Germany: First Imam Training Center in Germany Opens in Hesse

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It is close to the Aziz Mosque, inaugurated eight years ago, creating a small, livable campus for the incoming class of 80 students who are to arrive this week. 

Ahmadiyya Times | News Watch | US Desk
Source/Credit: German Mission in the US
By German Mission / DPA | Dec 17, 2012

Germany’s only training center for imams opened in the Hessian town of Riedstadt

Germany’s only training center for imams opened ... in the Hessian town of Riedstadt. The initial 80 students are to begin their studies in Koranic interpretation, Islamic mysticism, Arabic and German history in the center, Germany’s first.

The Ahmadiyya Muslim Jamaat Islamic reform congregation started construction of the new center three years ago in Riedstadt, located about 45 kilometers south of Frankfurt. The new Islamic institute takes up approximately 7,000 square meters, which include seven classrooms, an auditorium for 100 guests, a dining hall with a kitchen, a gymnasium and a small boarding school. It is close to the Aziz Mosque, inaugurated eight years ago, creating a small, livable campus for the incoming class of 80 students who are to arrive this week.

Up to 200 young men at a time can be trained here as imams, divided into seven classes. The spokesperson for the Ahmadiyya congregation, Asif Sadiq, says that “it is a seven-year course of study, including internships in mosques and communities – which is long and intense, but this is due to the abundance of the material.” At the end of the day, imams are theologians at a high level, he explains. Because most students beginning at the institute come fresh out of school and have only lived with their parents up to that point, at the institute they learn some housework and cooking skills alongside their rites and prayers to enable them to live independently.

Prior to the construction of Aziz Mosque, discussions took place among city officials and citizens about whether Riedstadt was an appropriate place for an Islamic place of worship. However, there were no such debates about the institute building, according to the city’s independent mayor, Werner Amend. He says that rather than any unpleasantness, there was just exuberant joy that the Ahmadiyya community in Riedstadt managed bring the only Imam school in Germany, and one of only ten worldwide, to the area.  The mayor adds that the institute is "a logical next step to the construction of Aziz Mosque."

The Ahmadiyya Muslim Jamaat community in Germany has some 30,000 members, who are organized into more than 250 local communities. The community is considered moderate.  The worldwide leader of the Ahmadiyya community, Hadhrat Mirza Masroor Ahmad Khalif, was expected to attend the grand opening of the Institute for Islamic Theology and Languages.



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