In all the talk about the Muslim world and the tacit
approval by some of more extremist elements, there is something missing – the
intellectual and educational past of its decedents. When one considers the achievements
made by Muslims, it is a shocking concept that one group proclaiming the
tenets of Islam, the Shabab militants in Kenya, should target teachers and children
to shut down schools. Yet, this is what the people of Kenya are facing. Sadly,
and not just Kenya, centers of education are being attacked under the
unfounded idea that somehow such things are against God.
Muhammad, he who founded the Islamic faith, was a worldly man. He had traveled throughout the region with his uncle, a merchant. He knew of other people and indeed, his knowledge of other people and their culture helped in the spread of his nascent faith. From the very beginning, a practical and worldly education propelled Islam forward, into the world of the peripatetic arena of the Bedouin, into the ancient lands of the Fertile Crescent to the dusty lands of North Africa and into the Iberian Peninsula. It latched on to other, older cultures, absorbing its history and knowledge and in doing so, spreading the faith and expanding its borders into Persia and India.
Early Muslim scholars rescued the works of the Romans and Greeks, preserving them for generations to come at a time when the Europeans had denigrated into barbarism. Such intellectual achievements were also seen with early mathematicians such as Muhammad ibn Musa Al-Khwarizmi, scientists such as Abu Nasr al-Farabi and Thabit ibn Qurra, historians like Ibn Battuta and Ibn Khaldun, philosophers such as Ibn Sina (Avicenna) and Ibn Rushd (Averroes) and physicians like Ibn Al-Baitar and Ibn Zuhr.
Muhammad, he who founded the Islamic faith, was a worldly man. He had traveled throughout the region with his uncle, a merchant. He knew of other people and indeed, his knowledge of other people and their culture helped in the spread of his nascent faith. From the very beginning, a practical and worldly education propelled Islam forward, into the world of the peripatetic arena of the Bedouin, into the ancient lands of the Fertile Crescent to the dusty lands of North Africa and into the Iberian Peninsula. It latched on to other, older cultures, absorbing its history and knowledge and in doing so, spreading the faith and expanding its borders into Persia and India.
Early Muslim scholars rescued the works of the Romans and Greeks, preserving them for generations to come at a time when the Europeans had denigrated into barbarism. Such intellectual achievements were also seen with early mathematicians such as Muhammad ibn Musa Al-Khwarizmi, scientists such as Abu Nasr al-Farabi and Thabit ibn Qurra, historians like Ibn Battuta and Ibn Khaldun, philosophers such as Ibn Sina (Avicenna) and Ibn Rushd (Averroes) and physicians like Ibn Al-Baitar and Ibn Zuhr.
We now move forward nearly millennia, where thugs in the
name of Allah are attacking schools and killing teachers and students. It is a level and focus of violence that can
only be described as a type of mass psychosis.
Those who encourage and facilitate education in the Muslim world or Dar
al-Salam are fighting an uphill battle.
On some level, this has to be a low point from which Muslim culture must
rebound and take, once more, its place among the world’s great intellectual
centers. It has universities and
scholars but few whose voice extends throughout the region and beyond.
As for Kenyan schoolchildren and teachers, Shabab is wreaking
havoc as teachers are fearful to resume their duties and soon-to-be graduating
students have little to no instruction for their preparation with exams. These exams are vital for their placement in
universities. Especially in the northeast,
with its proximity to Somalia (the home territory of the Shabab), officials in
Nairobi are concerned for the future of the region. The terrorist attack at the university in
Garissa last year as well as the attack on a bus load of mostly teachers
heading home for Christmas has brought the idea of education to the fore.
County governments have little desirable options in trying
to answer the needs of their students and Nairobi searches for answers that are
more affordable than placing armed units of soldiers at every school and school
function. Of course, other countries
could offer help but the African Union has a role to play here if it can agree
to a course of action. Nairobi might say
that it is unwilling to have outsiders play the role of driving out other
outsiders but if it cannot come up with its own answers, what is the
alternative?
