Azerbaijan Institute of Theology (AIT) was established by President of the Republic of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev’s Decree no 3654 dated February 9, 2018, under the State Committee on Religious Associations of the Republic of Azerbaijan. According to the Decree, the Faculty of Theology of Baku State University was included in the structure of the newly established Azerbaijan Institute of Theology. The Faculty of Theology, which is as old as the Independent Republic of Azerbaijan, was established according to the agreement between the Ministry of Education of the Republic of Azerbaijan, Baku State University and the Turkey Diyanet Foundation in the 1992-1993 academic year and functioned under Baku State University until 2018. The faculty was led by academician Vasim Mammadaliyev until that date.
Over the past 25 years, the Faculty of Theology, which has an exceptional role in the development of high-level specialists, educated hundreds of graduates and scholars for the Azerbaijani society. Performing a historic mission to educate local specialists in theology, the faculty has made a significant contribution to the establishment of AIT with local opportunities. All major disciplines are currently being taught by local staff, who have academic degrees and titles.
The primary goal of the faculty is to educate theologians who will play an active role in the development of social consciousness with various social projects under the guidance of high-level instructors with deep understanding of theology, who are able to evaluate their national-cultural heritage, have right and unbiased understanding of the religion, respond positively to all the useful innovations and contribute to the development of science.
The main mission of the faculty includes exploring religious sources for the study of unbiased understanding and learning of religion, offering solutions to the problems that are closely related to the traditional methods of religious studies, following the needs and tendencies of society, and educating high-level theologians and religious figures with universal values and multideimensional knowledge.