Alexander in the Qur'an
Encyclopedia
Alexander the Great in the Qur'an refers to the conjecture
that the story of Dhul-Qarnayn
(in Arabic
ذو القرنين, literally "The Two-Horned One", also transliterated as Zul-Qarnain or Zulqarnain), mentioned in the Qur'an
, is in fact a reference to Alexander III of Macedon (356–323 BC), popularly known as Alexander the Great.
Dhul-Qarnayn is a figure who was well known in the lore
of the ancient
dwellers of the Arabian Peninsula
and is mentioned in the Qur'an, the sacred scripture of Islam
. Dhul-Qarnayn is regarded by some Muslim
s as a prophet, and is identified with Alexander the Great in early Islamic literature. There have been many different cultural depictions of Alexander the Great
since antiquity
. Muslims have generally endorsed the identification of Dhul-Qarnayn with Alexander the Great, at least until recent times.
The Alexander legends, known as the Alexander romance
have many similarities to the story in the Qur'an but are also more elaborate and describe Alexander's fantastical deeds in detail, such as the story of Alexander building a wall to capture Gog and Magog
. The identification of Alexander with Dhul-Qarnayn has been a matter of theological controversy amongst Islamic scholars since early times, but similarities between the Qur'an and the Alexander romance folklore
were only identified in relatively recent academic research based on the discovery of certain medieval Syriac manuscript
s.
(?-833 AD) in the Sira literature. This identification with Alexander is also endorsed by Islamic tafsir
(exegesis
) literature dating as far back as the tenth century. Some prominent Islamic scholars in recent times have also endorsed this identification.
Secular philologists studying ancient Syriac Christian
legend
s about Alexander the Great independently came to the conclusion that Dhul-Qarnayn is an ancient epithet
for Alexander the Great . Edwards says,
In the 19th century, Orientalists
studying the Qur'an
began researching the identity of Dhul-Qarnayn. Theodor Nöldeke, believed that Dhul-Qarnayn was none other than Alexander the Great and that the source of the Qur'anic narrations were the Alexander romance
legends recorded in Syriac (a dialect of Middle Aramaic). The Syriac manuscripts were translated into English in 1889 by E. A. Wallis Budge
.
In the early 1900s Andrew Runni Anderson wrote a series of articles on the question in the Transactions of the American Philological Association
. The findings of the philologists imply that the source of the Qur'an's story of Dhul-Qarnayn is the Alexander romance, a thoroughly embellished compilation of Alexander's exploits from Hellenistic
and early Christian
sources, which underwent numerous expansions and revisions for two-thousand years, throughout Antiquity
and the Middle Ages
.
since antiquity
, including references in the Hebrew Bible
in 1 Maccabees
and the Book of Daniel
. Alexander the Great was an immensely popular ficogure in the classical
and post-classical cultures of the Mediterranean
and Middle East
. Almost immediately after his death in 323 BC a body of legend began to accumulate about his exploits and life which, over the centuries, became increasingly fantastic as well as allegorical. Collectively this tradition is called the Alexander romance and some recensions feature such vivid episodes as Alexander ascending through the air to Paradise
, journeying to the bottom of the sea in a glass bubble, and journeying through the Land of Darkness
in search of the Water of Life (Fountain of Youth).
The earliest Greek
manuscripts of the Alexander romance, as they have survived, indicate that it was composed at Alexandria
in the 3rd century. The original text was lost but was the source of some eighty different versions written in twenty-four different languages. As the Alexander romance persisted in popularity over the centuries, it was assumed by various neighboring peoples. Of particular significance was its incorporation into Jewish and later Christian legendary traditions. In the Jewish tradition Alexander was initially a figure of satire
, representing the vain or covetous ruler who is ignorant of larger spiritual truths. Yet their belief in a just, all-powerful God forced Jewish interpreters of the Alexander tradition to come to terms with Alexander's undeniable temporal success. Why would a just, all-powerful God show such favor to an unrighteous ruler? This theological need
, plus acculturation to Hellenism
, led to a more positive Jewish interpretation of the Alexander legacy. In its most neutral form this was typified by having Alexander show deference to either the Jewish people or the symbols of their faith. In having the great conqueror thus acknowledge the essential truth of the Jews' religious, intellectual, or ethical traditions, the prestige of Alexander was harnessed to the cause of Jewish ethnocentrism
. Eventually Jewish writers would almost completely co-opt Alexander, depicting him as a righteous gentile
or even a believing monotheist.
The Christianized peoples of the Near East
, inheritors of both the Hellenic as well as Judaic strands of the Alexander romance, further theologized Alexander until in some stories he was depicted as a saint
. The Christian legends turned the ancient Greek conqueror Alexander III into Alexander "the Believing King", implying that he was a believer in monotheism. Eventually elements of the Alexander romance were combined with Biblical legends such as Gog and Magog
.
During the period of history during which the Alexander romance was written, little was known about the true historical Alexander the Great
as most of the history of his conquests had been preserved in the form of folklore and legends. It was not until the Renaissance
(1300-1600 AD) that the true history of Alexander III was rediscovered:
The legendary Alexander material originated as early as the time of the Ptolemaic dynasty
(305 BC to 30 BC) and its unknown authors are sometimes referred to as the Pseudo-Callisthenes (not to be confused with Callisthenes of Olynthus, who was Alexander's official historian). The earliest surviving manuscript of the Alexander romance, called the α (alpha
) recension
, can be dated to the 3rd century AD and was written in Greek
in Alexandria
:
The Greek
variants of the Alexander romance continued to evolve until, in the 4th century, the Greek legend was translated into Latin
by Julius Valerius Alexander Polemius
(where it is called the Res gestae Alexandri Magni) and from Latin it spread to all major vernacular
languages of Europe
in the Middle Ages. Around the same as its translation into Latin, the Greek text was also translated into the Syriac language and from Syriac it spread to eastern cultures and languages as far afield as China and Southeast Asia. The Syriac legend was the source of an Arabic variant called the Qisas Dhul-Qarnayn (Tales of Dhul-Qarnayn) and a Persian
variant called the Iskandarnamah (Book of Alexander), as well as Armenian
and Ethiopic translations.
The version recorded in Syriac is of particular importance because it was current in the Middle East
during the time of the Qur'an's writing and is regarded as being closely related to the literary and linguistic
origins of the story of Dhul-Qarnayn in the Qur'an. The Syriac legend, as it has survived, consists of five distinct manuscripts, including a Syriac Christian
religious legend concerning Alexander and a sermon about Alexander attributed to the Syriac poet-theologian Jacob of Serugh
(451-521 AD, also called Mar Jacob). The Syriac Christian legend concentrates on Alexander's journey to the end of the World, where he constructs the Gates of Alexander
to enclose the evil nations of Gog and Magog
, while the sermon describes his journey to the Land of Darkness
to discover the Water of Life (Fountain of Youth). These legends concerning Alexander are remarkably similar to the story of Dhul-Qarnayn found in the Qur'an.
One of the five Syriac manuscripts, as it has survived, can be dated to between 629 AD and 636 AD. There is evidence in the manuscript of "ex eventu knowledge of the Khazar invasion of Armenia
in A.D. 629," meaning that it was burdened with additions by a redactor
sometime around 629 AD. The manuscript appears to have been composed as propaganda
in support of Emperor Heraclius
(575-641 AD) shortly after he defeated the Persians in the Byzantine-Sassanid War of 602–628
. It is notable that this manuscript fails to mention the Islamic conquest of Jerusalem in 636 AD by Muhammad
's (570-632 AD) successor, Caliph
Umar
(590-644 AD). This fact means that the manuscript must have been recorded before the "cataclysmic event"`that was the Muslim conquest of Syria
and the resulting surrender of Jerusalem
in November 636 AD. That the Byzantine–Arab Wars would have been referenced in the manuscript, had it been written after 636 AD, is supported by the fact that in 692 AD a Syriac Christian adaption of the Alexander romance called the Apocalypse of Pseudo-Methodius
was indeed written as a response to the Muslim invasions and was falsely attributed
to St Methodius
(?-311 AD). The Apocalypse of Pseudo-Methodius equated the evil nations of Gog and Magog with the Muslim invaders and shaped the eschatological
imagination of Christendom
for centuries.
The manuscripts also contain evidence of lost texts. For example, there is some evidence of a lost pre-Islamic Arabic version of the translation that is thought to have been an intermediary between the Syriac Christian and the Ethiopic Christian translations. There is also evidence that the Syriac translation was not directly based on the Greek recensions but was based on a lost Pahlavi
(pre-Islamic Persian) intermediary.
had themselves co-opted Alexander the Great as a religious figure. However, it is clear that the historical Alexander the Great
was a Greek pagan (Alexander's mother, Olympias
, was a devout member of the orgiastic
snake-worshiping cult
of Dionysus
, and may have slept with snakes). These historical facts about Alexander the Great became well known, even the Western world, only during the Renaissance
period (1300-1600 AD) when the Anabasis Alexandri
of Arrian
(AD 86- 160) was rediscovered. In light of the modern view of Alexander the Great, his identity as Dhul-Qarnayn has become a matter of great controversy for Muslims. In reaction, alternative theories about the identity of Dhul-Qarnayn have been advanced by some Muslim scholars. For example, it has been suggested that Dhul-Qarnayn could be Cyrus the Great
(see Cyrus the Great in the Qur'an
). The Muslim sentiment against Alexander is reflected in Islamic textbooks (e.g. "Some [Muslim Scholars] say it was Alexander the Great, who lived from 356 BCE to 323 BCE, but that is highly unlikely, given that Alexander was an idol-worshipper and a known homosexual."), often with references to his polytheistic religious beliefs and (more recently) his personal relationships
, the sacred scripture believed by Muslims to have been revealed by Allah
to Muhammad
. The story of Dhul-Qarnayn appears in seventeen short verses of the Qur'an, specifically verses 18:83-99 of Surah
Al-Kahf
. Dhul-Qarnayn is mentioned in only one place in the Qur'an, unlike the more familiar stories that are repeated throughout the text (for example, Jesus is mentioned in 93 verses in 15 different surahs of the Qur'an). The Qur'anic story describes a man called Dhul-Qarnayn (meaning "the Two-Horned"), who was already familiar to the inhabitants of the region, to whom Allah gave great power, and who traveled to the rising place and setting place of the sun, where he found the sun setting in a murky (or boiling) sea. At this place, Dhul-Qarnayn builds a wall in order to enclose the nations of Gog and Magog
. It is thought that Gog and Magog will breach Dhul-Qarnayn's wall before Yaum al-Qiyāmah
(the Day of Judgement) and will wreak havoc in the world (Islamic Armageddon
):
The earliest mention of Dhul-Qarnayn outside the Qur'an is found in the works of the earliest Muslim historian and hagiographer
, Ibn Ishaq
(?-761 AD), which form the main corpus of the Sira (religious biography) literature. Ibn Ishaq's Sira reports that the eighteenth chapter of the Qur'an (which includes the story of Dhul-Qarnayn) was revealed to Muhammad by God
on account of some questions posed to Muhammad
by the rabbis. The verse was revealed during the Meccan period of Muhammad's life. According to Ibn Ishaq, Muhammad's tribe, the powerful Quraysh, were greatly concerned about their tribesman who had started claiming prophethood and wished to consult the Jewish
rabbis' superior knowledge of the scriptures and about the prophets of God. The two Quraysh men described their tribesman, Muhammad, to the Jewish scholars. The rabbis told the men to ask Muhammad three questions:
The famous story in the Sira relates that when Muhammad was informed of the three questions from the Rabbis, he declared that he would have the answers in the morning. However, Muhammad did not give the answer in the morning. For fifteen days, Muhammad did not answer the question. Doubt in Muhammad began to grow amongst the people of Mecca
. Then, after fifteen days, Muhammad received the revelation that is Sura
Al-Kahf
("The Cave"), the eighteenth chapter of the Qur'an. Surah Al-Kahf mentions the "People of the Cave," a strange story about some young men in ancient times who slept in a cave for many years (the widespread myth of the Seven Sleepers
, see below). Surah Al-Kahf also mentions the winds (related to the word for spirit, verse 45). Finally, the surah also mentions "a man who travelled a great deal and reached the east and the west of the earth"—namely, Dhul-Qarnayn. Though Ibn Ishaq himself does not explicitly mention the name Alexander, he relates that a storyteller told him that Dhul-Qarnayn was a Greco-Egyptian (an accurate description of Alexander):
Ibn Ishaq's original work is lost, but it has been almost completely incorporated in Ibn Hisham
(?-833 AD), another early Muslim historian. Ibn Hisham collected Ibn Ishaq's Sira and added his notes to it; in regards to Dhul-Qarnayn, Ibn Hisham noted:
The theme, amongst Islamic scholars, of identifying Dhul-Qarnayn with Alexander the Great appears to have originated here. Why Ibn Hisham made this identification is not entirely clear.
recorded many pre-Islamic Arabic poems in the Sira, including a poem about Dhul-Qarnayn that he claims was composed by a pre-Islamic king of ancient Yemen
named Tubba':
The poem's reference to "a learned sage" from whom Dhul-Qarnayn sought knowledge from may be a reference to the story of Dhul-Qarnayn and Al-Khidir. Other pre-Islamic Arab poems about Dhul-Qarnayn are also reported in the Sira literature:
One poem by Hassan ibn Thabit
reads:
, the exegesis
or commentaries of the Qur'an that were written by prominent early Islamic scholars. Significantly, Alexander the Great is mentioned in Tafsir al-Jalalayn
, a well-known Sunni tafsir of the Qur'an from the 15th century. The tafsir notes that Dhul-Qarnayn's name was Alexander and also indicates that Dhul-Qarnayn was not a prophet:
The commentators of the Qur'an debated on whether or not Dhul-Qarnayn was a prophet of Islam; some concluded that he was not a prophet but was a holy man or a "friend of God" since he is mentioned favorably in the Qur'an. In Islam it is ambiguous as to whether or not Dhul-Qarnayn is a full-fledged prophet.
Fakhr al-Din al-Razi
(1149-1209 AD), in Tafsir al-Kabir also comments that Dhul-Qarnayn is Alexander the Macedonian. He provides a vague justification, saying that the Dhul-Qarnayn mentioned in the Qur'an travelled to the east and the west achieving victories and so he must be Alexander:
Muslim philosophers, such as al-Kindi
(801–873 AD), al-Farabi
(872-950 AD), and Avicenna
(980 - 1037 AD), enthusiastically embraced the concept of Dhul-Qarnayn being an ancient Greek
king. They stylized Dhul-Qarnayn as a Greek philosopher king
. Ibn Taymiyyah (1263–1328 AD) objected to the identification on the basis that Alexander was a pagan idolater, and he accused the Aristotelian Muslim philosophers such as Avicenna of making the "mistaken" identification:
The Egyptian historian Al-Maqrizi
(1364–1442 AD) claimed in his book Al-Khotatt that Dhul-Qarnayn was a Yemenite
king named Sa'b and wrote:
In his famous English translation and commentary of the Qur'an, Abdullah Yusuf Ali
(1872–1953 AD) supported the notion of Dhul-Qarnayn being Alexander the Great and he indicated an extensive knowledge of the legends concerning Alexander:
In his commentary of the Qur'an, Abul Ala Maududi
(1903–1979 AD) noted that historically most Muslim scholars had endorsed the identification of Dhul-Qarnayn with Alexander the Great, but recent commentators have forwarded an alternative theory that Dhul-Qarnayn is Cyrus the Great
:
co-opting the historical Alexander. Finally, ancient Christian Syriac and Ethiopic manuscripts of the Alexander romance from the Middle East
have been found which closely resemble the story in the Qur'an. This leads to the theologically controversial conclusion that these legends are the source of the story of Dhul-Qarnayn in the Qur'an.
The Egyptian god
Ammon-Ra was depicted with ram horns. Rams were considered a symbol of virility
due to their rutting
behavior. The horns of Ammon may have also represented the East and West of the Earth, and one of the titles of Ammon
was "the two-horned." Alexander was depicted with the horns of Ammon as a result of his conquest of ancient Egypt
in 332 BC, where the priesthood received him as the son of the god Ammon, who was identified by the ancient Greeks with Zeus
, the King of the Gods
. The combined deity
Zeus-Ammon was a distinct figure in ancient Greek mythology. According to five historians of antiquity (Arrian
, Curtius
, Diodorus, Justin
, and Plutarch
), Alexander visited the Oracle
of Ammon at Siwa
in the Libyan
desert and rumors spread that the Oracle had revealed Alexander's father to be the deity
Ammon, rather than Philip. Alexander styled himself as the son of Zeus-Ammon and even demanded to be worshiped as a god:
Ancient Greek coins
, such as the coins minted by Alexander's successor Lysimachus
(360-281 BC), depict the ruler with the distinctive horns of Ammon
on his head. Archaeologists have found a large number of different types of ancients coins depicting Alexander the Great with two horns. The 4th century BC silver tetradrachmon ("four drachma") coin, depicting a deified
Alexander with two horns, replaced the 5th century BC Athenian
silver tetradrachmon (which depicted the goddess Athena
) as the most widely used coin in the Greek world. After Alexander's conquests, the drachma was used in many of the Hellenistic kingdoms in the Middle East
, including the Ptolemaic
kingdom in Alexandria
. The Arabic unit of currency known as the dirham
, known from pre-Islamic times up to the present day, inherited its name from the drachma. In the late 2nd century BC, silver coins depicting Alexander with ram horns were used as a principal coinage in Arabia and were issued by an Arab
ruler by the name of Abi'el who ruled in the south-eastern region of the Arabian Peninsula
.
In 1971, Ukrainian
archeologist B.M. Mozolevskii discovered an ancient Scythian kurgan
(burial mound) containing many treasures. The burial site was constructed in the 4th century BC near the city of Ordzhonikidze
and is given the name Tovsta Mohyla (another name is Babyna Mogila). Amongst the artifacts excavated at this site were four silver gilded phalera
(ancient Roman
military medals). Two of the four medals are identical and depict the head of a bearded man with two horns, while the other two medals are also identical and depict the head of a clean-shaven man with two horns. According to a recent theory, the bearded figure with horns is actually Zeus-Ammon and the clean-shaved figure is none other than Alexander the Great.
Alexander has also been identified, since ancient times, with the horned figure in the Old Testament
in the prophecy of Daniel 8 who overthrows the kings of Media and Persia. In the prophesy, Daniel
has a vision of a ram with two long horns and verse 20 explains that "The ram which thou sawest having two horns is the kings of Media
and Persia.":
The Christian Syriac version of the Alexander romance, in the sermon by Jacob of Serugh
, describes Alexander as having been given two horns of iron by God. The legend describes Alexander (as a Christian king) bowing himself in prayer, saying:
In Christian Alexander legends written in Ethiopic
(an ancient South Semitic
language) between the fourteenth and the sixteenth century, Alexander the Great is always explicitly referred to using the epithet
the "Two Horned." A passage from the Ethiopic Christian legend describes the Angel of the Lord
calling Alexander by this name:
References to Alexander's supposed horns are found in literature ranging many different languages, regions and centuries:
For these reasons, among others, the Qur'an's Arabic epithet "Dhul-Qarnayn," literally meaning "the two-horned one," is interpreted as a reference to Alexander the Great.
The Qur'an's story describes Dhul-Qarnayn building a great barrier in order to enclose the nations of Gog and Magog
who "do great mischief in the earth." A similar story about Alexander is found in the Alexander romance and the origins of the story can be dated as far back as 329 BC.
by Alexander to repel the barbarian peoples identified with Gog and Magog has ancient provenance and the wall is known as the Gates of Alexander
or the Caspian Gates. The name Caspian Gates originally applied to the narrow region at the southeast corner of the Caspian Sea
, through which Alexander actually marched in the pursuit of Bessus
in 329 BC, although he did not stop to fortify it. It was transferred to the passes through the Caucasus, on the other side of the Caspian, by the more fanciful historians of Alexander. The Jewish historian Flavius Josephus
(37–100 AD) mentions that:
Josephus also records that the people of Magog, the Magogites, were synonymous with the Scythians. According to Andrew Runni Anderson, this merely indicates that the main elements of the story were already in place six centuries before the Qur'an's revelation, not that the story itself was known in the cohesive form apparent in the Qur'anic account. Similarly, St. Jerome
(347–420 AD), in his Letter 77, mentions that,
In his Commentary on Ezekiel
(38:2), Jerome identifies the nations located beyond the Caucasus mountains
and near Lake Maeotis
as Gog and Magog. Thus the Gates of Alexander
legend was combined with the legend of Gog and Magog
from the Book of Revelation
. It has been suggested that the incorporation of the Gog and Magog legend into the Alexander romance was prompted by the invasion of the Huns across the Caucasus
mountains in 395 AD into Armenia
and Syria
.
. Several variations of the legend can be found. In the story, Alexander the Great built a gate of iron between two mountains, at the end of the Earth
, to prevent the armies of Gog and Magog
from ravaging the plains. The Christian legend was written in Syria
shortly before the Qur'an's writing and closely parallels the story of Dhul-Qarnayn. The legend describes an apocryphal letter from Alexander to his mother, wherein he writes:
These pseudepigraphic letters from Alexander to his mother Olympias and his tutor Aristotle, describing his marvellous adventures at the end of the World, date back to the original Greek recension α
written in the 4th century in Alexandria. The letters are "the literary expression of a living popular tradition" that had been evolving for at least three centuries before the Qur'an was written.
Several historical figures, both Muslim and Christian, searched for Alexander's Gate and several different identifications were made with actual walls. During the Middle Ages
, the Gates of Alexander story was included in travel literature such as the Travels of Marco Polo (1254–1324 AD) and the Travels of Sir John Mandeville. The Alexander romance identified the Gates of Alexander, variously, with the Pass of Dariel, the Pass of Derbent
, the Great Wall of Gorgan
and even the Great Wall of China
. In the legend's original form, Alexander's Gates are located at the Pass of Dariel. In later versions of the Christian legends, dated to around the time of Emperor Heraclius
(575-641 AD), the Gates are instead located in Derbent
, a city situated on a narrow strip of land between the Caspian Sea and the Caucasus mountains, where an ancient Sassanid fortification was mistakenly identified with the wall built by Alexander. In the Travels of Marco Polo, the wall in Derbent is identified with the Gates of Alexander. The Gates of Alexander
are most commonly identified with the Caspian Gates of Derbent whose thirty north-looking towers used to stretch for forty kilometers between the Caspian Sea
and the Caucasus Mountains
, effectively blocking the passage across the Caucasus. Later historians would regard these legends as false:
In the Muslim world, several expeditions were undertaken to try to find and study Alexanders's wall, specifically the Caspian Gates of Derbent. An early expedition to Derbent was ordered by the Caliph Umar
(586–644 AD) himself, during the Arab conquest of Armenia
where they heard about Alexander's Wall in Derbent from the conquered Christian Armenians. Umar's expedition was recorded by the renowned exegetes of the Qur'an
, Al-Tabarani
(873-970 AD) and Ibn Kathir
(1301–1373 AD), and by the Muslim geographer Yaqut al-Hamawi
(1179-1229 AD):
Two hundred years later, the Abbasid
Caliph Al-Wathiq
(?-847 AD) dispatched an expedition to study the wall of Dhul-Qarnain in Derbent, Russia. The expedition was led by Sallam-ul-Tarjuman, whose observations have were recorded by Yaqut al-Hamawi
and by Ibn Kathir
:
The Muslim geographer Yaqut al-Hamawi
further confirmed the same view in a number of places in his book on geography; for instance under the heading "Khazar" (Caspian) he writes:
The Caliph Harun al-Rashid
(763 – 809 AD) even spent some time living in Derbent. Not all Muslim travelers and scholars, however, associated Dhul-Qarnayn's wall with the Caspian Gates of Derbent. For example, the Muslim explorer Ibn Battuta
(1304–1369 AD) traveled to China
on order of the Sultan of Delhi
, Muhammad bin Tughluq
and he comments in his travel log that "Between it [the city of Zaitun
in Fujian
] and the rampart of Yajuj and Majuj [Gog and Magog] is sixty days' travel." The translator of the travel log notes that Ibn Battuta confused the Great Wall of China with that supposedly built by Dhul-Qarnayn.
people whom Dhul-Qarnayn has enclosed behind a wall, preventing them from invading the Earth. In Islamic eschatology
, before the Day of Judgement Gog and Magog will destroy this gate, allowing them to ravage the Earth, as it is described in the Qur'an:
A similar story is found in the Alexander romance legends.
In the Syriac Christian legends, Alexander the Great encloses the Gog and Magog horde behind a mighty gate between two mountains, preventing Gog and Magog from invading the Earth. In addition, it is written in the Christian legend that in the end times God will cause the Gate of Gog and Magog to be destroyed, allowing the Gog and Magog horde to ravage the Earth;
The Christian Syriac legend describes a flat Earth
orbited by the sun
and surrounded by the Paropamisadae
(Hindu Kush) mountains. The Paropamisadae mountains are in turn surrounded by a narrow tract of land which is followed by a treacherous Ocean sea called Okeyanos
. It is within this tract of land between the Paropamisadae
mountains and Okeyanos
that Alexander encloses Gog and Magog, so that they could not cross the mountains and invade the Earth. The legend describes "the old wise men" explaining this geography
and cosmology
of the Earth to Alexander, and then Alexander setting out to enclose Gog and Magog behind a mighty gate between a narrow passage at the end of the flat Earth:
Flat Earth beliefs in the Early Christian Church varied and the Fathers of the Church shared different approaches. Those of them who were more close to Aristotle
and Plato
's visions, like Origen
, shared peacefully the belief in a spherical Earth
. A second tradition, including St Basil and St Augustine, accepted the idea of the round Earth and the radial gravity, but in a critical way. In particular they pointed out a number of doubts about the antipodes
and the physical reasons of the radial gravity. However, a flat Earth approach was more or less shared by all the Fathers coming from the Syriac area, who were more inclined to follow the letter of the Old Testament
. Diodore of Tarsus (?-390 AD), Cosmas Indicopleustes
(6th century), and Chrysostom (347–407 AD) belonged to this flat Earth tradition.
, a Turkic people who lived near the Caspian Sea
. In his 9th century work Expositio in Matthaeum Evangelistam
, the Benedictine
monk Christian of Stavelot
refers to the Khazars as Hunnic
descendants of Gog and Magog, and says they are "circumcised and observing all [the laws of] Judaism"; the Khazars were a Central Asia
n people with a long association with Judaism
. A Georgian
tradition, echoed in a chronicle, also identifies the Khazars with Gog and Magog, stating they are "wild men with hideous faces and the manners of wild beasts, eaters of blood."
Early Muslim scholars writing about Dhul-Qarnayn also associated Gog and Magog with the Khazars. Ibn Kathir
(1301–1373 AD), the famous commentator of the Qur'an, identified Gog and Magog with the Khazars who lived between the Black and Caspian Sea
in his work Al-Bidayah wa al-Nihayah (The Beginning and the End). The Muslim explorer Ahmad ibn Fadlan
, in his travelogue regarding his diplomatic mission in 921 AD to Volga Bulgars (a vassal
of the Khazarian Empire), noted the beliefs about Gog and Magog being the ancestors of the Khazars.
Thus Muslim scholars associated the Khazars with Dhul-Qarnayn just as the Christian legends associated the Khazars with Alexander the Great.
In his commentary of the Qur'an, Ibn Kathir
(1301–1373 AD) explains that verse 18:89 is referring to the literal ends of the Earth:
In this commentary Ibn Kathir differentiates between the end of the (presumably flat) Earth and the supposed "place in the sky" where the sun sets (the "resting place" of the sun. Ibn Kathir contends that Dhul-Qarnayn did reach the end of the Earth but not the "resting place" of the sun and he goes on to mention that the People of the Book
(Jews and Christians) tell myths about Dhul-Qarnayn travelling so far beyond the end of the Earth that the sun was "behind him." This shows that Ibn Kathir was aware of the Christian legends and it suggests that Ibn Kathir considered Christian myths about Alexander to be referring to the same figure as the Dhul-Qarnayn mentioned in the Qu'an.
A similar theme is elaborated upon in several places in the Islamic hadith
literature, in Sahih al-Bukhari
and Sahih Muslim
:
The setting place of the sun is also commented on by Al-Tabari (838-923 AD) and Al-Qurtubi
(1214 - 1273 AD) and, like Ibn Kathir
, they showed some reservations towards the literal idea of the sun setting in a muddy spring but held to the basic theme of Dhul-Qarnayn reaching the ends of the Earth. The later Islamic scholar Imam al-Suyuti (1445-1505 AD) also maintained that the Earth is flat.
On the other hand, Muslim astronomers believed in a spherical Earth
as early as 830 AD. The great Persian
Muslim scholar and polymath Abu Rayhan Biruni (973-1048 AD) successfully calculated the Earth's circumference to within sixteen kilometers of its true value and is regarded as the father of the science of geodesy
. The Islamic scholar Ibn Taymiyyah (1263–1328 AD) also maintained that the Earth is spherical, though he elaborated on an incorrect geocentric model of the universe:
It is not entirely surprising that, by the 9th century, Muslim astronomers in the Samanid Empire and elsewhere were contemplating a spherical earth. Islamic astronomy inherited the concept of a spherical Earth, along with most of its theoretical foundation, from the ancient Greek astronomical tradition
where none other than Pythagoras
(570-495 BC) himself first proposed that the Earth must be spherical. All this, however, did not prevent the Alexander romance legends from claiming that Alexander traveled to the ends of a flat Earth.
rises from the west and in which the Sun sets in the east. The waters of this sea were imagined as being intensely hot from the heat of the Sun when it rose from the waters. Upon hearing about this place, Alexander sets out to the end of the flat Earth and witnesses the Sun rising from the fetid sea. At this place, where the Sun rises out of a terrible sea, Alexander finds a people who have no shelter from the Sun which is literally rising out of an intensely hot sea:
The Christian legend is much more detailed than the Qur'an's version and elaborates at length about the cosmology
of the Earth that is implied by the story:
This ancient motif
of a legendary figure traveling to the end of Earth is also found in the Epic of Gilgamesh
, which can be dated to circa
2000 BC, making it one of the earliest known works of literary writing. In the epic poem, in tablet nine, Gilgamesh sets out on a quest for the Water of Life to seek immortality. Gilgamesh travels far to the east, to the mountain passes at the ends of the earth where he grapples and slays monstrous mountain lions, bears and others. Eventually he comes to the twin peaks of Mount Mashu at the end of the earth, from where the sun rises from the other world, the gate of which is guarded by two terrible scorpion-beings. They allow him to proceed through the gate after Gilgamesh convinces them to let him pass, stating his divinity and desperation, and he travels through the dark tunnel where the sun travels every night. Just before the sun is about to catch up with him, and with the North Wind and ice lashing him, he reaches the end. The world at the end of the tunnel is a bright wonderland full of trees with leaves of jewels. The myth of a flat Earth surrounded by an Ocean into which the sun sets is also found in the Iliad
, the famous epic poem written by Homer
and dated to circa 900 BC. The story of creation in the Hebrew Bible
, in Genesis 1:10, (dated circa 900-550 BC) is also considered by scholars to be describing a flat Earth surrounded by a sea.
The ancient Greek historian Herodotus
(484– 425 BC) also gave an account of the eastern "end of the Earth," in his descriptions of India
. He reported that in India the sun's heat is extremely intense in the morning, instead of noon being the hottest time of day. It has been argued that he based this on his belief that since India is located at the extreme east of a flat Earth, it would only be logical if the morning were unbearably hot due to the sun's proximity.
The Qur'an and the Alexander romance both have it that Dhul-Qarnayn (or Alexander) travelled a great deal. In the Qur'an`s story of Dhul-Qarnayn, "God gave him unto every thing a road" (or more literally, "We gave him the means of everything" 18:84) He travels as far as the ends of the Earth, to the place on the Earth where the Sun sets (the west) and the place on the Earth where the Sun rises (the east). The Qur'an portrays him traveling to the "setting of the sun." Muslim interpretations of these verses are varied, but classical Muslim scholars seemed to have been of the opinion that Dhul-Qarnayn's journey was real, not allegorical, and that Dhul-Qarnayn's wall is also a real, physical wall somewhere on Earth.
In the Christian legends, Alexander travels to the places of the setting and rising of the Sun and this is meant to say that he traveled to the ends of the flat Earth
and thus he had traversed the entire world. This legendary account served to convey the theme of Alexander's exploits as a great conqueror. Alexander was indeed a great conqueror, having ruled the largest empire in ancient history
by the time he was 25 years old. However, the true historical extent of Alexander's travels are known to be greatly exaggerated in legends. For example, legend has it that upon reaching India,
In reality, while Alexander did travel a great deal, he did not travel further west than ancient Libya
and did not travel further east than the fringes of India
. According to historians, Alexander invaded India following his desire to reach the "ends of the world and the Great Outer Sea." However, when he reached the Hyphasis River in the Punjab
in 326 BC, his army nearly mutinied
and refused to march further east, exhausted by years of campaigning. Alexander's desire to reach "the ends of the Earth" was instilled by his tutor Aristotle
:
This view of the world taught by Aristotle and followed by Alexander is apparent in Aristotle's Meteorologica, a treatise on earth sciences where he discusses the "length" and "width" of "the inhabited earth." However, Aristotle knew that the Earth is spherical and even provided observational proof of this fact. Aristotle's cosmological view was that the Earth is round but he prescribed to the notion of an "inhabited Earth," surrounded by the Ocean, and an "uninhabited Earth" (though exactly how much of this was understood by his student Alexander the Great is not known).
Surah Al-Kahf has also been linked to the Alexander romance through a second story. The Qur'an verses 18:60–82, which immediately precede the story of Dhul-Qarnayn, mention the story of Al-Khidir and a fish that miraculously comes to life. It has been theorized that the Qur'an's story was influenced by the story of the Water of Life (Fountain of Youth) mentioned in Eastern versions of the Alexander romance.
In Islamic traditions, Al-Khidir (literally "the Green One," an enigmatic figure in Islam) is the maternal cousin of Alexander or Dhul-Qarnayn. The Qur'an's story is about Moses
and Al-Khidir, though the classical Islamic scholars showed some disagreement over whether or not 'Moses' in this story is Moses
of the Israelites. In the Qur'an's story, this Moses goes with a servant ( identified as Joshua in Hadith) to the "junction of the two seas". A certain fish (which they presumably had been carrying with them) "in an amazing way" makes its way to the sea. When the servant tells Moses this, they retrace their steps. They then meet one of God's servants (traditionally called Al-Khidir, although not named in the Qur'an) who puts Moses to a test of patience in which Moses must travel with Al-Khidir but not ask any questions. Al-Khidir cracks a hole in a vessel endangering its passengers, then he murders a boy, and then rebuilding a wall each time causing Moses to break his silence. Al-Khidir explains how each of his lawless acts was for a greater good and Moses fails the test of patience. The Qur'anic story is remarkably similar to Jewish folklore concerning Elijah. In the Jewish tale, Rabbi Joshua ben Levi asks to join the prophet Elijah in his wanderings. Elijah grants the Rabbi's wish on the condition that he refrain from asking any questions about any of the prophet’s actions. He agrees and they begin their journey. Elijah carries out "lawless" acts, like Al-Khidir in the Qur'an, and similarly the Rabbi breaks his silence and demands an explanation.
The story in the Qur'an is summarized in a hadith
of Sahih Al-Bukhari
:
The idea that the sources of these verses are found in the Alexander romance was first proposed by Mark Lidzbarski and Karl Duroff in 1892. In 1913 Israel Friedlander wrote a book on the subject titled`"The Al-Khidir Legend and the Alexander Romance." Early Persian and Ethiopic Muslim legends concerning Alexander made a similar connection between Al-Khidir and Alexander (see figure).
One similarity between the Qur'an story and the Alexander romance concerns the fish that miraculously comes to life. This motif
is found in the Syriac sermon by Jacob of Serugh
, where Alexander travels in search of the Water of Life (Fountain of Youth). A shorter version of the story in also found in the Greek β-recension of the Alexander romance. In the Syriac legend, Alexander finds a wise man who tells Alexander to take a salted fish and wash it in the fountains in the Land of Darkness
, and if the fish comes to life then he will have found the Water of Life:
Another similarity between the Al-Khidir legends and the Alexander romance is the Water of Life. Though the Qur'an does not mention the Fountain of Youth
, it is alluded to in the hadith
literature. Al-Khidir in the hadith literature is described as being immortal, having taught every prophet before Muhammad, and having the appearance of a young adult but having a long, white beard, and he is even described as being present at Muhammad's funeral:
The story of Al-Khidir, in the Qur'an, does not mention Dhul-Qarnayn, rather only a figure called "Moses" is referred to by name. This would seem to shed doubt on the idea that the story is about Dhul-Qarnayn, as it appears to be a story about Moses
of the Israelites. However, the early Islamic literature raises questions about whether the Moses mentioned in the story of the fish is the Moses of the Israelites, or someone entirely different:
The story, in the Alexander romance and in the Qur'an, is considered by scholars to have been influenced by the Epic of Gilgamesh
(specifically Giglamesh's search for the Water of Life ). Gilgamesh reaches the water but, like Alexander, fails to become immortal. Like Alexander, Giglamesh also comes to the spot at which the sun rises from the Earth:
A peculiar aspect of the story in the Qur'an is that Al-Khidir is found at a distant place called the "junction of the two seas." This is believed by secular scholars to be a reference to the end of the World, where the sun rises from the outer Ocean sea. The "junction of the two seas" is mentioned in several places in the Qur'an:
This has been compared to the ancient Akkadian myth of the Abzu
, the name for a fresh water underground sea that was given a religious quality in Sumerian and Akkadian mythology. Lakes, springs, rivers, wells, and other sources of fresh water were thought to draw their water from the Abzu
underground sea, while the Ocean that surrounded the world was a saltwater sea. It would follow that the "junction" of these two seas would be at the end of the World, at "the setting place of the sun," where Dhul-Qarnayn sees the sun setting into a body of water. The Abzu freshwater sea was also depicted as a deity
in the Babylonian creation myth, the Enûma Elish
, where he was a primal
being made of fresh water and a lover to another primal deity, Tiamat
, who was a creature of salt water. The Enuma Elish begins:
Similarly in Greek mythology
, the world was surrounded by Oceanus
, the world-ocean of classical antiquity
. Oceanus was personified as the god Titan
, whose consort was the aquatic
sea goddess Tethys
. It was also thought that rainfall was due a third ocean above the "canopy of the sky." A comprehensive understanding of the Earth's water cycle
did not exist until a treatise titled De l'origine des fontaines ("On the origin of springs") was written by Pierre Perrault
in 1674 AD.
The earliest surviving Arabic narrative of the Alexander romance was composed by Umara ibn Zayd (767-815 AD). In the tale, Alexander travels a great deal, builds the Wall against Gog and Magog, searches for the Water of Life (Fountain of Youth), and encounters angels who give him a "wonder-stone" that both weighs more than any other stone but is also as light as dust. This wonder-stone is meant to admonish Alexander for his ambitions and indicate that his lust for conquest and eternal life will not end until his death. The story of the wonder-stone is not found in the Syriac Christian legend, but is found in Jewish Talmudic traditions about Alexander as well as in Persian traditions.
A South Arabian
Alexander legend was written by the Yemen
ite traditionist Wahb ibn Munabbih
(?-732 AD) and this legend was later incorporated in a book by Ibn Hisham
(?-833 AD) regarding the history of the Himyarite Kingdom in ancient Yemen. In the Yemenite variation, Dhul-Qarnayn is identified with an ancient king of Yemen named Tubba', rather than Alexander the Great, but the Arabic story still describes the story of Alexander's Wall against Gog and Magog and his quest for the Water of Life. The story also mentions that Dhul-Qarnayn (Tubba') visited a castle with glass walls and visited the Brahmins of India. The South Arabian legend was composed within the context of the division between the South Arabs and North Arabs that began with the Battle of Marj-al-Rahit
in 680 AD and consolidated over two centuries.
The Alexander romance also had an important influence on Arabic wisdom literature
. In Secretum Secretorum
("Secret of Secrets", in Arabic Kitab sirr al-asrar), an encyclopedic Arabic treatise on a wide range of topics such as statecraft
, ethics
, physiognomy
, alchemy
, astrology
, magic
and medicine
, Alexander appears as a speaker and subject of wise sayings and as a correspondent with figures such as Aristotle
. The origins of the treatise are uncertain. No Greek
original exists, though there are claims in the Arabic treatise that it was translated from the Greek into Syriac and from Syriac into Arabic by a well-known 9th century translator, Yahya ibn al-Bitriq (?-815 AD). It appears, however, that the treatise was actually composed originally in Arabic.
In another example of Arabic wisdom literature relating to Alexander, Ibn al-Nadim
(?-997 AD) refers to a work on divination
titled The Drawing of Lots by Dhul-Qarnain and to a second work on divination by arrows titled The gift of Alexander, but only the titles of these works have survived.
Notably, the Abbasid
Caliph
Al-Mu'tasim
(794-842 AD) had ordered the translation of the Thesaurus Alexandri, a work on elixirs and amulets, from Greek
and Latin
into Arabic. The Greek work Thesaurus Alexandri was attributed to Hermes
(the great messenger of the gods in Greek mythology
) and similarly contained supposed letters from Aristotle addressed to Alexander.
A more direct Arabic translation of the Alexander romance, called Sirat Al-Iskandar, was discovered in Constantinople
, at the Hagia Sophia
, and is dated to the 13th century. This version includes the letter from Alexander to his mother about his travels in India and at the end of the World. It also includes features which occur exclusively in the Syriac version. Interestingly, the Arabic legend also retains certain pagan elements of the story, which are sometimes modified to suit the Islamic message:
Another piece of Arabic Alexander literature is the Laments (or Sayings) of the Philosophers. These are a collection of remarks supposedly made by some philosophers gathered at the tomb of Alexander after his death. This legend was originally written in the 6th century in Syriac and was later translated into Arabic and expanded upon. The Laments of the Philosophers eventually gained enormous popularity in the Europe:
The Arabic Alexander romance also had an influence on a wider range of Arabic literature. It has been noted that some features of the Arabic Alexander legends found their way into The Seven Voyages of Sinbad the Sailor
, a medieval story-cycle of Arabic origin. Sinbad, the hero of the epic, is a fictional sailor
from Basrah, living during the Abbasid Caliphate. During his voyages throughout the seas east of Africa and south of Asia, he has fantastic adventures going to magical places, meeting monsters, and encountering supernatural phenomena. As a separate example of this influence on Arabic literature, the legend of Alexander's search for the Water of Life is found in One Thousand and One Nights, a collection of Middle East
ern and South Asia
n stories and folktales compiled in Arabic
during the Islamic Golden Age
.
After the Umayyad
Muslim conquest of Al-Andalus
(Spain) in 711 AD, Muslim literature flourished under the Caliphate of Córdoba
(929 to 1031 AD). An Arabic derivative of the Alexander romance was produced, called Qisas Dhul-Qarnayn (Tales of Dhul-Qarnayn). The material was later incorporated into Qisas Al-Anbiya
(Tales of the Prophets):
By 1236 AD, the Reconquista
was essentially completed and Europeans had retaken the Iberian peninsula
from the Muslims, but the Emirate of Granada
, a small Muslim vassal of the Christian Kingdom of Castile
, remained in Spain until 1492 AD. During the Reconquista, Muslims were forced to either convert to Catholicism
or leave the peninsula. The descendants of Muslims who converted to Christianity were called the Morisco
s (meaning "Moor
-like") and were suspecting of secretly practicing Islam. The Moriscos used a language called Aljamiado
, which was a dialect of the Spanish language (Mozarabic) but was written using the Arabic alphabet
. Aljamiado played a very important role in preserving Islam and the Arabic language in the life of the Moriscos; prayers and the sayings of Muhammad were translated into Aljamiado transcriptions of the Spanish language, while keeping all Qur'anic verses in the original Arabic. During this period, a version of the Alexander legend was written in the Aljamaido language, building on the Arabic Qisas Dhul-Qarnayn legends as well as Romance language versions of the Alexander romance.
With the Muslim conquest of Persia
in 644 AD, the Alexander romance found its way into Persian literature
—an ironic outcome considering pre-Islamic Persia's
hostility towards the national enemy who conquered the Achaemenid Empire
and was directly responsible for centuries of Persian domination by Hellenistic
foreign rulers. Islamic Persian accounts of the Alexander legend, known as the Iskandarnamah, combined the Pseudo-Callisthenes
material about Alexander, some of which is found in the Qur'an, with indigenous Sassanid Middle Persian
ideas about Alexander. For example, Pseudo-Callisthenes is the source of many incidents in the Shahnama written by Ferdowsi
(935–1020 AD) in New Persian. Persian sources on the Alexander legend devised a mythical genealogy for him whereby his mother was a concubine of Darius II
, making him the half-brother of the last Achaemenid shah
, Darius
. By the 12th century such important writers as Nizami Ganjavi were making him the subject of their epic poems
. The Muslim traditions also elaborated the legend that Alexander the Great had been the companion of Aristotle
and the direct student of Plato
.
There is also evidence that the Syriac translation of the Alexander romance, dating to the 6th century, was not directly based on the Greek recensions but was based on a lost Pahlavi
(pre-Islamic Persian) manuscript.
, specifically Bulgar
, Tatar and Bashkir
peoples of the Volga-Ural
region (within what is today Tatarstan
in the Russian Federation), carried on a rich tradition of the Alexander legend well into the 19th century. The region was conquered by the Abbasid
Caliphate in the early 10th century. In these legends, Alexander is referred to as Iskandar
Dhul-Qarnayn (Alexander the Two Horned), and is "depicted as founder of local cities and an ancestor of local figures." The local folklore about Iskandar Dhul-Qarnayn played in an important role in communal identity:
The Iskandar Dhul-Qanryan legends played an important role in the conversion narrative of the Volga Bulgar Muslims:
In 1577 AD the Tsardom of Russia
annexed control of the region and Bulgar Muslim writings concerning Dhul-Qarnayn do not appear again until the 18th and 19th centuries, which saw a resurgence of local Iskandar Dhul-Qarnayn legends as a source of Muslim and ethnic identity:
Conjecture
A conjecture is a proposition that is unproven but is thought to be true and has not been disproven. Karl Popper pioneered the use of the term "conjecture" in scientific philosophy. Conjecture is contrasted by hypothesis , which is a testable statement based on accepted grounds...
that the story of Dhul-Qarnayn
Dhul-Qarnayn
Dhul-Qarnayn , literally "He of the Two Horns" or "He of the two centuries" is a figure mentioned in the Qur'an, the sacred scripture of Islam, where he is described as a great and righteous ruler who built a long wall that keeps Gog and Magog from attacking the people who he met on his journey...
(in Arabic
Arabic language
Arabic is a name applied to the descendants of the Classical Arabic language of the 6th century AD, used most prominently in the Quran, the Islamic Holy Book...
ذو القرنين, literally "The Two-Horned One", also transliterated as Zul-Qarnain or Zulqarnain), mentioned in the Qur'an
Qur'an
The Quran , also transliterated Qur'an, Koran, Alcoran, Qur’ān, Coran, Kuran, and al-Qur’ān, is the central religious text of Islam, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God . It is regarded widely as the finest piece of literature in the Arabic language...
, is in fact a reference to Alexander III of Macedon (356–323 BC), popularly known as Alexander the Great.
Dhul-Qarnayn is a figure who was well known in the lore
Folklore
Folklore consists of legends, music, oral history, proverbs, jokes, popular beliefs, fairy tales and customs that are the traditions of a culture, subculture, or group. It is also the set of practices through which those expressive genres are shared. The study of folklore is sometimes called...
of the ancient
Classical antiquity
Classical antiquity is a broad term for a long period of cultural history centered on the Mediterranean Sea, comprising the interlocking civilizations of ancient Greece and ancient Rome, collectively known as the Greco-Roman world...
dwellers of the Arabian Peninsula
Arabian Peninsula
The Arabian Peninsula is a land mass situated north-east of Africa. Also known as Arabia or the Arabian subcontinent, it is the world's largest peninsula and covers 3,237,500 km2...
and is mentioned in the Qur'an, the sacred scripture of Islam
Islam
Islam . The most common are and . : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...
. Dhul-Qarnayn is regarded by some Muslim
Muslim
A Muslim, also spelled Moslem, is an adherent of Islam, a monotheistic, Abrahamic religion based on the Quran, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God as revealed to prophet Muhammad. "Muslim" is the Arabic term for "submitter" .Muslims believe that God is one and incomparable...
s as a prophet, and is identified with Alexander the Great in early Islamic literature. There have been many different cultural depictions of Alexander the Great
Cultural depictions of Alexander the Great
Alexander the Great's accomplishments and legacy have been preservedand depicted in many ways. Alexander has figured in works of both "high" and popular culture from his own era to the modern day.-In the Bible:...
since antiquity
Ancient history
Ancient history is the study of the written past from the beginning of recorded human history to the Early Middle Ages. The span of recorded history is roughly 5,000 years, with Cuneiform script, the oldest discovered form of coherent writing, from the protoliterate period around the 30th century BC...
. Muslims have generally endorsed the identification of Dhul-Qarnayn with Alexander the Great, at least until recent times.
The Alexander legends, known as the Alexander romance
Alexander Romance
Alexander romance is any of several collections of legends concerning the mythical exploits of Alexander the Great. The earliest version is in Greek, dating to the 3rd century. Several late manuscripts attribute the work to Alexander's court historian Callisthenes, but the historical figure died...
have many similarities to the story in the Qur'an but are also more elaborate and describe Alexander's fantastical deeds in detail, such as the story of Alexander building a wall to capture Gog and Magog
Gog and Magog
Gog and Magog are names that appear primarily in various Jewish, Christian and Muslim scriptures, as well as numerous subsequent references in other works. Their context can be either genealogical or eschatological and apocalyptic, as in Ezekiel and Revelation...
. The identification of Alexander with Dhul-Qarnayn has been a matter of theological controversy amongst Islamic scholars since early times, but similarities between the Qur'an and the Alexander romance folklore
Folklore
Folklore consists of legends, music, oral history, proverbs, jokes, popular beliefs, fairy tales and customs that are the traditions of a culture, subculture, or group. It is also the set of practices through which those expressive genres are shared. The study of folklore is sometimes called...
were only identified in relatively recent academic research based on the discovery of certain medieval Syriac manuscript
Manuscript
A manuscript or handwrite is written information that has been manually created by someone or some people, such as a hand-written letter, as opposed to being printed or reproduced some other way...
s.
Introduction
Early Islamic scholars generally endorsed the identification of Dhul-Qarnayn with Alexander. The earliest written identification between Alexander and Dhul-Qarnayn is made by the Muslim hagiographer Ibn HishamIbn Hisham
Abu Muhammad 'Abd al-Malik bin Hisham , or Ibn Hisham edited the biography of Muhammad written by Ibn Ishaq. Ibn Ishaq's work is lost and is now only known in the recensions of Ibn Hisham and al-Tabari. Ibn Hisham grew up in Basra, Iraq, but moved afterwards to Egypt, where he gained a name...
(?-833 AD) in the Sira literature. This identification with Alexander is also endorsed by Islamic tafsir
Tafsir
Tafseer is the Arabic word for exegesis or commentary, usually of the Qur'an. Ta'wīl is a subset of tafsir and refers to esoteric or mystical interpretation. An author of tafsir is a mufassir .- Etymology :...
(exegesis
Exegesis
Exegesis is a critical explanation or interpretation of a text, especially a religious text. Traditionally the term was used primarily for exegesis of the Bible; however, in contemporary usage it has broadened to mean a critical explanation of any text, and the term "Biblical exegesis" is used...
) literature dating as far back as the tenth century. Some prominent Islamic scholars in recent times have also endorsed this identification.
Secular philologists studying ancient Syriac Christian
Syriac Christianity
Syriac or Syrian Christianity , the Syriac-speaking Christians of Mesopotamia, comprises multiple Christian traditions of Eastern Christianity. With a history going back to the 1st Century AD, in modern times it is represented by denominations primarily in the Middle East and in Kerala, India....
legend
Legend
A legend is a narrative of human actions that are perceived both by teller and listeners to take place within human history and to possess certain qualities that give the tale verisimilitude...
s about Alexander the Great independently came to the conclusion that Dhul-Qarnayn is an ancient epithet
Epithet
An epithet or byname is a descriptive term accompanying or occurring in place of a name and having entered common usage. It has various shades of meaning when applied to seemingly real or fictitious people, divinities, objects, and binomial nomenclature. It is also a descriptive title...
for Alexander the Great . Edwards says,
Alexander's association with two horns and with the building of the gate against Gog and Magog occurs much earlier than the Quran and persists in the beliefs of all three of these religions [Judaism, Christianity and Islam]. The denial of Alexander's identity as Dhul-Qarnain is the denial of a common heritage shared by the cultures which shape the modern world--both in the east and the west. The popularity of the legend of Alexander the Great proves that these cultures share a history which suggests that perhaps they are not so different after all.
In the 19th century, Orientalists
Oriental studies
Oriental studies is the academic field of study that embraces Near Eastern and Far Eastern societies and cultures, languages, peoples, history and archaeology; in recent years the subject has often been turned into the newer terms of Asian studies and Middle Eastern studies...
studying the Qur'an
Qur'an
The Quran , also transliterated Qur'an, Koran, Alcoran, Qur’ān, Coran, Kuran, and al-Qur’ān, is the central religious text of Islam, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God . It is regarded widely as the finest piece of literature in the Arabic language...
began researching the identity of Dhul-Qarnayn. Theodor Nöldeke, believed that Dhul-Qarnayn was none other than Alexander the Great and that the source of the Qur'anic narrations were the Alexander romance
Alexander Romance
Alexander romance is any of several collections of legends concerning the mythical exploits of Alexander the Great. The earliest version is in Greek, dating to the 3rd century. Several late manuscripts attribute the work to Alexander's court historian Callisthenes, but the historical figure died...
legends recorded in Syriac (a dialect of Middle Aramaic). The Syriac manuscripts were translated into English in 1889 by E. A. Wallis Budge
E. A. Wallis Budge
Sir Ernest Alfred Thompson Wallis Budge was an English Egyptologist, Orientalist, and philologist who worked for the British Museum and published numerous works on the ancient Near East.-Earlier life:...
.
In the early 1900s Andrew Runni Anderson wrote a series of articles on the question in the Transactions of the American Philological Association
American Philological Association
The American Philological Association , founded in 1869, is a non-profit North American scholarly organization devoted to all aspects of Greek and Roman civilization...
. The findings of the philologists imply that the source of the Qur'an's story of Dhul-Qarnayn is the Alexander romance, a thoroughly embellished compilation of Alexander's exploits from Hellenistic
Hellenistic civilization
Hellenistic civilization represents the zenith of Greek influence in the ancient world from 323 BCE to about 146 BCE...
and early Christian
Christian
A Christian is a person who adheres to Christianity, an Abrahamic, monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as recorded in the Canonical gospels and the letters of the New Testament...
sources, which underwent numerous expansions and revisions for two-thousand years, throughout Antiquity
Ancient history
Ancient history is the study of the written past from the beginning of recorded human history to the Early Middle Ages. The span of recorded history is roughly 5,000 years, with Cuneiform script, the oldest discovered form of coherent writing, from the protoliterate period around the 30th century BC...
and the Middle Ages
Middle Ages
The Middle Ages is a periodization of European history from the 5th century to the 15th century. The Middle Ages follows the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and precedes the Early Modern Era. It is the middle period of a three-period division of Western history: Classic, Medieval and Modern...
.
Historical background on religious Alexander legends
There have been many different cultural depictions of Alexander the GreatCultural depictions of Alexander the Great
Alexander the Great's accomplishments and legacy have been preservedand depicted in many ways. Alexander has figured in works of both "high" and popular culture from his own era to the modern day.-In the Bible:...
since antiquity
Ancient history
Ancient history is the study of the written past from the beginning of recorded human history to the Early Middle Ages. The span of recorded history is roughly 5,000 years, with Cuneiform script, the oldest discovered form of coherent writing, from the protoliterate period around the 30th century BC...
, including references in the Hebrew Bible
Hebrew Bible
The Hebrew Bible is a term used by biblical scholars outside of Judaism to refer to the Tanakh , a canonical collection of Jewish texts, and the common textual antecedent of the several canonical editions of the Christian Old Testament...
in 1 Maccabees
1 Maccabees
The First book of Maccabees is a book written in Hebrew by a Jewish author after the restoration of an independent Jewish kingdom, about the latter part of the 2nd century BC. The original Hebrew is lost and the most important surviving version is the Greek translation contained in the Septuagint...
and the Book of Daniel
Book of Daniel
The Book of Daniel is a book in the Hebrew Bible. The book tells of how Daniel, and his Judean companions, were inducted into Babylon during Jewish exile, and how their positions elevated in the court of Nebuchadnezzar. The court tales span events that occur during the reigns of Nebuchadnezzar,...
. Alexander the Great was an immensely popular ficogure in the classical
Classical antiquity
Classical antiquity is a broad term for a long period of cultural history centered on the Mediterranean Sea, comprising the interlocking civilizations of ancient Greece and ancient Rome, collectively known as the Greco-Roman world...
and post-classical cultures of the Mediterranean
Mediterranean Sea
The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean surrounded by the Mediterranean region and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Anatolia and Europe, on the south by North Africa, and on the east by the Levant...
and Middle East
Middle East
The Middle East is a region that encompasses Western Asia and Northern Africa. It is often used as a synonym for Near East, in opposition to Far East...
. Almost immediately after his death in 323 BC a body of legend began to accumulate about his exploits and life which, over the centuries, became increasingly fantastic as well as allegorical. Collectively this tradition is called the Alexander romance and some recensions feature such vivid episodes as Alexander ascending through the air to Paradise
Paradise
Paradise is a place in which existence is positive, harmonious and timeless. It is conceptually a counter-image of the miseries of human civilization, and in paradise there is only peace, prosperity, and happiness. Paradise is a place of contentment, but it is not necessarily a land of luxury and...
, journeying to the bottom of the sea in a glass bubble, and journeying through the Land of Darkness
Land of Darkness
The Land of Darkness was a mythical land supposedly enshrouded in perpetual darkness. It was usually said to be in Abkhazia and was officially known as Hanyson or Hamson , or simply the Forest of Abkhazia.The Land of Darkness enjoyed popularity in fictional medieval travel literature such as...
in search of the Water of Life (Fountain of Youth).
The earliest Greek
Greek language
Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. Its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the majority of its history;...
manuscripts of the Alexander romance, as they have survived, indicate that it was composed at Alexandria
Alexandria
Alexandria is the second-largest city of Egypt, with a population of 4.1 million, extending about along the coast of the Mediterranean Sea in the north central part of the country; it is also the largest city lying directly on the Mediterranean coast. It is Egypt's largest seaport, serving...
in the 3rd century. The original text was lost but was the source of some eighty different versions written in twenty-four different languages. As the Alexander romance persisted in popularity over the centuries, it was assumed by various neighboring peoples. Of particular significance was its incorporation into Jewish and later Christian legendary traditions. In the Jewish tradition Alexander was initially a figure of satire
Satire
Satire is primarily a literary genre or form, although in practice it can also be found in the graphic and performing arts. In satire, vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ideally with the intent of shaming individuals, and society itself, into improvement...
, representing the vain or covetous ruler who is ignorant of larger spiritual truths. Yet their belief in a just, all-powerful God forced Jewish interpreters of the Alexander tradition to come to terms with Alexander's undeniable temporal success. Why would a just, all-powerful God show such favor to an unrighteous ruler? This theological need
Problem of evil
In the philosophy of religion, the problem of evil is the question of how to explain evil if there exists a deity that is omnibenevolent, omnipotent, and omniscient . Some philosophers have claimed that the existences of such a god and of evil are logically incompatible or unlikely...
, plus acculturation to Hellenism
Hellenistic civilization
Hellenistic civilization represents the zenith of Greek influence in the ancient world from 323 BCE to about 146 BCE...
, led to a more positive Jewish interpretation of the Alexander legacy. In its most neutral form this was typified by having Alexander show deference to either the Jewish people or the symbols of their faith. In having the great conqueror thus acknowledge the essential truth of the Jews' religious, intellectual, or ethical traditions, the prestige of Alexander was harnessed to the cause of Jewish ethnocentrism
Ethnocentrism
Ethnocentrism is the tendency to believe that one's ethnic or cultural group is centrally important, and that all other groups are measured in relation to one's own. The ethnocentric individual will judge other groups relative to his or her own particular ethnic group or culture, especially with...
. Eventually Jewish writers would almost completely co-opt Alexander, depicting him as a righteous gentile
Righteous Among the Nations
Righteous among the Nations of the world's nations"), also translated as Righteous Gentiles is an honorific used by the State of Israel to describe non-Jews who risked their lives during the Holocaust to save Jews from extermination by the Nazis....
or even a believing monotheist.
The Christianized peoples of the Near East
Near East
The Near East is a geographical term that covers different countries for geographers, archeologists, and historians, on the one hand, and for political scientists, economists, and journalists, on the other...
, inheritors of both the Hellenic as well as Judaic strands of the Alexander romance, further theologized Alexander until in some stories he was depicted as a saint
Saint
A saint is a holy person. In various religions, saints are people who are believed to have exceptional holiness.In Christian usage, "saint" refers to any believer who is "in Christ", and in whom Christ dwells, whether in heaven or in earth...
. The Christian legends turned the ancient Greek conqueror Alexander III into Alexander "the Believing King", implying that he was a believer in monotheism. Eventually elements of the Alexander romance were combined with Biblical legends such as Gog and Magog
Gog and Magog
Gog and Magog are names that appear primarily in various Jewish, Christian and Muslim scriptures, as well as numerous subsequent references in other works. Their context can be either genealogical or eschatological and apocalyptic, as in Ezekiel and Revelation...
.
During the period of history during which the Alexander romance was written, little was known about the true historical Alexander the Great
Historical Alexander the Great
There are numerous surviving ancient Greek and Latin sources on Alexander, as well as some oriental texts. None is contemporary.-Contemporary sources:...
as most of the history of his conquests had been preserved in the form of folklore and legends. It was not until the Renaissance
Renaissance
The Renaissance was a cultural movement that spanned roughly the 14th to the 17th century, beginning in Italy in the Late Middle Ages and later spreading to the rest of Europe. The term is also used more loosely to refer to the historical era, but since the changes of the Renaissance were not...
(1300-1600 AD) that the true history of Alexander III was rediscovered:
Since the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BC there has been no age in history, whether in the West or the in the East, in which his name and exploits have not been familiar. And yet not only have all contemporary records been lost but even the work based on those records though written some four and a half centuries after his death, the AnabasisAnabasis AlexandriAnabasis Alexandri , the Campaigns of Alexander by Arrian, is the most important source on Alexander the Great.The Greek term anabasis referred to an expedition from a coastline into the interior of a country. The term katabasis referred to a trip from the interior to the coast...
of ArrianArrianLucius Flavius Arrianus 'Xenophon , known in English as Arrian , and Arrian of Nicomedia, was a Roman historian, public servant, a military commander and a philosopher of the 2nd-century Roman period...
, was totally unknown to the writers of the Middle Ages and became available to Western scholarship only with the Revival of Learning [the Renaissance]. The perpetuation of Alexander's fame through so many ages and amongst so many peoples is due in the main to the innumerable recensions and transmogrifications of a work known as the Alexander Romance or Pseudo-Callisthenes.
Dating and origins of the Alexander legends
Ptolemaic dynasty
The Ptolemaic dynasty, was a Macedonian Greek royal family which ruled the Ptolemaic Empire in Egypt during the Hellenistic period. Their rule lasted for 275 years, from 305 BC to 30 BC...
(305 BC to 30 BC) and its unknown authors are sometimes referred to as the Pseudo-Callisthenes (not to be confused with Callisthenes of Olynthus, who was Alexander's official historian). The earliest surviving manuscript of the Alexander romance, called the α (alpha
Alpha
Alpha is the first letter of the Greek alphabet. Alpha or ALPHA may also refer to:-Science:*Alpha , the highest ranking individuals in a community of social animals...
) recension
Recension
Recension is the practice of editing or revising a text based on critical analysis. When referring to manuscripts, this may be a revision by another author...
, can be dated to the 3rd century AD and was written in Greek
Greek language
Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. Its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the majority of its history;...
in Alexandria
Alexandria
Alexandria is the second-largest city of Egypt, with a population of 4.1 million, extending about along the coast of the Mediterranean Sea in the north central part of the country; it is also the largest city lying directly on the Mediterranean coast. It is Egypt's largest seaport, serving...
:
There have been many theories regarding the date and sources of this curious work [the Alexander romance]. According to the most recent authority, ... it was compiled by a Greco-Egyptian writing in Alexandria about A.D. 300. The sources on which the anonymous author drew were twofold. On the one hand he made use of a `romanticized history of Alexander of a highly rhetorical type depending on the CleitarchusCleitarchusCleitarchus or Clitarchus , one of the historians of Alexander the Great, son of the historian Dinon of Colophon, was possibly a native of Egypt, or at least spent a considerable time at the court of Ptolemy Lagus.Quintilian Cleitarchus or Clitarchus , one of the historians of Alexander the Great,...
tradition, and with this he amalgamated a collection of imaginary letters derived from an Epistolary Romance of Alexander written in the first century B.C. He also included two long letters from Alexander to his mother OlympiasOlympiasOlympias was a Greek princess of Epirus, daughter of king Neoptolemus I of Epirus, the fourth wife of the king of Macedonia, Philip II, and mother of Alexander the Great...
and his tutor AristotleAristotleAristotle was a Greek philosopher and polymath, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. His writings cover many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, poetry, theater, music, logic, rhetoric, linguistics, politics, government, ethics, biology, and zoology...
describing his marvellous adventures in India and at the end of the World. These are the literary expression of a living popular tradition and as such are the most remarkable and interesting part of the work.
The Greek
Greek language
Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. Its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the majority of its history;...
variants of the Alexander romance continued to evolve until, in the 4th century, the Greek legend was translated into Latin
Latin
Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...
by Julius Valerius Alexander Polemius
Julius Valerius Alexander Polemius
Julius Valerius Alexander Polemius of the Valerius gens was a translator of the Greek Pseudo-Callisthenes, the romantic history of Alexander the Great, to the Latin Res gestae Alexandri Macedonis, in three books: birth; acts; death. The work is important in connection with the transmission of the...
(where it is called the Res gestae Alexandri Magni) and from Latin it spread to all major vernacular
Vernacular
A vernacular is the native language or native dialect of a specific population, as opposed to a language of wider communication that is not native to the population, such as a national language or lingua franca.- Etymology :The term is not a recent one...
languages of Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
in the Middle Ages. Around the same as its translation into Latin, the Greek text was also translated into the Syriac language and from Syriac it spread to eastern cultures and languages as far afield as China and Southeast Asia. The Syriac legend was the source of an Arabic variant called the Qisas Dhul-Qarnayn (Tales of Dhul-Qarnayn) and a Persian
Persian language
Persian is an Iranian language within the Indo-Iranian branch of the Indo-European languages. It is primarily spoken in Iran, Afghanistan, Tajikistan and countries which historically came under Persian influence...
variant called the Iskandarnamah (Book of Alexander), as well as Armenian
Armenian language
The Armenian language is an Indo-European language spoken by the Armenian people. It is the official language of the Republic of Armenia as well as in the region of Nagorno-Karabakh. The language is also widely spoken by Armenian communities in the Armenian diaspora...
and Ethiopic translations.
The version recorded in Syriac is of particular importance because it was current in the Middle East
Middle East
The Middle East is a region that encompasses Western Asia and Northern Africa. It is often used as a synonym for Near East, in opposition to Far East...
during the time of the Qur'an's writing and is regarded as being closely related to the literary and linguistic
Linguistics
Linguistics is the scientific study of human language. Linguistics can be broadly broken into three categories or subfields of study: language form, language meaning, and language in context....
origins of the story of Dhul-Qarnayn in the Qur'an. The Syriac legend, as it has survived, consists of five distinct manuscripts, including a Syriac Christian
Syriac Christianity
Syriac or Syrian Christianity , the Syriac-speaking Christians of Mesopotamia, comprises multiple Christian traditions of Eastern Christianity. With a history going back to the 1st Century AD, in modern times it is represented by denominations primarily in the Middle East and in Kerala, India....
religious legend concerning Alexander and a sermon about Alexander attributed to the Syriac poet-theologian Jacob of Serugh
Jacob of Serugh
Jacob of Serugh , also called Mar Jacob, was one of the foremost Syriac poet-theologians among the Syriac, perhaps only second in stature to Ephrem the Syrian and equal to Narsai. Where his predecessor Ephrem is known as the 'Harp of the Spirit', Jacob is the 'Flute of the Spirit'...
(451-521 AD, also called Mar Jacob). The Syriac Christian legend concentrates on Alexander's journey to the end of the World, where he constructs the Gates of Alexander
Gates of Alexander
The Gates of Alexander was a legendary barrier supposedly built by Alexander the Great in the Caucasus to keep the uncivilized barbarians of the north from invading the land to the south. The gates were a popular subject in medieval travel literature, starting with the Alexander Romance in a...
to enclose the evil nations of Gog and Magog
Gog and Magog
Gog and Magog are names that appear primarily in various Jewish, Christian and Muslim scriptures, as well as numerous subsequent references in other works. Their context can be either genealogical or eschatological and apocalyptic, as in Ezekiel and Revelation...
, while the sermon describes his journey to the Land of Darkness
Land of Darkness
The Land of Darkness was a mythical land supposedly enshrouded in perpetual darkness. It was usually said to be in Abkhazia and was officially known as Hanyson or Hamson , or simply the Forest of Abkhazia.The Land of Darkness enjoyed popularity in fictional medieval travel literature such as...
to discover the Water of Life (Fountain of Youth). These legends concerning Alexander are remarkably similar to the story of Dhul-Qarnayn found in the Qur'an.
One of the five Syriac manuscripts, as it has survived, can be dated to between 629 AD and 636 AD. There is evidence in the manuscript of "ex eventu knowledge of the Khazar invasion of Armenia
Armenia
Armenia , officially the Republic of Armenia , is a landlocked mountainous country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia...
in A.D. 629," meaning that it was burdened with additions by a redactor
Redaction
Redaction is a form of editing in which multiple source texts are combined and subjected to minor alteration to make them into a single work. Often this is a method of collecting a series of writings on a similar theme and creating a definitive and coherent work...
sometime around 629 AD. The manuscript appears to have been composed as propaganda
Propaganda
Propaganda is a form of communication that is aimed at influencing the attitude of a community toward some cause or position so as to benefit oneself or one's group....
in support of Emperor Heraclius
Heraclius
Heraclius was Byzantine Emperor from 610 to 641.He was responsible for introducing Greek as the empire's official language. His rise to power began in 608, when he and his father, Heraclius the Elder, the exarch of Africa, successfully led a revolt against the unpopular usurper Phocas.Heraclius'...
(575-641 AD) shortly after he defeated the Persians in the Byzantine-Sassanid War of 602–628
Byzantine-Sassanid War of 602–628
The Byzantine–Sassanid War of 602–628 was the final and most devastating of the series of wars fought between the Roman Empire and the Sassanid Empire. The previous war had ended in 591 after Emperor Maurice had helped the Sassanian king Khosrau II regain his throne. In 602, Maurice was murdered...
. It is notable that this manuscript fails to mention the Islamic conquest of Jerusalem in 636 AD by Muhammad
Muhammad
Muhammad |ligature]] at U+FDF4 ;Arabic pronunciation varies regionally; the first vowel ranges from ~~; the second and the last vowel: ~~~. There are dialects which have no stress. In Egypt, it is pronounced not in religious contexts...
's (570-632 AD) successor, Caliph
Caliph
The Caliph is the head of state in a Caliphate, and the title for the ruler of the Islamic Ummah, an Islamic community ruled by the Shari'ah. It is a transcribed version of the Arabic word which means "successor" or "representative"...
Umar
Umar
`Umar ibn al-Khattāb c. 2 November , was a leading companion and adviser to the Islamic prophet Muhammad who later became the second Muslim Caliph after Muhammad's death....
(590-644 AD). This fact means that the manuscript must have been recorded before the "cataclysmic event"`that was the Muslim conquest of Syria
Muslim conquest of Syria
The Muslim conquest of Syria occurred in the first half of the 7th century, and refers to the region known as the Bilad al-Sham, the Levant, or Greater Syria...
and the resulting surrender of Jerusalem
Siege of Jerusalem (637)
The Siege of Jerusalem was a part of a military conflict which took place in the year 637 between the Byzantine Empire and the Rashidun Caliphate. It began when the Rashidun army, under the command of Abu Ubaidah, besieged Jerusalem in November 636. After six months, the Patriarch Sophronius...
in November 636 AD. That the Byzantine–Arab Wars would have been referenced in the manuscript, had it been written after 636 AD, is supported by the fact that in 692 AD a Syriac Christian adaption of the Alexander romance called the Apocalypse of Pseudo-Methodius
Apocalypse of Pseudo-Methodius
The Apocalypse of Pseudo-Methodius is a 7th-century apocalypse that shaped the eschatological imagination of Christendom throughout the Middle Ages. The work was written in Syriac in the late 7th century, in reaction to the Islamic conquest of the Near East, and is falsely attributed to the...
was indeed written as a response to the Muslim invasions and was falsely attributed
Pseudepigraphy
Pseudepigrapha are falsely attributed works, texts whose claimed authorship is unfounded; a work, simply, "whose real author attributed it to a figure of the past." The word "pseudepigrapha" is the plural of "pseudepigraphon" ; the Anglicized forms...
to St Methodius
Methodius of Olympus
The Church Father and Saint Methodius of Olympus was a Christian bishop, ecclesiastical author, and martyr.-Life:Few reports have survived on the life of this first scientific opponent of Origen; even these short accounts present many difficulties. Eusebius does not mention him in his Church...
(?-311 AD). The Apocalypse of Pseudo-Methodius equated the evil nations of Gog and Magog with the Muslim invaders and shaped the eschatological
Eschatology
Eschatology is a part of theology, philosophy, and futurology concerned with what are believed to be the final events in history, or the ultimate destiny of humanity, commonly referred to as the end of the world or the World to Come...
imagination of Christendom
Christendom
Christendom, or the Christian world, has several meanings. In a cultural sense it refers to the worldwide community of Christians, adherents of Christianity...
for centuries.
The manuscripts also contain evidence of lost texts. For example, there is some evidence of a lost pre-Islamic Arabic version of the translation that is thought to have been an intermediary between the Syriac Christian and the Ethiopic Christian translations. There is also evidence that the Syriac translation was not directly based on the Greek recensions but was based on a lost Pahlavi
Pahlavi scripts
Pahlavi or Pahlevi denotes a particular and exclusively written form of various Middle Iranian languages. The essential characteristics of Pahlavi are*the use of a specific Aramaic-derived script, the Pahlavi script;...
(pre-Islamic Persian) intermediary.
Theological controversy
The identity of Dhul-Qarnayn has been a matter of theological controversy amongst Muslim scholars for centuries. Dhul-Qarnayn was equated with Alexander by classical Islamic scholars during a period when Christians and JewsJews
The Jews , also known as the Jewish people, are a nation and ethnoreligious group originating in the Israelites or Hebrews of the Ancient Near East. The Jewish ethnicity, nationality, and religion are strongly interrelated, as Judaism is the traditional faith of the Jewish nation...
had themselves co-opted Alexander the Great as a religious figure. However, it is clear that the historical Alexander the Great
Historical Alexander the Great
There are numerous surviving ancient Greek and Latin sources on Alexander, as well as some oriental texts. None is contemporary.-Contemporary sources:...
was a Greek pagan (Alexander's mother, Olympias
Olympias
Olympias was a Greek princess of Epirus, daughter of king Neoptolemus I of Epirus, the fourth wife of the king of Macedonia, Philip II, and mother of Alexander the Great...
, was a devout member of the orgiastic
Orgy
In modern usage, an orgy is a sex party where guests engage in promiscuous or multifarious sexual activity or group sex. An orgy is similar to debauchery, which refers to excessive indulgence in sensual pleasures....
snake-worshiping cult
Greek mythology
Greek mythology is the body of myths and legends belonging to the ancient Greeks, concerning their gods and heroes, the nature of the world, and the origins and significance of their own cult and ritual practices. They were a part of religion in ancient Greece...
of Dionysus
Dionysus
Dionysus was the god of the grape harvest, winemaking and wine, of ritual madness and ecstasy in Greek mythology. His name in Linear B tablets shows he was worshipped from c. 1500—1100 BC by Mycenean Greeks: other traces of Dionysian-type cult have been found in ancient Minoan Crete...
, and may have slept with snakes). These historical facts about Alexander the Great became well known, even the Western world, only during the Renaissance
Renaissance
The Renaissance was a cultural movement that spanned roughly the 14th to the 17th century, beginning in Italy in the Late Middle Ages and later spreading to the rest of Europe. The term is also used more loosely to refer to the historical era, but since the changes of the Renaissance were not...
period (1300-1600 AD) when the Anabasis Alexandri
Anabasis Alexandri
Anabasis Alexandri , the Campaigns of Alexander by Arrian, is the most important source on Alexander the Great.The Greek term anabasis referred to an expedition from a coastline into the interior of a country. The term katabasis referred to a trip from the interior to the coast...
of Arrian
Arrian
Lucius Flavius Arrianus 'Xenophon , known in English as Arrian , and Arrian of Nicomedia, was a Roman historian, public servant, a military commander and a philosopher of the 2nd-century Roman period...
(AD 86- 160) was rediscovered. In light of the modern view of Alexander the Great, his identity as Dhul-Qarnayn has become a matter of great controversy for Muslims. In reaction, alternative theories about the identity of Dhul-Qarnayn have been advanced by some Muslim scholars. For example, it has been suggested that Dhul-Qarnayn could be Cyrus the Great
Cyrus the Great
Cyrus II of Persia , commonly known as Cyrus the Great, also known as Cyrus the Elder, was the founder of the Achaemenid Empire. Under his rule, the empire embraced all the previous civilized states of the ancient Near East, expanded vastly and eventually conquered most of Southwest Asia and much...
(see Cyrus the Great in the Qur'an
Cyrus the Great in the Qur'an
Cyrus the Great in the Qur'an is a theory that holds that the character of Dhul-Qarnayn, mentioned in the Qur'an, is in fact Cyrus the Great. Dhul-Qarnayn is mentioned in the Qur'an. The story of Dhul-Qarnayn appears in sixteen verses of the Qur'an, specifically the 16 verses 18:83-98...
). The Muslim sentiment against Alexander is reflected in Islamic textbooks (e.g. "Some [Muslim Scholars] say it was Alexander the Great, who lived from 356 BCE to 323 BCE, but that is highly unlikely, given that Alexander was an idol-worshipper and a known homosexual."), often with references to his polytheistic religious beliefs and (more recently) his personal relationships
Qur'an
Dhul-Qarnayn (The two-horned in English) features in the Qur'anQur'an
The Quran , also transliterated Qur'an, Koran, Alcoran, Qur’ān, Coran, Kuran, and al-Qur’ān, is the central religious text of Islam, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God . It is regarded widely as the finest piece of literature in the Arabic language...
, the sacred scripture believed by Muslims to have been revealed by Allah
God in Islam
In Islamic theology, God is the all-powerful and all-knowing creator, sustainer, ordainer, and judge of the universe. Islam puts a heavy emphasis on the conceptualization of God as strictly singular . God is unique and inherently One , all-merciful and omnipotent. According to the Islamic...
to Muhammad
Muhammad
Muhammad |ligature]] at U+FDF4 ;Arabic pronunciation varies regionally; the first vowel ranges from ~~; the second and the last vowel: ~~~. There are dialects which have no stress. In Egypt, it is pronounced not in religious contexts...
. The story of Dhul-Qarnayn appears in seventeen short verses of the Qur'an, specifically verses 18:83-99 of Surah
Sura
A sura is a division of the Qur'an, often referred to as a chapter. The term chapter is sometimes avoided, as the suras are of unequal length; the shortest sura has only three ayat while the longest contains 286 ayat...
Al-Kahf
Al-Kahf
Sura al-Kahf "The Cave" is the 18th surah of the Qur'an with 110 ayat. It is a Meccan sura.-People of the Cave:Verses 9 – 26 of the chapter tell the story of the People of the Cave . Some number of young monotheistic men lived in a time where they were persecuted. They fled the city together, and...
. Dhul-Qarnayn is mentioned in only one place in the Qur'an, unlike the more familiar stories that are repeated throughout the text (for example, Jesus is mentioned in 93 verses in 15 different surahs of the Qur'an). The Qur'anic story describes a man called Dhul-Qarnayn (meaning "the Two-Horned"), who was already familiar to the inhabitants of the region, to whom Allah gave great power, and who traveled to the rising place and setting place of the sun, where he found the sun setting in a murky (or boiling) sea. At this place, Dhul-Qarnayn builds a wall in order to enclose the nations of Gog and Magog
Gog and Magog
Gog and Magog are names that appear primarily in various Jewish, Christian and Muslim scriptures, as well as numerous subsequent references in other works. Their context can be either genealogical or eschatological and apocalyptic, as in Ezekiel and Revelation...
. It is thought that Gog and Magog will breach Dhul-Qarnayn's wall before Yaum al-Qiyāmah
Islamic eschatology
Islamic eschatology is concerned with the al-Qiyāmah . Like the other Abrahamic religions, Islam teaches the bodily resurrection of the dead, the fulfillment of a divine plan for creation, and the judgement of the soul; the righteous are rewarded with the pleasures of Jannah while the unrighteous...
(the Day of Judgement) and will wreak havoc in the world (Islamic Armageddon
Armageddon
Armageddon is, according to the Bible, the site of a battle during the end times, variously interpreted as either a literal or symbolic location...
):
| Qur'an Verse | Abdullah Yusuf Ali Abdullah Yusuf Ali Hafiz Abdullah Yusuf Ali, CBE, FRSL was an Indian Islamic scholar who translated the Qur'an into English. His translation of the Qur'an is one of the most widely-known and used in the English-speaking world.... | Pickthall Marmaduke Pickthall Marmaduke Pickthall was a Western Islamic scholar, noted as an English translator of the Qur'an into English. A convert from Christianity, Pickthall was a novelist, esteemed by D. H. Lawrence, H. G. Wells, and E. M. Forster, as well as a journalist, headmaster, and political and religious leader... |
|---|---|---|
| 18:83 | They ask thee concerning Zul-qarnain Say, "I will rehearse to you something of his story." | They will ask thee of Dhu'l-Qarneyn. Say: "I shall recite unto you a remembrance of him." |
| 18:84 | Verily We established his power on earth, and We gave him the ways and the means to all ends. | Lo! We made him strong in the land and gave him unto every thing a road. |
| 18:85 | One (such) way he followed, | And he followed a road |
| 18:86 | Until, when he reached the setting of the sun, he found it set in a spring of murky water: near it he found a people: We said: "O Zul-qarnain! (thou hast authority), either to punish them, or to treat them with kindness." | Till, when he reached the setting-place of the sun, he found it setting in a muddy spring, and found a people thereabout. We said: "O Dhu'l-Qarneyn! Either punish or show them kindness." |
| 18:87 | He said: "Whoever doth wrong, him shall we punish; then shall he be sent back to his Lord; and He will punish him with a punishment unheard-of (before). | He said: "As for him who doeth wrong, we shall punish him, and then he will be brought back unto his Lord, Who will punish him with awful punishment!" |
| 18:88 | "But whoever believes, and works righteousness, he shall have a goodly reward, and easy will be his task as we order it by our command." | "But as for him who believeth and doeth right, good will be his reward, and We shall speak unto him a mild command." |
| 18:89 | Then followed he (another) way. | Then he followed a road |
| 18:90 | Until, when he came to the rising of the sun, he found it rising on a people for whom We had provided no covering protection against the sun. | Till, when he reached the rising-place of the sun, he found it rising on a people for whom We had appointed no shelter therefrom. |
| 18:91 | (He left them) as they were: We completely understood what was before him. | So (it was). And We knew all concerning him. |
| 18:92 | Then followed he (another) way. | Then he followed a road |
| 18:93 | Until, when he reached (a tract) between two mountains, he found, beneath them, a people who scarcely understood a word. | Till, when he came between the two mountains, he found upon their hither side a folk that scarce could understand a saying. |
| 18:94 | They said: "O Zul-qarnain! the Gog and Magog (people) do great mischief on earth: shall we then render thee tribute in order that thou mightest erect a barrier [wall] between us and them?" | They said: "O Dhu'l-Qarneyn! Lo! Gog and Magog are spoiling the land. So may we pay thee tribute on condition that thou set a barrier [wall] between us and them?" |
| 18:95 | He said: "(The power) in which my Lord has established me is better (than tribute): help me therefore with strength (and labour): I will erect a strong barrier [wall] between you and them: | He said: "That wherein my Lord hath established me is better (than your tribute). Do but help me with strength (of men), I will set between you and them a bank [wall]." |
| 18:96 | "Bring me blocks of iron." At length, when he had filled up the space between the two steep mountain sides, he said, "Blow (with your bellows)" then, when he had made it (red) as fire, he said: "Bring me, that I may pour over it, molten lead." | "Give me pieces of iron" - till, when he had leveled up (the gap) between the cliffs, he said: "Blow!" - till, when he had made it a fire, he said: "Bring me molten copper to pour thereon." |
| 18:97 | Thus were they made powerless to scale it or to dig through it. | And (Gog and Magog) were not able to surmount, nor could they pierce (it). |
| 18:98 | He said: "This is a mercy from my Lord: but when the promise of my Lord comes to pass, He will make it into dust; and the promise of my Lord is true." | He said: "This is a mercy from my Lord; but when the promise of my Lord cometh to pass, He will lay it low, for the promise of my Lord is true." |
| 18:99 | On that day We shall leave them [Gog and Magog] to surge like waves on one another: the trumpet will be blown, and We shall collect them all together. | And on that day we shall let some of them [Gog and Magog] surge against others, and the Trumpet will be blown. Then We shall gather them together in one gathering. |
Sira
Hagiography
Hagiography is the study of saints.From the Greek and , it refers literally to writings on the subject of such holy people, and specifically to the biographies of saints and ecclesiastical leaders. The term hagiology, the study of hagiography, is also current in English, though less common...
, Ibn Ishaq
Ibn Ishaq
Muḥammad ibn Isḥaq ibn Yasār ibn Khiyār was an Arab Muslim historian and hagiographer...
(?-761 AD), which form the main corpus of the Sira (religious biography) literature. Ibn Ishaq's Sira reports that the eighteenth chapter of the Qur'an (which includes the story of Dhul-Qarnayn) was revealed to Muhammad by God
God
God is the English name given to a singular being in theistic and deistic religions who is either the sole deity in monotheism, or a single deity in polytheism....
on account of some questions posed to Muhammad
Muhammad
Muhammad |ligature]] at U+FDF4 ;Arabic pronunciation varies regionally; the first vowel ranges from ~~; the second and the last vowel: ~~~. There are dialects which have no stress. In Egypt, it is pronounced not in religious contexts...
by the rabbis. The verse was revealed during the Meccan period of Muhammad's life. According to Ibn Ishaq, Muhammad's tribe, the powerful Quraysh, were greatly concerned about their tribesman who had started claiming prophethood and wished to consult the Jewish
Judaism
Judaism ) is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people...
rabbis' superior knowledge of the scriptures and about the prophets of God. The two Quraysh men described their tribesman, Muhammad, to the Jewish scholars. The rabbis told the men to ask Muhammad three questions:
They (the rabbis) said, 'Ask him about three things which we will tell you to ask and if he answers them then he is a Prophet who has been sent (by Allah); if he does not, then he is saying things that are not true, in which case how you will deal with him will be up to you. Ask him about some young men in ancient times, what was their story? For theirs is a strange and wondrous tale. Ask him about a man who travelled a great deal and reached the east and the west of the earth. What was his story? And ask him about the RuhRuhRūḥ is an Arabic word meaning spirit. It is the third among the six purities or Lataif-e-sitta-Thirteen stages of taming ruh:To attend Tajalliy-e-Ruh, the Salik needs to achieve the following thirteen.#Iradah or Commitment with God...
(soul or spirit) —what is it? If he tells you about these things, then he is a Prophet, so follow him, but if he does not tell you, then he is a man who is making things up, so deal with him as you see fit.'
The famous story in the Sira relates that when Muhammad was informed of the three questions from the Rabbis, he declared that he would have the answers in the morning. However, Muhammad did not give the answer in the morning. For fifteen days, Muhammad did not answer the question. Doubt in Muhammad began to grow amongst the people of Mecca
Mecca
Mecca is a city in the Hijaz and the capital of Makkah province in Saudi Arabia. The city is located inland from Jeddah in a narrow valley at a height of above sea level...
. Then, after fifteen days, Muhammad received the revelation that is Sura
Sura
A sura is a division of the Qur'an, often referred to as a chapter. The term chapter is sometimes avoided, as the suras are of unequal length; the shortest sura has only three ayat while the longest contains 286 ayat...
Al-Kahf
Al-Kahf
Sura al-Kahf "The Cave" is the 18th surah of the Qur'an with 110 ayat. It is a Meccan sura.-People of the Cave:Verses 9 – 26 of the chapter tell the story of the People of the Cave . Some number of young monotheistic men lived in a time where they were persecuted. They fled the city together, and...
("The Cave"), the eighteenth chapter of the Qur'an. Surah Al-Kahf mentions the "People of the Cave," a strange story about some young men in ancient times who slept in a cave for many years (the widespread myth of the Seven Sleepers
Seven Sleepers
The Seven Sleepers, commonly called the "Seven Sleepers of Ephesus", refers to a group of Christian youths who hid inside a cave outside the city of Ephesus around 250 AD, to escape a persecution of Christians being conducted during the reign of the Roman emperor Decius...
, see below). Surah Al-Kahf also mentions the winds (related to the word for spirit, verse 45). Finally, the surah also mentions "a man who travelled a great deal and reached the east and the west of the earth"—namely, Dhul-Qarnayn. Though Ibn Ishaq himself does not explicitly mention the name Alexander, he relates that a storyteller told him that Dhul-Qarnayn was a Greco-Egyptian (an accurate description of Alexander):
A man who used to purvey stories of the foreigners, which were handed down among them, told me that Dhul-Qarnayn was an Egyptian whose name was Marzuban bin Mardhaba, the Greek.
Ibn Ishaq's original work is lost, but it has been almost completely incorporated in Ibn Hisham
Ibn Hisham
Abu Muhammad 'Abd al-Malik bin Hisham , or Ibn Hisham edited the biography of Muhammad written by Ibn Ishaq. Ibn Ishaq's work is lost and is now only known in the recensions of Ibn Hisham and al-Tabari. Ibn Hisham grew up in Basra, Iraq, but moved afterwards to Egypt, where he gained a name...
(?-833 AD), another early Muslim historian. Ibn Hisham collected Ibn Ishaq's Sira and added his notes to it; in regards to Dhul-Qarnayn, Ibn Hisham noted:
Dhu al-Qarnain is Alexander the Greek, the king of Persia and Greece, or the king of the east and the west, for because of this he was called Dhul-Qarnayn [meaning, 'the two-horned one']...
The theme, amongst Islamic scholars, of identifying Dhul-Qarnayn with Alexander the Great appears to have originated here. Why Ibn Hisham made this identification is not entirely clear.
Pre-Islamic Arabic poetry
Ibn IshaqIbn Ishaq
Muḥammad ibn Isḥaq ibn Yasār ibn Khiyār was an Arab Muslim historian and hagiographer...
recorded many pre-Islamic Arabic poems in the Sira, including a poem about Dhul-Qarnayn that he claims was composed by a pre-Islamic king of ancient Yemen
Yemen
The Republic of Yemen , commonly known as Yemen , is a country located in the Middle East, occupying the southwestern to southern end of the Arabian Peninsula. It is bordered by Saudi Arabia to the north, the Red Sea to the west, and Oman to the east....
named Tubba':
Dhu’l-Qarnayn before me was a Muslim
Conquered kings thronged his court,
East and west he ruled, yet he sought
Knowledge true from a learned sage.
He saw where the sun sinks from view
In a pool of mud and fetid slime
Before him Bilqis [Queen of Sheba] my father's sister
Ruled them until the hoopoe came to her.
The poem's reference to "a learned sage" from whom Dhul-Qarnayn sought knowledge from may be a reference to the story of Dhul-Qarnayn and Al-Khidir. Other pre-Islamic Arab poems about Dhul-Qarnayn are also reported in the Sira literature:
The pre-Islamic poet Al-`Asha and the contemporary of Muhammad Hassan ibn ThabitHassan ibn ThabitHassan ibn Thabit was an Arabian poet and one of the Sahaba, or companions of Muhammad. He was born in Yathrib , and was member of the Banu Khazraj tribe. According to tradition, he was the court poet to Muhammad.-Life:...
(?-674 AD) both composed verses referring to the conquest of Gog and Magog and furthest east by Dhu`l-qarnain.
One poem by Hassan ibn Thabit
Hassan ibn Thabit
Hassan ibn Thabit was an Arabian poet and one of the Sahaba, or companions of Muhammad. He was born in Yathrib , and was member of the Banu Khazraj tribe. According to tradition, he was the court poet to Muhammad.-Life:...
reads:
Ours the realm of Dhu 'l-Qarnayn the glorious
Realm like his was never won by mortal king.
Followed he the Sun to view its setting
When it sank into the somber ocean-spring;
Up he clomb to see it rise at morning,
From within its Mansions when the East it fired;
All day long the horizons led him onward,
All night through he watched the stars and never tired.
Then of iron and of liquid metal
He prepared a rampart not to be o'erpassed,
Gog and Magog there he threw in prison
Till on Judgement Day they shall awake at last
Tafsir
Alexander is mentioned in the tafsirTafsir
Tafseer is the Arabic word for exegesis or commentary, usually of the Qur'an. Ta'wīl is a subset of tafsir and refers to esoteric or mystical interpretation. An author of tafsir is a mufassir .- Etymology :...
, the exegesis
Exegesis
Exegesis is a critical explanation or interpretation of a text, especially a religious text. Traditionally the term was used primarily for exegesis of the Bible; however, in contemporary usage it has broadened to mean a critical explanation of any text, and the term "Biblical exegesis" is used...
or commentaries of the Qur'an that were written by prominent early Islamic scholars. Significantly, Alexander the Great is mentioned in Tafsir al-Jalalayn
Tafsir al-Jalalayn
Tafsīr al-Jalālayn is a classical Sunni tafsir of the Qur'an, composed first by Jalal ad-Din al-Mahalli in 1459 and then completed by his student Jalal ad-Din as-Suyuti in 1505, thus its name. It is recognised as one of the most popular exegeses of the Qur'an today, due to its simple style and...
, a well-known Sunni tafsir of the Qur'an from the 15th century. The tafsir notes that Dhul-Qarnayn's name was Alexander and also indicates that Dhul-Qarnayn was not a prophet:
And they, the Jews, question you concerning Dhū’l-Qarnayn, whose name was Alexander; he was not a prophet. Say: ‘I shall recite, relate, to you a mention, an account, of him’, of his affair.
The commentators of the Qur'an debated on whether or not Dhul-Qarnayn was a prophet of Islam; some concluded that he was not a prophet but was a holy man or a "friend of God" since he is mentioned favorably in the Qur'an. In Islam it is ambiguous as to whether or not Dhul-Qarnayn is a full-fledged prophet.
Fakhr al-Din al-Razi
Fakhr al-Din al-Razi
Abu Abdullah Muhammad ibn Umar ibn al-Husayn al-Taymi al-Bakri al-Tabaristani Fakhr al-Din al-Razi , most commonly known as Fakhruddin Razi was a well-known Persian Sunni Muslim theologian and philosopher....
(1149-1209 AD), in Tafsir al-Kabir also comments that Dhul-Qarnayn is Alexander the Macedonian. He provides a vague justification, saying that the Dhul-Qarnayn mentioned in the Qur'an travelled to the east and the west achieving victories and so he must be Alexander:
While a survey in the history we do not find anybody other than Macedonian Alexander, therefore, the Dhul Qarnayn is the same Macedonian Alexander.
Other Islamic literature
AristotelianAristotle
Aristotle was a Greek philosopher and polymath, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. His writings cover many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, poetry, theater, music, logic, rhetoric, linguistics, politics, government, ethics, biology, and zoology...
Muslim philosophers, such as al-Kindi
Al-Kindi
' , known as "the Philosopher of the Arabs", was a Muslim Arab philosopher, mathematician, physician, and musician. Al-Kindi was the first of the Muslim peripatetic philosophers, and is unanimously hailed as the "father of Islamic or Arabic philosophy" for his synthesis, adaptation and promotion...
(801–873 AD), al-Farabi
Al-Farabi
' known in the West as Alpharabius , was a scientist and philosopher of the Islamic world...
(872-950 AD), and Avicenna
Avicenna
Abū ʿAlī al-Ḥusayn ibn ʿAbd Allāh ibn Sīnā , commonly known as Ibn Sīnā or by his Latinized name Avicenna, was a Persian polymath, who wrote almost 450 treatises on a wide range of subjects, of which around 240 have survived...
(980 - 1037 AD), enthusiastically embraced the concept of Dhul-Qarnayn being an ancient Greek
Ancient Greek
Ancient Greek is the stage of the Greek language in the periods spanning the times c. 9th–6th centuries BC, , c. 5th–4th centuries BC , and the c. 3rd century BC – 6th century AD of ancient Greece and the ancient world; being predated in the 2nd millennium BC by Mycenaean Greek...
king. They stylized Dhul-Qarnayn as a Greek philosopher king
Philosopher king
Philosopher kings are the rulers, or Guardians, of Plato's Utopian Kallipolis. If his ideal city-state is to ever come into being, "philosophers [must] become kings…or those now called kings [must]…genuinely and adequately philosophize" .-In Book VI of The Republic:Plato defined a philosopher...
. Ibn Taymiyyah (1263–1328 AD) objected to the identification on the basis that Alexander was a pagan idolater, and he accused the Aristotelian Muslim philosophers such as Avicenna of making the "mistaken" identification:
...Thus, the sages of the Persian Zoroastrians are all kafirKafirKafir is an Arabic term used in a Islamic doctrinal sense, usually translated as "unbeliever" or "disbeliever"...
[infidels], as well as the sages of Greece such as Aristotle and those like him. They were associationists, worshipping idols and the planets. Aristotle was before 'Isa (Jesus) by three hundred years, and was a minister for Alexander son of Phillip the Macedonian, who is mentioned in the histories of Rome and Greece, as well as the histories of the Christians and the Jews. He is not, however, the same as the man named Dhu-l-Qarnain who Allah mentioned in His book, as some imagined. Some people mistakenly thought that Aristotle was a minister for dhu-l-qarnain, when they saw that (the one found in the Western histories) was named Alexander, and the names are similar, they thought that they were one and the same man. This mistaken view has been promulgated by Ibn Seena [Avicenna] and some others with him.
The Egyptian historian Al-Maqrizi
Al-Maqrizi
Taqi al-Din Ahmad ibn 'Ali ibn 'Abd al-Qadir ibn Muhammad al-Maqrizi ; Arabic: , was an Egyptian historian more commonly known as al-Maqrizi or Makrizi...
(1364–1442 AD) claimed in his book Al-Khotatt that Dhul-Qarnayn was a Yemenite
Yemenite
Yemenite may refer to:*Yemenite, a person from Yemen*Yemeni Arabic, dialect of the Arabic language*Yemenite step, an Israeli folk dance step originating from Yemen*Yemenite Jews...
king named Sa'b and wrote:
Those who claim that he [Dhul-Qarnayn] was Iranian, Roman, or that he was Alexander of Macedon, are wrong.
In his famous English translation and commentary of the Qur'an, Abdullah Yusuf Ali
Abdullah Yusuf Ali
Hafiz Abdullah Yusuf Ali, CBE, FRSL was an Indian Islamic scholar who translated the Qur'an into English. His translation of the Qur'an is one of the most widely-known and used in the English-speaking world....
(1872–1953 AD) supported the notion of Dhul-Qarnayn being Alexander the Great and he indicated an extensive knowledge of the legends concerning Alexander:
Another suggestion was made that, Quranic Zul-qarnain was an ancient king of Persia. A king of Persia is referred to as a Ram with two horns in the Book of Daniel (viii. 3) in the Old Testament. But in the same Book, the Ram with the two horns was smitten, cast down to the ground, and stamped upon by a he-goat with one horn (8:7-8). But there is nothing in our literature to suggest that Zul-qarnain came to any such ignominious end. ... If it is argued that it was some old prehistoric Persian king who built the Iron Gates (18:96) to keep out the Gog and Magog tribes (18:94), this is no identification at all. ...
Another suggestion made is that it was some old prehistoric Himyarite king from YemenYemenThe Republic of Yemen , commonly known as Yemen , is a country located in the Middle East, occupying the southwestern to southern end of the Arabian Peninsula. It is bordered by Saudi Arabia to the north, the Red Sea to the west, and Oman to the east....
, about whom nothing else is known. This, again, is no identification at all. ...
Personally, I have not the least doubt that Zul-Qarnain is meant to be Alexander the Great, the historic Alexander, and not the legendary Alexander...
In his commentary of the Qur'an, Abul Ala Maududi
Abul Ala Maududi
Syed Abul A'ala Maududi , also known as Molana or Shaikh Syed Abul A'ala Mawdudi, was a Sunni Pakistani journalist, theologian, Muslim revivalist leader and political philosopher, and a major 20th century Islamist thinker. He was also a prominent political figure in Pakistan and was the first...
(1903–1979 AD) noted that historically most Muslim scholars had endorsed the identification of Dhul-Qarnayn with Alexander the Great, but recent commentators have forwarded an alternative theory that Dhul-Qarnayn is Cyrus the Great
Cyrus the Great
Cyrus II of Persia , commonly known as Cyrus the Great, also known as Cyrus the Elder, was the founder of the Achaemenid Empire. Under his rule, the empire embraced all the previous civilized states of the ancient Near East, expanded vastly and eventually conquered most of Southwest Asia and much...
:
The identification of Zul-Qarnain has been a controversial matter from the earliest times. In general the commentators have been of the opinion that he was Alexander the Great but the characteristics of Zul-Qarnain described in the Qur'an are not applicable to him. However, now the commentators are inclined to believe that Zul-Qarnain was CyrusCyrus the GreatCyrus II of Persia , commonly known as Cyrus the Great, also known as Cyrus the Elder, was the founder of the Achaemenid Empire. Under his rule, the empire embraced all the previous civilized states of the ancient Near East, expanded vastly and eventually conquered most of Southwest Asia and much...
, an ancient king of IranIranIran , officially the Islamic Republic of Iran , is a country in Southern and Western Asia. The name "Iran" has been in use natively since the Sassanian era and came into use internationally in 1935, before which the country was known to the Western world as Persia...
. We are also of the opinion that probably Zul-Qarnain was Cyrus, but the historical facts, which have come to light up to this time, are not sufficient to make any categorical assertion.
Philological evidence
Philologists, studying ancient Christian legends about Alexander the Great, have come to conclude that the Qur'an's stories about Dhul-Qarnayn closely parallel certain legends about Alexander the Great found in ancient Hellenistic and Christian writings. There is some numismatic evidence, in the form of ancient coins, to identify the Arabic epithet "Dhul-Qarnayn" with Alexander the Great. There is also a long history of monotheistic religionsMonotheism
Monotheism is the belief in the existence of one and only one god. Monotheism is characteristic of the Baha'i Faith, Christianity, Druzism, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism, Samaritanism, Sikhism and Zoroastrianism.While they profess the existence of only one deity, monotheistic religions may still...
co-opting the historical Alexander. Finally, ancient Christian Syriac and Ethiopic manuscripts of the Alexander romance from the Middle East
Middle East
The Middle East is a region that encompasses Western Asia and Northern Africa. It is often used as a synonym for Near East, in opposition to Far East...
have been found which closely resemble the story in the Qur'an. This leads to the theologically controversial conclusion that these legends are the source of the story of Dhul-Qarnayn in the Qur'an.
The two-horned one
The literal translation of the Arabic phrase "Dhul-Qarnayn," as written in the Qur'an, is "the Two-Horned." Alexander the Great was portrayed with two horns in ancient Greek depictions of Alexander:It is well known that already in his own time Alexander was portrayed with horns according to the iconographyIconographyIconography is the branch of art history which studies the identification, description, and the interpretation of the content of images. The word iconography literally means "image writing", and comes from the Greek "image" and "to write". A secondary meaning is the painting of icons in the...
of the Egyptian god AmmonAmmonAmmon , also referred to as the Ammonites and children of Ammon, was an ancient nation located east of the Jordan River, Gilead, and the Dead Sea, in present-day Jordan. The chief city of the country was Rabbah or Rabbath Ammon, site of the modern city of Amman, Jordan's capital...
.
The Egyptian god
Egyptian pantheon
The Egyptian pantheon consisted of the many gods worshipped by the Ancient Egyptians. A number of major deities are addressed as the creator of the cosmos. These include Atum, Ra, Amun and Ptah amongst others, as well as composite forms of these gods such as Amun-Ra. This was not seen as...
Ammon-Ra was depicted with ram horns. Rams were considered a symbol of virility
Virility
Virility refers to any of a wide range of masculine characteristics viewed positively. It is not applicable to women or to negative characteristics. The Oxford English Dictionary says virile is "marked by strength or force." Virility is commonly associated with vigour, health, sturdiness, and...
due to their rutting
Rut (mammalian reproduction)
The rut is the mating season of ruminant animals such as deer, sheep, elk, moose, caribou, ibex, goats, pronghorn and Asian and African antelope....
behavior. The horns of Ammon may have also represented the East and West of the Earth, and one of the titles of Ammon
Ammon
Ammon , also referred to as the Ammonites and children of Ammon, was an ancient nation located east of the Jordan River, Gilead, and the Dead Sea, in present-day Jordan. The chief city of the country was Rabbah or Rabbath Ammon, site of the modern city of Amman, Jordan's capital...
was "the two-horned." Alexander was depicted with the horns of Ammon as a result of his conquest of ancient Egypt
Ancient Egypt
Ancient Egypt was an ancient civilization of Northeastern Africa, concentrated along the lower reaches of the Nile River in what is now the modern country of Egypt. Egyptian civilization coalesced around 3150 BC with the political unification of Upper and Lower Egypt under the first pharaoh...
in 332 BC, where the priesthood received him as the son of the god Ammon, who was identified by the ancient Greeks with Zeus
Zeus
In the ancient Greek religion, Zeus was the "Father of Gods and men" who ruled the Olympians of Mount Olympus as a father ruled the family. He was the god of sky and thunder in Greek mythology. His Roman counterpart is Jupiter and his Etruscan counterpart is Tinia.Zeus was the child of Cronus...
, the King of the Gods
King of the Gods
In Polytheistic systems there is a tendency for one divinity, usually male, to achieve pre-eminence as King of the Gods. This tendency is paralleled with the growth of hierarchical systems of political power, in which a monarch eventually comes to assume ultimate authority for human affairs...
. The combined deity
Deity
A deity is a recognized preternatural or supernatural immortal being, who may be thought of as holy, divine, or sacred, held in high regard, and respected by believers....
Zeus-Ammon was a distinct figure in ancient Greek mythology. According to five historians of antiquity (Arrian
Arrian
Lucius Flavius Arrianus 'Xenophon , known in English as Arrian , and Arrian of Nicomedia, was a Roman historian, public servant, a military commander and a philosopher of the 2nd-century Roman period...
, Curtius
Curtius
Curtius is a Roman nomen which may refer to:* Quintus Curtius Rufus, 1st century CE historian* Lacus Curtius, a mysterious hole in the ground in the Roman Forum* Curtius Curtius may also refer to:...
, Diodorus, Justin
Justin
Justin is a given name. It may refer to:People* Justin , a common given name* Justin , 3rd century Roman historian* Justin I , or Flavius Iustinius Augustus, an Eastern Roman Emperor who ruled from 518 to 527...
, and Plutarch
Plutarch
Plutarch then named, on his becoming a Roman citizen, Lucius Mestrius Plutarchus , c. 46 – 120 AD, was a Greek historian, biographer, essayist, and Middle Platonist known primarily for his Parallel Lives and Moralia...
), Alexander visited the Oracle
Oracle
In Classical Antiquity, an oracle was a person or agency considered to be a source of wise counsel or prophetic predictions or precognition of the future, inspired by the gods. As such it is a form of divination....
of Ammon at Siwa
Siwa Oasis
The Siwa Oasis is an oasis in Egypt, located between the Qattara Depression and the Egyptian Sand Sea in the Libyan Desert, nearly 50 km east of the Libyan border, and 560 km from Cairo....
in the Libyan
Ancient Libya
The Latin name Libya referred to the region west of the Nile Valley, generally corresponding to modern Northwest Africa. Climate changes affected the locations of the settlements....
desert and rumors spread that the Oracle had revealed Alexander's father to be the deity
Deity
A deity is a recognized preternatural or supernatural immortal being, who may be thought of as holy, divine, or sacred, held in high regard, and respected by believers....
Ammon, rather than Philip. Alexander styled himself as the son of Zeus-Ammon and even demanded to be worshiped as a god:
He seems to have become convinced of the reality of his own divinityDivinityDivinity and divine are broadly applied but loosely defined terms, used variously within different faiths and belief systems — and even by different individuals within a given faith — to refer to some transcendent or transcendental power or deity, or its attributes or manifestations in...
and to have required its acceptance by others ... The cities perforce complied, but often ironically: the SpartaSpartaSparta or Lacedaemon, was a prominent city-state in ancient Greece, situated on the banks of the River Eurotas in Laconia, in south-eastern Peloponnese. It emerged as a political entity around the 10th century BC, when the invading Dorians subjugated the local, non-Dorian population. From c...
n decree read, 'Since Alexander wishes to be a god, let him be a god.'
Ancient Greek coins
Ancient Greek coinage
The history of Ancient Greek coinage can be divided into three periods, the Archaic, the Classical, and the Hellenistic. The Archaic period extends from the introduction of coinage to the Greek world in about 600 BCE until the Persian Wars in about 480 BCE...
, such as the coins minted by Alexander's successor Lysimachus
Lysimachus
Lysimachus was a Macedonian officer and diadochus of Alexander the Great, who became a basileus in 306 BC, ruling Thrace, Asia Minor and Macedon.-Early Life & Career:...
(360-281 BC), depict the ruler with the distinctive horns of Ammon
Ammon
Ammon , also referred to as the Ammonites and children of Ammon, was an ancient nation located east of the Jordan River, Gilead, and the Dead Sea, in present-day Jordan. The chief city of the country was Rabbah or Rabbath Ammon, site of the modern city of Amman, Jordan's capital...
on his head. Archaeologists have found a large number of different types of ancients coins depicting Alexander the Great with two horns. The 4th century BC silver tetradrachmon ("four drachma") coin, depicting a deified
Imperial cult
An imperial cult is a form of state religion in which an emperor, or a dynasty of emperors , are worshipped as messiahs, demigods or deities. "Cult" here is used to mean "worship", not in the modern pejorative sense...
Alexander with two horns, replaced the 5th century BC Athenian
Athens
Athens , is the capital and largest city of Greece. Athens dominates the Attica region and is one of the world's oldest cities, as its recorded history spans around 3,400 years. Classical Athens was a powerful city-state...
silver tetradrachmon (which depicted the goddess Athena
Athena
In Greek mythology, Athena, Athenê, or Athene , also referred to as Pallas Athena/Athene , is the goddess of wisdom, courage, inspiration, civilization, warfare, strength, strategy, the arts, crafts, justice, and skill. Minerva, Athena's Roman incarnation, embodies similar attributes. Athena is...
) as the most widely used coin in the Greek world. After Alexander's conquests, the drachma was used in many of the Hellenistic kingdoms in the Middle East
Middle East
The Middle East is a region that encompasses Western Asia and Northern Africa. It is often used as a synonym for Near East, in opposition to Far East...
, including the Ptolemaic
Ptolemaic dynasty
The Ptolemaic dynasty, was a Macedonian Greek royal family which ruled the Ptolemaic Empire in Egypt during the Hellenistic period. Their rule lasted for 275 years, from 305 BC to 30 BC...
kingdom in Alexandria
Alexandria
Alexandria is the second-largest city of Egypt, with a population of 4.1 million, extending about along the coast of the Mediterranean Sea in the north central part of the country; it is also the largest city lying directly on the Mediterranean coast. It is Egypt's largest seaport, serving...
. The Arabic unit of currency known as the dirham
Dirham
Dirham or dirhem is a unit of currency in several Arab or Berber nations, and formerly the related unit of mass in the Ottoman Empire and Persian states...
, known from pre-Islamic times up to the present day, inherited its name from the drachma. In the late 2nd century BC, silver coins depicting Alexander with ram horns were used as a principal coinage in Arabia and were issued by an Arab
Arab
Arab people, also known as Arabs , are a panethnicity primarily living in the Arab world, which is located in Western Asia and North Africa. They are identified as such on one or more of genealogical, linguistic, or cultural grounds, with tribal affiliations, and intra-tribal relationships playing...
ruler by the name of Abi'el who ruled in the south-eastern region of the Arabian Peninsula
Arabian Peninsula
The Arabian Peninsula is a land mass situated north-east of Africa. Also known as Arabia or the Arabian subcontinent, it is the world's largest peninsula and covers 3,237,500 km2...
.
In 1971, Ukrainian
Ukrainians
Ukrainians are an East Slavic ethnic group native to Ukraine, which is the sixth-largest nation in Europe. The Constitution of Ukraine applies the term 'Ukrainians' to all its citizens...
archeologist B.M. Mozolevskii discovered an ancient Scythian kurgan
Kurgan
Kurgan is the Turkic term for a tumulus; mound of earth and stones raised over a grave or graves, originating with its use in Soviet archaeology, now widely used for tumuli in the context of Eastern European and Central Asian archaeology....
(burial mound) containing many treasures. The burial site was constructed in the 4th century BC near the city of Ordzhonikidze
Ordzhonikidze
Ordzhonikidze may refer to:People:*Grigoriy Ordzhonikidze , a Georgian Bolshevik and Soviet political leader*Sergei Ordzhonikidze, a Russian diplomat*Iosif Ordzhonikidze , a mayor of Moscow...
and is given the name Tovsta Mohyla (another name is Babyna Mogila). Amongst the artifacts excavated at this site were four silver gilded phalera
Phalera
Phalera may refer to:* Phalera , a genus of moths* Phalera , a piece of horse harness, frequently decorated in antiquity* Phalera , a sculpted disk of precious metal worn on the breastplate as a form of medal by soldiers of the Roman Empire...
(ancient Roman
Ancient Rome
Ancient Rome was a thriving civilization that grew on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 8th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea and centered on the city of Rome, it expanded to one of the largest empires in the ancient world....
military medals). Two of the four medals are identical and depict the head of a bearded man with two horns, while the other two medals are also identical and depict the head of a clean-shaven man with two horns. According to a recent theory, the bearded figure with horns is actually Zeus-Ammon and the clean-shaved figure is none other than Alexander the Great.
Alexander has also been identified, since ancient times, with the horned figure in the Old Testament
Old Testament
The Old Testament, of which Christians hold different views, is a Christian term for the religious writings of ancient Israel held sacred and inspired by Christians which overlaps with the 24-book canon of the Masoretic Text of Judaism...
in the prophecy of Daniel 8 who overthrows the kings of Media and Persia. In the prophesy, Daniel
Daniel
Daniel is the protagonist in the Book of Daniel of the Hebrew Bible. In the narrative, when Daniel was a young man, he was taken into Babylonian captivity where he was educated in Chaldean thought. However, he never converted to Neo-Babylonian ways...
has a vision of a ram with two long horns and verse 20 explains that "The ram which thou sawest having two horns is the kings of Media
Medes
The MedesThe Medes...
and Persia.":
JosephusJosephusTitus Flavius Josephus , also called Joseph ben Matityahu , was a 1st-century Romano-Jewish historian and hagiographer of priestly and royal ancestry who recorded Jewish history, with special emphasis on the 1st century AD and the First Jewish–Roman War, which resulted in the Destruction of...
[37–100 AD], in his Antiquities of the JewsAntiquities of the JewsAntiquities of the Jews is a twenty volume historiographical work composed by the Jewish historian Flavius Josephus in the thirteenth year of the reign of Roman emperor Flavius Domitian which was around 93 or 94 AD. Antiquities of the Jews contains an account of history of the Jewish people,...
xi, 8, 5 tells of a visit that Alexander is purported to have made to Jerusalem, where he met the high priest Jaddua and the assembled Jews, and was shown the book of Daniel in which it was prophesied that some one of the Greeks would overthrow the empire of Persia. Alexander believed himself to be the one indicated, and was pleased. The pertinent passage in Daniel would seem to be VIII. 3-8 which tells of the overthrow of the two-horned ram by the one-horned goat, the one horn of the goat being broken in the encounter ...The interpretation of this is given further ... "The ram which thou sawest that had the two horns, they are the kings of Media and Persia. And the rough he-goat is the king of Greece." This identification is accepted by the church fathers ...
The Christian Syriac version of the Alexander romance, in the sermon by Jacob of Serugh
Jacob of Serugh
Jacob of Serugh , also called Mar Jacob, was one of the foremost Syriac poet-theologians among the Syriac, perhaps only second in stature to Ephrem the Syrian and equal to Narsai. Where his predecessor Ephrem is known as the 'Harp of the Spirit', Jacob is the 'Flute of the Spirit'...
, describes Alexander as having been given two horns of iron by God. The legend describes Alexander (as a Christian king) bowing himself in prayer, saying:
O God ... I know in my mind that thou hast exalted me above all kings, and thou hast made me horns upon my head, wherewith I might thrust down the kingdoms of the world...I will magnify thy name, O Lord, forever ... And if the Messiah, who is the Son of God [Jesus], comes in my days, I and my troops will worship Him...
In Christian Alexander legends written in Ethiopic
Ge'ez language
Ge'ez is an ancient South Semitic language that developed in the northern region of Ethiopia and southern Eritrea in the Horn of Africa...
(an ancient South Semitic
South Semitic
South Semitic is a commonly accepted branch of the Semitic languages. Semitic itself is a branch of the larger Afro-Asiatic language family found in Africa and Asia....
language) between the fourteenth and the sixteenth century, Alexander the Great is always explicitly referred to using the epithet
Epithet
An epithet or byname is a descriptive term accompanying or occurring in place of a name and having entered common usage. It has various shades of meaning when applied to seemingly real or fictitious people, divinities, objects, and binomial nomenclature. It is also a descriptive title...
the "Two Horned." A passage from the Ethiopic Christian legend describes the Angel of the Lord
Angel of the Lord
The Angel of the Lord is one of many terms in the Hebrew Bible used for an angel. The Biblical name for angel, מלאך mal'ach, which translates simply as "messenger," obtained the further signification of "angel" only through the addition of God's name, as The Angel of the Lord (or the Angel of...
calling Alexander by this name:
Then God, may He be blessed and exalted! put it into the heart of the Angel to call Alexander 'Two-horned,' ... And Alexander said unto him, ' Thou didst call me by the name Two-horned, but my name is Alexander ... and I thought that thou hadst cursed me by calling me by this name.' The angel spake unto him, saying, 'O man, I did not curse thee by the name by which thou and the works that thou doest are known. Thou hast come unto me, and I praise thee because, from the east to the west, the whole earth hath been given unto thee ...'
References to Alexander's supposed horns are found in literature ranging many different languages, regions and centuries:
The horns of Alexander ... have had a varied symbolism. They represent him as a god, as a son of a god, as a prophet and propagandist of the Most High, as something approaching the role of a messiah, and also as the champion of Allah. They represent him as a world conqueror, who subjugated the two horns or ends of the world, the lands of the rising and of the setting sun ...
For these reasons, among others, the Qur'an's Arabic epithet "Dhul-Qarnayn," literally meaning "the two-horned one," is interpreted as a reference to Alexander the Great.
Alexander's Wall
Gog and Magog
Gog and Magog are names that appear primarily in various Jewish, Christian and Muslim scriptures, as well as numerous subsequent references in other works. Their context can be either genealogical or eschatological and apocalyptic, as in Ezekiel and Revelation...
who "do great mischief in the earth." A similar story about Alexander is found in the Alexander romance and the origins of the story can be dated as far back as 329 BC.
Early accounts of Alexander's Wall
The building of gates in the Caucasus MountainsCaucasus Mountains
The Caucasus Mountains is a mountain system in Eurasia between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea in the Caucasus region .The Caucasus Mountains includes:* the Greater Caucasus Mountain Range and* the Lesser Caucasus Mountains....
by Alexander to repel the barbarian peoples identified with Gog and Magog has ancient provenance and the wall is known as the Gates of Alexander
Gates of Alexander
The Gates of Alexander was a legendary barrier supposedly built by Alexander the Great in the Caucasus to keep the uncivilized barbarians of the north from invading the land to the south. The gates were a popular subject in medieval travel literature, starting with the Alexander Romance in a...
or the Caspian Gates. The name Caspian Gates originally applied to the narrow region at the southeast corner of the Caspian Sea
Caspian Sea
The Caspian Sea is the largest enclosed body of water on Earth by area, variously classed as the world's largest lake or a full-fledged sea. The sea has a surface area of and a volume of...
, through which Alexander actually marched in the pursuit of Bessus
Bessus
Artaxerxes V, also known as Bessus was a prominent Persian nobleman and satrap of Bactria, and later self-proclaimed king of Persia...
in 329 BC, although he did not stop to fortify it. It was transferred to the passes through the Caucasus, on the other side of the Caspian, by the more fanciful historians of Alexander. The Jewish historian Flavius Josephus
Josephus
Titus Flavius Josephus , also called Joseph ben Matityahu , was a 1st-century Romano-Jewish historian and hagiographer of priestly and royal ancestry who recorded Jewish history, with special emphasis on the 1st century AD and the First Jewish–Roman War, which resulted in the Destruction of...
(37–100 AD) mentions that:
...a nation of the Alans, whom we have previously mentioned elsewhere as being Scythians ... travelled through a passage which King Alexander [the Great] shut up with iron gates.
Josephus also records that the people of Magog, the Magogites, were synonymous with the Scythians. According to Andrew Runni Anderson, this merely indicates that the main elements of the story were already in place six centuries before the Qur'an's revelation, not that the story itself was known in the cohesive form apparent in the Qur'anic account. Similarly, St. Jerome
Jerome
Saint Jerome was a Roman Christian priest, confessor, theologian and historian, and who became a Doctor of the Church. He was the son of Eusebius, of the city of Stridon, which was on the border of Dalmatia and Pannonia...
(347–420 AD), in his Letter 77, mentions that,
The hordes of the Huns had poured forth all the way from MaeotisSea of AzovThe Sea of Azov , known in Classical Antiquity as Lake Maeotis, is a sea on the south of Eastern Europe. It is linked by the narrow Strait of Kerch to the Black Sea to the south and is bounded on the north by Ukraine mainland, on the east by Russia, and on the west by the Ukraine's Crimean...
(they had their haunts between the icy TanaisTanaisTanais is the ancient name for the River Don in Russia. Strabo regarded it as the boundary between Europe and Asia.In antiquity, Tanais was also the name of a city in the Don river delta that reaches into the northeasternmost part of the Sea of Azov, which the Greeks called Lake Maeotis...
and the rude MassagetaeMassagetaeThe Massageteans or Massagetaeans were an Iranian nomadic confederation in antiquity known primarily from the writings of Herodotus. Their name was probably akin to Thyssagetae.-Name:...
, where the gates of AlexanderGates of AlexanderThe Gates of Alexander was a legendary barrier supposedly built by Alexander the Great in the Caucasus to keep the uncivilized barbarians of the north from invading the land to the south. The gates were a popular subject in medieval travel literature, starting with the Alexander Romance in a...
keep back the wild peoples behind the Caucasus).
In his Commentary on Ezekiel
Ezekiel
Ezekiel , "God will strengthen" , is the central protagonist of the Book of Ezekiel in the Hebrew Bible. In Judaism, Christianity and Islam, Ezekiel is acknowledged as a Hebrew prophet...
(38:2), Jerome identifies the nations located beyond the Caucasus mountains
Caucasus Mountains
The Caucasus Mountains is a mountain system in Eurasia between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea in the Caucasus region .The Caucasus Mountains includes:* the Greater Caucasus Mountain Range and* the Lesser Caucasus Mountains....
and near Lake Maeotis
Sea of Azov
The Sea of Azov , known in Classical Antiquity as Lake Maeotis, is a sea on the south of Eastern Europe. It is linked by the narrow Strait of Kerch to the Black Sea to the south and is bounded on the north by Ukraine mainland, on the east by Russia, and on the west by the Ukraine's Crimean...
as Gog and Magog. Thus the Gates of Alexander
Gates of Alexander
The Gates of Alexander was a legendary barrier supposedly built by Alexander the Great in the Caucasus to keep the uncivilized barbarians of the north from invading the land to the south. The gates were a popular subject in medieval travel literature, starting with the Alexander Romance in a...
legend was combined with the legend of Gog and Magog
Gog and Magog
Gog and Magog are names that appear primarily in various Jewish, Christian and Muslim scriptures, as well as numerous subsequent references in other works. Their context can be either genealogical or eschatological and apocalyptic, as in Ezekiel and Revelation...
from the Book of Revelation
Book of Revelation
The Book of Revelation is the final book of the New Testament. The title came into usage from the first word of the book in Koine Greek: apokalupsis, meaning "unveiling" or "revelation"...
. It has been suggested that the incorporation of the Gog and Magog legend into the Alexander romance was prompted by the invasion of the Huns across the Caucasus
Caucasus
The Caucasus, also Caucas or Caucasia , is a geopolitical region at the border of Europe and Asia, and situated between the Black and the Caspian sea...
mountains in 395 AD into Armenia
Armenia
Armenia , officially the Republic of Armenia , is a landlocked mountainous country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia...
and Syria
Syria
Syria , officially the Syrian Arab Republic , is a country in Western Asia, bordering Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea to the West, Turkey to the north, Iraq to the east, Jordan to the south, and Israel to the southwest....
.
Alexander's Wall in Christian legends
Christian legends speak of the Caspian Gates (Gates of Alexander), also known as Alexander's wall, built by Alexander the Great in the Caucasus mountainsCaucasus Mountains
The Caucasus Mountains is a mountain system in Eurasia between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea in the Caucasus region .The Caucasus Mountains includes:* the Greater Caucasus Mountain Range and* the Lesser Caucasus Mountains....
. Several variations of the legend can be found. In the story, Alexander the Great built a gate of iron between two mountains, at the end of the Earth
Flat Earth
The Flat Earth model is a belief that the Earth's shape is a plane or disk. Most ancient cultures have had conceptions of a flat Earth, including Greece until the classical period, the Bronze Age and Iron Age civilizations of the Near East until the Hellenistic period, India until the Gupta period ...
, to prevent the armies of Gog and Magog
Gog and Magog
Gog and Magog are names that appear primarily in various Jewish, Christian and Muslim scriptures, as well as numerous subsequent references in other works. Their context can be either genealogical or eschatological and apocalyptic, as in Ezekiel and Revelation...
from ravaging the plains. The Christian legend was written in Syria
Syria
Syria , officially the Syrian Arab Republic , is a country in Western Asia, bordering Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea to the West, Turkey to the north, Iraq to the east, Jordan to the south, and Israel to the southwest....
shortly before the Qur'an's writing and closely parallels the story of Dhul-Qarnayn. The legend describes an apocryphal letter from Alexander to his mother, wherein he writes:
I petitioned the exalted Deity, and he heard my prayer. And the exalted Deity commanded the two mountains and they moved and approached each other to a distance of twelve ellEllAn ell , is a unit of measurement, approximating the length of a man's arm.Several national forms existed, with different lengths, includingthe Scottish ell ,the Flemish ell ,the French ell...
s, and there I made ... copper gates 12 ells broad, and 60 ells high, and smeared them over within and without with copper ... so that neither fire nor iron, nor any other means should be able to loosen the copper; ... Within these gates, I made another construction of stones ... And having done this I finished the construction by putting mixed tin and lead over the stones, and smearing .... over the whole, so that no one might be able to do anything against the gates. I called them the Caspian Gates. Twenty and two Kings did I shut up therein.
These pseudepigraphic letters from Alexander to his mother Olympias and his tutor Aristotle, describing his marvellous adventures at the end of the World, date back to the original Greek recension α
Alexander Romance
Alexander romance is any of several collections of legends concerning the mythical exploits of Alexander the Great. The earliest version is in Greek, dating to the 3rd century. Several late manuscripts attribute the work to Alexander's court historian Callisthenes, but the historical figure died...
written in the 4th century in Alexandria. The letters are "the literary expression of a living popular tradition" that had been evolving for at least three centuries before the Qur'an was written.
Medieval accounts of Alexander's Wall
Middle Ages
The Middle Ages is a periodization of European history from the 5th century to the 15th century. The Middle Ages follows the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and precedes the Early Modern Era. It is the middle period of a three-period division of Western history: Classic, Medieval and Modern...
, the Gates of Alexander story was included in travel literature such as the Travels of Marco Polo (1254–1324 AD) and the Travels of Sir John Mandeville. The Alexander romance identified the Gates of Alexander, variously, with the Pass of Dariel, the Pass of Derbent
Derbent
Derbent |Lak]]: Чурул, Churul; Persian: دربند; Judæo-Tat: דארבּאנד/Дэрбэнд/Dərbənd) is a city in the Republic of Dagestan, Russia, close to the Azerbaijani border. It is the southernmost city in Russia, and it is the second most important city of Dagestan...
, the Great Wall of Gorgan
Great Wall of Gorgan
The Great Wall of Gorgan is a series of ancient defensive fortifications located near Gorgan in the Golestān Province of northeastern Iran, at the southeastern part of the Caspian Sea...
and even the Great Wall of China
Great Wall of China
The Great Wall of China is a series of stone and earthen fortifications in northern China, built originally to protect the northern borders of the Chinese Empire against intrusions by various nomadic groups...
. In the legend's original form, Alexander's Gates are located at the Pass of Dariel. In later versions of the Christian legends, dated to around the time of Emperor Heraclius
Heraclius
Heraclius was Byzantine Emperor from 610 to 641.He was responsible for introducing Greek as the empire's official language. His rise to power began in 608, when he and his father, Heraclius the Elder, the exarch of Africa, successfully led a revolt against the unpopular usurper Phocas.Heraclius'...
(575-641 AD), the Gates are instead located in Derbent
Derbent
Derbent |Lak]]: Чурул, Churul; Persian: دربند; Judæo-Tat: דארבּאנד/Дэрбэнд/Dərbənd) is a city in the Republic of Dagestan, Russia, close to the Azerbaijani border. It is the southernmost city in Russia, and it is the second most important city of Dagestan...
, a city situated on a narrow strip of land between the Caspian Sea and the Caucasus mountains, where an ancient Sassanid fortification was mistakenly identified with the wall built by Alexander. In the Travels of Marco Polo, the wall in Derbent is identified with the Gates of Alexander. The Gates of Alexander
Gates of Alexander
The Gates of Alexander was a legendary barrier supposedly built by Alexander the Great in the Caucasus to keep the uncivilized barbarians of the north from invading the land to the south. The gates were a popular subject in medieval travel literature, starting with the Alexander Romance in a...
are most commonly identified with the Caspian Gates of Derbent whose thirty north-looking towers used to stretch for forty kilometers between the Caspian Sea
Caspian Sea
The Caspian Sea is the largest enclosed body of water on Earth by area, variously classed as the world's largest lake or a full-fledged sea. The sea has a surface area of and a volume of...
and the Caucasus Mountains
Caucasus Mountains
The Caucasus Mountains is a mountain system in Eurasia between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea in the Caucasus region .The Caucasus Mountains includes:* the Greater Caucasus Mountain Range and* the Lesser Caucasus Mountains....
, effectively blocking the passage across the Caucasus. Later historians would regard these legends as false:
The gate itself had wandered from the Caspian Gates to the pass of Dariel, from the pass of Dariel to the pass of Derbend [Derbent], as well as to the far north; nay, it had travelled even as far as remote eastern or north-eastern Asia, gathering in strength and increasing in size as it went, and actually carrying the mountains of Caspia with it. Then, as the full light of modern day come on, the Alexander Romance ceased to be regarded as history, and with it Alexander's Gate passed into the realm of fairyFairyA fairy is a type of mythical being or legendary creature, a form of spirit, often described as metaphysical, supernatural or preternatural.Fairies resemble various beings of other mythologies, though even folklore that uses the term...
land.
In the Muslim world, several expeditions were undertaken to try to find and study Alexanders's wall, specifically the Caspian Gates of Derbent. An early expedition to Derbent was ordered by the Caliph Umar
Umar
`Umar ibn al-Khattāb c. 2 November , was a leading companion and adviser to the Islamic prophet Muhammad who later became the second Muslim Caliph after Muhammad's death....
(586–644 AD) himself, during the Arab conquest of Armenia
Arab conquest of Armenia
The Arab conquest of Armenia was a part of the Muslim conquests after the death of Muhammad in AD 632.Persian Armenia had fallen to the Byzantine Empire shortly before, in AD 629, and was conquered in the Rashidun Caliphate by AD 645.-Islamic expansion:...
where they heard about Alexander's Wall in Derbent from the conquered Christian Armenians. Umar's expedition was recorded by the renowned exegetes of the Qur'an
Tafsir
Tafseer is the Arabic word for exegesis or commentary, usually of the Qur'an. Ta'wīl is a subset of tafsir and refers to esoteric or mystical interpretation. An author of tafsir is a mufassir .- Etymology :...
, Al-Tabarani
Al-Tabarani
Abu al-Qasim Sulaiman ibn Ahmad ibn Al-Tabarani was born sometime in 260 AH and lived until 360 AH . He narrated numerous aḥadīth.-Students:...
(873-970 AD) and Ibn Kathir
Ibn Kathir
Ismail ibn Kathir was a Muslim muhaddith, Faqih, historian, and commentator.-Biography:His full name was Abu Al-Fida, 'Imad Ad-Din, Isma'il bin 'Umar bin Kathir, Al-Qurashi, Al-Busrawi...
(1301–1373 AD), and by the Muslim geographer Yaqut al-Hamawi
Yaqut al-Hamawi
Yāqūt ibn-'Abdullah al-Rūmī al-Hamawī) was an Islamic biographer and geographer renowned for his encyclopedic writings on the Muslim world. "al-Rumi" refers to his Greek descent; "al-Hamawi" means that he is from Hama, Syria, and ibn-Abdullah is a reference to his father's name, Abdullah...
(1179-1229 AD):
... UmarUmar`Umar ibn al-Khattāb c. 2 November , was a leading companion and adviser to the Islamic prophet Muhammad who later became the second Muslim Caliph after Muhammad's death....
sent ... in 22 A.H. [643 AD] ... an expedition to Derbent [Russia] ... `Abdur Rahman bin Rabi`ah [was appointed] as the chief of his vanguard. When 'Abdur Rehman entered ArmeniaEastern ArmeniaEastern Armenia or Caucasian Armenia was the portion of Ottoman Armenia and Persian Armenia that was ceded to the Russian Empire following the Russo-Turkish War, 1828-1829...
, the ruler Shehrbaz surrendered without fighting. Then when `Abdur Rehman wanted to advance towards Derbent, Shehrbaz [ruler of Armenia] informed him that he had already gathered full information about the wall built by Dhul-Qarnain, through a man, who could supply all the necessary details ...
Two hundred years later, the Abbasid
Abbasid
The Abbasid Caliphate or, more simply, the Abbasids , was the third of the Islamic caliphates. It was ruled by the Abbasid dynasty of caliphs, who built their capital in Baghdad after overthrowing the Umayyad caliphate from all but the al-Andalus region....
Caliph Al-Wathiq
Al-Wathiq
Al-Wathiq ibn Mutasim was an Abbasid caliph who reigned from 842 until 847 AD .-Biography:...
(?-847 AD) dispatched an expedition to study the wall of Dhul-Qarnain in Derbent, Russia. The expedition was led by Sallam-ul-Tarjuman, whose observations have were recorded by Yaqut al-Hamawi
Yaqut al-Hamawi
Yāqūt ibn-'Abdullah al-Rūmī al-Hamawī) was an Islamic biographer and geographer renowned for his encyclopedic writings on the Muslim world. "al-Rumi" refers to his Greek descent; "al-Hamawi" means that he is from Hama, Syria, and ibn-Abdullah is a reference to his father's name, Abdullah...
and by Ibn Kathir
Ibn Kathir
Ismail ibn Kathir was a Muslim muhaddith, Faqih, historian, and commentator.-Biography:His full name was Abu Al-Fida, 'Imad Ad-Din, Isma'il bin 'Umar bin Kathir, Al-Qurashi, Al-Busrawi...
:
...this expedition reached ... the Caspian territory. From there they arrived at Derbent and saw the wall [of Dhul-Qarnayn].
The Muslim geographer Yaqut al-Hamawi
Yaqut al-Hamawi
Yāqūt ibn-'Abdullah al-Rūmī al-Hamawī) was an Islamic biographer and geographer renowned for his encyclopedic writings on the Muslim world. "al-Rumi" refers to his Greek descent; "al-Hamawi" means that he is from Hama, Syria, and ibn-Abdullah is a reference to his father's name, Abdullah...
further confirmed the same view in a number of places in his book on geography; for instance under the heading "Khazar" (Caspian) he writes:
This territory adjoins the Wall of Dhul-Qarnain just behind Bab-ul-Abwab, which is also called Derbent.
The Caliph Harun al-Rashid
Harun al-Rashid
Hārūn al-Rashīd was the fifth Arab Abbasid Caliph in Iraq. He was born in Rey, Iran, close to modern Tehran. His birth date remains a point of discussion, though, as various sources give the dates from 763 to 766)....
(763 – 809 AD) even spent some time living in Derbent. Not all Muslim travelers and scholars, however, associated Dhul-Qarnayn's wall with the Caspian Gates of Derbent. For example, the Muslim explorer Ibn Battuta
Ibn Battuta
Abu Abdullah Muhammad Ibn Battuta , or simply Ibn Battuta, also known as Shams ad–Din , was a Muslim Moroccan Berber explorer, known for his extensive travels published in the Rihla...
(1304–1369 AD) traveled to China
China
Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...
on order of the Sultan of Delhi
Delhi Sultanate
The Delhi Sultanate is a term used to cover five short-lived, Delhi based kingdoms or sultanates, of Turkic origin in medieval India. The sultanates ruled from Delhi between 1206 and 1526, when the last was replaced by the Mughal dynasty...
, Muhammad bin Tughluq
Muhammad bin Tughluq
Muhammad bin Tughluq was the Turkic Sultan of Delhi from 1325 to 1351. He was the eldest son of Ghiyas-ud-din Tughlaq.He was born in Kotla Tolay Khan in Multan. His wife was daughter of the raja of Dipalpur...
and he comments in his travel log that "Between it [the city of Zaitun
Quanzhou
Quanzhou is a prefecture-level city in Fujian province, People's Republic of China. It borders all other prefecture-level cities in Fujian but two and faces the Taiwan Strait...
in Fujian
Fujian
' , formerly romanised as Fukien or Huguing or Foukien, is a province on the southeast coast of mainland China. Fujian is bordered by Zhejiang to the north, Jiangxi to the west, and Guangdong to the south. Taiwan lies to the east, across the Taiwan Strait...
] and the rampart of Yajuj and Majuj [Gog and Magog] is sixty days' travel." The translator of the travel log notes that Ibn Battuta confused the Great Wall of China with that supposedly built by Dhul-Qarnayn.
Gog and Magog
In the Qur'an's story, it is none other than the Gog and MagogGog and Magog
Gog and Magog are names that appear primarily in various Jewish, Christian and Muslim scriptures, as well as numerous subsequent references in other works. Their context can be either genealogical or eschatological and apocalyptic, as in Ezekiel and Revelation...
people whom Dhul-Qarnayn has enclosed behind a wall, preventing them from invading the Earth. In Islamic eschatology
Eschatology
Eschatology is a part of theology, philosophy, and futurology concerned with what are believed to be the final events in history, or the ultimate destiny of humanity, commonly referred to as the end of the world or the World to Come...
, before the Day of Judgement Gog and Magog will destroy this gate, allowing them to ravage the Earth, as it is described in the Qur'an:
- Until, when Gog and Magog are let loose [from their barrier], and they swiftly swarm from every mound. And the true promise [Day of Resurrection] shall draw near [of fulfillment]. Then [when mankind is resurrected from their graves], you shall see the eyes of the disbelievers fixedly stare in horror. [They will say,] ‘Woe to us! We were indeed heedless of this; nay, but we were wrongdoers.’ (Quran 21:96-97. Note that the phrases in square brackets are not in the Arabic original.)
A similar story is found in the Alexander romance legends.
Gog and Magog in Christian legends
The Lord spake by the hand of the angel, [saying] ...The gate of the north shall be opened on the day of the end of the world, and on that day shall evil go forth on the wicked ... The earth shall quake and this door [gate] which thou [Alexander] hast made be opened ... and anger with fierce wrath shall rise up on mankind and the earth ... shall be laid waste ... And the nations that is within this gate shall be roused up, and also the host of Agog and the peoples of Magog [Gog and Magog] shall be gathered together. These peoples, the fiercest of all creatures.
The Christian Syriac legend describes a flat Earth
Flat Earth
The Flat Earth model is a belief that the Earth's shape is a plane or disk. Most ancient cultures have had conceptions of a flat Earth, including Greece until the classical period, the Bronze Age and Iron Age civilizations of the Near East until the Hellenistic period, India until the Gupta period ...
orbited by the sun
Sun
The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is almost perfectly spherical and consists of hot plasma interwoven with magnetic fields...
and surrounded by the Paropamisadae
Paropamisadae
Paropamisadae or Paropamisus was the ancient Greek name for a region of the Hindu-Kush in eastern Afghanistan, centered on the cities of Kabul and Kapisa .-History of Paropamisadae:...
(Hindu Kush) mountains. The Paropamisadae mountains are in turn surrounded by a narrow tract of land which is followed by a treacherous Ocean sea called Okeyanos
Oceanus
Oceanus ; , Ōkeanós) was a pseudo-geographical feature in classical antiquity, believed by the ancient Greeks and Romans to be the world-ocean, an enormous river encircling the world....
. It is within this tract of land between the Paropamisadae
Paropamisadae
Paropamisadae or Paropamisus was the ancient Greek name for a region of the Hindu-Kush in eastern Afghanistan, centered on the cities of Kabul and Kapisa .-History of Paropamisadae:...
mountains and Okeyanos
Oceanus
Oceanus ; , Ōkeanós) was a pseudo-geographical feature in classical antiquity, believed by the ancient Greeks and Romans to be the world-ocean, an enormous river encircling the world....
that Alexander encloses Gog and Magog, so that they could not cross the mountains and invade the Earth. The legend describes "the old wise men" explaining this geography
Geography
Geography is the science that studies the lands, features, inhabitants, and phenomena of Earth. A literal translation would be "to describe or write about the Earth". The first person to use the word "geography" was Eratosthenes...
and cosmology
Cosmology
Cosmology is the discipline that deals with the nature of the Universe as a whole. Cosmologists seek to understand the origin, evolution, structure, and ultimate fate of the Universe at large, as well as the natural laws that keep it in order...
of the Earth to Alexander, and then Alexander setting out to enclose Gog and Magog behind a mighty gate between a narrow passage at the end of the flat Earth:
The old men say, "Look, my lord the king, and see a wonder, this mountain which God has set as a great boundary." King Alexander the son of Philip said, "How far is the extent of this mountain?" The old men say, "Beyond India it extends in its appearance." The king said, "How far does this side come?" The old men say, "Unto all the end of the earth." And wonder seized the great king at the council of the old men ... And he had it in his mind to make there a great gate. His mind was full of spiritual thoughts, while taking advice from the old men, the dwellers in the land. He looked at the mountain which encircled the whole world ... The king said, "Where have the hosts [of Gog and Magog] come forth to plunder the land and all the world from of old?" They show him a place in the middle of the mountains, a narrow pass which had been constructed by God ...
Flat Earth beliefs in the Early Christian Church varied and the Fathers of the Church shared different approaches. Those of them who were more close to Aristotle
Aristotle
Aristotle was a Greek philosopher and polymath, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. His writings cover many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, poetry, theater, music, logic, rhetoric, linguistics, politics, government, ethics, biology, and zoology...
and Plato
Plato
Plato , was a Classical Greek philosopher, mathematician, student of Socrates, writer of philosophical dialogues, and founder of the Academy in Athens, the first institution of higher learning in the Western world. Along with his mentor, Socrates, and his student, Aristotle, Plato helped to lay the...
's visions, like Origen
Origen
Origen , or Origen Adamantius, 184/5–253/4, was an early Christian Alexandrian scholar and theologian, and one of the most distinguished writers of the early Church. As early as the fourth century, his orthodoxy was suspect, in part because he believed in the pre-existence of souls...
, shared peacefully the belief in a spherical Earth
Spherical Earth
The concept of a spherical Earth dates back to ancient Greek philosophy from around the 6th century BC, but remained a matter of philosophical speculation until the 3rd century BC when Hellenistic astronomy established the spherical shape of the earth as a physical given...
. A second tradition, including St Basil and St Augustine, accepted the idea of the round Earth and the radial gravity, but in a critical way. In particular they pointed out a number of doubts about the antipodes
Antipodes
In geography, the antipodes of any place on Earth is the point on the Earth's surface which is diametrically opposite to it. Two points that are antipodal to one another are connected by a straight line running through the centre of the Earth....
and the physical reasons of the radial gravity. However, a flat Earth approach was more or less shared by all the Fathers coming from the Syriac area, who were more inclined to follow the letter of the Old Testament
Old Testament
The Old Testament, of which Christians hold different views, is a Christian term for the religious writings of ancient Israel held sacred and inspired by Christians which overlaps with the 24-book canon of the Masoretic Text of Judaism...
. Diodore of Tarsus (?-390 AD), Cosmas Indicopleustes
Cosmas Indicopleustes
Cosmas Indicopleustes was an Alexandrian merchant and later hermit, probably of Nestorian tendencies. He was a 6th-century traveller, who made several voyages to India during the reign of emperor Justinian...
(6th century), and Chrysostom (347–407 AD) belonged to this flat Earth tradition.
Medieval accounts of Gog and Magog
In the Christian Alexander romance literature, Gog and Magog were sometimes associated with the KhazarsKhazars
The Khazars were semi-nomadic Turkic people who established one of the largest polities of medieval Eurasia, with the capital of Atil and territory comprising much of modern-day European Russia, western Kazakhstan, eastern Ukraine, Azerbaijan, large portions of the northern Caucasus , parts of...
, a Turkic people who lived near the Caspian Sea
Caspian Sea
The Caspian Sea is the largest enclosed body of water on Earth by area, variously classed as the world's largest lake or a full-fledged sea. The sea has a surface area of and a volume of...
. In his 9th century work Expositio in Matthaeum Evangelistam
Expositio in Matthaeum Evangelistam
Exposito in Matthaeum Evangelistam is a work by the ninth-century Benedictine monk Christian of Stavelot. As its name implies, it is a commentary on the Gospel of Matthew...
, the Benedictine
Benedictine
Benedictine refers to the spirituality and consecrated life in accordance with the Rule of St Benedict, written by Benedict of Nursia in the sixth century for the cenobitic communities he founded in central Italy. The most notable of these is Monte Cassino, the first monastery founded by Benedict...
monk Christian of Stavelot
Christian of Stavelot
Christian of Stavelot was a ninth-century Christian monk. He is sometimes referred to as Christian Druthmar or Druthmar of Aquitaine. Christian was a noted grammarian, Biblical commentator, and eschatologist. He was born in Aquitaine in the early ninth century CE, and became a monk at the...
refers to the Khazars as Hunnic
Huns
The Huns were a group of nomadic people who, appearing from east of the Volga River, migrated into Europe c. AD 370 and established the vast Hunnic Empire there. Since de Guignes linked them with the Xiongnu, who had been northern neighbours of China 300 years prior to the emergence of the Huns,...
descendants of Gog and Magog, and says they are "circumcised and observing all [the laws of] Judaism"; the Khazars were a Central Asia
Central Asia
Central Asia is a core region of the Asian continent from the Caspian Sea in the west, China in the east, Afghanistan in the south, and Russia in the north...
n people with a long association with Judaism
Judaism
Judaism ) is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people...
. A Georgian
Georgian people
The Georgians are an ethnic group that have originated in Georgia, where they constitute a majority of the population. Large Georgian communities are also present throughout Russia, European Union, United States, and South America....
tradition, echoed in a chronicle, also identifies the Khazars with Gog and Magog, stating they are "wild men with hideous faces and the manners of wild beasts, eaters of blood."
Early Muslim scholars writing about Dhul-Qarnayn also associated Gog and Magog with the Khazars. Ibn Kathir
Ibn Kathir
Ismail ibn Kathir was a Muslim muhaddith, Faqih, historian, and commentator.-Biography:His full name was Abu Al-Fida, 'Imad Ad-Din, Isma'il bin 'Umar bin Kathir, Al-Qurashi, Al-Busrawi...
(1301–1373 AD), the famous commentator of the Qur'an, identified Gog and Magog with the Khazars who lived between the Black and Caspian Sea
Caspian Sea
The Caspian Sea is the largest enclosed body of water on Earth by area, variously classed as the world's largest lake or a full-fledged sea. The sea has a surface area of and a volume of...
in his work Al-Bidayah wa al-Nihayah (The Beginning and the End). The Muslim explorer Ahmad ibn Fadlan
Ahmad ibn Fadlan
Ahmad ibn Fadlān ibn al-Abbās ibn Rāšid ibn Hammād was a 10th century Arab traveler, famous for his account of his travels as a member of an embassy of the Arab Abbasid Caliph of Baghdad to the king of the Volga Bulgars...
, in his travelogue regarding his diplomatic mission in 921 AD to Volga Bulgars (a vassal
Vassal
A vassal or feudatory is a person who has entered into a mutual obligation to a lord or monarch in the context of the feudal system in medieval Europe. The obligations often included military support and mutual protection, in exchange for certain privileges, usually including the grant of land held...
of the Khazarian Empire), noted the beliefs about Gog and Magog being the ancestors of the Khazars.
Thus Muslim scholars associated the Khazars with Dhul-Qarnayn just as the Christian legends associated the Khazars with Alexander the Great.
The rising place of the Sun
A peculiar aspect of the story of Dhul-Qarnayn, in the Qur'an, is that it describes Dhul-Qarnayn travelling to "the rising place of the Sun" and the "setting place of the Sun," where the Sun sets into a murky (or boiling) spring of water (or mud). Dhul-Qarnayn also finds a people living by the "rising place of the Sun," and finds that these people somehow have "no shelter."In his commentary of the Qur'an, Ibn Kathir
Ibn Kathir
Ismail ibn Kathir was a Muslim muhaddith, Faqih, historian, and commentator.-Biography:His full name was Abu Al-Fida, 'Imad Ad-Din, Isma'il bin 'Umar bin Kathir, Al-Qurashi, Al-Busrawi...
(1301–1373 AD) explains that verse 18:89 is referring to the literal ends of the Earth:
(Until, when he reached the setting place of the sun,) means, he followed a route until he reached the furthest point that could be reached in the direction of the sun's setting, which is the west of the earth. As for the idea of his reaching the place in the sky where the sun sets, this is something impossible, and the tales told by storytellers that he traveled so far to the west that the sun set behind him are not true at all. Most of these stories come from the myths of the People of the Book [Jews and Christians] and the fabrications and lies of their heretics.
In this commentary Ibn Kathir differentiates between the end of the (presumably flat) Earth and the supposed "place in the sky" where the sun sets (the "resting place" of the sun. Ibn Kathir contends that Dhul-Qarnayn did reach the end of the Earth but not the "resting place" of the sun and he goes on to mention that the People of the Book
People of the Book
People of the Book is a term used to designate non-Muslim adherents to faiths which have a revealed scripture called, in Arabic, Al-Kitab . The three types of adherents to faiths that the Qur'an mentions as people of the book are the Jews, Sabians and Christians.In Islam, the Muslim scripture, the...
(Jews and Christians) tell myths about Dhul-Qarnayn travelling so far beyond the end of the Earth that the sun was "behind him." This shows that Ibn Kathir was aware of the Christian legends and it suggests that Ibn Kathir considered Christian myths about Alexander to be referring to the same figure as the Dhul-Qarnayn mentioned in the Qu'an.
A similar theme is elaborated upon in several places in the Islamic hadith
Hadith
The term Hadīth is used to denote a saying or an act or tacit approval or criticism ascribed either validly or invalidly to the Islamic prophet Muhammad....
literature, in Sahih al-Bukhari
Sahih al-Bukhari
Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī , as it is commonly referred to, is one of the six canonical hadith collections of Islam. These prophetic traditions, or hadith, were collected by the Persian Muslim scholar Muhammad ibn Ismail al-Bukhari, after being transmitted orally for generations. Muslims view this as one of...
and Sahih Muslim
Sahih Muslim
Sahih Muslim is one of the Six major collections of the hadith in Sunni Islam, oral traditions relating to the words and deeds of the Islamic Prophet Muhammad. It is the second most authentic hadith collection after Sahih Al-Bukhari, and is highly acclaimed by Sunni Muslims...
:
It is narrated ... that the Messenger of Allah one day said: Do you know where the sun goes? They replied: Allah and His Apostle know best. He (the Holy Prophet) observed: Verily it (the sun) glides till it reaches its resting place under the Throne [of Allah]. Then it falls prostrate and remains there until it is asked: Rise up and go to the place whence you came, and it goes back and continues emerging out from its rising place...
The setting place of the sun is also commented on by Al-Tabari (838-923 AD) and Al-Qurtubi
Al-Qurtubi
Imam Abu 'Abdullah Al-Qurtubi or Abu 'Abdullah Muhammad ibn Ahmad ibn Abu Bakr al-Ansari al-Qurtubi was a famous mufassir, muhaddith and faqih scholar from Cordoba of maliki origin. He is most famous for his commentary of the Quran, Tafsir al-Qurtubi....
(1214 - 1273 AD) and, like Ibn Kathir
Ibn Kathir
Ismail ibn Kathir was a Muslim muhaddith, Faqih, historian, and commentator.-Biography:His full name was Abu Al-Fida, 'Imad Ad-Din, Isma'il bin 'Umar bin Kathir, Al-Qurashi, Al-Busrawi...
, they showed some reservations towards the literal idea of the sun setting in a muddy spring but held to the basic theme of Dhul-Qarnayn reaching the ends of the Earth. The later Islamic scholar Imam al-Suyuti (1445-1505 AD) also maintained that the Earth is flat.
On the other hand, Muslim astronomers believed in a spherical Earth
Spherical Earth
The concept of a spherical Earth dates back to ancient Greek philosophy from around the 6th century BC, but remained a matter of philosophical speculation until the 3rd century BC when Hellenistic astronomy established the spherical shape of the earth as a physical given...
as early as 830 AD. The great Persian
Persian people
The Persian people are part of the Iranian peoples who speak the modern Persian language and closely akin Iranian dialects and languages. The origin of the ethnic Iranian/Persian peoples are traced to the Ancient Iranian peoples, who were part of the ancient Indo-Iranians and themselves part of...
Muslim scholar and polymath Abu Rayhan Biruni (973-1048 AD) successfully calculated the Earth's circumference to within sixteen kilometers of its true value and is regarded as the father of the science of geodesy
Geodesy
Geodesy , also named geodetics, a branch of earth sciences, is the scientific discipline that deals with the measurement and representation of the Earth, including its gravitational field, in a three-dimensional time-varying space. Geodesists also study geodynamical phenomena such as crustal...
. The Islamic scholar Ibn Taymiyyah (1263–1328 AD) also maintained that the Earth is spherical, though he elaborated on an incorrect geocentric model of the universe:
Celestial bodies are round—as it is the statement of astronomers and mathematicians—it is likewise the statement of the scholars of Islam. Indeed Allah has said: "And He [Allah] it is Who created the night and the day, the sun and the moon; They float, each in a falak [orbit]." [Qur'an 21:33] Ibn Abbas says [regarding this verse]: "A falaka like that of a spinning wheel." As for the other side of the earth it is surrounded by water. There are no human beings or anything like that [on that side].
It is not entirely surprising that, by the 9th century, Muslim astronomers in the Samanid Empire and elsewhere were contemplating a spherical earth. Islamic astronomy inherited the concept of a spherical Earth, along with most of its theoretical foundation, from the ancient Greek astronomical tradition
Greek astronomy
Greek astronomy is astronomy written in the Greek language in classical antiquity. Greek astronomy is understood to include the ancient Greek, Hellenistic, Greco-Roman, and Late Antiquity eras. It is not limited geographically to Greece or to ethnic Greeks, as the Greek language had become the...
where none other than Pythagoras
Pythagoras
Pythagoras of Samos was an Ionian Greek philosopher, mathematician, and founder of the religious movement called Pythagoreanism. Most of the information about Pythagoras was written down centuries after he lived, so very little reliable information is known about him...
(570-495 BC) himself first proposed that the Earth must be spherical. All this, however, did not prevent the Alexander romance legends from claiming that Alexander traveled to the ends of a flat Earth.
The rising place of the Sun in the Alexander legends
An almost identical discourse regarding the rising place of the Sun is found in the Christian legends concerning Alexander the Great. The Christian legend about Alexander explains that when the Sun sets into the fetid sea, it enters into heaven and immediately bows down in obedience to God. Alexander travels to the end of the flat Earth to witness this spectacle. The legend explained that "the old, wise men" told Alexander about the sea in which the SunSun
The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is almost perfectly spherical and consists of hot plasma interwoven with magnetic fields...
rises from the west and in which the Sun sets in the east. The waters of this sea were imagined as being intensely hot from the heat of the Sun when it rose from the waters. Upon hearing about this place, Alexander sets out to the end of the flat Earth and witnesses the Sun rising from the fetid sea. At this place, where the Sun rises out of a terrible sea, Alexander finds a people who have no shelter from the Sun which is literally rising out of an intensely hot sea:
The place of his [the Sun's] rising is over the sea, and the people who dwell there, when he is about to rise, flee away and hide themselves in the sea, that they be not burnt by his rays; and he passes through the midst of heaven to the place where he enters the window of heaven; and wherever he passes there are terrible mountains, and those who dwell there have caves hollowed out in the rocks, and as soon as they see the Sun passing [over them], men and birds flee away from before him and hide in the caves ... And when the Sun enters the window of heaven, he [it] straight away bows down and makes obeisance before God his Creator; and he travels and descends the whole night through the heavens, until at length he finds himself where he [the Sun] rises ... So the whole camp mounted, and Alexander and his troops went up between the fetid sea and the bright sea to the place where the Sun enters the window of heaven; for the Sun is the servant of the Lord, and neither by night nor by day does he cease from his travelling.
The Christian legend is much more detailed than the Qur'an's version and elaborates at length about the cosmology
Cosmology
Cosmology is the discipline that deals with the nature of the Universe as a whole. Cosmologists seek to understand the origin, evolution, structure, and ultimate fate of the Universe at large, as well as the natural laws that keep it in order...
of the Earth that is implied by the story:
He [Alexander] said to them [the nobles]: "This thought has arisen in my mind, and I am wondering what is the extent of the earth, and how high the heavens are ... and upon what the heavens are fixed ... Now this I desire to go and see, upon what the heavens rest, and what surrounds all creation." The nobles answered and said to the king, ... "As to the thing, my lord, which thy majesty desires to go and see, namely, upon what the heaveans rest, and what surrounds the earth, the terrible seas which surround the world will not give thee a passage; because there are eleven bright seas, on which the ships of men sail, and beyond these there is about ten miles of dry land, and beyond these ten miles there is the foetid sea, OkeyanosOceanusOceanus ; , Ōkeanós) was a pseudo-geographical feature in classical antiquity, believed by the ancient Greeks and Romans to be the world-ocean, an enormous river encircling the world....
(the Ocean), which surrounds all creation. Men are not able to come near to this foetid sea ... Its waters are like poison and if men swim therein, they die at once."
This ancient motif
Motif (narrative)
In narrative, a motif is any recurring element that has symbolic significance in a story. Through its repetition, a motif can help produce other narrative aspects such as theme or mood....
of a legendary figure traveling to the end of Earth is also found in the Epic of Gilgamesh
Epic of Gilgamesh
Epic of Gilgamesh is an epic poem from Mesopotamia and is among the earliest known works of literature. Scholars believe that it originated as a series of Sumerian legends and poems about the protagonist of the story, Gilgamesh king of Uruk, which were fashioned into a longer Akkadian epic much...
, which can be dated to circa
Circa
Circa , usually abbreviated c. or ca. , means "approximately" in the English language, usually referring to a date...
2000 BC, making it one of the earliest known works of literary writing. In the epic poem, in tablet nine, Gilgamesh sets out on a quest for the Water of Life to seek immortality. Gilgamesh travels far to the east, to the mountain passes at the ends of the earth where he grapples and slays monstrous mountain lions, bears and others. Eventually he comes to the twin peaks of Mount Mashu at the end of the earth, from where the sun rises from the other world, the gate of which is guarded by two terrible scorpion-beings. They allow him to proceed through the gate after Gilgamesh convinces them to let him pass, stating his divinity and desperation, and he travels through the dark tunnel where the sun travels every night. Just before the sun is about to catch up with him, and with the North Wind and ice lashing him, he reaches the end. The world at the end of the tunnel is a bright wonderland full of trees with leaves of jewels. The myth of a flat Earth surrounded by an Ocean into which the sun sets is also found in the Iliad
Iliad
The Iliad is an epic poem in dactylic hexameters, traditionally attributed to Homer. Set during the Trojan War, the ten-year siege of the city of Troy by a coalition of Greek states, it tells of the battles and events during the weeks of a quarrel between King Agamemnon and the warrior Achilles...
, the famous epic poem written by Homer
Homer
In the Western classical tradition Homer , is the author of the Iliad and the Odyssey, and is revered as the greatest ancient Greek epic poet. These epics lie at the beginning of the Western canon of literature, and have had an enormous influence on the history of literature.When he lived is...
and dated to circa 900 BC. The story of creation in the Hebrew Bible
Hebrew Bible
The Hebrew Bible is a term used by biblical scholars outside of Judaism to refer to the Tanakh , a canonical collection of Jewish texts, and the common textual antecedent of the several canonical editions of the Christian Old Testament...
, in Genesis 1:10, (dated circa 900-550 BC) is also considered by scholars to be describing a flat Earth surrounded by a sea.
The ancient Greek historian Herodotus
Herodotus
Herodotus was an ancient Greek historian who was born in Halicarnassus, Caria and lived in the 5th century BC . He has been called the "Father of History", and was the first historian known to collect his materials systematically, test their accuracy to a certain extent and arrange them in a...
(484– 425 BC) also gave an account of the eastern "end of the Earth," in his descriptions of India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
. He reported that in India the sun's heat is extremely intense in the morning, instead of noon being the hottest time of day. It has been argued that he based this on his belief that since India is located at the extreme east of a flat Earth, it would only be logical if the morning were unbearably hot due to the sun's proximity.
Alexander's travels
In the Christian legends, Alexander travels to the places of the setting and rising of the Sun and this is meant to say that he traveled to the ends of the flat Earth
Flat Earth
The Flat Earth model is a belief that the Earth's shape is a plane or disk. Most ancient cultures have had conceptions of a flat Earth, including Greece until the classical period, the Bronze Age and Iron Age civilizations of the Near East until the Hellenistic period, India until the Gupta period ...
and thus he had traversed the entire world. This legendary account served to convey the theme of Alexander's exploits as a great conqueror. Alexander was indeed a great conqueror, having ruled the largest empire in ancient history
Ancient history
Ancient history is the study of the written past from the beginning of recorded human history to the Early Middle Ages. The span of recorded history is roughly 5,000 years, with Cuneiform script, the oldest discovered form of coherent writing, from the protoliterate period around the 30th century BC...
by the time he was 25 years old. However, the true historical extent of Alexander's travels are known to be greatly exaggerated in legends. For example, legend has it that upon reaching India,
... said Alexander 'Truly, then, all the inhabited world is mine. West, north, east, south, there is nothing more for me to conquer.' Then he sat down and wept because there were not other worlds for him to conquer.
In reality, while Alexander did travel a great deal, he did not travel further west than ancient Libya
Ancient Libya
The Latin name Libya referred to the region west of the Nile Valley, generally corresponding to modern Northwest Africa. Climate changes affected the locations of the settlements....
and did not travel further east than the fringes of India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
. According to historians, Alexander invaded India following his desire to reach the "ends of the world and the Great Outer Sea." However, when he reached the Hyphasis River in the Punjab
Punjab region
The Punjab , also spelled Panjab |water]]s"), is a geographical region straddling the border between Pakistan and India which includes Punjab province in Pakistan and the states of the Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Chandigarh and some northern parts of the National Capital Territory of Delhi...
in 326 BC, his army nearly mutinied
Mutiny
Mutiny is a conspiracy among members of a group of similarly situated individuals to openly oppose, change or overthrow an authority to which they are subject...
and refused to march further east, exhausted by years of campaigning. Alexander's desire to reach "the ends of the Earth" was instilled by his tutor Aristotle
Aristotle
Aristotle was a Greek philosopher and polymath, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. His writings cover many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, poetry, theater, music, logic, rhetoric, linguistics, politics, government, ethics, biology, and zoology...
:
Alexander derived his concept of `Asia' from the teaching of Aristotle, for whom `the inhabited earth' was surrounded by `the Great sea' Ocean, and was divided into three areas - `Europe, Libya and Asia.' Thus the earth was not round but flat, and `Asia' was limited on the west by the TanaisTanaisTanais is the ancient name for the River Don in Russia. Strabo regarded it as the boundary between Europe and Asia.In antiquity, Tanais was also the name of a city in the Don river delta that reaches into the northeasternmost part of the Sea of Azov, which the Greeks called Lake Maeotis...
(Don), the inland sea and the Nile, and on the east by `India' and `the Great Sea' ... he was mistaken in supposing that from the ridge of the ParopamisadaeParopamisadaeParopamisadae or Paropamisus was the ancient Greek name for a region of the Hindu-Kush in eastern Afghanistan, centered on the cities of Kabul and Kapisa .-History of Paropamisadae:...
(Hindu Kush) one would see `the outer sea' and that `India' was a small peninsula running east into that sea.
This view of the world taught by Aristotle and followed by Alexander is apparent in Aristotle's Meteorologica, a treatise on earth sciences where he discusses the "length" and "width" of "the inhabited earth." However, Aristotle knew that the Earth is spherical and even provided observational proof of this fact. Aristotle's cosmological view was that the Earth is round but he prescribed to the notion of an "inhabited Earth," surrounded by the Ocean, and an "uninhabited Earth" (though exactly how much of this was understood by his student Alexander the Great is not known).
Al-Khidir
In Islamic traditions, Al-Khidir (literally "the Green One," an enigmatic figure in Islam) is the maternal cousin of Alexander or Dhul-Qarnayn. The Qur'an's story is about Moses
Moses
Moses was, according to the Hebrew Bible and Qur'an, a religious leader, lawgiver and prophet, to whom the authorship of the Torah is traditionally attributed...
and Al-Khidir, though the classical Islamic scholars showed some disagreement over whether or not 'Moses' in this story is Moses
Moses
Moses was, according to the Hebrew Bible and Qur'an, a religious leader, lawgiver and prophet, to whom the authorship of the Torah is traditionally attributed...
of the Israelites. In the Qur'an's story, this Moses goes with a servant ( identified as Joshua in Hadith) to the "junction of the two seas". A certain fish (which they presumably had been carrying with them) "in an amazing way" makes its way to the sea. When the servant tells Moses this, they retrace their steps. They then meet one of God's servants (traditionally called Al-Khidir, although not named in the Qur'an) who puts Moses to a test of patience in which Moses must travel with Al-Khidir but not ask any questions. Al-Khidir cracks a hole in a vessel endangering its passengers, then he murders a boy, and then rebuilding a wall each time causing Moses to break his silence. Al-Khidir explains how each of his lawless acts was for a greater good and Moses fails the test of patience. The Qur'anic story is remarkably similar to Jewish folklore concerning Elijah. In the Jewish tale, Rabbi Joshua ben Levi asks to join the prophet Elijah in his wanderings. Elijah grants the Rabbi's wish on the condition that he refrain from asking any questions about any of the prophet’s actions. He agrees and they begin their journey. Elijah carries out "lawless" acts, like Al-Khidir in the Qur'an, and similarly the Rabbi breaks his silence and demands an explanation.
The story in the Qur'an is summarized in a hadith
Hadith
The term Hadīth is used to denote a saying or an act or tacit approval or criticism ascribed either validly or invalidly to the Islamic prophet Muhammad....
of Sahih Al-Bukhari
Sahih al-Bukhari
Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī , as it is commonly referred to, is one of the six canonical hadith collections of Islam. These prophetic traditions, or hadith, were collected by the Persian Muslim scholar Muhammad ibn Ismail al-Bukhari, after being transmitted orally for generations. Muslims view this as one of...
:
Allah revealed to him [Moses]: 'At the junction of the two seas there is a slave of Ours [Al-Khidir] who is more learned than you. ' Moses asked, 'O my Lord, how can I meet him?' Allah said, 'Take a fish and put it in a basket (and set out), and where you, will lose the fish, you will find him.' So Moses (took a fish and put it in a basket and) set out, along with his boy-servant Yusha' bin Nun, till they reached a rock (on which) they both lay their heads and slept. The fish moved vigorously in the basket and got out of it and fell into the sea and there it took its way through the sea (straight) as in a tunnel.
The idea that the sources of these verses are found in the Alexander romance was first proposed by Mark Lidzbarski and Karl Duroff in 1892. In 1913 Israel Friedlander wrote a book on the subject titled`"The Al-Khidir Legend and the Alexander Romance." Early Persian and Ethiopic Muslim legends concerning Alexander made a similar connection between Al-Khidir and Alexander (see figure).
One similarity between the Qur'an story and the Alexander romance concerns the fish that miraculously comes to life. This motif
Motif (narrative)
In narrative, a motif is any recurring element that has symbolic significance in a story. Through its repetition, a motif can help produce other narrative aspects such as theme or mood....
is found in the Syriac sermon by Jacob of Serugh
Jacob of Serugh
Jacob of Serugh , also called Mar Jacob, was one of the foremost Syriac poet-theologians among the Syriac, perhaps only second in stature to Ephrem the Syrian and equal to Narsai. Where his predecessor Ephrem is known as the 'Harp of the Spirit', Jacob is the 'Flute of the Spirit'...
, where Alexander travels in search of the Water of Life (Fountain of Youth). A shorter version of the story in also found in the Greek β-recension of the Alexander romance. In the Syriac legend, Alexander finds a wise man who tells Alexander to take a salted fish and wash it in the fountains in the Land of Darkness
Land of Darkness
The Land of Darkness was a mythical land supposedly enshrouded in perpetual darkness. It was usually said to be in Abkhazia and was officially known as Hanyson or Hamson , or simply the Forest of Abkhazia.The Land of Darkness enjoyed popularity in fictional medieval travel literature such as...
, and if the fish comes to life then he will have found the Water of Life:
The king [Alexander] said, "I have heard that therein [in the Land of DarknessLand of DarknessThe Land of Darkness was a mythical land supposedly enshrouded in perpetual darkness. It was usually said to be in Abkhazia and was officially known as Hanyson or Hamson , or simply the Forest of Abkhazia.The Land of Darkness enjoyed popularity in fictional medieval travel literature such as...
] is the fountain of lifeFountain of LifeThe Fountain of Life, or in its earlier form the Fountain of Living Waters, is a Christian iconography symbol associated with baptism, first appearing in the 5th century in illuminated manuscripts and later in other art forms such as panel paintings....
, And I desire greatly to go forth and see if, of a truth, it is [there]. The old man said, ... "Command thy cook take with him a salt fish, and wherever he sees a fountain of water let him wash the fish; And if it be that it comes to life in his hands when he washes it, That is the fountain of the water of life which thou askest for, O King."
Another similarity between the Al-Khidir legends and the Alexander romance is the Water of Life. Though the Qur'an does not mention the Fountain of Youth
Fountain of Youth
The Fountain of Youth is a legendary spring that reputedly restores the youth of anyone who drinks of its waters. Tales of such a fountain have been recounted across the world for thousands of years, appearing in writings by Herodotus, the Alexander romance, and the stories of Prester John...
, it is alluded to in the hadith
Hadith
The term Hadīth is used to denote a saying or an act or tacit approval or criticism ascribed either validly or invalidly to the Islamic prophet Muhammad....
literature. Al-Khidir in the hadith literature is described as being immortal, having taught every prophet before Muhammad, and having the appearance of a young adult but having a long, white beard, and he is even described as being present at Muhammad's funeral:
... whether Khidr was still alive, was a more contentious issue. In the twelfth century a HanbaliHanbaliThe Hanbali school is one the schools of Fiqh or religious law within Sunni Islam. The jurisprudence school traces back to Imam Ahmad ibn Hanbal but was institutionalized by his students. Hanbali jurisprudence is considered very strict and conservative, especially regarding questions of dogma...
scholar denied the continued existence of Khidr. The majority of scholars, on the other hand, affirmed Khidr’s eternal lifeImmortalityImmortality is the ability to live forever. It is unknown whether human physical immortality is an achievable condition. Biological forms have inherent limitations which may or may not be able to be overcome through medical interventions or engineering...
and have continued to do so into the twentieth century. New Arabic texts on Khidr have appeared during the last twenty years of the twentieth century, the majority of which have rejected the idea of his eternal life as ‘unislamic’ without enlisting new arguments for their viewpoint though.
The story of Al-Khidir, in the Qur'an, does not mention Dhul-Qarnayn, rather only a figure called "Moses" is referred to by name. This would seem to shed doubt on the idea that the story is about Dhul-Qarnayn, as it appears to be a story about Moses
Moses
Moses was, according to the Hebrew Bible and Qur'an, a religious leader, lawgiver and prophet, to whom the authorship of the Torah is traditionally attributed...
of the Israelites. However, the early Islamic literature raises questions about whether the Moses mentioned in the story of the fish is the Moses of the Israelites, or someone entirely different:
Narrated Sa'id: Ibn 'Abbas said, "Ask me (any question)" I [Sa'id] said, "O Abu Abbas! ... There is a man at KufaKufaKufa is a city in Iraq, about south of Baghdad, and northeast of Najaf. It is located on the banks of the Euphrates River. The estimated population in 2003 was 110,000....
who is a story-teller called Nauf; who claims that he (Al-Khadir's companion) is not Moses of Bani Israel ... Ibn 'Abbas said, "(Nauf) the enemy of Allah told a lie."
The story, in the Alexander romance and in the Qur'an, is considered by scholars to have been influenced by the Epic of Gilgamesh
Epic of Gilgamesh
Epic of Gilgamesh is an epic poem from Mesopotamia and is among the earliest known works of literature. Scholars believe that it originated as a series of Sumerian legends and poems about the protagonist of the story, Gilgamesh king of Uruk, which were fashioned into a longer Akkadian epic much...
(specifically Giglamesh's search for the Water of Life ). Gilgamesh reaches the water but, like Alexander, fails to become immortal. Like Alexander, Giglamesh also comes to the spot at which the sun rises from the Earth:
The sources of the Khidir-story go back to mythological motifsMotif (narrative)In narrative, a motif is any recurring element that has symbolic significance in a story. Through its repetition, a motif can help produce other narrative aspects such as theme or mood....
appearing in the Akkadian Epic of Gilgamesh, in the Alexander romance and in Jewish legends centered around the mythical figure of Elijah. The story as it is told by the Qur'an interweaves several narrative motifs: the test of patience, the quest for the spring of life, and so on. The identification of the servant of god with al-Khidir is attested to in traditions from the Prophet, which may be the reason why it is rarely contested by Muslim commentators. There is less exegetical unanimity about whether the Moses mentioned here is the Egyptian Moses or not.
A peculiar aspect of the story in the Qur'an is that Al-Khidir is found at a distant place called the "junction of the two seas." This is believed by secular scholars to be a reference to the end of the World, where the sun rises from the outer Ocean sea. The "junction of the two seas" is mentioned in several places in the Qur'an:
He [Allah] is the one who has let free the two bodies of flowing water, one sweet and palatable, and the other salty and bitter. And He has made between them a barrier and a forbidding partition. (Qur'an 25:53)
This has been compared to the ancient Akkadian myth of the Abzu
Abzu
The abzu also called engur, literally, ab='ocean' zu='to know' or 'deep' was the name for fresh water from underground aquifers that was given a religious quality in Sumerian and Akkadian mythology...
, the name for a fresh water underground sea that was given a religious quality in Sumerian and Akkadian mythology. Lakes, springs, rivers, wells, and other sources of fresh water were thought to draw their water from the Abzu
Abzu
The abzu also called engur, literally, ab='ocean' zu='to know' or 'deep' was the name for fresh water from underground aquifers that was given a religious quality in Sumerian and Akkadian mythology...
underground sea, while the Ocean that surrounded the world was a saltwater sea. It would follow that the "junction" of these two seas would be at the end of the World, at "the setting place of the sun," where Dhul-Qarnayn sees the sun setting into a body of water. The Abzu freshwater sea was also depicted as a deity
Deity
A deity is a recognized preternatural or supernatural immortal being, who may be thought of as holy, divine, or sacred, held in high regard, and respected by believers....
in the Babylonian creation myth, the Enûma Elish
Enûma Elish
The is the Babylonian creation myth . It was recovered by Austen Henry Layard in 1849 in the ruined Library of Ashurbanipal at Nineveh , and published by George Smith in 1876.The Enûma Eliš has about a thousand lines and is recorded in Old Babylonian on seven clay tablets, each holding...
, where he was a primal
Primal
Primal can refer to:* An old term for a hypersurface in mathematics.* Primal , a season 1 episode of Eureka* Primal , an action video game for the PlayStation 2...
being made of fresh water and a lover to another primal deity, Tiamat
Tiamat
In Babylonian mythology, Tiamat is a chaos monster, a primordial goddess of the ocean, mating with Abzû to produce younger gods. It is suggested that there are two parts to the Tiamat mythos, the first in which Tiamat is 'creatrix', through a "Sacred marriage" between salt and fresh water,...
, who was a creature of salt water. The Enuma Elish begins:
When above the heavens did not yet exist nor the earth below, ApsuAbzuThe abzu also called engur, literally, ab='ocean' zu='to know' or 'deep' was the name for fresh water from underground aquifers that was given a religious quality in Sumerian and Akkadian mythology...
the freshwater ocean was there, the first, the begetter, and TiamatTiamatIn Babylonian mythology, Tiamat is a chaos monster, a primordial goddess of the ocean, mating with Abzû to produce younger gods. It is suggested that there are two parts to the Tiamat mythos, the first in which Tiamat is 'creatrix', through a "Sacred marriage" between salt and fresh water,...
, the saltwater sea, she who bore them all; they were still mixing their waters, and no pasture land had yet been formed, nor even a reed marsh...
Similarly in Greek mythology
Greek mythology
Greek mythology is the body of myths and legends belonging to the ancient Greeks, concerning their gods and heroes, the nature of the world, and the origins and significance of their own cult and ritual practices. They were a part of religion in ancient Greece...
, the world was surrounded by Oceanus
Oceanus
Oceanus ; , Ōkeanós) was a pseudo-geographical feature in classical antiquity, believed by the ancient Greeks and Romans to be the world-ocean, an enormous river encircling the world....
, the world-ocean of classical antiquity
Classical antiquity
Classical antiquity is a broad term for a long period of cultural history centered on the Mediterranean Sea, comprising the interlocking civilizations of ancient Greece and ancient Rome, collectively known as the Greco-Roman world...
. Oceanus was personified as the god Titan
Helios
Helios was the personification of the Sun in Greek mythology. Homer often calls him simply Titan or Hyperion, while Hesiod and the Homeric Hymn separate him as a son of the Titans Hyperion and Theia or Euryphaessa and brother of the goddesses Selene, the moon, and Eos, the dawn...
, whose consort was the aquatic
Greek sea gods
The ancient Greeks had a large number of sea deities. The philosopher Plato once remarked that the Greek people were like frogs sitting around a pond—their many cities hugging close to the Mediterranean coastline from the Hellenic homeland to Asia Minor, Libya, Sicily and Southern Italy. It was...
sea goddess Tethys
Tethys (mythology)
In Greek mythology, Tethys , daughter of Uranus and Gaia was an archaic Titaness and aquatic sea goddess, invoked in classical Greek poetry but not venerated in cult. Tethys was both sister and wife of Oceanus...
. It was also thought that rainfall was due a third ocean above the "canopy of the sky." A comprehensive understanding of the Earth's water cycle
Water cycle
The water cycle, also known as the hydrologic cycle or H2O cycle, describes the continuous movement of water on, above and below the surface of the Earth. Water can change states among liquid, vapor, and solid at various places in the water cycle...
did not exist until a treatise titled De l'origine des fontaines ("On the origin of springs") was written by Pierre Perrault
Pierre Perrault
Pierre Perrault was a Québécois documentary film director. He directed 20 films between 1963 and 1996. He was one of the most important filmmakers in Canada although largely unknown outside of Québec...
in 1674 AD.
Arabic traditions
Alexander the Great features prominently in early Arabic literature. There are many surviving versions of the Alexander romance in Arabic that were written after the conquest of Islam. It is also thought that pre-Islamic Arabic versions of the Alexander romance may have existed.The earliest surviving Arabic narrative of the Alexander romance was composed by Umara ibn Zayd (767-815 AD). In the tale, Alexander travels a great deal, builds the Wall against Gog and Magog, searches for the Water of Life (Fountain of Youth), and encounters angels who give him a "wonder-stone" that both weighs more than any other stone but is also as light as dust. This wonder-stone is meant to admonish Alexander for his ambitions and indicate that his lust for conquest and eternal life will not end until his death. The story of the wonder-stone is not found in the Syriac Christian legend, but is found in Jewish Talmudic traditions about Alexander as well as in Persian traditions.
A South Arabian
South Arabian
The Modern South Arabian languages are spoken mainly by minority populations in the Arabian Peninsula in Yemen and Oman, which, together with the Ethiopian Semitic languages, form the Western South Semitic branch. In his glottochronology-based classification, A...
Alexander legend was written by the Yemen
Yemen
The Republic of Yemen , commonly known as Yemen , is a country located in the Middle East, occupying the southwestern to southern end of the Arabian Peninsula. It is bordered by Saudi Arabia to the north, the Red Sea to the west, and Oman to the east....
ite traditionist Wahb ibn Munabbih
Wahb ibn Munabbih
'Wahb ibn Munabbih' was a Muslim traditionist of Dhimar in Yemen; died at the age of ninety, in a year variously given by Arabic authorities as 725, 728, 732, and 737 C.E....
(?-732 AD) and this legend was later incorporated in a book by Ibn Hisham
Ibn Hisham
Abu Muhammad 'Abd al-Malik bin Hisham , or Ibn Hisham edited the biography of Muhammad written by Ibn Ishaq. Ibn Ishaq's work is lost and is now only known in the recensions of Ibn Hisham and al-Tabari. Ibn Hisham grew up in Basra, Iraq, but moved afterwards to Egypt, where he gained a name...
(?-833 AD) regarding the history of the Himyarite Kingdom in ancient Yemen. In the Yemenite variation, Dhul-Qarnayn is identified with an ancient king of Yemen named Tubba', rather than Alexander the Great, but the Arabic story still describes the story of Alexander's Wall against Gog and Magog and his quest for the Water of Life. The story also mentions that Dhul-Qarnayn (Tubba') visited a castle with glass walls and visited the Brahmins of India. The South Arabian legend was composed within the context of the division between the South Arabs and North Arabs that began with the Battle of Marj-al-Rahit
Battle of Marj-al-Rahit
The Battle of Mari-al-Rahit was a minor conflict fought between the Ghassanid Arab allies of Byzantine Empire and Rashidun army under the command of Khalid bin Walid...
in 680 AD and consolidated over two centuries.
The Alexander romance also had an important influence on Arabic wisdom literature
Wisdom literature
Wisdom literature is the genre of literature common in the Ancient Near East. This genre is characterized by sayings of wisdom intended to teach about divinity and about virtue...
. In Secretum Secretorum
Secretum Secretorum
Secretum secretorum is a medieval treatise also known as Secret of Secrets, or The Book of the Secret of Secrets, or in Arabic Kitab sirr al-asrar, or the Book of the science of government: on the good ordering of statecraft...
("Secret of Secrets", in Arabic Kitab sirr al-asrar), an encyclopedic Arabic treatise on a wide range of topics such as statecraft
Public administration
Public Administration houses the implementation of government policy and an academic discipline that studies this implementation and that prepares civil servants for this work. As a "field of inquiry with a diverse scope" its "fundamental goal.....
, ethics
Ethics
Ethics, also known as moral philosophy, is a branch of philosophy that addresses questions about morality—that is, concepts such as good and evil, right and wrong, virtue and vice, justice and crime, etc.Major branches of ethics include:...
, physiognomy
Physiognomy
Physiognomy is the assessment of a person's character or personality from their outer appearance, especially the face...
, alchemy
Alchemy
Alchemy is an influential philosophical tradition whose early practitioners’ claims to profound powers were known from antiquity. The defining objectives of alchemy are varied; these include the creation of the fabled philosopher's stone possessing powers including the capability of turning base...
, astrology
Astrology
Astrology consists of a number of belief systems which hold that there is a relationship between astronomical phenomena and events in the human world...
, magic
Magic (paranormal)
Magic is the claimed art of manipulating aspects of reality either by supernatural means or through knowledge of occult laws unknown to science. It is in contrast to science, in that science does not accept anything not subject to either direct or indirect observation, and subject to logical...
and medicine
Medicine
Medicine is the science and art of healing. It encompasses a variety of health care practices evolved to maintain and restore health by the prevention and treatment of illness....
, Alexander appears as a speaker and subject of wise sayings and as a correspondent with figures such as Aristotle
Aristotle
Aristotle was a Greek philosopher and polymath, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. His writings cover many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, poetry, theater, music, logic, rhetoric, linguistics, politics, government, ethics, biology, and zoology...
. The origins of the treatise are uncertain. No Greek
Greek language
Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. Its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the majority of its history;...
original exists, though there are claims in the Arabic treatise that it was translated from the Greek into Syriac and from Syriac into Arabic by a well-known 9th century translator, Yahya ibn al-Bitriq (?-815 AD). It appears, however, that the treatise was actually composed originally in Arabic.
In another example of Arabic wisdom literature relating to Alexander, Ibn al-Nadim
Ibn al-Nadim
Abu'l-Faraj Muhammad bin Is'hāq al-Nadim , whose father was known as al-Warrāq was a Shia Muslim scholar and bibliographer. Some scholars regard him as a Persian, but this is not certain. He is famous as the author of the Kitāb al-Fihrist...
(?-997 AD) refers to a work on divination
Divination
Divination is the attempt to gain insight into a question or situation by way of an occultic standardized process or ritual...
titled The Drawing of Lots by Dhul-Qarnain and to a second work on divination by arrows titled The gift of Alexander, but only the titles of these works have survived.
Notably, the Abbasid
Abbasid
The Abbasid Caliphate or, more simply, the Abbasids , was the third of the Islamic caliphates. It was ruled by the Abbasid dynasty of caliphs, who built their capital in Baghdad after overthrowing the Umayyad caliphate from all but the al-Andalus region....
Caliph
Caliph
The Caliph is the head of state in a Caliphate, and the title for the ruler of the Islamic Ummah, an Islamic community ruled by the Shari'ah. It is a transcribed version of the Arabic word which means "successor" or "representative"...
Al-Mu'tasim
Al-Mu'tasim
Abu Ishaq 'Abbas al-Mu'tasim ibn Harun was an Abbasid caliph . He succeeded his half-brother al-Ma'mun...
(794-842 AD) had ordered the translation of the Thesaurus Alexandri, a work on elixirs and amulets, from Greek
Greek language
Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. Its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the majority of its history;...
and Latin
Latin
Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...
into Arabic. The Greek work Thesaurus Alexandri was attributed to Hermes
Hermes
Hermes is the great messenger of the gods in Greek mythology and a guide to the Underworld. Hermes was born on Mount Kyllini in Arcadia. An Olympian god, he is also the patron of boundaries and of the travelers who cross them, of shepherds and cowherds, of the cunning of thieves, of orators and...
(the great messenger of the gods in Greek mythology
Greek mythology
Greek mythology is the body of myths and legends belonging to the ancient Greeks, concerning their gods and heroes, the nature of the world, and the origins and significance of their own cult and ritual practices. They were a part of religion in ancient Greece...
) and similarly contained supposed letters from Aristotle addressed to Alexander.
A more direct Arabic translation of the Alexander romance, called Sirat Al-Iskandar, was discovered in Constantinople
Constantinople
Constantinople was the capital of the Roman, Eastern Roman, Byzantine, Latin, and Ottoman Empires. Throughout most of the Middle Ages, Constantinople was Europe's largest and wealthiest city.-Names:...
, at the Hagia Sophia
Hagia Sophia
Hagia Sophia is a former Orthodox patriarchal basilica, later a mosque, and now a museum in Istanbul, Turkey...
, and is dated to the 13th century. This version includes the letter from Alexander to his mother about his travels in India and at the end of the World. It also includes features which occur exclusively in the Syriac version. Interestingly, the Arabic legend also retains certain pagan elements of the story, which are sometimes modified to suit the Islamic message:
It is quite remarkable that some characteristics belonging to a pre-Islamic 'pagan' entourage, have survived in the text ... For example, Alexander orders an offering of sacrificial animals at the temple of HerculesHerculesHercules is the Roman name for Greek demigod Heracles, son of Zeus , and the mortal Alcmene...
. In the Arabic letter the name of the deity has been replaced by AllahAllahAllah is a word for God used in the context of Islam. In Arabic, the word means simply "God". It is used primarily by Muslims and Bahá'ís, and often, albeit not exclusively, used by Arabic-speaking Eastern Catholic Christians, Maltese Roman Catholics, Eastern Orthodox Christians, Mizrahi Jews and...
... Another passage in the account of the palace of Shoshan or Sus, gives a description of the large silver jars, which were alleged to have capacity of three hundred and sixty measures of wine. Alexander puts this assertion to the test, having one of the jars filled with wine and poured out for his soldiers during a banquet. This exact specification has been maintained, heedless of the Islamic ban on the use of wine ... These retouched borrowings are highly significant in this text, because the Arabic Alexander figure is portrayed as a propagator of Islamic monotheism.
Another piece of Arabic Alexander literature is the Laments (or Sayings) of the Philosophers. These are a collection of remarks supposedly made by some philosophers gathered at the tomb of Alexander after his death. This legend was originally written in the 6th century in Syriac and was later translated into Arabic and expanded upon. The Laments of the Philosophers eventually gained enormous popularity in the Europe:
[The 'Sayings of the Philosophers' are] remarks of the philosophers gathered at the tomb of Alexander, who utter a series of apophthegmsApophthegmata PatrumThe Apophthegmata Patrum is the name given to various collections of Sayings of the Desert Fathers, consisting of stories and sayings attributed to the Desert Fathers from approximately the 5th century CE....
on the theme of the brevity of life and the transience of human achievement ... a work entitled 'Sayings of the Philosophers' was first composed in Syriac in the sixth century; a longer Arabic version was composed by Hunayan Ibn IshaqHunayn ibn IshaqHunayn ibn Ishaq was a famous and influential Assyrian Nestorian Christian scholar, physician, and scientist, known for his work in translating Greek scientific and medical works into Arabic and Syriac during the heyday of the Islamic Abbasid Caliphate.Ḥunayn ibn Isḥaq was the most productive...
(809-973) the distinguished scholar-translator, and a still longer one by al-Mubashshir ibn Fatiq (who also wrote a book about Alexander) around 1053. Hunayan's version was translated into Spanish ... in the late thirteenth century.
The Arabic Alexander romance also had an influence on a wider range of Arabic literature. It has been noted that some features of the Arabic Alexander legends found their way into The Seven Voyages of Sinbad the Sailor
Sinbad the Sailor
Sinbad the Sailor is a fictional sailor from Basrah, living during the Abbasid Caliphate – the hero of a story-cycle of Middle Eastern origin...
, a medieval story-cycle of Arabic origin. Sinbad, the hero of the epic, is a fictional sailor
Sailor
A sailor, mariner, or seaman is a person who navigates water-borne vessels or assists in their operation, maintenance, or service. The term can apply to professional mariners, military personnel, and recreational sailors as well as a plethora of other uses...
from Basrah, living during the Abbasid Caliphate. During his voyages throughout the seas east of Africa and south of Asia, he has fantastic adventures going to magical places, meeting monsters, and encountering supernatural phenomena. As a separate example of this influence on Arabic literature, the legend of Alexander's search for the Water of Life is found in One Thousand and One Nights, a collection of Middle East
Middle East
The Middle East is a region that encompasses Western Asia and Northern Africa. It is often used as a synonym for Near East, in opposition to Far East...
ern and South Asia
South Asia
South Asia, also known as Southern Asia, is the southern region of the Asian continent, which comprises the sub-Himalayan countries and, for some authorities , also includes the adjoining countries to the west and the east...
n stories and folktales compiled in Arabic
Arabic language
Arabic is a name applied to the descendants of the Classical Arabic language of the 6th century AD, used most prominently in the Quran, the Islamic Holy Book...
during the Islamic Golden Age
Islamic Golden Age
During the Islamic Golden Age philosophers, scientists and engineers of the Islamic world contributed enormously to technology and culture, both by preserving earlier traditions and by adding their own inventions and innovations...
.
Andalusian traditions
Umayyad
The Umayyad Caliphate was the second of the four major Arab caliphates established after the death of Muhammad. It was ruled by the Umayyad dynasty, whose name derives from Umayya ibn Abd Shams, the great-grandfather of the first Umayyad caliph. Although the Umayyad family originally came from the...
Muslim conquest of Al-Andalus
Al-Andalus
Al-Andalus was the Arabic name given to a nation and territorial region also commonly referred to as Moorish Iberia. The name describes parts of the Iberian Peninsula and Septimania governed by Muslims , at various times in the period between 711 and 1492, although the territorial boundaries...
(Spain) in 711 AD, Muslim literature flourished under the Caliphate of Córdoba
Caliphate of Córdoba
The Caliphate of Córdoba ruled the Iberian peninsula and part of North Africa, from the city of Córdoba, from 929 to 1031. This period was characterized by remarkable success in trade and culture; many of the masterpieces of Islamic Iberia were constructed in this period, including the famous...
(929 to 1031 AD). An Arabic derivative of the Alexander romance was produced, called Qisas Dhul-Qarnayn (Tales of Dhul-Qarnayn). The material was later incorporated into Qisas Al-Anbiya
Qisas Al-Anbiya
The "Qasas Al-Anbiya" or Stories of the Prophets is any of various collections of tales adapted from the Quran and other Islamic literature, closely related to exegesis of the Qur'an. One of the best-known is that composed by Kisa'i in either the 6th or the 13th century; others include the Ara'is...
(Tales of the Prophets):
By the turn of the first millennium C.E., the romance of Alexander in Arabic had a core centered on the Greek legendary material ... Interwoven later into this narrative in the Tales of the Prophets literature were episodes of an apparent Arab-Islamic elaboration: the construction of a great barrier to keep the people of Gog and Magog from harassing the people of the civilized world until Judgement Day, the voyage to the end of the Earth to witness the sun set in a pool of boiling mud, and Dhu al-Qarnayn's expedition into the Land of DarknessLand of DarknessThe Land of Darkness was a mythical land supposedly enshrouded in perpetual darkness. It was usually said to be in Abkhazia and was officially known as Hanyson or Hamson , or simply the Forest of Abkhazia.The Land of Darkness enjoyed popularity in fictional medieval travel literature such as...
in search of the Fountain of Life accompanied by his companion Khidir ("the Green-One").
By 1236 AD, the Reconquista
Reconquista
The Reconquista was a period of almost 800 years in the Middle Ages during which several Christian kingdoms succeeded in retaking the Muslim-controlled areas of the Iberian Peninsula broadly known as Al-Andalus...
was essentially completed and Europeans had retaken the Iberian peninsula
Iberian Peninsula
The Iberian Peninsula , sometimes called Iberia, is located in the extreme southwest of Europe and includes the modern-day sovereign states of Spain, Portugal and Andorra, as well as the British Overseas Territory of Gibraltar...
from the Muslims, but the Emirate of Granada
Emirate of Granada
The Emirate of Granada , also known as the Nasrid Kingdom of Granada , was an emirate established in 1238 following the defeat of Muhammad an-Nasir of the Almohad dynasty by an alliance of Christian kingdoms at the Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa in 1212...
, a small Muslim vassal of the Christian Kingdom of Castile
Kingdom of Castile
Kingdom of Castile was one of the medieval kingdoms of the Iberian Peninsula. It emerged as a political autonomous entity in the 9th century. It was called County of Castile and was held in vassalage from the Kingdom of León. Its name comes from the host of castles constructed in the region...
, remained in Spain until 1492 AD. During the Reconquista, Muslims were forced to either convert to Catholicism
Catholicism
Catholicism is a broad term for the body of the Catholic faith, its theologies and doctrines, its liturgical, ethical, spiritual, and behavioral characteristics, as well as a religious people as a whole....
or leave the peninsula. The descendants of Muslims who converted to Christianity were called the Morisco
Morisco
Moriscos or Mouriscos , meaning "Moorish", were the converted Christian inhabitants of Spain and Portugal of Muslim heritage. Over time the term was used in a pejorative sense applied to those nominal Catholics who were suspected of secretly practicing Islam.-Demographics:By the beginning of the...
s (meaning "Moor
Moors
The description Moors has referred to several historic and modern populations of the Maghreb region who are predominately of Berber and Arab descent. They came to conquer and rule the Iberian Peninsula for nearly 800 years. At that time they were Muslim, although earlier the people had followed...
-like") and were suspecting of secretly practicing Islam. The Moriscos used a language called Aljamiado
Aljamiado
Aljamiado or Aljamía texts are manuscripts which use the Arabic script for transcribing Romance languages such as Mozarabic, Berber Spanish or Ladino.According to Anwar G...
, which was a dialect of the Spanish language (Mozarabic) but was written using the Arabic alphabet
Arabic alphabet
The Arabic alphabet or Arabic abjad is the Arabic script as it is codified for writing the Arabic language. It is written from right to left, in a cursive style, and includes 28 letters. Because letters usually stand for consonants, it is classified as an abjad.-Consonants:The Arabic alphabet has...
. Aljamiado played a very important role in preserving Islam and the Arabic language in the life of the Moriscos; prayers and the sayings of Muhammad were translated into Aljamiado transcriptions of the Spanish language, while keeping all Qur'anic verses in the original Arabic. During this period, a version of the Alexander legend was written in the Aljamaido language, building on the Arabic Qisas Dhul-Qarnayn legends as well as Romance language versions of the Alexander romance.
Persian traditions
Islamic conquest of Persia
The Muslim conquest of Persia led to the end of the Sassanid Empire in 644, the fall of Sassanid dynasty in 651 and the eventual decline of the Zoroastrian religion in Persia...
in 644 AD, the Alexander romance found its way into Persian literature
Persian literature
Persian literature spans two-and-a-half millennia, though much of the pre-Islamic material has been lost. Its sources have been within historical Persia including present-day Iran as well as regions of Central Asia where the Persian language has historically been the national language...
—an ironic outcome considering pre-Islamic Persia's
Achaemenid Empire
The Achaemenid Empire , sometimes known as First Persian Empire and/or Persian Empire, was founded in the 6th century BCE by Cyrus the Great who overthrew the Median confederation...
hostility towards the national enemy who conquered the Achaemenid Empire
Achaemenid Empire
The Achaemenid Empire , sometimes known as First Persian Empire and/or Persian Empire, was founded in the 6th century BCE by Cyrus the Great who overthrew the Median confederation...
and was directly responsible for centuries of Persian domination by Hellenistic
Seleucid Empire
The Seleucid Empire was a Greek-Macedonian state that was created out of the eastern conquests of Alexander the Great. At the height of its power, it included central Anatolia, the Levant, Mesopotamia, Persia, today's Turkmenistan, Pamir and parts of Pakistan.The Seleucid Empire was a major centre...
foreign rulers. Islamic Persian accounts of the Alexander legend, known as the Iskandarnamah, combined the Pseudo-Callisthenes
Alexander Romance
Alexander romance is any of several collections of legends concerning the mythical exploits of Alexander the Great. The earliest version is in Greek, dating to the 3rd century. Several late manuscripts attribute the work to Alexander's court historian Callisthenes, but the historical figure died...
material about Alexander, some of which is found in the Qur'an, with indigenous Sassanid Middle Persian
Middle Persian
Middle Persian , indigenously known as "Pârsig" sometimes referred to as Pahlavi or Pehlevi, is the Middle Iranian language/ethnolect of Southwestern Iran that during Sassanid times became a prestige dialect and so came to be spoken in other regions as well. Middle Persian is classified as a...
ideas about Alexander. For example, Pseudo-Callisthenes is the source of many incidents in the Shahnama written by Ferdowsi
Ferdowsi
Ferdowsi was a highly revered Persian poet. He was the author of the Shahnameh, the national epic of Iran and related societies.The Shahnameh was originally composed by Ferdowsi for the princes of the Samanid dynasty, who were responsible for a revival of Persian cultural traditions after the...
(935–1020 AD) in New Persian. Persian sources on the Alexander legend devised a mythical genealogy for him whereby his mother was a concubine of Darius II
Darius II of Persia
Darius II , was king of the Persian Empire from 423 BC to 405 BC.Artaxerxes I, who died on December 25, 424 BC, was followed by his son Xerxes II. After a month and a half Xerxes II was murdered by his brother Secydianus or Sogdianus...
, making him the half-brother of the last Achaemenid shah
Shah
Shāh is the title of the ruler of certain Southwest Asian and Central Asian countries, especially Persia , and derives from the Persian word shah, meaning "king".-History:...
, Darius
Darius III of Persia
Darius III , also known by his given name of Codomannus, was the last king of the Achaemenid Empire of Persia from 336 BC to 330 BC....
. By the 12th century such important writers as Nizami Ganjavi were making him the subject of their epic poems
Epic poetry
An epic is a lengthy narrative poem, ordinarily concerning a serious subject containing details of heroic deeds and events significant to a culture or nation. Oral poetry may qualify as an epic, and Albert Lord and Milman Parry have argued that classical epics were fundamentally an oral poetic form...
. The Muslim traditions also elaborated the legend that Alexander the Great had been the companion of Aristotle
Aristotle
Aristotle was a Greek philosopher and polymath, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. His writings cover many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, poetry, theater, music, logic, rhetoric, linguistics, politics, government, ethics, biology, and zoology...
and the direct student of Plato
Plato
Plato , was a Classical Greek philosopher, mathematician, student of Socrates, writer of philosophical dialogues, and founder of the Academy in Athens, the first institution of higher learning in the Western world. Along with his mentor, Socrates, and his student, Aristotle, Plato helped to lay the...
.
There is also evidence that the Syriac translation of the Alexander romance, dating to the 6th century, was not directly based on the Greek recensions but was based on a lost Pahlavi
Pahlavi scripts
Pahlavi or Pahlevi denotes a particular and exclusively written form of various Middle Iranian languages. The essential characteristics of Pahlavi are*the use of a specific Aramaic-derived script, the Pahlavi script;...
(pre-Islamic Persian) manuscript.
Central Asian traditions
Certain Muslim people of Central AsiaCentral Asia
Central Asia is a core region of the Asian continent from the Caspian Sea in the west, China in the east, Afghanistan in the south, and Russia in the north...
, specifically Bulgar
Bulgars
The Bulgars were a semi-nomadic who flourished in the Pontic Steppe and the Volga basin in the 7th century.The Bulgars emerge after the collapse of the Hunnic Empire in the 5th century....
, Tatar and Bashkir
Bashkirs
The Bashkirs are a Turkic people indigenous to Bashkortostan extending on both parts of the Ural mountains, on the place where Europe meets Asia. Groups of Bashkirs also live in the republic of Tatarstan, Perm Krai, Chelyabinsk, Orenburg, Tyumen, Sverdlovsk, Kurgan, Samara and Saratov Oblasts of...
peoples of the Volga-Ural
Ural (region)
Ural is a geographical region located around the Ural Mountains, between the East European and West Siberian plains. It extends approximately from north to south, from the Arctic Ocean to the bend of Ural River near Orsk city. The boundary between Europe and Asia runs along the eastern side of...
region (within what is today Tatarstan
Tatarstan
The Republic of Tatarstan is a federal subject of Russia located in the Volga Federal District. Its capital is the city of Kazan, which is one of Russia's largest and most prosperous cities. The republic borders with Kirov, Ulyanovsk, Samara, and Orenburg Oblasts, and with the Mari El, Udmurt,...
in the Russian Federation), carried on a rich tradition of the Alexander legend well into the 19th century. The region was conquered by the Abbasid
Abbasid
The Abbasid Caliphate or, more simply, the Abbasids , was the third of the Islamic caliphates. It was ruled by the Abbasid dynasty of caliphs, who built their capital in Baghdad after overthrowing the Umayyad caliphate from all but the al-Andalus region....
Caliphate in the early 10th century. In these legends, Alexander is referred to as Iskandar
Iskandar
Iskandar or Eskandar is the Persian version of the name Alexander, after Alexander the Great. It is used as male first name in Middle East, Central Asia and South Asia. It can refer to:* 9K720 Iskander, ballistic missile...
Dhul-Qarnayn (Alexander the Two Horned), and is "depicted as founder of local cities and an ancestor of local figures." The local folklore about Iskandar Dhul-Qarnayn played in an important role in communal identity:
The conversion of the Volga Bulghars to Islam is commonly dated to the first decades of the 10th century, and by the middle of the 12th century, it is apparent that Islamic historical figures and Islamic forms of communal validation had become important factors for Bulghar communal and political cohesion. The AndalusianAl-AndalusAl-Andalus was the Arabic name given to a nation and territorial region also commonly referred to as Moorish Iberia. The name describes parts of the Iberian Peninsula and Septimania governed by Muslims , at various times in the period between 711 and 1492, although the territorial boundaries...
traveler Abū Hamid al-Gharnāti who visited Bulghar in the 1150s, noted that Iskandar Dhū 1-Qarnayn passed through Bulghar, that is, the Volga-KamaVolga BulgariaVolga Bulgaria, or Volga–Kama Bolghar, is a historic Bulgar state that existed between the seventh and thirteenth centuries around the confluence of the Volga and Kama rivers in what is now Russia.-Origin:...
region, on his way to build the iron walls that contained Yā'jūj and Mā'jūj [Gog and Magog] within the land of darknessLand of DarknessThe Land of Darkness was a mythical land supposedly enshrouded in perpetual darkness. It was usually said to be in Abkhazia and was officially known as Hanyson or Hamson , or simply the Forest of Abkhazia.The Land of Darkness enjoyed popularity in fictional medieval travel literature such as...
... while Najib al-Hamadāni reports that the rulers of Bulghar claimed descent from Iskandar Dhūl-Qarnayn.
The Iskandar Dhul-Qanryan legends played an important role in the conversion narrative of the Volga Bulgar Muslims:
There are numerous digressions dealing with the founding of the Bulghar conversion narrative, and legends concerning Iskandar Dhūl-Qarnayn [Alexander Dhul-Qarnayn] and SocratesSocratesSocrates was a classical Greek Athenian philosopher. Credited as one of the founders of Western philosophy, he is an enigmatic figure known chiefly through the accounts of later classical writers, especially the writings of his students Plato and Xenophon, and the plays of his contemporary ...
. According to the account, Socrates was born a Christian in Samarqand and went to Greece to serve Iskandar Dhūl-Qarnayn (Iskandar Rūmi). Together, they went to the Land of DarknessLand of DarknessThe Land of Darkness was a mythical land supposedly enshrouded in perpetual darkness. It was usually said to be in Abkhazia and was officially known as Hanyson or Hamson , or simply the Forest of Abkhazia.The Land of Darkness enjoyed popularity in fictional medieval travel literature such as...
(diyār-i zulmat) to seek the Fountain of YouthFountain of YouthThe Fountain of Youth is a legendary spring that reputedly restores the youth of anyone who drinks of its waters. Tales of such a fountain have been recounted across the world for thousands of years, appearing in writings by Herodotus, the Alexander romance, and the stories of Prester John...
(āb-i hayāt). In the northern lands they built a city and called it Bulghar.
In 1577 AD the Tsardom of Russia
Tsardom of Russia
The Tsardom of Russia was the name of the centralized Russian state from Ivan IV's assumption of the title of Tsar in 1547 till Peter the Great's foundation of the Russian Empire in 1721.From 1550 to 1700, Russia grew 35,000 km2 a year...
annexed control of the region and Bulgar Muslim writings concerning Dhul-Qarnayn do not appear again until the 18th and 19th centuries, which saw a resurgence of local Iskandar Dhul-Qarnayn legends as a source of Muslim and ethnic identity:
It was only at the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries that we begin to see historical legends concerning Iskandar Dhūl-Qarnayn reemerge among Volga-KamaVolga BulgariaVolga Bulgaria, or Volga–Kama Bolghar, is a historic Bulgar state that existed between the seventh and thirteenth centuries around the confluence of the Volga and Kama rivers in what is now Russia.-Origin:...
Muslims, at least in written form, and it was not until the 19th century that such legends were recorded from local Muslim oral tradition. In one of his earliest historical works, entitled Ghilālat al-Zamān and written in 1877 the Tatar theologian, Shihāb al-Dīn Marjānī wrote that according to Arabic and other Muslim writings, as well as according to popular legends, the city of Bulghar was founded by Alexander the Great.
See also
- Origin and development of the Qur'anOrigin and development of the Qur'anThe study of the origins and development of the Qur'an can be said to fall into two major schools of thought, the first being a traditional Islamic view and the second being a secular view, finding its origins in the works of Western scholars....
- Legends and the Qur'anLegends and the Qur'anThis article considers the relation of the Qur'an, the central religious text of Islam, and pre-Islamic mythology and legends.Early in Islamic history, debates over the role of Jewish mythology, as well as Christian Biblical apocrypha references in the Qur'an, the sacred text of Islam, existed...
- Biblical narratives and the Qur'anBiblical narratives and the Qur'anThe Qur'an, the central religious text of Islam, contains references to over fifty people and events also found in the Bible. While the stories told in each book are generally comparable in most respects, important differences sometimes emerge....
- Sana'a manuscriptsSana'a manuscriptsThe Sana'a manuscripts, found in Yemen in 1972, are considered by some to be the oldest existent version of the Qur'an. Although the text has been dated to the first two decades of the eighth century The Sana'a manuscripts, found in Yemen in 1972, are considered by some to be the oldest existent...