Fostering Intellectual Islam: An Interview with Peter Strohschneider (German Council of Science and Humanities)

13 August 2010 In future, centres for Islamic Studies are to be set up at German universities to train Muslim religious scholars. In an interview with Qantara, Peter Strohschneider, chairman of the German Council of Science and Humanities, talks about these plans. He claims that the project would not only be for the “intellectual self-reflection…

Share Button
Read More

Germany’s Islam conference: State Islam would be unconstitutional

The Muslims will have to organize if they want to ensure themselves of a place within the system of constitutional law on religion. In order to conduct negotiations on religious matters the neutral state requires someone to talk to. A commentary by canon lawyer Hans Michael Heinig Symbolic Picture of Islam in Germany and the…

Share Button
Read More

German education of Islamic schoolteachers and imams remains source of conflict

Educating Islamic theologians – schoolteachers and imams – at German universities has caused a lot of discussion in the past. Now the Wissenschaftsrat (German Council of Science and Humanities) has proposed a concept to grant both universities and Muslim associations a say in the education, but it is still likely to stir controversy. So far,…

Share Button
Read More

Islam in Germany

Demographics [Return to top] Germany has the largest Muslim population in Western Europe after France. Approximately 3.0 to 3.5 million Muslims live in Germany, and 80% of them do not have German citizenship; 608,000 are German citizens.1 100,000 of them are German converts to Islam.2 Recent statistics show a continuing increase in their numbers.3 70%…

Share Button
Read More

Exhibitions in Berlin emphasise past and present interrelations of the three Abrahamic faiths

Germany, like many locales, is currently undergoing processes of societal boundary drawing giving renewed salience to religious difference. The aftermath of President Trump’s decision to recognise Jerusalem as the Israeli capital brought fierce debates about the (real or imputed) anti-Semitism of Muslim immigrants and their descendants. The result was a further instance of the discursive…

Share Button
Read More