What is Tarbiyah?

The word "Tarbiyah" is an Arabic word that linguistically means increase, growth, and loftiness. Conventionally, Tarbiyah means the development and training of people in various aspects. The word is commonly used to describe the upbringing of children as the parents provide them with the physical, educational, moral, and spiritual needs to help them grow and become useful parties in the society.

In MAS terminology, the word means the systematic development and training of human resources. In MAS, all members are subject to this comprehensive way of development and training in all aspects including the physical, educational, moral, and spiritual aspects. The word Islamic Tarbiyah implies that the development process conforms to Islamic guidelines and standards. It means that the goals that the process is supposed to achieve in the individual are inspired by the teachings of Islam and the means used to establish such goals are Islamically guided. The Tarbiyah process exceeds the level of individuals to the level of the group trying to establish team spirit that Islam teaches such as love, brotherhood, and mutual trust.

At MAS, the Tarbiyah process is considered the most important process and the Tarbiyah Department is a permanent department in the organization. This belief traces its origin to the teachings of Prophet Muhammad as he—peace be upon him—invested a lot of effort instilling Tarbiyah in his companions. As a result of his effort, he not only left a great message, the message of Islam, but also left a great generation that carried the message and spread it all over the land and moved humanity from darkness to light. Islamic history proved that whenever this process was considered, Muslims were able to succeed and Islam prevailed. Imam Hasan Al-Banna, the founder and the leader of a great Islamic movement, the Muslim Brotherhood, said "Whenever you find the good Muslim you find with him all the means for great success."