In the summer of 2025, the Centre for Islamic Knowledge (CIK) convened its inaugural Summer Academic Intensive at the Süleymaniye Madrasa in Istanbul, in collaboration with Ibn Haldun University.

The program brought together a cohort of graduate-level students and scholars from North America, Europe, Türkiye, Pakistan, Southeast Asia, and the Middle East for advanced study in the classical Islamic sciences and their contemporary applications.
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Holding the Intensive within the Süleymaniye complex — historically one of the most significant centres of learning in the Ottoman world — provided an appropriate setting for sustained, text-based study rooted in the intellectual tradition.

Courses & Faculty

The Intensive featured seminars in the following areas:

• Shurūṭ al-Aʾimma al-Khamsa (Conditions of Ḥadīth Authentication Among the Five Imams) – Dr. Issam Eido​
• Comparative Theories and Methods: Between Uniplexity and Multiplexity – Dr. Recep Şentürk
• Al-Qawāʿid al-Fiqhiyya (Legal Maxims) – Dr. Necmettin Kızılkaya
• Kalam 3.0: Modern Scientific Materialism and the Qurʾanic Contingency Argument – Shaykh Hamza Karamali
• The Meaning of ‘Insān’: Qurʾanic Perspectives on Human Nature and Society – Dr. Heba Raouf Ezzat
• Structured Ummah as the Goal of the Sharīʿah – Dr. Sohail Hanif
• Comparative Tafsīr Methodology – Dr. Sohaib Saeed
• Pathways to Knowing Allah: Cognitive and Experiential Approaches to Faith Formation – Dr. Osman Umarji
• Siyāsa Sharʿiyya and Islamic Political Thought – Dr. Jaan Islam
• Islamic Codicology: Navigating Manuscripts – Dr. Safaruk Chowdhury

Sessions were conducted in seminar format, with close engagement with primary texts and extended discussion.

Academic Profile of the Cohort

The cohort was intentionally limited in size in order to preserve depth of engagement and direct access to faculty.

Participants included doctoral researchers, seminary graduates, nonprofit leaders and institutional educators engaged in sustained scholarly work. Affiliations represented within the cohort included al-Azhar University, SOAS University of London, University of California, Los Angeles, Newcastle University, and Nadwatul Ulama, among others.

Notably, many participants had undergone training in both traditional madāris and Western academic institutions. Several combined advanced university study with formal ʿĀlimiyyah programs, reflecting a generation of scholars conversant in both classical disciplinary frameworks and contemporary academic method.

This dual formation enriched discussion throughout the Intensive, allowing for sustained engagement across methodological assumptions, textual interpretation, and civilizational analysis.
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The program was structured not as a conference, but as a concentrated period of study among peers committed to serious intellectual development.

​​Manuscript Engagement

Participants visited the Süleymaniye Kütüphanesi, one of the largest manuscript libraries in the world. The visit provided direct exposure to codicological features of Islamic manuscripts and situated the curriculum within the material history of knowledge transmission.

Scholarly Engagement in Istanbul

During the program, students also attended:

• The USUL Forum, where they benefited from the presence of the eminent muhaddith Shaykh Mohammad Awwama
• The Ummatics Annual Conference: The Ummatic Turn: Research, Method, Futures

​These engagements complemented the Intensive’s curriculum by situating it within broader contemporary scholarly discourse.

Institutional Aim

The Summer Academic Intensive was conceived as an annual initiative dedicated to rigorous study within historically grounded settings. Its aim is to cultivate scholarly depth, methodological clarity, and intellectual networks that contribute — even modestly — to the renewal of serious scholarship within the Ummah.

​We ask Allah to accept this effort and to grant tawfīq for its continued development in the years ahead.