DISTANCE EDUCATION AMID THE WESTERN ATTRIBUTES AND THE ARABIC WORD ROOTING, TEACHING ARABIC REMOTELY AS A MODEL

Abstract

The current study addresses a modern and recurring issue in all types of education in general and in Arabic language distance education in particular. Western scholars have mentioned this type of education, attributing its emergence to the modern industrial revolution in Europe when the steam engine was discovered and used in railways in the early 19th century. Since then, trains have been used to transport educational materials over long distances for students who struggle with direct education. Many Arab scholars have also followed this principle, attributing the origin of distance education to the West. This study provides conclusive evidence that distance education, in its original and simple sense, referred to by Western researchers as "correspondence education," is a product of our Arab-Islamic civilization. The credit for this goes to the Hadith scholars when they discussed methods of acquiring and transmitting knowledge, elaborated on these methods, described them precisely, and outlined their various types and how they occur. This study has shown that some of these methods can be indirect or remote. The researcher in this study has expanded the scope of research from methods of acquiring and transmitting knowledge in the field of Prophetic Hadith at a distance to methods of acquiring and transmitting knowledge at a distance in the field of Arabic language with its various branches. It has been clarified that Arab language scholars have mentioned many of these methods in Arabic writings long before the emergence of correspondence education in Western countries.