All That We Lost: The Colonized Mind and the Decline of the Islamic Education System

In a 2009 CNN documentary entitled Generation Islam, a segment dedicated to Islamic education in Pakistan stated: “Many madrassas teach a version of Islam that’s locked in the past. Students are rarely taught math or science…” The documentary then goes on to praise an NGO worker by describing him as “…on the forefront of the battle to modernize Pakistan’s madrassas….” The documentary’s depiction of madaaris as remnants of a pre-modern Muslim culture frozen in time, out of touch, and at times in conflict with the modern world, is reflective of a wider discourse found in media outlets, think tanks, intellectual circles, and governmental bodies that explains educational challenges of the Muslim world as a result of a lack of “modernization.” From this vantage point, the inability of educational institutes in many parts of the Muslim world to meet the needs of their populations, is explained away as being the result of an inability to evolve into modernity. The “tradition vs. modernity” narrative has been supported by various historians and academics who have depicted Islamic educational institutes as having a very limited role in intellectual development in Muslim civilization. This narrative, however, has been challenged by many other historians, intellectuals, and scholars over the years, despite the fact that the depiction of Islamic educational institutes, such as the madrasa, as archaic remnants of a medieval past is still prevalent in popular discourse. Following on the works of earlier researchers and intellectuals, this paper demonstrates that the current state of education in the Muslim world, far from being a remnant of ancient Muslim civilization, is rather a by-product of developments that began during the colonial period. To make the case that the current state of education in the Muslim world is quite modern, as opposed to a relic of the past, I will examine the philosophical foundations of schooling in the Muslim world and the impact of colonialism on these educational systems. For context, in the Muslim world, various school systems were developed on the basis of an Islamic worldview. The oneness of God (tawhid), prophethood (nubuwwa), and the afterlife (akhira) helped shape and sustain the educational institutes established in traditional Muslim societies. Starting in the 18th century, with the rise of European colonialism, the educational system in the Muslim world underwent a radical transformation. European colonialism introduced into the Muslim world educational theories and institutes that were grounded within a secular paradigm. With exposure to these new understandings of pedagogy and schooling, older understandings of education became displaced in many parts of the Muslim world. A problem arose, however, with the fact that these new school systems were established on epistemologies and worldviews that were foreign to the Islamic worldview, which in turn created an educational crisis in the Muslim world that exists to this day.