The Zaytuna MA Program: Teaching the Best of Both Worlds

Now entering its third year, Zaytuna’s nascent MA in Islamic Texts program has already attracted and graduated talented students from around the world. This unique program, headed by the Kurdish scholar Shaykh Mahsuk Yamac and American scholar Dr. Jawad Qureshi, enables qualified candidates to navigate well Islam’s primary sources in their original language. The program uses both our Muslim civilization’s rigorous scholastic approach coupled with the best of Western academic disciplines. This dual approach sets it apart from most other programs. Students accepted into this course of study grapple with the engaging and timeless canonical texts of Islam, enabling them to penetrate the more abstruse elements by approaching the tradition from within. “Our faculty, trained in both the Western academy as well as in the Islamic ijazah system, help our students on their journey toward the knowledge of two—ofttimes similar, sometimes divergent— intellectual approaches to the deep study of texts,” notes President Hamza Yusuf.

With concentrations in either Islamic law or Islamic philosophy and theology, students tackle some of the world’s greatest classics using the Islamic trivium (al-ulūm al-āliyyah) to develop excellent skills in academic analysis and writing as they work towards their master’s thesis. The rigor of the program has led to many of the graduates finding placement in some of the world’s most prestigious universities and law schools, including Harvard, University of Chicago, Oxford, Georgetown, UC Berkeley, and UC Davis.

Shaykh Mahsuk Yamac teaching MA students

Class of 2021 MA Theses

Student Name Advisor Thesis Title Sara Kuratnik Jawad Qureshi The Prophetic Clinic as Demonstrated by the Imam for Skeptics and Cynics: Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī’s Critical Contributions to the Proofs of Prophecy Sami Rahman Abdullah Ali Khabar as Testimony and Transmission: A Comparative Study of Islamic and Western Epistemologies Ibrahim Qureshi Omar Qureshi What is Moral Action? The Relationship Between Human Flourishing, Character Traits, and Right Action in Classical Islamic Ethics Suzanne Kasim Fadi Elhin Stem Cell Research: Islamic Jurisprudential uśūlī and Islamic Bioethical perspectives Hiba Rahman Jawad Qureshi ‘Ajā’iz Nīsabūr: The Role of Reason in Matters of Faith