Knowledge Policy in the Fatimid Caliphate: An Analysis of the Function of Educational and Religious Institutions

Abstract

This study aims to examine the relationship between the structure of political power in the Fatimid Caliphate and the institutions of knowledge production and transmission, in order to determine how the Fatimid state reproduced its religious authority through the organization of institutions such as libraries, mosques, disputation sessions, and domestic scholarly circles. The research method is a “descriptive-analytical” study based on the analysis of historical documents and reports from classical texts. Through a critical approach, the study examines historical data within the framework of institutional analysis. The findings indicate that the Fatimid scholarly system represented a dialectical interaction between the “politics of knowledge control” and the “dynamism of independent institutions.” Thus, while palace libraries and wisdom sessions were monopolized by the state for the promotion of Ismaʿili ideology, educational circles held in scholars’ homes provided a space for preserving intellectual autonomy and sustaining educational traditions. Ultimately, the study concludes that the Fatimid state, by integrating ancient educational traditions with ideological needs, presented a model of “knowledge-based governance” that, while strengthening political centralization, also created the necessary foundations for intellectual plurality and the continuity of scientific heritage in the medieval centuries.