It is a widely accepted fact that under centuries of Muslim rule, areas from Andalusia to Samarkand and from Cairo to Delhi were home to vibrant and often world-leading traditions of teaching and learning. In the process, there emerged a diversity of positions on knowledge, teaching methods, and student learning. These traditions thrived in places such as mosques, kuttabs (places of elementary education), and madrasas (institutions of higher learning), as well as in libraries, palaces, and centers of translation.

The impetus for education was a combination of a religious quest to understand the will of God in order to fashion personal and collective life in its light, a search for useful knowledge to run empires, and the attraction of the Hellenistic, Persian, and Indian intellectual heritages. ...