Anwar Al-Awlaqi: His life and works

He was a young preacher who studied engineering at Colorado State University, served as an imam in various mosques in the United States for eight years, served as a peacemaker between the two sides after the 9/11 attacks, had a master's degree in Educational Leadership, started a PhD in Human Resource Development but had to drop out, considered or tried various traditional career paths such as entrepreneurship, and tried to invite people to Islam by following an itinerant path in his forty years of life. He was regarded by his sympathetic circle as a dawah caller to ıslam, sheikh, imam and jihadist leader, and by the Western media as the bin Laden of the Internet, the Interpreter of Jihad and the Superstar of Jihad. The author of this information was none other than Anwar al-Awlaki. In this study, which consists of two parts, in the first part, Anwar al-Awlaki's life was analysed in detail. Topics such as his educational life, his career as an imam, the recording of his sermons on Islamic history as audio cassettes, his moderate attitude during the events of 11 September, the fame of his sermons that crossed the borders of the country, and his murder by his country of citizenship by polarising with America on the axis of his changing ideas over time were tried to be covered in titles. In the second part, the importance of Islamic history for al-Awlāqī was analysed and his contributions to Islamic history were evaluated in terms of his approach based on the Qur'ān and the Sunnah, his enrichment of his narrative by making use of other sources, his method of evaluating historical events, and his efforts to develop a strong Islamic identity through religious education, focusing on the early history of Islam in order to protect Muslims' beliefs. In addition, it is an undeniable fact that he created a following with his narratives on Islamic history. It is known that people were influenced by his sermons and carried out some actions, and even after his death, he was portrayed by the media as if he was responsible for these actions. With the completion of this study, we hope that we will be able to reach the information about al-Awlaki's historiography, which he gave in the early years of his career before adopting salafi-jihadism and which we think left a mark on people.