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Shah
Jalal (R) a major Sufi saint of Bengal. His full
name is Shaikh Jalaluddin. Shah Jalal (R) commands
great respect of Muslims of the subcontinent.
He lies buried at Sylhet.
Shah
Jalal's name is associated with the Muslim conquest
of Sylhet. Tradition goes that a Hindu king named
Gaur Govinda ruled the Sylhet area. Burhanuddin,
a Muslim who lived in the territory under his
control once sacrificed a cow to celebrate the
birth of his son. But a kite snatched a piece
of flesh of the slaughtered cow and it fell from
its beak on the house of a Brahmin. According
to another tradition, the piece of flesh fell
on the temple of the king himself, which he took
as a great offence. At the order of the king,
Burhanuddin's hands were said to have been cut
off and his son killed. Burhanuddin went to gaur
and submitted a prayer to Sultan Shamsuddin Firuz
Shah for justice from him. The sultan accordingly
sent an army under the command of his nephew Sikandar
Khan Ghazi, who was however, defeated twice by
Gaur Govinda. The sultan then ordered his sipahsalar
(armed forces chief) Nasiruddin to lead the war.
During the same time Shah Jalal (R) with his 360
followers reached Bengal and joined the Muslim
army in the Sylhet campaign. This time the Muslim
army won, Gaur Govinda fled the country and Sylhet
came under Muslim rule.
Though
based on folk tales, historic evidences support
the truth of the war event. King Gaur Govinda,
Sultan Shamsuddin Firuz Shah, Skiandar Khan Ghazi,
Nasiruddin, Shah Jalal are all historical persons;
there might be some imaginary accounts in illustrating
the story, but the main event, i.e., the conquest
of Sylhet, is a historical fact. Sultan Shamsuddin
Firuz Shah ruled Bengal during the period from
1301 to 1322 AD and expanded the territory under
his rule in all directions. Epigraphic and literary
sources also attest the fact of the conquest of
Sylhet during Shamsuddin Firuz Shah's rule and
of the involvement of Shah Jalal (R) in the process.
ibn
batuta visited Bengal when Sultan fakhruddin mubarak
shah was ruling at Sonargaon (1338-1349 AD). He
met Shah Jalal (R) in the latter's khanqah and
stayed three days there in 1346 AD. Ibn Batuata,
however, wrongly recorded the name of the saint
as Shaikh Jalaluddin Tabrizi (R). Scholars have
established that Ibn Batuta's 'Tabrizi' is a mistake
for 'Kuniyayi', the epithet for Shah Jalal (R).
The
earliest and most acceptable source of information
about the first Muslim conquest of Sylhet and
the advent of Islam in the area is a Persian inscription
of 918 AH/1512 AD issued in the reign of Sultan
Alauddin husain shah (1494-1519 AD). According
to the inscription, Sylhet was first conquered
by Sikandar Shah Ghazi in 703 AH/1303 AD in the
reign of Shamsuddin Firuz Shah. The inscription
was dedicated to the sacred memory of Shaikh Jalal
Mujarrad ibn Muhammad. Though the inscription
was issued after a little more than two hundred
years of the event, it seems to have the accurate
historical dates.
An
account of the conquest of Sylhet by Shah Jalal
(R) and his companions is found in the Gulzar-i-Abrar
of Ghausi, written in 1613 AD. It is based on
the earlier work Sharh-i-Nuzhat-ul-Arwah by Shaikh
Ali Sher, a descendant of Shaikh Nurul Huda Abul
Karamat, who was a companion of Shah Jalal (R)
who took part in the conquest of Sylhet. According
to this source, Shaikh Jalaluddin Mujarrad, a
khalifah of Sultan Syed Ahmed Yesvi, was born
in Turkistan and had settled in Sylhet. With the
permission of the Pir, he came to India with 700
companions to take part in jihad (holy war). He
reached Bengal with 360 of his companions. They
fought against Raja Gaur Govinda of Sylhet who
fled and the country around Sylhet fell into the
hands of the victors. Shah Jalal (R) divided the
conquered lands among his followers, permitted
them to get married, but he himself, however,
remained a celibate. This source gives the credit
for conquering Sylhet to Shah Jalal (R) and his
followers, and has no reference to any reigning
king or his generals.
Nasiruddin
Haidar wrote a biography of Shah Jalal (R) in
Persian in 1860. The author claims that in writing
the book titled Suhail-i-Yaman, he used two Persian
manuscripts such as Risalat written by Muhiuddim
Khadim in 1711 AD and Rauzat-us-Salatin written
by an unknown author in 1721 AD. Both the manuscripts
were kept preserved in the dargah of the saint.
Shah Jalal's father, Muhammad, was a Sufi of Yamen.
Shah Jalal (R) lost his parents in his childhood
and was brought up by his maternal uncle Sayyid
Ahamd Kabir Suhrawardy, a great saint. After completion
of formal education, Shah Jalal (R) received spiritual
lessons from his uncle. It is said that Kabir
gave him a handful of earth and instructed him
to go to India for preaching Islam. Shah Jalal
(R) was told to find the sacred place of India
where the earth was of the colour and smell similar
to the earth given to him and should pass the
rest of his life there in prayer and meditation.
On his way to India, Shah Jalal (R) met Shakh
Nizamuddin Auliya at Delhi who gave him a pair
of pigeons of a special species, which, according
to folk belief is found still today in the dargah
of Shah Jalal (R) in Sylhet and some other places
of Bengal. So advised, Shah Jalal (R) moved to
Bengal. It so happened that during this time,
the army of Sultan Shamsuddin Firuz Shah was fighting
against King Gaur Govinda of Sylhet. Shah Jalal
(R) and his followers joined the battle. The biography
of Shah Jalal (R) gives description of how Sylhet
was conquered, as well as of some miraculous events
that demonstrate the spiritual powers of the saint,
which were considered for the victory more important
than the prowess of the army.
Although
Suhail-i-Yaman is a relatively recent book written
by using both facts and hearsay, it was for sometime
looked upon as a standard biography of Hazrat
Shah Jalal (R). The book says that the saint came
from Yemen (of the Arab peninsula), but this has
been proved wrong. An inscription discovered in
Sylhet in 1873 categorically indicates that Shah
Jalal (R) was a Kuniyayi, ie, he came from Kuniya,
a township in Turkey. In the Gulzar-i-Abrar of
Ghausi he is called Turkistani. There are every
reasons to believe that Shah Jalal (R) came from
Turkey and not from Yemen. Another inscription
issued in honour of Shaikh-ul-Mashaikh Makhdum
Shaikh Jalal Mujarrad bin Muhammad records that
Sylhet was first conquered by Sikandar Khan Ghazi
in the reign of Sultan Firuz Shah in 703 AH/1303
AD. This is also supported by Gulzar-i-Abrar.
In
his travel accounts, Ibn Batuta described that
Shah Jalal (R) was a great saint of hoary age
and a dervish with exceptional spiritual powers.
Ibn Batuta learnt that the saint had met Caliph
al-Mustasim Billah at Baghdad, and that he was
there at the time of the Caliph's assassination.
The companions of Shah Jalal (R) later told Ibn
Batuta that the saint died at the age of one hundred
and fifty and that he observed fasting in almost
all the days of a year. He also performed namaz
throughout the night. He was thin, tall and scantily
bearded.
Ibn
Batuta also described some events that demonstrate
the spiritual powers of the saint and noted that
he had got the message of his death in the following
year at Beijing. Recent studies show that Ibn
Batuta visited Bengal in 1345-46 AD, which means,
Shah Jalal (R) died in 1347.
Shah
Jalal (R) was a disciple of Sayyid Ahmad Yesvi
and belonged to the Naqshbandiya order of the
Sufis. His preceptor and fellow friends lived
in agony and suspense in the days of turmoil following
the Mongol invasion in Turkey.
Ibn
Batuta's statement that he had met Shaikh Jalaluddin
Tabrizi (R) has become a subject of controversy.
Some modern scholars believe that both the Jalals
(Shaikh Jalaluddin Tabrizi (R) and Shah Jalal
(R) of Sylhet) are one and the same person, which
they were not, according to recent studies. However,
both of them were great saints, and had great
influence on the people of Bengal. They lived
and worked at different places and different times.
Shaikh Jalaluddin Tabrizi (R) lived in Pandua
and Deotala of Maldah (West Bengal), but Shah
Jalal (R) lived in Sylhet (East Bengal). Tabrizi's
period was at least a century earlier than that
of Shah Jalal (R) of Sylhet. The former was a
contemporary of Sultan Shamsuddin iltutmish (died
1236 AD), Shaikh Qutbuddin Bakhtiyar Kaki of Delhi
(died 1235 AD) and Shaikh Bahauddin Zakariya of
Multan (died 1262). According to Hagiologists,
Jalaluddin Tabrizi (R) died in 1226, or 1244 AD
and, even if the later date is considered correct,
he died one hundred three years before the death
of Shah Jalal (R) of Sylhet.
The
tomb of Shah Jalal (R) is visited daily by a large
number of devotees. His grave is unusually large,
which indicates his tall physique as described
by Ibn Batuta.
Bibliography: HAR Gibb, Ibn Battuta: Travels
in Asia and Africa, London 1928; 'Gulzar-i-Abrar
of Ghausi', Journal of the Asiatic Society of
Pakistan, II, 1959; Muhammad Enamul Haq, A History
of Sufism in Bengal, Dhaka 1975; A Karim, Social
History of the Muslim in Bengal, (2nd ed), Chittagong
1985. |
