# Should I go to Madinah University or a madrasa to study Islam?

*Should I go to Madinah University? Who the madrasa route suits*

- URL: https://muftiabulayth.org/r/zasz48lx_wi/s/3/
- Date: 2020-12-11 · Kind: discussion · Transcript tier: machine · Recording: Dr Javad T. Hashmi | Axis of Morality & Archetypal Myths in the Quran | MindTrap 46 |Mufti Abu Layth (6:44–10:05)
- Status: a view quoted in order to be discussed, not a position held
- Watch from the start of the segment: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZAsz48lX_WI&t=404s
- Recording page: https://muftiabulayth.org/r/zasz48lx_wi/

**Topics:** How to study Islam; Education, madrasas and seminaries

**Summary (not a quotation; machine-made, unchecked):** The guest advises open-minded, critical thinkers against a traditional madrasa, which he says selects, programmes and isolates its students from current scholarship, citing his own rejection by Madinah University.

## Longer summary

Mufti Abu Layth says people often ask him whether to go to Madinah University or elsewhere to deepen their knowledge, and asks what the guest would recommend. The guest says it depends on the person: an open-minded, critical thinker should not go to a traditional madrasa. He describes a pre-selective process, saying he was himself rejected by the Islamic University of Madinah more than a decade ago even though it takes students straight from high school, then five to ten years of programming in which a student who thinks differently is either expelled or conforms. He adds that madrasa graduates are isolated from the world and from the latest Western academic scholarship on Islam, so that the average mullah cannot deal with much of it, with exceptions, and notes that Yasir Qadhi chose to do a PhD at Yale.

## Sources and names cited

- Dr Javad T. Hashmi (guest)
- Islamic University of Madinah
- Yasir Qadhi
- taqiyya

## Transcript (machine tier, 6:44–10:05)

[6:34] So I think doing both is the best best route and I think you're you're obviously someone who does the same too cuz you trained in the traditional route and now you also read academic stuff. So I I think that combination is the best. Wow. You know just a quick question before uh moving on to something else. People ask me sometimes that uh look I I want to enhance my knowledge of Islam.

[6:57] Uh what should I do? Uh should I uh in fact I had a message from somebody just last week about uh should I go to Medina University? Should I go to uh and I get asked this a lot by people. Alhamdulillah it reflects people are interested in enhancing their knowledge. Would you recommend I I'm just curious what you'd recommend and would it be a western university or would it be something? I'm just curious.

[7:22] Um that's one I think it depends on the person themselves what their religious views are. If you are an open-minded critical thinking kind of person then I don't think a traditional madrasa is the place for you to go. Uh I think first of all there's it's a pre-selective process. So I actually applied to the University of Medina many many years ago uh more than a decade ago and I actually got rejected.

[7:49] Uh, meanwhile they accept Are you glad now that you Of course I'm of course I'm [laughter] glad. But but I think about they als they accept people straight out of high school. So how could they not have accepted me? Um I mean that's a little bit super sillious of me to say but uh you know I I was saying that's ridiculous how I didn't get accepted. Um but so there's a pre-selective process part of a divine plan. It's part of plan. Well, they decided they obviously don't want somebody who is going to be a freeth thinker who's going to think for themselves.

[8:21] So, there's first a pre-selective process. Then once you get into the univers the Madrasa system, you have to study there for 5 to 10 years. Yeah. And during those 5 to 10 years, they're going to program you. And if you start thinking differently, one of two things is going to happen. Either you're gonna get kicked out or [laughter] or you're going to change your views to conform to them. you're going to do some sort of takya like uh you know just go along with everything but ultimately if you're and actually you had a good talk on this I remember about the problem with studying in a madrasa you become very isolated from the entire world and you don't even realize the discourses that are going on and it's not just by the way in the

[9:00] geopolitics and you know what's going on sociologically it's actually you don't even know what's going on in the western academy what's the latest Islamic studies scholarship so I don't think a average moola can deal with much of the stuff that's coming out of the western academy. Um, now there are exceptions. There are some that are fantastic and wonderful, but for the most part that's not the case. And that's why even somebody like Sheh Yaser Kadi decided to do a PhD at Yale.

[9:28] Now Yale is no Harvard. No, I'm just kid. That's just a joke. We have a rivalry with Harvard. Um but uh that shows you that he did find something of use in the western academy and I I I believe in that. So sorry the mic just slightly jumped in for a little while but uh uh right. Yep. So and you know just [clears throat] to to share on that um my my view as well very similarly is that I do feel that there's uh a lot of uh I mean there is a lot of good in what a madrasa can provide.

## Cite

Mufti Abu Layth Archive, segment ZAsz48lX_WI/s/3. https://muftiabulayth.org/r/zasz48lx_wi/s/3/

Not a fatwa: these answers were given to specific people at specific times. Ask a qualified scholar about your own situation.