The holy city of Tivaouane, capital of the Tijaaniyya in Senegal, is a radiant religious center where great religious leaders have come to train, and then spread Islam throughout Africa and the world. This center of teaching and exchange has been able to format an educational model built on the precepts of Islam while drawing inspiration from humanist values enriched by the African cultural heritage that has been able, at all times, to provide the conceptual and intellectual means for critical and constructive assimilation. Both a religious center and a space for intellectual challenge, Tivaouane offers a school of thought, a method proven on generations of disciples.

One of the spiritual fathers of the Tijaaniyya in Senegal, El Hadji Maodo Malick, remains an icon whose commitment and self-denial greatly contributed to the Islamization of the Senegalese population, who, until the dawn of the 19th century, were in the darkness of ignorance. First, the son of Sidy Ousmane Sy and Sokhna Fawade Wélé, born, according to some historians, in 1855 in Gaya, a village located on the left bank of the Senegal River, north of Dagana, would favor teaching.

At the time, people were illiterate and illiterate. The society of the time was composed of notables who were content with their descendants. So Maodo, knowing their ignorance of the texts of the Koran, preferred to establish the seminaries of Ndiarndé, with which he would train his first “Moukhadams” that he would disseminate in all the nooks and crannies of the country, through what can be called “decentralization”. The latter would have the task of fighting against paganism and spreading the teachings of Maodo in all the regions of the country. This is why some people amused themselves by saying that Maodo had instructed Moors, Wolofs and Toucouleurs while helping those who were in the darkness of ignorance.

The latter, charged with popularizing Islam, helped him, with detachment, in his noble and exalting mission: to rescue souls wandering in the meanders of triumphant paganism and to make his talibés models of believers. Prompt to refine their religious practice more each day. He did remarkable work among the Lebous in strengthening their faith and the equation of their religious practices tinged until then with vestiges of paganism. His main concern was Islam in general, its popularization rather than the dissemination of the Tijaaniyya. El Hadji Malick, the builder of the Tivaouane school, knew, in a context of colonial invasion and conflict with the pagan power, how to achieve, beyond all expectations, his objectives of Islamization, without using a single weapon or encouraging violence. Rather than planting bombs, he established mosques in all parts of the territory, rather than continuing the Jihad of his venerated predecessor, El Hadj Omar Foutyou Tall, he preferred the weapons of Islamic teaching and the conquest of hearts. This winning strategy allowed the Tidjanya to establish itself throughout West Africa. In his work called Kifaaya, Maodo gave necessary advice for cohabitation with the colonial authorities. This is the basis of his strategy. June 27, 1922, El Hadji Malick Sy had just been called to Allah. It was in Tivaouane that he was buried.