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Scholarly Exchanges Between the Azhar and Kabul: Islamic Education in Modern Afghanistan
Abstract
Beginning in the 1950’s, a series of steps was taken to advance Islamic education in Afghanistan. This effort at modernization built upon several schools founded by the government in cities such as Herat, Bagram, Jalalabad, and Mazar-i-Sharif. In addition to studying the traditional Islamic sciences, such as tafsir and Hadith, many of these schools incorporated subjects like physics and math. In the early 1950’s, the Islamic Law Faculty was founded at Kabul University. The teachers in this department included Afghans who graduated from al-Azhar University in Cairo; moreover, al-Azhar sent some Egyptians to teach in Kabul. Among other changes enacted under the leadership of Abdul Satar Sirat, who served as Dean of the Faculty of Islamic Sciences at Kabul University, and later as Minister of Justice, a Department of Islamic Studies for Afghan Women was established. This presentation will examine the theology taught by Azhari professors in Kabul and how Afghans’ tradition of adherence to the Hanafi school of jurisprudence may have evolved in this time period. Although much has been written on the alleged ties between the Ikwan in Egypt and Afghanistan—especially in the post-9/11 period—a vibrant history of scholarly exchanges between Egypt and Afghanistan remains open to examination.
Discipline
History
Geographic Area
Afghanistan
Sub Area
19th-21st Centuries