From Education about Islam to Education according to Islam:Reconstructing the Paradigm of Islamic Education Based on Tawhid and Ta'dib

Dari Pendidikan tentang Islam menuju Pendidikan menurut Islam: Merekonstruksi Paradigma Pendidikan Islam Berdasarkan Tauhid dan Ta'dib

Abstract

This article examines the conceptual ambiguity of Islamic education: whether it should be understood as education about Islam or education according to Islam. The study argues that education about Islam, understood as the teaching of Islamic subject matter, is necessary but insufficient when it is detached from Islamic worldview, moral formation, and the ordering of knowledge. Using qualitative conceptual library research, the article analyzes foundational works of Syed Muhammad Naquib al-Attas on ta'dib, Ismail Raji al-Faruqi on tawhid, and contemporary scholarship on Islamic pedagogy, educational purpose, and knowledge integration. The findings show that tawhid functions as the ontological and epistemological foundation of Islamic education, while ta'dib functions as its formative and pedagogical foundation. A reconstructed paradigm therefore requires more than adding religious content to curriculum; it demands integration of purpose, knowledge, pedagogy, assessment, teacher formation, and institutional culture. The article contributes a conceptual model that distinguishes Islam as object of instruction from Islam as educational paradigm. It concludes that Islamic education becomes genuinely Islamic when Islamic content is situated within a tawhidic worldview and embodied through ta'dib, producing learners who are intellectually competent, morally disciplined, spiritually aware, and socially responsible.