Advice to University Professors Regarding Their Interaction with Students
Machine translationRead the Arabic original
The questioner : Your Eminence the Shaykh! I would like Your Eminence to advise our professors at this blessed university; for it is they who keep us away from seeking knowledge. This is because they deal with us only through grades, difficult questions, and ultimately failing. You see nothing from them but the one whom Allah has shown mercy to, who is lenient and sincere. Rather, they cling to the regulations, intensify the curriculum, and deal with us through difficult questions, may Allah guide them.
The Shaykh : I fear that if they are lenient, this will be to the detriment of the students. For if a student sees leniency in adhering to the regulations or in obligating the student to fulfill his duties, he will be lenient. And if the student is lenient, that is to his detriment, O our brothers, and to his detriment. So if the professors’ strictness is with justice, looking at strictness from one angle and the student’s mercy from another, that is good and excellent. And the student will not praise the professor’s strictness until he grows up and realizes that he will not attain the knowledge he attains except through the professor’s strictness. But I do not want the professor to be strict and angry due to an abundance of questions or discussion, unless he knows from the student that most of the questions are to waste time. For some students are clever; if the curriculum is fifty pages, he occupies the professor with questions so that he does not proceed. And if he does not proceed and the exam questions are on what was read rather than the curriculum, the student gains, for the curriculum required of him becomes little or much? Little. So if we know that the student only wants this, the professor should not answer them.
As for if the student asks the question of one seeking guidance, it is never permissible for the professor to be angry with him, or to show annoyance at his question. For the student who discusses for the sake of knowledge is better than the student who is silent. And the student who is silent, we do not know what is behind his silence. He may be silent because of his knowledge and does not need to ask, and I think this is rare. He may be silent out of shyness. And he may be silent out of indifference.
So if the professor finds among the students one who is lively, who enlivens the lesson and asks and discusses, but with a pure intention and seeking guidance from the professor, it is never permissible to treat him with harshness at all.
The Shaykh : I fear that if they are lenient, this will be to the detriment of the students. For if a student sees leniency in adhering to the regulations or in obligating the student to fulfill his duties, he will be lenient. And if the student is lenient, that is to his detriment, O our brothers, and to his detriment. So if the professors’ strictness is with justice, looking at strictness from one angle and the student’s mercy from another, that is good and excellent. And the student will not praise the professor’s strictness until he grows up and realizes that he will not attain the knowledge he attains except through the professor’s strictness. But I do not want the professor to be strict and angry due to an abundance of questions or discussion, unless he knows from the student that most of the questions are to waste time. For some students are clever; if the curriculum is fifty pages, he occupies the professor with questions so that he does not proceed. And if he does not proceed and the exam questions are on what was read rather than the curriculum, the student gains, for the curriculum required of him becomes little or much? Little. So if we know that the student only wants this, the professor should not answer them.
As for if the student asks the question of one seeking guidance, it is never permissible for the professor to be angry with him, or to show annoyance at his question. For the student who discusses for the sake of knowledge is better than the student who is silent. And the student who is silent, we do not know what is behind his silence. He may be silent because of his knowledge and does not need to ask, and I think this is rare. He may be silent out of shyness. And he may be silent out of indifference.
So if the professor finds among the students one who is lively, who enlivens the lesson and asks and discusses, but with a pure intention and seeking guidance from the professor, it is never permissible to treat him with harshness at all.
Source
لقاء مع طلاب جامعة الإمام بمسجد الإسكان — archive.org (1:24:50)
The Arabic text is a machine transcription of the audio recording.