Challenge Of Educational Reforms: A Reflection On The Discourse Of Islamisation Of Knowledge

Abstract

Muslim intellectuals commonly opine that the malaise of Muslim Ummah and the decline of Islamic civilisation is due to the drawbacks in the educational system in the Muslim lands, which need to be addressed. The struggles for educational reforms started long back, and several Muslim scholars put their efforts in this regard. As Al-Ghazālī (d. 505/1111), tried to reconcile between the revelation and reason, and later, in the Subcontinent, Allama Muhammad Iqbal (d. 1938), among others also put the efforts for that. In the late 1970s, during the Islamic revivalism, it was restarted again when the idea of Islamisation of Knowledge for the educational reforms in Muslim lands was further developed in a broad sense by late Prof. Ismā‘il Rajī Al-Fārūqī (d. 1986), in response to what he referred as "the malaise of the Ummah". This article highlights some of the efforts made by Muslim Intellectuals to reform the educational system in Muslim lands, and the contributions made by the Islamisation of Knowledge movement to contemporary Islamic thought will be discussed. Hence, it is also an attempt to evaluate the Islamisation of the knowledge movement. The article argues that there is sufficient room for contribution and improvement in the discourse of the Islamisation of Knowledge, particularly in its methodology. A dialogue between scholars of different civilisations is needed in setting and applying Islamic global norms for a purposeful and beneficial education system for the world.