Ijazah

Did You Know?

• Students could receive six different types of ijazahs: specific, non-specific, general, on a book, by correspondence, and honorific.
• Children of wealthy families sometimes received ijazahs for social status, even if too young to comprehend the subject.
• Female hadith scholars such as Zaynab bint al-Kamal earned ijazahs and instructed other students.

Description

The ijazah system developed early in Hadith scholarship, involving travel to specific authorities to hear hadiths directly and obtain permission to transmit them. This personal certification system served not only for Hadith but also for texts of history, law, philology, literature, mysticism, and theology. A formal written ijazah typically includes an isnad, or scholarly lineage, tracing the teacher's chain of transmission back to the Prophet, a later venerable shaykh, or the author of a specific book.

Hypothesis on origins of doctorate

Some scholars, including George Makdisi, have argued that the ijazah was a type of academic degree issued in medieval madrasahs, similar to the European doctorate. Makdisi initially held that the Christian doctorate differed from the ijazah, but later stated that the European licentia docendi originated from the ijāzah al-tadrīs wa al-iftā' (license to teach and issue legal opinions) in medieval Islamic legal education. He proposed that this ijazat was equivalent to the Doctor of Laws qualification, developed during the ninth century after the formation of the Madh'hab legal schools. To obtain it, a student studied in a guild school of law for at least four years for an undergraduate course and at least ten years for postgraduate work, followed by an oral examination testing the originality of theses and the ability to defend them in disputations. Devin J. Stewart sees a parallel but notes a difference in granting authority: individual professor for the ijazah versus a corporate entity for the university. Alfred Guillaume and Syed Farid al-Attas also support the theory of Islamic origin, while Toby Huff and others reject it.

Differences between an ijazah and a diploma

The Western education system centers on the university, where a faculty of professors teaches groups of students, and a diploma verifies that the institution recognizes an individual's knowledge. In contrast, the ijazah system emphasizes one-to-one instruction between student and teacher, with location depending on the subject: mosques for religious matters, hospitals for medicine, and madrasas or other places for other subjects. An ijazah could focus on a single book or be general, whereas a college diploma covers a variety of subjects. Upon completion, a student underwent an oral examination, similar to a modern thesis defense, and received certification stating the subject of expertise, associated solely with the instructor, not an institution.

Ijazahs issued to a scribe vs a student

Ijazahs were granted to scribes as permission to transmit a book from the author, serving as a stamp of approval for replication. The process involved the author reciting a rough draft to the scribe, who wrote it down; the scribe then read it back, the author made changes, and once satisfied, issued the ijazah. For students, the process differed: a student was selected by a teacher, learned under them for years, then took a test reciting all teachings and commenting on them. If the teacher judged the student fully understood, an ijazah was awarded, allowing the student to teach others.