Shaykh Mahbubur Rahman Maruf

Shaykh Mahbubur Rahman Maruf is an imam, educator, researcher, and community leader with a background in traditional Islamic scholarship, academic study, chaplaincy, curriculum development, media, and interfaith engagement. Born and raised in London, he completed the traditional ʿĀlimiyyah / Dars al-Niẓāmī programme at Ebrahim College, studying Arabic, Qur’anic sciences, ḥadīth, Hanafi fiqh and uṣūl al-fiqh, tafsīr, logic, rhetoric, theology, Islamic philosophy, spirituality, sīrah, and Islamic history. He also holds ijāzah in seven canonical Qur’anic readings.

He holds a Master’s degree from the University of Warwick in the Philosophy and History of Education in the Islamic tradition, where his work focused on teaching Islam in Western contexts to Muslim and non-Muslim audiences, educational philosophy, and teacher training. He later completed a second Master’s degree in Islamic Texts at Zaytuna College, with particular emphasis on advanced uṣūl al-fiqh in the mutakallimūn tradition and the intellectual foundations of Islamic legal praxis.

Over the years, Shaykh Ma’rouf has served in religious and educational roles in both the United Kingdom and the United States. He worked for approximately four years in chaplaincy in London until Covid, later served students across several colleges and universities in the United States, taught advanced adult students at the Institute of Knowledge Seminary, and has held roles in American Muslim school leadership and religious curriculum development. In the UK, he also worked in Islamic media as a presenter for the Islamic Channel’s National Qur’an Competition, a judge for the Recite show, and a live English translator of sermons from Makkah, Madinah, and al-Aqsa.

In Arizona, he is serving as an Imam, actively involved in interfaith and civic engagement through the Arizona Faith Network, community reflections, dialogue with law-enforcement representatives, revert support, outreach initiatives, and wider community programming. He is also the founder of URF Institute.

His interests include Islamic intellectual history, comparative religion, philosophy, civilisation, education, languages, and the relationship between tradition and modernity. He enjoys reading, travelling, hiking, participating in book clubs focused on ancient and classical texts, and engaging with diverse religious and intellectual communities. He is currently studying Hebrew and Persian.