“And prepare against them whatever you are able of power…”
— Qur’an, Al-Anfāl (8:60)
“The best of your leaders are those whom you love and who love you; you pray for them and they pray for you.”
— Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim
Introduction: Leadership as Cultivation, Not Coincidence
True leadership in Islam does not emerge from chance or charisma; it is cultivated through revelation, discipline, and companionship. The heroes of our history — from Ṣalāḥuddīn al-Ayyūbī to Muḥammad al-Fātiḥ — were not accidents of time but outcomes of long, deliberate formation. Their lives remind us that leadership is a craft of hearts before it is a position of hands. If our Ummah longs for leaders of depth and direction, it must rebuild the ecosystems that form them.
Three timeless models can guide us — each distinct in form, yet united in purpose: forming human beings who lead through sincerity, service, and steadfastness.
Model One: The Qur’anic Formation Pathway
The Qur’an teaches that true leaders are born from patience and certainty: “We made from among them leaders, guiding by Our command, when they were patient and when they were certain of Our signs.” (32:24). In other words, imāmah — the ability to guide others — is not inherited or appointed but cultivated in the quiet struggle between sabr (endurance) and yaqīn (conviction).
This model begins where all change must begin — within the heart. Before strategy or systems, it demands the formation of the soul. Those who cannot serve cannot lead; those who have not tasted sabr cannot build lasting institutions. The training of such leaders must involve long projects with delayed results, invisible service with no applause, and mentorship that constantly reminds them that Allah’s pleasure outweighs the approval of people. In this way, patience becomes muscle and certainty becomes sight.
When nurtured correctly, such formation produces individuals who stand steady when the world trembles — leaders immune to vanity, capable of seeing through the fog of fame and failure alike.
Model Two: From Siege to Statecraft — The Architecture behind Ṣalāḥuddīn and al-Fātiḥ
Rather than re-telling their victories, we must understand how such men were made. Ṣalāḥuddīn and Muḥammad al-Fātiḥ both represent a training architecture that fused revelation with reason, scholarship with statecraft, and piety with power. They were raised not only by fathers, but by scholars who understood that leadership begins in the madrasa, not the palace.
Their education was never confined to memorisation or military exercise. It was a balanced curriculum of faith and function — Qur’an, fiqh, and akhlāq alongside mathematics, history, and governance. Each had mentors who modelled humility before Allah and firmness before injustice. Their teachers, like Nūr al-Dīn Zengī and Aq Shams al-Dīn, combined vision with vigilance: they taught their students to weep before Allah and to act with courage before men. These were ecosystems of growth — spaces where spiritual and strategic literacy developed side by side.
Through such deliberate design, young men once taught in tents went on to liberate cities and reform nations. Their secret was never just genius or skill but the slow, generational cultivation of trust, intellect, and ihsān.
Today, we need institutions that replicate this dual inheritance. Schools and seminaries must train the mind and the moral conscience together. We need students who can quote the Qur’an and manage a budget, who can teach a child and defend a principle, who see worship as preparation for responsibility. Leadership built on such balance is what turns siege moments into statecraft — crises into continuity.
Model Three: The Seminary Network that Replicates — Deoband, Bury, and Beyond
If individual leaders are the fruit, institutions are the soil that nourishes them. The seminary networks of the Muslim world — from Deoband to Bury, from Cairo to Timbuktu — are living proof of how sincere systems can outlast centuries.
In 1866, Mawlānā Muḥammad Qāsim Nānautawī and Mawlānā Rashīd Aḥmad Gangohī founded Dār al-ʿUlūm Deoband with modest resources but immense clarity. Their aim was to preserve authentic scholarship and produce reformers rooted in Qur’an, Sunnah, and service. What began as a humble madrasa in India became a movement of learning that crossed continents. A century later, Shaykh Yūsuf Motālā established Dār al-ʿUlūm Bury in the UK, carrying Deoband’s DNA into Europe. His institution combined memorisation, Arabic mastery, and moral training, producing scholars who could teach, translate, and transform communities.
The pattern repeated elsewhere. Al-Azhar in Cairo and al-Zaytūna in Tunis served as open universities of Islam — centres where scholarship was public, not privileged, sustained by waqf endowments that ensured independence from rulers. Dār al-Ḥadīth al-Ashrafiyyah in Damascus refined the art of hadith verification, while the Sankore University in Timbuktu and the Mauritanian Maḥāḍir showed how knowledge could thrive in deserts with nothing but ink, hearts, and tents.
These seminaries shared certain DNA: isnād before image — authority passed through living teachers, not platforms; independence through endowment or simplicity; clear, replicable curricula balanced with local relevance; and deep community attachment. Students were not trained to escape society but to serve it. Graduates became founders of new centres, creating self-replicating systems of scholarship that spread like light — quiet, consistent, unstoppable.
This model still holds the secret to sustainability. The Ummah’s intellectual revival will not come from large conferences or campaigns, but from local seminaries producing thoughtful, humble, well-anchored individuals who can plant, teach, and lead wherever Allah places them.
Building Pathways in Our Time
From these three models — Qur’anic formation, siege-to-statecraft training, and replicating seminary networks — emerges a single principle: great leaders are built through process, not applause. Every generation must design its own training grounds, balancing timeless principles with contemporary needs.
This means scouting and nurturing talent early, pairing every student with mentors for both heart and skill, and crafting curriculums that integrate revelation, reason, and craft. It means making worship structural — embedding Qur’an, tahajjud, and sadaqah as habits that stabilise the soul. It means financing independence through waqf, measuring success not by fame but by continuity, and assessing character with as much seriousness as intellect.
Leadership formation is not an academic module; it is a way of life. When communities consciously shape their people, they shift from reaction to vision — from waiting for heroes to becoming nurseries of them.
The Measure of True Leadership
True leadership in Islam is a trust, not a throne. It is born from sincerity, not spectacle; from service, not self-promotion. Leadership is not the power to command but the courage to uplift; not the pursuit of status but the willingness to be accountable before Allah and compassionate toward His creation. And in our time, it must be said plainly: leadership is not about cloning personalities, building replicas, or orbiting cults of charisma. We are not manufacturing look-alikes; we are forming souls.
Real leaders are dynamic enough to meet their moment. When history demanded public struggle, Shaykh Ḥusayn Aḥmad Madanī stood in the political arena without surrendering his scholarship. In our own era, scholars like Muftī Taqī ʿUthmānī and Shaykh Muḥammad al-Ḥasan al-Dedew (al-Daduw) step forward in different ways—judiciary and finance, daʿwah and revival—each translating revelation into the needs of their age. This is what authentic leadership looks like: fidelity to the sources, fluency in the present, and the moral spine to act when action is required.
Such leadership cannot be packaged as a weekend course or a certificate. It is the slow work of character-building—sabr and yaqīn cultivated over years; adab learned in companionship; humility formed in hidden worship; judgment refined through service and accountability. When leaders see themselves as servants, not saviours—and when communities prize patience over performance and substance over image—a different kind of greatness appears, one that outlives titles, trends, and timelines.
Conclusion: Growing the Best of Ourselves
We no longer need to find the next Ṣalāḥuddīn or al-Fātiḥ — we need to grow them. But more importantly, we need to grow every believer into the best version of themselves. The task of every seminary, institute, or daʿwah organisation is not only to produce scholars and imams, but to shape complete human beings — thoughtful, disciplined, compassionate, and awake to their divine purpose.
Each student should have a plan, a pathway, a personalised vision of service. A Dār al-ʿUlūm that does not chart the growth of its students is a garden that plants without pruning. Teachers must look at every pupil and ask, what is the potential of this soul? — then cultivate it with time, trust, and training.
The Prophet ﷺ said, “People are like mines of gold and silver.” Within every person lies hidden value, waiting for someone to uncover it. Let our seminaries and madrasahs become the mines of the Ummah — places that refine character, awaken potential, and polish hearts until they shine.
When we invest in people with sincerity and system, Allah brings forth leaders who guide with light. And when that happens, we will no longer speak of lost glory or distant heroes — for every believer will have become a small light of renewal, illuminating their corner of the Ummah.
“Unquestionably, the help of Allah is near.” (Qur’an 2:214)
