Abdul Awwal Jaunpuri

ʿAbd al-Awwal Jaunpūrī (, ; 1867 – 18 June 1921) was an Indian Muslim scholar, religious preacher, educationist, poet and author. Described by Muhammad Mojlum Khan as one of the "most gifted and outstanding" of Karamat Ali Jaunpuri's many children, he displayed an important role leading his father's founded Taiyuni reformist movement in Bengal.

Early life and family Abdul Awwal Jaunpuri was born in 1867, as the youngest son of Karamat Ali Jaunpuri and Batul Bibi, on the island of Sandwip off the coast of Bengal. He belonged to an Indian Muslim family that traced their ancestry to the Arab tribe of Quraysh, with Jaunpuri being a 36th-generation direct descendant of Abu Bakr, the first Rashidun caliph. Jaunpuri's father had migrated from Jaunpur in North India with the intention of reforming the Muslims of Bengal. His paternal grandfather, Abu Ibrahim Shaykh Muhammad Imam Bakhsh was a student of Shah Abdul Aziz, and his great-grandfather Jarullah was also a shaykh. Many of his family members were also Islamic scholars, for example, his eldest brother Hafiz Ahmad Jaunpuri. Jaunpuri completed its hifz (memorisation) at the age of thirteen, He gave lectures at the Chawkbazar Shahi Mosque. His second son, Muhammad Hammad Abduz Zahir Jaunpuri (d. 1896-97 CE), died at an early age and in memory of him, Jaunpuri established the Madrasah-i-Hammadiyyah in the city's Armanitola neighbourhood. Nawab Khwaja Salimullah was known to have performed Eid prayers behind Jaunpuri at the Lalbagh Fort. He began touring eastern Bengal, visiting places such as Mymensingh, Chandpur, Laksam and Faridpur. The latter was an important centre for their Faraizi opponents who were then under the leadership of Abdul Ghafur Naya Miyan (son of Dudu Miyan). For the first time in history, there began a union between the Faraizis and Taiyunis, as a result of Naya Miyan pledging bay'ah to Abdul Awwal Jaunpuri. Among Jaunpuri's activities was the condemnation of Sufi music, dancing and the veneration of shrines.

Personal life Jaunpuri married the daughter of Hafiz Ahsan, one of his early teachers in Jaunpur. Their first two sons, Abdul Akhir Jaunpuri and Muhammad Hammad Abduz Zahir Jaunpuri, died at an early age. They had five more sons and five daughters. His son, Abdul Batin Jaunpuri, wrote a biography of Karamat Ali Jaunpuri and Abdul Awwal Jaunpuri.

Death Abdul Awwal Jaunpuri died on 18 June 1921 in Calcutta. He had arrived in Calcutta for medical aid from Faridpur. He was buried in Maniktala, North Calcutta, in the garden of his disciple Abdur Rahman Khan of Dhaka. His early biography, Seerat Molana Abdul Avval Jaunpuri Rehmatullahi Aleihi, was written by his son Abdul Batin Jaunpuri in 1950. Another one of his biographers, Muhammad Abdullah, identified 63 of his books and published Mawlana Abdul Awwal Jaunpuri in 1995.