Turkey's New Imam-Hatip Schools

Abstract

In response to a general, deeply felt need of the Turkish public the National government is now supporting Muslim religious education in elementary schools, special secondary schools, teacher training institutions, and in the Faculty of Divinity at Ankara University. Private instruction is much more popular than it was ten years ago, and informal, even illegal Muslim religious education groups are also active. How is this all organized, where are the schools, what is taught, and how are they operating? During the last half of 1954 I spent several months in Turkey traveling widely, visiting village, town and city schools, government agencies, and private individuals in an effort to find clear answers to these and related questions. This article will deal primarily with the special new Imam-Hatip Okullart (Prayer Leader and Preacher Schools). There is little need in this brief article to review the background of Islam in republican Turkey, or even the genesis of this new Muslim religious education movement. Ample details can be found in Gotthard J aschke's excellent book, Der Islam in der neuen Tiirkei, Eine Rechtsgeschichtliche Untersuchung, Leiden: E. J. Brill, I95I, I74 pp., being Nos. I and 2 of Die Welt des Islams N.S., vol I, hereafter cited as G.J., as well as in his subsequent notes and additions which have appeared in later issues of the same journal 2. It may however be useful to summarize these events briefly, in order to put my comments into proper relation with recent events in Turkey.