Hermeneutics of Islamic education and the construction of new Muslim cultures in the west: Faithful but reformed

Abstract This dissertation is grounded in twenty years of personal and professional practice as an educator, both formally and informally and as a Muslim activist in the West. It is a historical and theoretical investigation of the religious and social relationship between the past and the present as they help in constructing a comprehensive understanding of Islamic education and Muslim cultures in changing circumstances and new Western contexts. It is intended that this understanding forms the foundation for helping Muslim communities in the West to integrate successfully by remaining faithful to basic religious principles while being reformed within new host societies. The past matters. The past and the present are powerfully related and we cannot just step over our own shadows, as Gadamer suggests. However, we can live our traditions in different ways than our ancestors did by seeing tradition as the source for shaping or reshaping lives within a contemporary environment. This study analyzes the manner in which Muslims in the past have attempted to nurture, synthesize and implement prescriptions of the faith in fashioning their worldview in different contexts. This dissertation identifies the ground upon which Muslim communities can build capacity by using Ijtihad or "individual reasoning" as a practical mechanism for ascertaining the position of Islamic law on educational and social issues. It describes how Ijtihad can be used as a method of legal reformation in Muslim communities in the West today. The thesis is designed to form a whole chain of developmental elements to help in understanding the essence of Muslim religious principles and cultures, education, identity, leadership and possibilities of reform when the context is changed. Its culture should be grounded in teachings of the Qur’an and the Sunnah, attempting to imbue educational and social institutions and cultural experimental activities with an Islamic character, while being flexible in the new contexts. Finally, the study considers Muslims settling, reconciling and contributing in new contexts. It offers recommendations about how Muslims might proceed to transform their communities in the West through education and to build their relationships with new societies, creating a more cohesive environment.