Life and Teachings of the Prophet Muhammad
7. The Importance of Education in Islam
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mention in history as authorities on various Islamic sciences such
as hadith, Islamic jurisprudence, seerah of the Prophet,
commentary on the Quran, etc. The Prophet’s own wife, Aishah,
imparted the knowledge and wisdom she received from the first
educator, for almost half a century. She has narrated more than
two thousand traditions of the Prophet, and according to the
Muslim jurists, these are the source of two thirds of Islamic laws
relating to social, political and cultural issues.
Biographers such as Ibn Khallikan (author of
Waqeyatul Ayan
),
Ibn Sa’d (author of
Tabaqat
), Khatib Bhaghdadi (author of
Taarikh
Baghdad
) and Al-Miqrizi (author of
al-Khutal wal-Athar
) have
mentioned the names of thousands of women and their outstanding
contribution in the field of education and development in the
Muslim world. Noteworthy among them, for instance, are the two
sisters of Al-Fahri of Morocco, Fatimah and Maryam, the daughters
of Muhammad ibn Abdullah, who founded the Qayrawan University
and the Andalus University in the historical city of Fas in 245 A.H.
THE DEVELOPMENT OF NATURAL SCIENCES
The emphasis of Islam on learning and teaching was not
confined to the Quran or the teachings of the Prophet. The Quran,
in fact, has given a new outlook, a new perspective or paradigm as
coined by Thomas Kahn (
The Structure of Scientific Revolution
,
1955). According to this Quranic paradigm, man’s most important
activity being intellectual contemplation or reflection, he was not
supposed to blindly follow any idea or notion just because it was
