Do you know what students of Ottoman madrasahs were taught? What kinds of books were there on their desks? Which subjects and fields of knowledge were placed emphasis on? What, apart from religious content, was also included in the academic curriculum? This is what we are going to speak about today.
Students of madrasahs in the Ottoman Empire clearly had to not only read certain religious books, but also know syntax, logic and understand hadiths and commentaries to the Quran. As far as secular sciences are concerned, mathematical sciences, philosophy and jurisprudence were obligatory. Of course, now, after so many centuries, we cannot reconstruct the curriculum of madrasahs of that time with one hundred percent accuracy. But we can make at least an approximate draft based on the biographies of teachers and scientists, as well as on the extant statutes of madrasahs.
From the very beginning and up to the end of the studies, a student of an Ottoman madrasah had to read and memorize a considerable amount of books in different fields of knowledge. Of course, there were certain differences in the subjects that a student had to study, depending on a madrasah and particular era of study. One can follow all these changes by studying the biography of Taşköpri-zade Ahmed B. Isameddin, who lived in the XVI century, and those subjects he taught as an ustaz. It would be also useful to learn the activity of Kâtip Çelebi (it is the XVII century).
If this information is not enough, you can refer to a rather closed and little known source – “Kevâkib-i Seb'a” (“Seven Planets”), which was written in the XVIII century (1742) at the request of the French Ambassador in Istanbul, Marques de Villanueva. Interesting information about teaching methods can be found in the book “De La Littérature des Turcs” by Italian Abbot Toderini. If you want to learn something about the peculiarities of education in the XIX century, the autobiography of Ahmed Cevdet Pasha will be very useful.
Apparently, according to research by specialists, the textbooks used for education in madrasahs, were first of all prepared in such a way as to give each Muslim the knowledge necessary to solve religious and secular issues. Logically, the main goal of education in madrasahs was to give Muslims the knowledge and educate them to be highly moral people.
The Law Code (Kanunname) of the period of Suleiman the Magnificent’s rule indicates that it is extremely important to understand the mystery of creation, to establish a state that acts in an orderly manner, to reveal the realities of the world in order to ensure eternal order in the world and the welfare of mankind. And for all this to be realized in our world, it is necessary to comprehend the Universe created by God, as well as to study the teachings of the prophets. To the extent that this can be clearly defined from the Code written in the style used for official documents in that period, the views of the Ottoman rulers on education point to the fact that education primarily includes the pursuit of science and wisdom and only then the study of the essence of virtue, talent, religion and development of human abilities. The Ottoman Sultan was personally responsible for implementing the education plan.
It is noteworthy that during the training, books read by students were ordered in a certain way. The first three on the list were morphology (sarf), syntax (nahiv) and logic (mantic). The last two included hadiths and commentary on the Quran (tafsir). In between, such subjects were studied as oratory (Adab-fil Bahs), sermon (vaaz), rhetoric (balaghat), philosophical theology (Kelam), philosophy (hikmet), jurisprudence (fikih), inheritance (ferâiz), the dogmas of faith (aqaid) and legal theory and methodolody (uṣūl al-fiqh).
The work “Kevâkib-i Seb'a”, which has been mentioned above, gives us very valuable information about the way how students studied. It is said in the book that students had five classes per week. The author also tells us that it took students about 8-9 hours to prepare for lessons. The next day they told the teacher about the material they had learnt, shared their points of view and engaged in a discussion with the ustaz. After careful analysis and study of the lesson, students returned to their rooms and continued to study until the next lesson came.
Mathematical sciences, such as arithmetic, algebra and geometry, as well as natural sciences, such as classical physics, were also taught in Ottoman madrasahs. This is indicated by the biographies of teachers.
Here is what is said in one of the works devoted to the study of the principle of Ottoman madrasahs: “Since such books as Serh Al-Mevakif and Serh Al-Makasid are related to theology (Kelam), they contain all the auxiliary sciences: Divine philosophy, astronomy, geometry and arithmetic. Geometry and arithmetic are easy to perceive, so they do not require much thought and are not studied as separate subjects. They are taken together with aforementioned sciences… Astronomy, on the other hand, involves the use of imagination and conjecture, which makes it a more complex science than geometry. That is why astronomy is studied separately. It is well known that scientists do not get tired of students’ temperaments and always give them days off on Tuesdays and Fridays to support the zeal of young people to knowledge and give the necessary rest. Students use these two days to prepare the materials they need, and in summer they go on trips and picnics. Even there they do not sit idly but discuss arithmetic, geometry, astrolabe, land management, Indian, Coptic and Ethiopian arithmetic, parmak hisabi (counting), mechanics and other sciences. In winter they devote their free time to solving riddles (muamma), mukadarat (measurement and comparison), history and poetry”.
From the work “de la Littérature des Turcs” written by Toderini, who lived in Istanbul from October of the year 1781 till May of the year 1786, we learn that there were also teachers who taught small children geometry. The author says that he visited the Valide madrasah twice and noticed that students gathered together to listen to the geometry lesson and used the Arabic translation of Euclid.
Ilmira Gafiyatullina
Photo: Creative Commons