much lower than moderate, and especially liberal, religionists. the system is rigged so that any deviation from “orthodoxy” means the whole system collapses and one sees nihilism as the only valid alternative.”

   
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  buzz 2:42 pm on August 9, 2009 | 4 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: domestic terrorism (9), Extremism (166), Muslim education, pluralism (4), scotland (20), UK (121)

  The Solas Foundation is attempting to address muslim extremism in the UK.

  August 9, 2009

  Reclaiming Islam

  Unveiling a bold new plan to tackle the radicalism that was born in Bosnia and culminated in a shocking attack on Glasgow Airport
  Essay Of The Week By Azeem Ibrahim

  THE DAWN of the 21st century has not been a quiet one. Over the past decade, as we have become familiar with the threat posed by terrorism and extremism, we have had to search for ways of combating these forces. So what have we learned? There is, it seems, bad news and good news. The bad news is that there is only so much you can do to cure terrorism with wars, intelligence, policing and high-tech gadgets – in other words, most of the methods on which we have traditionally relied. The good news is that you can begin to prevent it, using methods that are cheap, simple, and not reliant upon government agencies. The best news of all is that this is best done from the grassroots up, which means that an entrepreneur like me can help.

  Later this month, my friends and I will establish a new Islamic educational organisation. The Solas Foundation will, among other things, teach young people about Islam in its proper context. It will provide organisations with advice on Islamic law and practice, and it will begin to strengthen the Muslim community. Ultimately, it will make Scotland and Britain safer.

  How, you might ask, could Islamic education possibly help to improve the security of all of us, Muslim and non-Muslim alike?

  The answer and the rest of the article here.

   
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  johnpi 5:32 am on August 1, 2009 | 0 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: education (70), Muslim education, Muslim science (3), science (70), Western education (2), Western science (3)

  Nigerian Catholic church releases statement on Islamist sect, condemns “any religious movement that would subvert the progress that has been made in education and technology in Nigeria.”

  “We, therefore, call on the leaders of the Boko Haram movement (translated as Western education is sin), currently causing hardship for innocent ordinary citizens in the northern parts of the country, to adopt a creative approach to their religious practice in order to give honour and glory to Almighty God.”

  The church said that the underlying pillars of any religion include the principles of justice and progress; tolerance and the dignity of all human beings.

  “Modern education and modern civilizations do not preclude ardent religious devotion. In fact, it should be underlined that Islam, as a religious practice, from places like Al-Azhar, carried the light of learning through so many centuries and paved the way for Europe’s renaissance and enlightenment.”

  Muslim communities have contributed to the development of the order of algebra, magnetic compass and tools for navigation, the mastery of pens and printing, mastery of the knowledge of diseases and healing technologies, timeless poetry and cherished music, and calligraphy, the church stated.

  “We therefore condemn any religious movement that would subvert the progress that has been made in education and technology in Nigeria and at the same time thwart law and order. We condemn a descent to religious fanaticism that would destroy our national peace and stability.”