F.I.I.S.T. is an online Islamic educational institute that is designed to enhance the knowledge base of the grassroots Muslim community in the West. It is specifically designed to produce specialists in Arabic Grammar and Islamic Jurisprudence. F.I.I.S.T. focuses on the core texts in the Arabic language curriculum that will provide the tools for the student to grasp the outward and inner meanings of the texts of the Sacred Tradition, beginning with most elementary text to the most advanced. Likewise, the core curriculum for the subject of jurisprudence is covered from the primary text to the most advanced. This type of approach to Islamic Studies produces qualified grammarians and fuqaha, something no other program can claim. The program begins at level one with the beginning book of each science, with the student graduating to the next level until he reaches the Alamiyya level in which he has attained the highest level of Islamic scholarship. Below we have provided the rough draft of a preliminary curriculum of what the entire system would look like.
The impetus behind the development of this type of educational system is the dire need of traditional Islamic scholarship in the grassroots Muslim communities in the West. The need for the development of scholars in the Arabic language and qualified scholars in Islamic Law is of the utmost importance. We want to provide an opportunity to raise and teach a group of dedicated students to become qualified specialists and scholars in these fields that will anchor those communities with knowledge and guidance.
Our long term goal is to establish a physical site in the West where students can learn and study in an ideal environment conducive for Islamic learning. In the meantime, F.I.I.S.T. will conduct the program online seeking to reach a wide constituent of students dedicating to Islamic learning.
The overall objective of F.I.I.S.T. is to illuminate a path toward real reform and renewal for the modern day Muslim community. At the same time, we want to quell the impulse of many modern thinkers who want to divorce the Muslim community from traditional thought and practice. The significance of adhering to traditional Islamic methodology is indispensable. Traditional learning and methodology are seen as something that is old, archaic, or outdated without any relevance to contemporary discourse. This is a grave mistake for those Muslim communities that wish to move forward toward reform and renewal. F.I.I.S.T. will produce scholars and specialists in the most important subject areas that will provide an inroad into a methodology for the contemporary Muslim community to move forward by adhering to the Islamic traditional methodology of renewal.
Shaykh Mujahid Abdul-Karim:
Mujahid Abdul-Karim was born and raised in Inglewood, California. He accepted Islam in 1994 while a student in undergraduate school. He became a serious student of the Islamic Sacred Sciences after a trip to Fez, Morocco where he was introduced to Maliki fiqh. Thereafter, he subsequently traveled to study in Tuwemurat, Mauritania, under the order of Shaykh Salek bin Siddina, to the village of Shaykh Murabit al Hajj al Fahfu. There he studied Maliki fiqh with Shaykh Abdur Rahman Hadamin, Shaykh Abdallah ibn Ahmedna, and Shaykh Muhammad Tahir. He spent time and studied with Shaykh Salek bin Siddina in his village, Dar as Salaam, before going to study in Tayseer Institute of Islamic Sciences of Shaykh Muhammad Hassan al Khadim. Mujahid is a long time student of Shaykh Salek Bin Siddina, with whom he studied a variety of Islamic Sciences, most notably the Kafaf al Mubtadi of Shaykh Muhammad Mauluud in fiqh, and the Idda’tul Djunna of Shaykh Ahmad al-Maqqari in Aqidah.. He went on to study the Mukhtasar Khalil with Shaykh Abdullah Bin Bayyah in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, and with Shaykh Muhammad Hadamin and his brother Shaykh Abdur Rahman Hadamin in Al Ain, UAE.
Mujahid holds a B.A. in African-American Studies from Morgan State University in Baltimore, Maryland; and an M.A. in African History from Howard University in Washington, DC. He also studied Islamic Political Science at The Graduate School of Islamic and Social Sciences in Leesburg, Virginia. His research interests include West African History, Slavery in the Muslim World, and the Shariah Sciences. Mujahid lives in Al Ain, UAE where he continues his Islamic studies with Mauritanian scholars.
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