By IINA
Sharjah : Muslims should hold steadfast to education if they want to regain their old glory in science and technology, a presenter at the First International Conference on Arabs and Muslims History of Science in Sharjah University has advised. Presenting a paper on Islamic Science and Education, Dr. Mohammed Majid has pointed out that giving priority to education in the past is what enabled Muslims to make huge contributions to science and technology. “It was the Abbasids that first formalized education in the Muslim world setting in motion what is considered as the golden age of Islam by historians, where substantial development occurred in many scientific spheres,” he said. He added that the Abbasids Caliphs attracted to their courts men of science, poets, physicians and philosophers whom they supported. Learning progressed and developed with differences of creed, color, race and tribe being no barrier to learning.
Dr. Majid said the mosque served as the fundamental educational institution of the caliph.
However, as the demand for learning grew, the madrassa (modern day college) began to appear. Prior to this period education was imparted in mosques in an informal manner. At this early stage, people seeking knowledge tended to gather around certain knowledgeable Muslims – sheikhs, and these sheikhs began to hold regular religious education sessions – majlis. “With the creation of madrassa’s the Jamia (university) emerged. The Guinness Book of World Records recognizes the University of Al-Karaouine (Jami’at al-Qarawiyyin) in Fez, Morocco as the oldest university in the world founded in 859,” he quipped.
“Al Azhar University, founded in Cairo, Egypt in the 10th century, offered a wide variety of academic degrees, including post-graduate degrees, and was the first fully-fledged university.” According to the scholar the Islamic form of education, was eventually emulated by the Europeans, of which many of the similarities stand till this day. Even the modern-day graduation ceremony resembles the Islamic ceremony. The robes worn today were called ‘jubba tul faqih’, and were given when an ‘alim’ (scholar) received his license to teach (ijaza).
The Muslim world also created the first public hospital (which replaced healing temples and sleep temples) and the psychiatric hospital, the public library and lending library, the academic degree-granting university, and the astronomical observatory as a research institute.
The first universities that issued diplomas were also in the Muslim world. According to the scholar, these were the Bimaristan medical university-hospitals, where medical diplomas were issued to students of medicine. The scholar here quotes Sir John Bagot Glubb, who wrote, “By Mamun’s time medical schools were extremely active in Baghdad. The first free public hospital was opened in Baghdad during the Caliphate of Haroon-al-Rashid. As the system developed, physicians and surgeons were appointed who gave lectures to medical students and issued diplomas to those who were considered qualified to practice. The first hospital in Egypt was opened in 872 AD and, thereafter, public hospitals sprang up all over the empire from Spain and the Maghreb to Persia.” Dr Majid also said that the madrassas were also the first law schools, and many have suggested that the “law schools known as Inns of Court in England” may have been derived from the madrassas that taught Islamic law and jurisprudence.