Making Islamic Education Relevant For Today
By Abdullah Hakim Quick | 2026-01-15T12:00:00.69762+00:00 | Topic: Iman
Making Islamic Education Relevant For Today
Opening Praise and Supplication
"In the name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful.
All praise is due to Allah, Lord of the worlds. May Allah send peace and blessings upon the Seal of the Prophets and Messengers, our master Muhammad, and upon his family and companions all together. And then to proceed..."
My beloved brothers and sisters, I greet you with the greeting of peace. I ask Allah that this talk will be a source of understanding and a source of inspiration for myself and you in the coming days. We have reached a very critical point now in the development of the Islamic communities here in the West.
It is of great importance for those who are in leadership positions, especially for those who are involved in education, that we begin to look very seriously at our present condition, reflecting on the past, and also projecting somewhat into the future. Insha'Allah, with the help of Allah, we can stand up to the great challenges that we are facing, especially in the coming millennium, in this time change that we are making, and with the great crises our society is facing.
The Command to Speak Truthfully
"I seek refuge in Allah from the accursed Satan."
Allah has told us in the Quran:
"O you who have believed, fear Allah and speak words of appropriate justice. He will amend for you your deeds and forgive you your sins. And whoever obeys Allah and His Messenger has certainly attained a great attainment." (Quran 33:70-71)
So I want to speak to you today in this spirit of speaking truthfully. That is because I would not come all this way and go through the changes that I've been going through—Toronto is getting cold now, by the way; coming to Miami is like a sauna bath-I wouldn't go through these changes just to say sweet nothings or say something that would tickle your ears and make you feel good. We all need to feel good, but we need to deal with reality.
We need to be very honest and sincere and respectful with each other when we are speaking about our conditions.
The Growth of Muslim Communities in the West
In Toronto now, our community has expanded to over 250,000 Muslims. It is expanding so rapidly that the government is in shock when they realize how many Muslims there are living in the metro Toronto area, now called the Greater Toronto area, and in Canada itself.
A recent survey said that 20% of the children born in Canadian hospitals are Muslims today in Canada. This is a number that was not known so well. People did not know Canada as a country where Muslims were expanding at this rate.
But with expansion, we are developing some very serious problems. And for a long time we were in a state of denial. We buried our heads in the sand. We said: "No, we are Muslims. We have the Quran. We have the Sunnah. We have the best way. We are the best nation raised up for people." And the problems continued.
The Reality of Migration and Cultural Transition
When the young people who were growing up within families—many of the families migrated to this part of the world from the Muslim countries with the intention of only staying in America to gain an education. Some people came here just to make a little money. Their intention was to return to the Muslim world.
But with the catastrophic changes that went on in the Muslim world in the 70s, 80s, and even in the 90s, it made it almost impossible for many of the Muslims to return to their countries in Africa, in the Middle East, and in Asia because of the changes that had gone on. When ten years went by, when twenty years went by, they turned around and looked at their children.
They were no longer little children running around, little Zainab and Zaid, mashallah, tabarakallah. They were now young adults. And in many cases, they had their own opinions about things. They were American or Canadian in their outlook as well as Islamic. And so we realized the need to come together for education.
The Islamic Heritage in the Americas
Another large faction in our community have been embracing Islam or re-entering into Islam in the Americas for the past 200 years. The African-American people, as you may know, are entering into Islam in large numbers. This is not a coincidence.
What you have to realize is that over 30% of the African people who were captured, who were prisoners of war and brought to this part of the world in a state of slavery, were Muslims. And what you have to realize is that not only were they Muslims who were captured and brought here, but in many cases, they were ulama.
It has now come to the surface that in Brazil, in the south, there was a huge slavery revolt. The Muslims actually had an Islamic state. They were ruling by sharia. They had Bayt al-Mal, a treasury house. They were doing amr
bil ma'ruf wal nahy 'an al-munkar─calling to the good, forbidding the evil. The Portuguese gave them boats and let them return to West Africa.
In Suriname, Dutch Guyana, in Jamaica, in Haiti, all throughout the Caribbean region and in the United States, there were scholars of Islam. There were scholarly communities. There were individuals who were leading revolts, who were also communicating with each other in classical Arabic.
In Jamaica, they found an underground society with scholars from Timbuktu and Djenne, who were communicating to each other and sending documents in classical Arabic language. In America, Omar bin Said -his writings have come forward now. He was writing the Quran by heart with the Maghribi, the khat, the script in Morocco. He was also writing Al-Risalah, the fiqh work of Ibn Abi Zayd al-Qayrawani. This is an important work in Maliki fiqh.
These types of works were being circulated amongst the people here. But the pain of slavery—mother separated from father, language being lost—the Muslims and other religions were not able to maintain their faith, but they knew they were different. And so that feeling of being different and the hidayah from Allah has now manifested itself with such large numbers now of African Americans returning to the faith.
Native American Muslim Connections
Also the Native Americans, who for a long time were looked upon as people who were outside of the parameters of civilization—we now realize that Muslims had contact with the Native people before Columbus. We also recognize the fact that during the Spanish period, when the Spanish came as conquerors, and the French colonial period, there were Muslims who came as workers. Some escaped and went to the Native people. So amongst the nations of the Natives, there are actually traces of Islam.
Right here in Florida, the Seminole nation—Seminoles have written records and there are also pictures and cultural traits showing that Muslims were amongst them. A group of Seminoles—there's a book called Black Indians a group of Seminoles went to Washington D.C. and met with the government, and they had turbans on and they had abaya. Some of them had openly Muslim names. This is right in Florida.
So this reality is coming to the surface: that what we are dealing with now is a transition into something that was already here but was covered up. And so those who have understood history, those who have controlled the masses in this country, in the western world for the last two to three hundred years, they recognize this fact. They know this.
The Global Economic and Social Crisis
Secondly, they also understand that on an international level, the present economic system is falling apart. Capitalism is being destroyed or is going into a recession now. Marx and Engels and those socialist and communist theoreticians who looked at the economy of the world recognized the fact that somewhere in the
20th century there would be a great recession and capitalism would fall apart, and so they developed this communist ideology to supersede it, but it didn't work.
Communism fell apart, especially when the Russians invaded Afghanistan and they killed the innocent Muslims and the Mujahideen took a stand in that part of the world. We know, if you read what the Prophet said about the du'a and about what happens when an innocent person is attacked who has a connection with Allah. He told us:
(Sahih al-Bukhari 2448, Sahih Muslim 19)
"Beware of the prayer of the oppressed person. There is no barrier between that du'a and Allah."
So the Soviet Union fell and communism as a viable way of life is falling apart. Even Fidel Castro's Cuba, which was the seedbed of socialism in this part of the world, is falling apart now. Everybody is running toward capitalism. And so with those two systems falling apart, the potential civilization which can supersede the present civilizations is the Islamic way of life, the Islamic civilization.
The Legacy of Islamic Civilization
In the last millennium, the year 1000 of the Christian era—and they're speaking about millennium and how important millennium is—but the last millennium, the largest city in the world was Cordoba. Cordoba in Spain, that was known as Al-Andalus in that time. At that time there were over a million people living. You could walk in any direction for 20 kilometers and the streets were lit. Lights, running water, universities, public baths, and the great scholars and those who sought civilization and education from throughout Europe and different parts of the world would go into Seville and Toledo and Granada, Valencia, and also to other parts of the Muslim world in order to get an education.
The same way we come to the University of Miami today. We go to Oxford or Sorbonne. We go to the non-Muslim capitals and we take off our Islamic lifestyle and we become like them, seeking an education to go back to our countries. The last millennium, the scholars of the world would throw off their cultures, learn Arabic, learn how to make wudu and clean themselves, and learn to write properly, and then go amongst the Muslims. Then they would take that back to their countries.
If you can really go into the source books dealing with civilization, the Renaissance, the new coming to life of civilization in Europe in the 14th, 15th century, you will see it is the legacy of the Muslim world.
The Tawhidic Educational System
Now, one of the important parts of this civilization that I wanted to just focus on, without going into details, is the fact that Muslims were able to develop a type of Tawhidic, all-inclusive educational system. That is, through
the concept of Tawhid, of oneness and unity, we not only saw that we were creations under Allah, and that there is one God, but also we related to knowledge from any part of the world.
"Wisdom is the lost property of a believer."
That hikmah, that wisdom and knowledge, wherever it comes from, is the lost property of a believer. Anywhere you get it. This is the property of a Muslim.
So the Muslims were able to take the knowledge of the Greeks, the Romans, the Egyptians, from India, from parts of Africa, from all parts of the world, were able to put it together with Quranic understanding, and give it a new type of dynamism, make it relevant—the number system. Roman numerals were confusing people.
So with Islamic concepts and also with knowledge of ancient India and ancient Egypt─because it's probably in the ancient pyramid, the step pyramid in Saqqara, in Egypt, there is writing from the old kingdom, 3000 BC, using zero decimal numbers, in ancient Egypt. So it's probably there where they first began to use it. It also went to India; it manifested itself.
So Muslims were able to take this, give it their understanding. Sifr-zero is an Arabic word. The number system, Algebra from al-jabr, and it goes on—your trigonometry, your calculus, all this came from this Islamic understanding using the Arabic language. And so they were able to give it a new life, a new impetus, and then it was ready to serve the world.
The Decline of Muslim Civilization
Now, unfortunately, we ourselves left our faith. In the next generations, we forgot Allah. We began to look at each other as nations and tribes. Arabi, Ajami. You're an Arab or non-Arab. Persian, Turkish, Berber, you come from different parts of the world, you're Chinese, you're Senegalese. Looking at different nations and different tribes, we divided up.
Also the rich began to look at themselves differently than the poor. The Ashraf, the noble ones, relating to the family of the Prophet, even saw themselves as a class or a tabaqa, a type of caste above the other Muslims. Corruption came in with the wealth.
And so when this came in, and as the Prophet said in the Hadith of Thawban, that a disease would strike the Muslims, there would be large numbers, they would be defeated—you probably heard this hadith—they would be like the foam and scum on the top of the surface, no weight. When they asked him: "What is the disease that would come into the hearts of the Muslims?" He told them:
"That you would love the life of this world, and you would hate death." (Sunan Abi Dawud 4297)
The Current Crisis After Five Centuries
Today we are now coming into the 500th year we are living under this material civilization after five centuries. And what is the result? Pollution. The environment is turning against us. This El Niño thing, La Niña, it is going out of control. And in the next 10 years we are going to see catastrophic environmental changes.
So the economy of the world is falling apart. The environment is falling apart. The social life is falling apart. The political system is falling apart. And we have the alternative.
The Colonial Legacy and Islamic Education
Now let's be honest with ourselves. We are coming out of a colonial period. In that colonial period we were forced to submit to another culture. Whether it be the Italians, the French, the British, the Spanish, the Dutch, the Belgians, whoever it was who conquered our countries.
In order to have upward mobility you had to ape the culture, imitate the culture of the colonial rulers. The more etiquette you had, the more characteristics you had of the elite of the colonial office, the higher you rise. The more Islamic you were, in your etiquette and adab, they would consider you to be outside of civilization. They would consider you to be uncivilized.
And they came into some countries, and even though the people wrote in Arabic language, and they spoke their own language, whether it's Turkish, Persian, Kiswahili, Hausa, Malay, whatever that language was, the Bosnian language and then if you did not write, if you weren't literate in French and English, or Italian, they said you're illiterate. Even though you could write Arabic. Even though you knew your Persian language. You were good in Turkish. If you did not know that language, you were illiterate.
So therefore our schools became French schools. British, English schools. And we were striving for this. In some countries, even officially, when high school students would take tests, they would send the best students to medical school. Engineering school. Accountancy. Law school. And the ones who could not make it on the test, they send you to the Quran school. Officially in some countries they do that. Even up until now, they do it in some countries.
So what happened with that? Islamic education was looked upon as not being the highest education. It was good and important, but it wasn't the highest.
The Gem of Islam
Now with the fall of communism, with the falling of capitalism, with morality going so low in this part of the world-even in the White House, morality totally out of control—Muslims are realizing that their Islam is a gem. It's like a diamond. A beautiful gem. And we've been covering it up all this time.
Now we need to take the gem out and show it to the world. We need to benefit from it first and then show it to the world. How do we do this? I want to be very practical with you. Because we don't have any more time left. I'm telling you. And if you understand the history of this country, we don't have much time left.
The Importance of Shame and Modesty
The Prophet said in a hadith reported by Abu Mas'ud Uqba ibn Amr al-Ansari. In this hadith, the Prophet ﷺ said:
(Sahih al-Bukhari 3484)
"From what has come to us, what the people have understood from the words of the early prophetic revelation: if you don't have haya (shame), then do anything. You're capable of anything."
And that's the situation now. In this society, even though it is so powerful technologically, shame has gone out of the people. And why did the Prophet ﷺ say:
(Sahih al-Bukhari 24, Sahih Muslim 36)
"Modesty and shame is part of faith."
This is what distinguishes, one of the distinguishing points about a Muslim: how he or she deals with other people. Not weakness, but it is humility and modesty for Allah.
The Challenge of Modern Islamic Education
And so now our challenge, which is a very interesting challenge, is that we now have to resurrect the Islamic teachings and bring it in line with the technology of the 20th century. And then bring that new dynamism again that can be used in the 21st century. This is, I believe, one of our greatest challenges that we face.
If we are able to do this, Insha'Allah, then I believe strongly that we will have a definite alternative to these societies. But that means we have to focus, I believe, strongly in two areas. One is the area of education. And secondly is the area of the family.
Because without families as the building blocks of society, there is no society. And without education, without people who are carrying that Islamic understanding and have the dynamism and the knowledge and capability, then we don't have direction. So we need to focus on this.
The Priority of Family and Education
For a long time, Muslims focus on the political aspects, the economic aspects. When you have a lecture in a community or a gathering, if you talk about the family issues, then you only get maybe about 5 to 10 percent of the community comes out. And three quarters are sisters. If you're talking about the family, right?
If you're talking about education, in the past, they would also—you'd only get 40 percent of the community. If you talk politics—this jamaat against that jamaat, this imam did wrong and the executive committee is gonna get him everybody's out there. The place is crowded. They want the politics.
Bring a hot political issue from the Muslim world. Islamic state. Islamic state. Overthrow the government. Hot political issue. Everybody comes out.
But when they went to one of the great scholars of Islam, Ahmed Zarruq, rahimahullah, from Morocco, and they asked him about Islamic state. And he looked at people who were not even dealing with the Islam and he told them, he said:
"They are asking for the victory without fulfilling the conditions of the victory."
You want Medina and you haven't gone through Mecca yet. You want to have an Islamic state, but yet Tawhid is not in your heart. Your character is not developed yet. And so the family is a crucial issue that we have to look at and we have to not bury our heads in the sand.
The Need for Islamic Social Services
What we developed in Toronto is Islamic social services. It's a new institution where we do family counseling. We deal with the issues. There's a problem between husband and wife, parents and children. Teenagers are running away. Children's Aid Society is taking your child. Let's deal with reality now. This is the basis of our community. Social services.
Those who are involved in social services have to have confidentiality. That means they have to keep the secrets of other Muslims. We have this bad tendency amongst us that we talk too much. We talk. And especially people from the same nationality.
I had people come in. A person came in from Bangladesh and they said: "I'll tell you my problem, but don't tell the Bengalis." Another person came from Egypt and they said: "Yes, I'll tell you, but don't tell the Egyptians." Every country they say that. They're afraid of their own people. Why? Because when people hear things, they get on the phone. "Oh, you know what happened to such and such and fulan fulan and this and that," and they're talking and then suddenly your business is all over.
The leadership, those in responsible positions have to have secrecy. Confidentiality. They do not speak about people's secrets. They do not carry namimah or begin namimah, scandal. The Prophet ﷺ said:
"The person who carries scandal will not enter Paradise." (Sahih al-Bukhari 6056, Sahih Muslim 105)
That's serious. It's very serious. And so confidentiality and also facing the issues head on and trying to give solutions that are Islamic and also dealing with the best professional methodologies used in this part of the world. Combining both worlds.
So doctors, social workers, lawyers need to come together with imams, community leaders and work together now to solve the family problems. And if it means you need a safe area where an abused woman or an abused child can come to that area and not feel threatened, then you need to have that. This is a crucial issue.
We have to go at these problems and try to develop the kind of family where the home is a source of peace. The home is not a battleground. If the home is a battleground, then how can we go out and spread peace in the land?
Making Islamic Education Relevant
The second area which I want to focus on a little bit more, especially since we are here in education—we're involved in education—and I'm sure that some of the points that I'm going to mention here to you have already been discussed by you. This is not...I don't believe that what I'm saying is something new. But I want to just give you some ideas that we have come across in our struggle in education in Canada and that area and what I've seen over the years traveling in the communities. And this is making Islamic education relevant to the society we're living in. How can these courses that we're doing become relevant? Because we need to have that.
One of the problems we faced about our Sunday schools, our weekend schools, is that the children started to get really bored. Everybody's memorizing Falaq al-Nas and Qul Huwa Allahu Ahad. They're reading the same seerah story. And they come in and sleep, you know, all during the class. And they're bored. They want to stay home and watch cartoons, right? This is what we face. This is not you though. I know that's not you. This is our community. They want to stay home and they want to watch cartoons.
So we have to think about making Islamic education relevant. Also, we have to think about our goals. What are the goals that you're moving toward through your education? That's important when you set your curriculum. That you have something in mind as an objective. Where are you going with this?
Eight Educational Objectives
1. Providing Access to Original Sources
Number one, we need to try to provide access to original sources of Islam. We have to begin to get our youth interested in going into original Arabic sources. That they can have a taste of the Arabic language and they can begin to love the search of Arabic language. And that also means Arabic speaking people. That's what it also means.
Because many of the Arabic speaking countries, in their street language, the 'ammiyah, what we call Patois here, it's very different than Fusha.
All types of things people are saying. You know what I'm talking about, right? We're teaching "Ma ismuka." Some countries they say:
And all these different things for "Ma ismuka." Okay, now we want to teach classical Arabic. So even an Arabic speaking person can begin to get the taste of Quranic Arabic and then converse with others in this. Through this knowledge, we can begin to get access to the original sources. That gives us access to the original sources.
2. Separating Islam from Culture
Secondly, and these are some broad objectives: we need to separate Islam from culture. Islam from culture. Because many times, what is transmitted to the student is not necessarily the principles of Islam, it is the cultural practice in a particular country. And that means that the teacher has got to be very clear. Be able to go to the sources themselves and make sure that they're not teaching cultural things. This can come in prayer, this can come in general dealings, character, and a lot of different areas.
3. Reconstructing the Islamic Personality
The third area is that we need to go about reconstructing the Islamic personality. To reconstruct the Islamic personality. This is an all-around personality. A person who is dunya and akhira. Both combined. Striving in this world, not of the world, not controlled by the world, but striving in this world toward the next life. Not one extreme or the other extreme.
4. Developing Muthaqafeen and Ulama
And fourth, we need to develop muthaqafeen and ulama. Now somebody who is muthaqaf, that is a person who has thaqafah, who has Islamic culture, education, general Islamic education. People who take courses like the one I did in Medina, who studied the usul of the deen, become muthaqaf. It is not an alim.
An alim is somebody who brings you the sources, who memorizes the whole Quran and can really bring the sources. There are other people who are cultured people. And that is a goal that we need to shoot for here. That at least we can produce students who are cultured in Islam. They have a taste of Islamic studies. They know how to access original sources. And they can translate the great works of the ulama and the scholars of the Muslim world into a relevant type of practice for today.
But also we need from the youngest students to project on making or developing ulama. And that is people who learn, who memorize Quran before they are 10 years old. You know the system. Memorize Quran before they are 10 years old, control the Arabic language, get into hadith, get into their studies, and then they go into Islamic education. We will have to produce in our next generation ulama.
The Role of Women Scholars
And I want to stress here that the ulama are not just men. That they are also women. And I say this because if you look at the Isnad, you look at Imam al-Shafi'i, Imam Malik, you look at many of the great scholars of Islam, you will find that there are women who also taught them.
We were studying a book of Sidi Ahmed Zarruq, rahimahullah, from Fes, one of the great scholars in Morocco. And within his Isnad, one of his greatest teachers was his grandmother. His grandmother. And he actually came up under her first before he went out to actually go to other people. And so you will find many great scholars like this. They are learning from their mothers, they are learning from their grandmother, knowledge is in their home, they are learning from a woman also, especially in their early years. And so this is important.
And then again the situation with the sisters themselves: what is happening now is that there are women in this society who want to hear about Islam. And somebody's got to teach them.
Women's Rights in Islamic Education
And sisters have to understand their rights. Just in the marriage area alone: How many sisters know about the rules of kafa'ah, suitability? How do you make suitability between your young child, or your teenager, your young adult, and another young adult to get married? What is suitability? How do you go into it?
How many of us know, even in divorce—and this divorce thing is plaguing us in our community-how many sisters know about khul' or khala'? You know they have the right to give back the mahr. How many know about faskh? That the marriage can be annulled if the man does not fulfill certain rights within the marriage. How many know?
People don't know that. They're stuck within marriage, like the practice of the orthodox Jews. And it comes out what we call al-mu'allaqah, where women are hung between marriage and divorce. And the husband says, he leaves her, and he said: "I will not divorce you until the Day of Judgment. I'll never divorce you." So you'll be hanging in between marriage, you'll never get married again. That's not Islamic. This mu'allaqah is not Islamic. And the sharia has solutions to this. There's solutions, but we don't know this.
Understanding Mahr (Dowry)
The mahr, the dowry itself. How many know the importance of the mahr? There was even one discussion in Shafi'i fiqh where they were talking about the mahr: if there is a difference of opinion between the two families as to how much the mahr would be for the girl, then you give the dowry or the mahr based upon the average dowry given to a woman in your area. If there's a difference of opinion, then you give the average dowry in your area.
What is the average dowry given in Miami? Does anybody know? Think about that. Does anybody know the average dowry? What is the average dowry? Is it $5,000? Is it $20,000? Is it a leather jacket and a pager? What is it? What is the dowry? We're not sure.
These are the kind of areas that through our education we need to go into to build our community. Therefore, we need to develop these types of leaders.
Seven Areas of Educational Emphasis
Some of the relevant areas of emphasis. I want to just put out a few areas of emphasis that we can emphasize on in our education.
1. Developing Classical Arabic Skills
One is, as I said before, developing a sound basis in classical Arabic. That is to nurture in the students the four skills: reading, writing, comprehension, speaking. Comprehension meaning hearing and speaking. To develop these skills.
Right from the beginning, we need to try to develop in the students speaking. A basic hiwar that can go on between the students. So they're using their Arabic. Even:
And they're talking like:
And then they're going on. So they're using things. If they know this:
They're using that. They know (جُمْلَةُ ٱسْمِيَّةٍ - jumlatusmiyyah) they know a noun sentence. They can use a noun sentence. They didn't have to put the verb "to be" in that sentence. So they have learned the grammar rule.
If you try to teach them (جُمْلَةُ ٱسْمِيَّةٍ - jumlatusmiyyah) you'll frighten everybody out of the room. Because Arabic grammar can seem intimidating. But if you start to use it, it's logical. It's logical language. English is illogical language. G-H- T and P-H. And all these letters that, you know, are written and not pronounced. And you have to learn so many exceptions to the rules, right? Arabic is very logical, but you gotta learn the rules, right? Once you know the rules, then you can get into the Arabic. So, to emphasize this.
2. Sciences of Quran and Hadith
Secondly, (عُلُومُ ٱلْقُرْآنِ وَٱلْحَدِيثِ - 'uloomul qur'ani walhadeeth). That we start to learn the 'ulum. That we learn something about the Quran itself. In the sense of how, when it was revealed. You know, what types of verses are there? Makki, Madani. Medinan verses. You know, the (عُلُومُ ٱلْقُرْآنِ - 'uloomul qur'ani). The tafsir. Start to go into the taste of the Quran. Right?
And then also into the hadith. That we start to go into the hadith to get an idea, give the students a feel of hadith. What is isnad? How this, you know, chain of narrators. What is a good hadith? And what is a weak hadith? What is a strong hadith? Give them a taste, so they can start to see how beautiful this (عُلُومُ ٱلْقُرْآنِ - 'uloomul qur'ani) really is.
Proper Approach to the Quran
In looking at the Quran itself, again, we should be very sincere to it. We should have:
That we should have beautification of the reading of the Quran. We should read it with tajweed. Tajweed. Or tarteel as they say.
That you give the proper rights to the letters. And you know the stops. How to stop and start. Tajweed. Everybody needs to learn that.
But also, we need to learn that we have to follow it. As many times we read the Quran, but we don't follow the verse. We don't love the Quran. As the Prophet said, the time would come when people would be reading the Quran in melodious tones and it wouldn't go past their throats. Okay? Wouldn't touch their hearts.
And lastly. We need to reflect on the verses. Learn to reflect on the Quran and reflect on the meanings.
3. Practical Sessions in Tawhid
The third area we need to focus on is practical sessions in Tawhid. And that is the oneness of Allah. Because that is the essence of Islam itself. And we need to focus in this society that our essence is not just certain clothes that we wear. It's not just certain language or food that we eat. The essence of being Muslim is the belief in one God. And we accept all the Prophets and the Prophet Muhammad صلى الله عليه وسلم as the last Prophet. So this needs to be a practical Tawhid.
Showing Tawhid amongst the Prophets. Showing Tawhid in other nations. You can also show Tawhid. Then showing especially what they call (تَوْحِيدُ ٱلْعِبَادَةِ - tawheedul 'ibaadah). And that is the unity in worship. How Tawhid plays itself out in your worship. Not only just in Salah, but in your dealings with other people. And (تَوْحِيدُ ٱلْعِبَادَةِ - tawheedul 'ibaadah) goes into even magic, superstition, all the different forms of shirk that can come into the ummah.
This is one of our great problems now that's holding us back. Is that we're afraid of everything except Allah. Afraid of the night. Afraid of jinn coming inside of us. Afraid of magicians putting spells on us. Right, we're afraid of these things.
You start talking about the jinn amongst people and everybody's eyes get big. Their eyes get big. He said: "Yes, last night I saw the footprints were backwards. The feet were backwards and they're walking. And I heard sounds outside. Something happened to me. I have a headache brother Abdullah, I have a headache."
He's stressed out. He's got two jobs. He's a victim of stress, but he thinks the jinn is inside of his head. And so to have that belief in Allah and to have that feeling, that connection with the Creator.
4. Understanding the Prophetic Biography
The fourth point we would emphasize is (ٱلسِّيرَةُ ٱلنَّبَوِيَّةُ - as-seeratun nabawiyyah). And especially what they would call (فِقْةُ ٱلسِّيرَةِ - fiqh tusseerah) the understanding of the seerah. You don't just read it as a story. Take knowledge from the different incidents that happened to the Prophet of Islam and his followers. And you can read (سِيرَةُ ٱبْنِ إِسْحَاقَ - seeratubni is'haaq). You can read (ٱلشَّفَاءُ لِلْقَاضِي عِيَاضٍ - ash-shifaa'u lilqaadi 'iyaad) a number of works that you can read where you will find seerah being expressed in a way where you can get something out of it.
Okay, this brings alive Islamic teachings. Seerah is important. And we use this as one of our main subjects for the students. And that is because the young people here, especially those who watch television a lot, and that's just about everybody—they're used to watching stories. Everything is a story.
The hero is there and his family is blown up by this wicked guy. And now he's gonna go get him. He's gotta get the evil people. The aliens have just landed over there. So they see a story and it comes to a conclusion. And some of these stories even teach them something. Unfortunately, they're teaching them the wrong ideas. But they'll teach them something with that story.
When you tell some of the stories of the Prophet of Islam, it's not just a story. It teaches something that we can learn from. If you go deep into it, it teaches tafsir. It teaches fiqh. It can teach hadith. Everything can be inside of the seerah.
Stories of the Companions
Also, you can teach what is called the stories of the Sahaba, radiyallahu anhum. And there is a work by Abdul Wahid Hamid, which is in English, called Companions of the Prophet. If you can't go to the Arabic sources, you can go to Companions of the Prophet. And there's female also companions, sahabiyat. And these are practical stories. And when the children hear this, then it's an example of somebody who did something.
Then you can go through Islamic history and you can look at different individuals in Islamic history and you can follow their lives. Tariq ibn Ziyad, Salah al-Din al-Ayyubi, many different people throughout history. You can see their examples right up until recent times. And these can be used.
5. Basic Fiqh and Tolerance Between Schools
Number six is basic fiqh. Basic fiqh. Simple, practical fiqh. So the students can begin to taste what fiqh is and to know how to make their prayers properly, taharah, and all these different aspects in a simple way.
But I want to stress that we need to have tolerance between schools of thought. There's a problem happening in some parts of America where people are now getting themselves fortified around schools of thought. "I am a
Hanafi. I am a Shafi'i. I am a Maliki." And in some cases they look at each other: "You Shafi'i?" Some people said: "Well, I mean..."
They came to me and they said: "Can a Hanafi marry a Shafi'i?" Right? As though it's like two different religions. They're fortifying themselves. Yes, you need to have a school of thought as the basis of your fiqh. But not to be intolerant.
There's another new wave that says no school of thought. Don't have any school of thought. Don't go to any of the scholars. That's another extreme position. This extremism. Because you cannot negate the great scholars of Islam. At the same time, you have to go back to the scholars themselves and see how tolerant they were of each other. How their love of the sources made them love the other scholars. They were teachers and students of each other. They were not rivals making different churches like Jehovah's Witnesses and Pentecostals and Baptists. This is a different concept which is alien to us.
Understanding Halal and Haram
The seventh point is that, okay, also in fiqh: halal and haram. That we need to have general courses in halal and haram so the students have a practical application of halal and haram in their life.
6. Character and Interpersonal Relations
Number seven is the sunnah in akhlaq, character and mu'amalat. Okay? That we have emphasized for a long time, ibadat. How to pray, how to fast. But we need to emphasize now character and dealings. Interpersonal relationships, mu'amalat.
And there's a whole body of sunnah in this area. How you deal with people, how you address people, your respect for each other, respect for children, for adults, adults for children, men for women, modesty, how you deal, mu'amalat. You know, how you do business. There's a lot of different areas of the sunnah in this field.
7. Knowledge of the Environment
Eight, knowledge of the environment, fiqh al-waqi'ah. And in that you need to have a general history of—you look at history from an Islamic perspective. Also we need to look at the history of this part of the world to get a general idea with Islamic perspective. What is the history of Muslims in this part of the world? That's an interesting subject.
Because you might not know, there might have been Muslims right here in the same place, when there was no university, in a little masjid. And they tried for 50 years, and then they went, they got lost. You need to know about them, so you don't fall in the same trap that they fell into.
Supplementary Aspects of Islamic Education
Now coming to a conclusion, some of the supplementary aspects of Islamic education.
Creating an Islamic Setting
One is, as much as possible, we need an Islamic setting. You need to have an Islamic setting. And you need to try to set things around you. To start to appreciate some of the Islamic, even in designs, in clothing, in your food, and what not. You need to go into your culture.
Our children are in great need of culture. Because our culture now is becoming the Dajjalic culture of the West. Even in Mecca and Medina they have Pizza Hut, McDonald's. It's all over the place. So we need to get them to appreciate other parts of Islam.
You know, in many Muslim countries for a hobby, Muslims used to do calligraphy, khat. And they learned how to do the khat, very beautiful. Now it's basketball, right, baseball. Okay, it's good to be athletic, right? But if that's your main hobby in life, you want to be Michael Jordan, you got a problem. Because only one in a billion are going to be like Michael Jordan in this society. And a Muslim is not going to be able to do all the things that he had to do to get that money. Because we have limits. Okay?
And so, hobbies, Islamic hobbies. Okay, this is an important thing. Culture, even making pottery. Okay, designing things. The Muslims used to design. Go to some of the Muslim countries. Go to Syria. Go to Borno, in the eastern part of Nigeria. Go to Morocco. Go to some parts of Pakistan. And look, even in the furniture, there's Islamic design. In the clothing, there's Islamic design.
We had this before. We had a taste for Islam where our Islam appeared in everything that we were doing. Even in food that is given out to you. Even, you know, we used to have these little ritual things that they might seem trivial. But even serving tea and coffee to each other. How do you serve a guest? And serve coffee to your guest. And tea.
Islamic Etiquette and Hospitality
Somebody comes to your house in Miami and they're sitting down. Okay? What do they need? Especially if they come from Canada. They need a drink of water. Get them some water. Right? So you shouldn't even say anything. You should be bringing water. That's Islamic adab.
What do our children know? Somebody comes in. You sit down. Turn on the TV. He's dying. He's thirsty. And suddenly he says: "Can I have a drink of water, brother?" And then you say: "Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. There's a guest here." Because the TV captured you, right? But the etiquette of Islam now deals with your guest. You know, see his health. See what he needs. Or she needs. Take care of them. Right?
These are little things. But this is our culture. That's what spread Islam. That's why Islam spread across the Niger River and to Hausa land and all the areas. That's why it spread in Indonesia. That's why Indonesia is the largest Muslim country. It was merchants that went to Indonesia.
In India itself, the Hindus were influenced by Muslims. All throughout the world, it is really the merchants and the scholars and the people of character who spread Islam.
Practical Recreation and Sports
The next point is we need practical recreation. We need to have along in our classes. We even took a period of time in our Sunday school classes. Just showing you our example. We would teach Seerah. We would teach some Quran. We would teach some Hadith. And then we had wrestling class. Wrestling.
So you separate the boys and you separate the girls. And the boys would do wrestling. And we get a Muslim brother who's good in wrestling or good in martial arts and he teaches them. So they have sports, right? That's what they love.
The girls too need sports. Some people say: "Well, wait a minute. No, the girls need sports too." You look at the Sahabiyat. Read about the Battle of the Trench. And read about Muslim women. You'll see they fought also. They knew how to fight. They lived a tough life also.
In Toronto, we had a rapist who was targeting Muslim women. Only Muslim women he loved. And so we started Wendo classes, which is women's self defense. And a woman comes in and she teaches the sisters they can still wear loose clothing. And she teaches them how to defend themselves if a rapist comes. How you defend yourself, what you do.
And even at the end of the course, the sister broke the board. And said: "Sister Zainab broke the board on May 22, 1998." And some sisters, as you may have heard before I said this, some sisters put it over their bed. In their bedroom. So next time they got into an argument with their husband, he looked at the board. And he said:
"Mashallah, Tabarakallah. (Quran 42:38). We will solve our problem in mutual consultation." Right? He looked at the board. That's Zainab. Right?
Outdoor Activities and Skills
So practical recreation. Riding. Horse riding. Take them sometimes for horse riding. I saw a store here in Miami where they were selling saddles and what not. Go outside of the city of Miami and you find some people, you know, they're fishing, they're horse riding, they're hunting. Take the Muslims hunting. These are our skills, right?
Swimming. Let them swim. Even the sisters, you can get an area, get a beach area or something and let the sisters be in an area. They can still wear, you know, some parts of their clothing. They don't have to wear the clothing of the other people. And they can go inside that area. Brothers protect the area and let them swim.
What we did is that we even worked with the city of Toronto and we got pools, swimming pools and we had only women in the pools. Only Muslim sisters. And we had some sisters who learned from women. They took
lifeguard courses. So the Muslim sisters were in the pool and they were able to swim in the pools. And they learned to swim.
These are some practical points that we need to have to supplement our education.
Skills Training
Number three, as I said, skills training. And that can include carpentry, agriculture, home economics and so forth and so on.
Seven Qualities of Effective Leadership
So I want to leave you with these points. And, you know, it is a challenge that we have in front of us. But really, in this coming period, in this time which is coming on us so rapidly, we need to have the type of leadership that can handle the challenges of the 21st century.
It is that leadership in summary which has:
- Proper knowledge of Islam and has Taqwa
- Balance and wisdom (Hikmah)
- Islamic character
- Courage and conviction
- A knowledge of the environment
- Emphasis on unity and cooperation with others
- A positive approach
As the Prophet ﷺ used to say to his followers when he would send them out:
(Sahih al-Bukhari 69, Sahih Muslim 1734)
"Don't make it difficult. Call them to what's good. Call them to Islam. Don't drive people away."
Closing Prayer
May Allah help us in the coming of the 21st century. And may Allah develop the type of Muslim homes and Islamic education that we need to present a dynamic system not only for the Muslim world but for the whole of the planet Earth.
"I say this and I seek Allah's forgiveness. Peace be upon you and the mercy of Allah and His blessings."
Questions and Answers Session
Educating Parents Alongside Children
In our Sunday school classes, the weekend schools, we had developed classes for the parents themselves which were parallel to the classes for the students, which you may be doing yourself. And so there were sister's classes, there were brother's classes. We even had some which were a joint class for adults. And it was a subject that they could relate to.
So that while the children are being educated the parents are also being educated. Because the problem is if the children start learning things and the parents don't learn, it develops a problem. Because when they go home they see the opposite. So it develops a problem. So the parents need to be educated.
And then also to have periodic meetings with the parents where you discuss the policy of the school. If they have any criticisms, suggestions they have input. They have direct input into what goes on in the school. Periodic meetings that they would know, they receive a communique and they know that this time of year there would be the parent-teachers meeting.
In the bigger schools that we have they even form a parent-teachers association. So this would be the Muslim parents of the children in the big schools. This is like a full-time school. So they would have a parents group that works along with the administration. Not against the administration. They work with the administration to solve the problems. And the administration should look upon the parents as a very important part of their leadership. They should realize that because these are the parents of the children. And that's very important.
Overcoming Historical Negativity Toward Islamic Education
In terms of the negativity with Islamic education, as I said at the beginning of the talk, in the Muslim world people are coming out of the colonial period. And during that period Islamic education was looked upon as inferior education. Even though people are religious. They were religious. But still they looked upon deep Islamic education as not relevant to technology and the changes in society.
And in some ways it wasn't relevant. Because it didn't deal with the science. It went away from science. So some scholars even said that the earth is flat. Up until the 80s. Big scholars. They said the earth is flat. They said nobody went out in space. They're liars. They're kadhab.
So when people who were involved in technology heard that, they said these people are ignorant. And so a gap developed between the professional people who were educated in the secular system and the people who were educated in the Islamic education system. So that developed.
Now that gap is closing. And people are coming together. But it will take some time. Because there's a lot of misunderstanding and also there needs to be a type of wisdom in leadership that can deal with both worlds. It can deal with both worlds. But it's coming together but it will take some time.
The American Muslim Experience
Also people from America who are accepting Islam did not have the benefit of knowing how deep Islamic education really is. Because many of the early movements for Islam in North America were founded by people, and I'm not blaming them—they did their best. But they invented the religion. They invented the religion. So they even sometimes claim prophethood.
And they invented how to pray, how to fast, how to do everything without going to the sources. Now they were trying to survive. But they thought it up themselves. And that's not the way Islam has been transmitted. There is creativity but it's revelation. You gotta learn the revelation.
And that was lost. People in America didn't have that understanding of how important the revelation is. Now it's here. Now it's widespread now. And so people are now realizing the importance of learning classical Arabic and going to the revelation.
Motivating Parents to Participate
Question: To add on the question to the sister, we do understand that all the stakeholders of Islamic education are involved. And we do have the classes for the adults. But the problem is how to motivate the parents to bring them over here. I mean that's a major problem to have the opportunity right over here. How do you motivate them?
Answer: To be honest with you brother, I don't claim to have the answer to this. Because even in our own area somehow the parents are not motivated enough. They don't realize the seriousness of it. Because in many cases they think that their main thing in life is working or just cooking food and you know what not. And these are important aspects of life obviously.
But the Islamic education is crucial. Because why are you cooking the food? How do you cook it? You got to know halal. How do you earn your money? You got to know halal and haram.
So these are important things but how to motivate people? Again, if you have some diversified type of classes, interesting topics. Maybe you can get people out like that. And with the youth, recreation to active sports type things. That can get the youth out to a lot of the programs.
But really this is a general problem within our community. I think unfortunately they're going to be motivated by the American society. Because this society is going through some big changes. And so people are going to realize Islam is a survival kit. It's a survival kit. And that's why there's more people coming now.
Challenges with Parent-Teacher Associations
Question: I do realize that it's very important that children get Islamic education. But as you said, they bring over here and they go to the Seerah Sermon. That's a major issue. And whenever we have formed the facts of migration, I saw people who were very active one day, they disappeared. So I'm scared of having a PTA. Except
only one person who has been the president of the PTA. The rest, whoever got elected as the president of the PTA disappeared. It's a major challenge here.
Answer: It's a challenge. But you know, you have to try to continue. Because it is a necessary element. Try somehow, if you get a speaker to come in, Dr. Ahmed Sakka, whoever comes, have a session with him, with the parents. And so they might come to listen to him. If you have somebody like that, send a flyer home to the parents. Say, this is your session now. You have somebody who's going to talk to you. Like something like that. Some ways of motivating them to come out.
Balance in School Administration
Question: What do you think of the administration of schools? Sometimes, if they are very strict, then this may scare the students and the parents. If they are too lenient, then this also makes them lose. And that's exactly what we are facing.
Answer: Well, this is where balance is required. And this is not easy. Because many of us, when we think of Islamic education from the Muslim world, you think of the 'Assar. He doesn't know the thing and you beat him. He doesn't know it, beat him. That's what a lot of the Quran schools were. You don't know your lesson, they're beating you every five minutes. They're beating you. They train students to terror.
Then on the other hand, you have people who are super liberal. And they allow the students to do anything. And some of these public schools, I don't know about here in Miami, but in Canada, it got so bad, they're carrying weapons in class, they wear all these strange clothes to school, and they're walking around, no respect for the teachers. Like it went the opposite direction.
So now we need balance. We need balance. This again is, it requires some creativity or flexibility. It's not easy. But the administration needs to be strict. It needs to be disciplined. There's got to be etiquette and respect. If you don't have etiquette, if you don't have respect, you're finished.
The children have to learn respect. At the same time, there's got to be love. It's got to be motivated out of sincerity and love and care. Not like terror, not terrorizing them. And that's not an easy thing to reach, but it's got to be a combination and a balance of the two.
Children Motivating Parents
Comment: It talks about motivation for parents. It doesn't work with very young children. But the motivation came from my son, who flatly said, if you're not going to come along with me to the classes, I'm not going to go. So here I am. I'm coming every Sunday because I have to go. The motivation can come from children, too. It's simply that he would not go if I don't go along.
Digital Resources and CD-ROMs
Question: You mentioned information going back to sources. There's 50 different books and everything. Do
you think nowadays we have a CD-ROM that me as a Muslim, I have a question about marriage, I type it in, I have the sources right there. I mean, is there something out there right there? I don't see that out there. I mean, any kind of subject matter, that's the way you do research.
Answer: Well, you know, there are CD-ROMs which are being developed now that bring a lot of discussions in it. But Islamic education, like any serious discipline, requires people who are educated properly. For instance, if you wanted to have an answer to brain surgery, and you have a CD-ROM that tells you which part of the brain to operate on. If you don't know medicine, they're talking Chinese to you. It's a language you do not understand what they're talking about.
So therefore, there are CD-ROMs, but you have to learn how to use that knowledge. You have to learn, you have to go to the Usul, the foundations and the fundamentals of the subjects, in order to appreciate the subject itself. Because sometimes when a person makes a Fatwa, it is based upon a whole foundation of information, why they come to that decision that they've come to.
You mentioned Dowry and so forth, and you mentioned taking the average. I mean, you could just put the subject in there, and you can have all this information right there. Well, you know, people are working on it. And there are books, like Fiqh al-Sunnah, which is translated into English. There are books like that, that have tried to bring together the information for you.
Right, well, I don't have full knowledge in that area itself. There was one called the Alim.
Completing Quran Reading
Question: You said, you know, the whole syllabus that you're talking about, I think you are working on the same line with the application, you know, that definitely helps in developing the Muslim personality in a child. As you see, most of our students come from the Pakistani and the Indian families. And that's the way I was educated, you know. Go ahead, whether you understand or not, read Quran, complete the Quran so that we can have a big function, until everybody in the child has read the Quran. That we cannot accomplish at Sunday school. And there's a major problem that we... I did the criticism, I was teaching my child for 2 years, 5 years, and still, he or she has not completed the Quran. And how you answer that, that's not our focus too.
Answer: Well, you know, people again, we have to separate Islam from culture. And some of the things that we did in Muslim countries were actually cultural practices. Because, you know, in Arabic speaking countries, to read the Quran like that, with no understanding, people don't do that, because they speak Arabic. So that's sort of a cultural thing.
And so some people would just read through the Quran itself, and just read it, and then they finish, and they do the khatam, and you know, whatever. And then mashallah, and you know, and that's it. But today, you need the knowledge of what's in the Quran as a survival kit to use it.
Now, this does not take away from tajweed (تَحْسِينُ تِلَاوَتِهِ) Everybody should learn tajweed. This is crucial. And it should be part of the curriculum.
What can be provided, what some people do, is that in these Sunday schools, we don't have enough time to cover everything. What they do is they have, after asr, they have a teacher, they hire a Quran teacher, and every day, or every other day, or twice a week, after asr, at a different time than the big class, that teacher reads Quran with them. So the ones who want to do that, they can have the 'asriyyah, after asr classes, you know, where they'll read through the whole Quran with a teacher.
Because those teachers need to have total focus on what they're doing. They can't, they're not teaching all these other subjects. But when we're in a greater community, there's other needs. There are other cultures, other needs. So those who have that need, what we have done, you hire a Quran teacher, and at a different time, you go specifically for that Quranic reading, you come to the general class for your general Islamic studies, and your knowledge. Then that way maybe you can overcome it.
Full-Time vs. Part-Time Schools
Question: Why do you have full-time Sunday and a full-time school?
Answer: Well, you know, in Toronto, there's different, there's full-time and there's Sunday classes also. Some, unfortunately, because of the size of our community, it's probably the same here, some people cannot afford to go to the full-time school, or they're too far away. We don't have enough schools.
So the ones who can't afford it, then would send their children to school, like in some masjids have Quran class after asr. So they go after asr. And on the weekends, they'll have a Saturday or a Sunday class where they get together like that, you know, to fill in.
But really, we should all be striving toward full-time Islamic education. There's no way around this. And as the American public schools get worse and worse, we will realize there's no way out but to put our children in full- time Islamic schools, where they get a good academic education too, where they learn the math, they learn the science, they learn English, but at the same time, they're in Islamic environment, peer group is Islamic, right, and then they'll learn some Islamic studies at the same time.
And hopefully, eventually, you'll become integrated completely where it's a really totally Islamic type of education.
Motivating Community Participation
Question: On top of tagging along on your question of motivating the whole community, we have a problem in the community where we have to motivate the whole community. And they all say they want a mosque, they want a mosque, they want a mosque, and they will come out. And we're thinking, is this mosque going to be empty? You know, we're building mosques everywhere, and it's empty. People are not coming out. And then we
have a problem with if someone gets involved in doing a particular thing, you know, helping and stuff, others will sit back and say, oh, let them do it. You know, that's a big problem.
Answer: Yeah, it is a problem. Really, the mosques have to become practical centers. You know, we have a tendency to want to build mausoleums. We have many beautiful mosques in the Muslim world. The Blue Mosque in Malaysia. Masjid al-Aqsa. So many, you know, mosques in Cairo. So we want to build something like, you know, Amr ibn al-'As in Cairo. Some huge, giant masjid we want to build.
And that's not practical for the situation we're in. And when you go back to the time of the Prophet, the masjid was small. You could bang your head on the ceiling if you were a little tall. It's a practical small building.
So, you know, a complex that has masjid, school, also recreation facilities. Gymnasium should be attached to the masjid. Then the youth will come to play basketball or to play soccer and other things. And then they can make Salat when it's time for Salat.
So, you know, we have to be very practical when we're looking at the new structures now. And there are many engineers now, Muslim engineers, who have developed very good patents. Good, you know, ways of simple Islamic architecture where you can get a practical building that doesn't have a big dome on it. A giant minaret. But can have basic Islamic design and a practical functional building.
And the activities have to be very practical ones. You know, that the students and the parents can be involved in.
Internet Resources
Question: Yes, there's a lot of information on the internet now. However, you have to be able to distinguish between those good things and those bad things.
Answer: Unfortunately, from my experience with the internet, the shaytan is really powerful on the internet, man. And there's even some people that are so wicked that they put Islam, you know, on their website. And they're actually talking against Islam.
So, you have to find the good websites, you know, that Muslims have checked for you. You know, that you can go into them so you won't get one of these devilish type of things. Because there's no control over this, you know, over the net itself. They can't control it.
So, you know, yes, you can get information, but try to get good websites. And some of the brothers are here from the MSA, the MSO. They can give you some good websites, insha'Allah, that you can access. Okay?
Government Funding for Islamic Schools
Question: This question about funding and something that you mentioned earlier that some Muslim family could not afford to send their kids to professional schools. Also, we don't have enough schools. And going with the idea of separation of religion and state, has there been any attempt to build some schools, not only Islamic
schools, but some Islamic mission that could accomplish both and then, therefore, could qualify for, you know, government funding. Because here, in the States, the last three or four years, there's a big movement on charter schools, but they do not fund religious, very religious schools. So I'm saying, with a community like yours, and probably the laws are similar, has there been any attempt in going that direction?
Answer: Well, you know, there has been attempts. Even some groups have, like the Islamic Society of North America, they have actually taken over school buildings that were deserted. They took over the buildings, and that solves a lot of problems, because the whole building is set up in such a way that it can be passed by the Board of Education.
And they even put their curriculum next to the board's curriculum. And in that way, you're able to get some funding. The problem is, though, sometimes, and this is based on where you live, sometimes the local people have some conditions they put on you that are very difficult to do a good Islamic education.
But if you have people who are involved in education, you have teachers who know the Board of Education, and then they can work along with the community to really help you to get the local funding. Each area is a little bit different, though.
And some people have tried to do Darul Ulooms. They get an area, and they set up a madrasa. Unfortunately, sometimes they transport something right out of India, or another part of the Muslim world, and they put it right down, as though you're in India. And that sometimes doesn't help, because it's not relevant. It's good for memorizing Quran, but then it's not relevant when you come out of the school to the society itself.
So really, some attempts have been made. And probably the Islamic Society of North America, they have one of the broadest-based school systems. Recently, Brother Yusuf Islam, there was a meeting with Brother Yusuf Islam and Abdullah Idrees, and a few other people, two teachers from South Africa, and Brother Bilal Phillips, Abu Aminah, and myself, we were in Toronto, and we met about Islamic education.
So what they're trying to do now is to revitalize the schools everywhere, and set new curriculums, and to unite the curriculums. There's a move being made like that, and even to make it up to the standards of the state, wherever they are. That's a move being made.
Follow-up: There was a recent, actually not recent, it's almost a year now, in Detroit, and I met two principals who are Muslims, and they qualified for charter schools. I mean, they teach in basic curriculum, but they incorporated a few subjects, not a lot, like Arabic was taught in those schools, and some basic religion, they say religious teachings, without being specific. And that way they were able to get done this in Detroit.
Response: Detroit has a very large Muslim population, over a million Muslims in the metropolitan Detroit area. So they have political power. And so they're able to get, there's Yemeni communities and Lebanese communities that have been there for like 50, 60, 100 years. So they have the power to be able to get certain assistance from the state and whatnot.
Home Schooling vs. Sunday School
Eventually here, if Muslims unite, we can unite. We can also get some benefits from the taxes that we pay every day.
Question: Can I ask you a last question? If I can educate my children at home with a private tutor, is it okay? I don't have to bring it up Sunday. What is the importance of the Sunday school?
Answer: Well, the importance of the Sunday school is that Islam is a way of life. And so therefore, it's not just information given. There is peer pressure. And there's also interaction with other Muslims. That's part of our Islam.
Because if you learn, if somebody says to you, you're supposed to be generous, you're supposed to cooperate. How do you do ta'awun? If you don't have anybody to cooperate with, you'll never learn how to share. You see what I'm saying? But when you're here, you interact with each other.
How do you learn to lower the gaze? How do you learn to be modest? Even sometimes you learn how to dress. You learn things from seeing other Muslims. Also, it's important for the young people, their identity. Their identity. Who are you?
If we don't enforce in them, you're a Muslim. And this is a group of Muslims. That's your community. Then they start seeing themselves as somebody else. And when you watch television too much, you'll start seeing yourself like somebody on television. Then you got a real problem.
So therefore, the society of Muslims, interaction with the society of Muslims is a very important element of education. Because Islamic education is living education. It's not just information. Right? It's information and practice. And especially the character. We emphasize in these times the character, mu'amalat, the interrelationship between people and our group as a society.
Closing Remarks
So I want to end at this point. And I pray that you would be successful in your striving here, in your school. And that Allah would bring us all together in unity and protect us from the fitna of the 21st century.
"I say this and I seek Allah's forgiveness for me and for you. Peace be upon you and the mercy of Allah and His blessings."