Tidbits on Madrasahs (early modern times: 1453-1789)

Madrasah:

Is derived from the Semitic root (dars) which relates to lesson, learning, and studying.
Madrasah then literally means a place where learning or studying of the lesson happens.

The first Ottoman "Medrese" was created in Iznik in 1331.
Most Ottoman medreses followed the traditions of sunni Islam.

Ottoman Madrasahs offered different branches of study, such as calligraphic sciences, oral sciences, and intellectual sciences but they primarily served the function of an Islamic center for spiritual learning.
"The goal of all knowledge and in particular, of the spiritual sciences is knowledge of God." Halil Inalcik
"Religious learning as the only true science, whose sole aim was the understanding of God's word." Halil Inalcik


Education system:

The Ottoman education system seems followed a linear, structured, fashion with different kinds of schools attached to different kinds of levels. There were the lower madrasahs and then the specialized ones.

Curriculum:*
A) Calligraphic sciences: styles of writing
B) Oral sciences: Arabic language, grammar and syntax
C) Intellectual sciences—logic in Islamic philosophy
D) Theoretical Spiritual sciences: Islamic theology and mathematics
E) Practical Spiritual science: Islamic ethics and politics
* From Halil Inalcik


Religion, schools, and social life:

Madrasahs were built around, or near mosques, revealing the interconnectedness between institutions of learning and religion, with religion dominating much of the knowledge and teachings. The mosques to which medresahs were attached, dominated the social life in Ottoman cities.


Culture of sharing and co-learning

The Islamic world (Egypt, Persia and Turkestan) was interconnected in the early modern period (1453-1789) as scholars traveled around and abroad to other Islamic states exchanging knowledge and receive education from each other.

Ottoman Empire - An Educational Primer

• Ottoman Empire begins 1299, ends with the emergence of Kemal Ataturk which brings its

remnants into a secularized democracy

• Ottomans used ideological legitimacy, derived from Islam, to maintain a longstanding

apparatus of power through tax payments and military service

• State-organized education had the primary purpose of educating personnel for this

apparatus of power

• The educational system was neither strongly centralized nor monolithic: given the number

of disparate provinces, considerable variation and divergent educational systems existed

• Generally speaking Sibyan schools (primary level) had a moral/religious focus and were

staffed by imams and Madrasahs ( secondary level) had a combination of religious and

scientific instruction

• Graduates from the Madrasahs became civil servants, imams and teachers, although another

source of state servants came from Enderun schools, which inculated non-Muslim children

in Islam

• Rural populations could not benefit from these schools and so a religious educational

network existed there: dervish lodges, religious orders and dergah (sufi brotherhood)