(Transcript from SBS World News Radio)
The main body representing Muslim clerics in Australia says it supports the establishment of a national registry of Imams and Sheikhs.
The National Imams Council says there is currently no central authority to verify their qualifications.
Senior Muslims have expressed concern about what they say is a small, but vocal, number of self-proclaimed religious leaders.
Brianna Roberts reports.
(Click on the audio tab above to hear the full report)
Just weeks before Sydney man Sulayman Khalid was arrested on terror-related charges, the 20 year old was posting videos on the online service Youtube.
In the videos he presents a series of lectures and offers to answer questions on Islam.
Senior Muslim leaders say they're worried people such as Sulayman Khalid are able to present themselves as Sheikhs or religious teachers.
Mehmet Ozalp, the President of the Islamic Science and Research Academy of Australia, says there is little that can be done to stop them.
"The word Sheikh, Imam, Maulana or Hoija really mean the same thing. They are learned people who know Islam and they can instruct people on Islamic religion. If somebody grows a beard, dons a religious attire and is able to quote verses from the Koran and looks intelligent can fool anybody that they are qualified to be a Sheikh. People have no way of checking."
The President of the Australian National Imams Council, Sheikh Abdul Azim, says his organisation would welcome the establishment of a national registry of qualified religious leaders in Australia.
"It is very good to have a registry for Imams and this is something that we really need in this country."
But not everyone agrees on who should set up such a registry and what the qualification criteria would be.
Kuranda Seyit from the Forum on Australian Islamic Relations says it would be difficult to find consensus.
"The Muslim community in Australia is quite fractured. And there are some very disparate groups, different schools of thought and ideologies. And to get everybody to work together on this initiative would be very difficult, unless it's lead by the government."
Sheikh Azim says a national registry should not be imposed on Muslims by the government.
"This is our business and the government can maybe support it, but this business is for the Imams, for the Muslim community itself."
The practical aspects of setting up a registry of Imams and other qualified religious teachers could be challenging.
And even with a registry, the Australian National Imams Council's Sheikh Abdul Azim says there is really no way of stopping people from styling themselves as teachers and amassing followers.
"We can do our best, but you always have people that claim things and assume things. You have fake doctors, fake engineers. You always have this problem."
One suggestion is to give more focus on training Imams to help them better relate to their followers, particularly to young people, within an Australian context.
Mr Seyit says this may help to prevent some of them from going online in search of answers, and being influenced false teachings.
"They're looking for guidance, they're looking for mentoring. And they're looking for someone to help them with some of the confusion around some of the issues that are involved in their life. And it really it really is crucial and critical the answers they are being given by those Imams. They can go to the left or the right and that's the critical pathway that hangs in the balance they're getting the information from the wrong people."
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