النص المفهرس

"Izz al-Din ibn 'Abd al-Salām
dignitaries, chiefs, and royal forces and even gave shoulder to the bier and
took part in the actual burial.
Witnessing the enormous funeral procession passing by the side of the
royal palace, the king said to one of his councilors, "My kingdom has been
strengthened today. If this man, who was the resort of the masses, would have
just made a gesture [against me], my rule would have vanished. Now that he
has died, I am confident about the endurance of my rule.">
1 Țabagāt al-Shafi'iyya, 5:84.
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CHAPTER 12
The Tartars: The Scourge of God
Causes of the Tartar Invasion
In the seventh/thirteenth century, Islam was confronted with another danger,
one unparalleled in the history of the world, which came close to wiping it
out of existence. This was the invasion of the wild and savage hordes of the
Tartars, who issued forth from the steppes of Central Asia and overpowered
almost the whole of the Islamic world with lightning speed.
The immediate cause of the Mongol invasion can be traced to a previ-
ous blunder of 'Alā al-Din Muhammad, the shah of Khwarizm.1 A body of
traders arriving from Mongolia had been put to death, and when Genghis
Khan, the Mongol ruler, deputed an embassy to inquire into the reasons for
it, Muhammad responded by killing the envoy too. On receiving the news
of this outrage against proper international conduct, Genghis Khan loosed
a whirlwind of savagery upon the world of Islam.
However, if one were to look into the moral behavior and attitudes of
ancient nations, particularly those relating to the Children of Israel as well
as their destruction and massacre, demolition and sacrilege of Jerusalem,
and the reasons therefor described in the Qur'an,2 one can clearly see with
1 Khwarizm was the area south of the Aral Sea on the lower course of the Amu Darya (Oxus
River). It now forms part of Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.
2 To observe the religio-moral standpoint of the Scripture on the downfall of the nations,
one need look at the following verse of the Qur'an: "We declared to the Children of Israel in the
Scripture, 'Twice you will spread corruption in the land and become highly arrogant.' When the
first of these warnings was fulfilled, We sent against you servants of Ours with great force, and
they ravaged your homes. That warning was fulfilled, but then We allowed you to prevail against
your enemy. We increased your wealth and offspring and made you more numerous-whether
you do good or evil it is to your own souls-and when the second warning was fulfilled [We sent
them] to shame your faces and enter the place of worship as they did the first time, and utterly
destroy whatever fell into their power. Your Lord may yet have mercy on you, but if you do the
same again, so shall We: We have made Hell a prison for those who defy [Our warning] (17:4-8).
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SAVIOURS OF ISLAMIC SPIRIT
the insight provided by scripture into the nature of the cycle of history: that
the reason for converting the Islamic world into a vast charnel house was
not a solitary act of cruelty on the part of a reckless and haughty sovereign.
As the Qur'an indicates, it was certainly not due to the mistake of a single
individual that the storm of death and destruction burst forth on the entire
world of Islam. If we were to cast a glance at the religious, moral, social, and
political conditions of the Muslim people in those days, there would be no
difficulty in finding out the reason for this calamity. Such a survey would
amply reveal that the carnage did not take place all of a sudden. It had deeper
and more far-reaching reasons than those narrated hitherto by historians.
We shall have to look for these reasons in the political situation and the social
condition of Muslim society a century or more before the Mongol invasion.
After the death of Salah al-Din in 589/1193, the vast empire carved out by
him split up into several independent principalities and kingdoms headed
by his sons or other successors. Like many other founders of an empire, his
successors did not possess the talent of their predecessor, and they fought
each other for a fairly long time. Some of these did not even hesitate to
seek the assistance of the Crusaders against their own brethren, an instance
of which has already been cited in the previous chapter. The whole of the
Islamic world was, in fact, in a state of chaos. Nowhere was to be found peace
and tranquility; a moral and social disintegration was at work, which was
clearly visible in the rapidly deteriorating political situation. The Crusaders
were again making inroads into the Muslim territories and had recaptured
lands emancipated from their clutches by Salah al-Din. All those factors had
already contributed to the repeated famines and epidemics. A fertile country
like Egypt was so devastated by the fratricidal warfare between Al-Malik
al-Adil and his nephew Al-Malik al-Afdal that when the Nile failed to flood
in 597/1201, the country was overtaken by such a severe famine that the people
had to resort to cannibalism.1 Death stalked over the land, killing people in
such large numbers that the dead had to be buried without shrouds. The
historian Abū Shāma relates that Sultan Al-Malik al-Adil provided shrouds
for 220,000 dead bodies in a single month. People began to take to canine
and human flesh without any feeling of revulsion; innumerable children
were eaten away. Ibn Kathir writes that a stage came when the children and
youth of tender age were all eaten up and people began to kill one another
to stay their hunger.2 These were grim reminders of Allah calling people to
1
Al-Bidāya wa '1-Nihaya,13:26.
2 Ibid.
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The Tartars: The Scourge of God
sincere repentance for their sins and mending their ways. The ravages of
famine and pestilence were followed by a severe and widespread earthquake
that hit a region spanning Syria, Asia Minor, and Iraq. The devastation and
destruction of the earthquake can be judged from the fact that in the town of
Nablus1 and its surrounding districts, 20,000 people were crushed in fallen
houses. Another historian writes in Mir'at al-Zaman that "eleven hundred
thousand"-that is, 1,100,000-people died in this earthquake.2
On the one hand, these natural calamities were visited upon the Islamic
world with unwelcome regularity; on the other, fratricidal feuds and forays
continued unabated. In 601/1205, two chieftains belonging to the same
family, Qatāda al-Husaynī of Makka and Salim al-Husaynī of Madīna, were
locked in heated battle.3 In 603/1206 the deadly feuds between the Ghorids
of Afghanistan and the ruler of Khwarizm flared up, which encouraged the
Muslims to waste their energy and power by shedding each other's blood.4
This was the state of affairs on the one side, while Christendom had mounted
another crusade on the other,5 barely two years after Salah al-Din's death,
and landed its forces on the Syrian coast in 604/1207. The rulers of Upper
Mesapotamia (Jazira) were secretly in league with the Franks6 in 607/1210,
while Damietta in Egypt, a city of considerable military importance, had
fallen to the Crusaders in 616/1219.7
In the caliphal metropolis of Islam, Baghdad, the magnificence and
splendor of the caliph's court, copied from the etiquettes and ceremonies
observed by the Arabian and Byzantine emperors, had touched the sum-
mit of extravagance. It is difficult to imagine the wealth amassed by such
personal servants of the caliphs as pages, cupbearers, wardrobe attendants,
who often entered service merely as slaves. The annual income from the
property acquired by 'Alā al-Din al-Țabrasī al-Zahirī, a slave purchased by
Caliph Zahir, is reported to have been as much as 3,000 dinars. The house he
built in Baghdad was outstanding in its size and beauty. Similar was the case
with other state officials: Mujahid al-Din Aybak al-Duwaydar al-Mustansiri
and Șalāh 'Abd al-Ghanī ibn Fakhir Firash, to name only two. The former
1 In the West Bank in present-day Palestine, also known as Shechem.
2 The estimate appears to be somewhat exaggerated.
3 Ibid., 13:41.
4 Ibid., 13:45.
5 A general tax known as the Saladin tithe was imposed in 1198 for the recovery of Palestine
by Pope Innocent the Third.
6 Ibid., 13:58-59.
7 Ibid., 13:79.
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SAVIOURS OF ISLAMIC SPIRIT
had an annual income of 500,000 dinars, while the latter, though an illiter-
ate man, lived like a prince. Historians have left staggering accounts of the
lavish expenditures on the weddings of their sons and daughters. On the
other hand, the teachers of the celebrated Madrasa Mustansiriyya were given
such paltry sums as didn't compare to the wages paid to the lowest-ranking
state official. The most erudite scholars and professors did not get more than
twelve dinars a month, while the servant of Sharabi, a governor under the
Abbasid regime, could spend 4,000 dinars on a wedding and pay 3,000 for
a bird brought to him from Mosul.1
Royal processions for the caliphs were held on 'Id, to mark the anniver-
sary of their accession to the throne and to seize upon this occasion as an
opportunity for ostentatious display of royal pomp and pageantry. The whole
of Baghdad came out to witness these processions in a free and easy mood,
amusing and entertaining themselves completely unconcerned even of the
obligatory congregational prayers. In 640/1242 the royal procession taken out
on the occasion of 'Id concluded after nightfall, with the result that most of
the people witnessing the procession performed the 'Id prayers just before
midnight.2 Again, in 644/1246, a large number of people missed the prayers
on the occasion of 'Id al-Adha and performed them at the time of sunset.
The usual mode of paying homage to the caliph was to bow almost to the
ground, or touch the ground with one's nose, but nobody even felt in it any-
thing opposed to the teachings of the Shari'a or degrading to the freedom and
honor of one's character. Confiscation of private property had become a com-
mon affair; illegal gratification by officials was widely prevalent; immodesty
and gross misconduct were on the rise. The Batinis, charlatans, and swindlers,
were basking in sunshine; everyone seemed to be after wealth; love of music
had grown almost into a craze. In short, the common pursuits of people and
the social and moral disintegration of society threw a lurid light on the state
of chaos then prevailing in the Muslim world.3
This was the time when the Mongols were devastating Turkistan and Iran
and were casting a covetous glance in the direction of Baghdad. "The year
626/1229 began," writes Ibn Kathir, "with the indecisive yet bloody battles
between the monarchs of the house of the Ayyubids." Such a state of chaos
prevailed in Baghdad, the center of the caliphate, that from 640/1242 to
643/1245, the caliph could make no arrangements for sending out hajj parties
1 For details, see Ibn al-Fūtī, Al-Hawādith al-Jāmia; Ghassanī, Al-Asjad al-Masbūk.
Al-Hawadith al-Jāmia, "Events of 640/1242," 141.
3 Nājī Ma'rūf, "Așr al-Sharābī bi-Baghdad," Al-Aqlām.
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The Tartars: The Scourge of God
nor for the re-shrouding of the Ka'ba. For twenty-one days, the walls of the
holy shrine remained without cover, which was taken by people as an ill omen
by the people. Ahmad Abū'l-Abbas succeeded his father, Caliph Mustadī', in
575/1180, taking the title Al-Nāșir li-Dīni 'Llah. He ruled for forty-six years.
His reign was the longest ever enjoyed by any Abbasid caliph yet perhaps also
the darkest of all the regimes in the House of 'Abbas. Historians have severely
criticized his regime for tyranny and misadministration. Writes Ibn al-Athir:
He was a tyrant who mistreated the populace. Iraq was a devastated land
during his reign. Much of its population migrated to neighboring countries,
and their possessions were confiscated by the caliph. He often gave contra-
dictory orders, rescinding orders he had issued a day earlier. ... Being much
too interested in sports and pastimes, he had prescribed a special uniform
which could be put on only by those permitted to take part in gymnastics
and athletics. His orders so severely curtailed the sports that these activities
practically came to an end in Iraq. His interest in entertainment had grown
almost into a craze. ... Iranians accuse him of inviting the Mongols to attack
the Muslim territories1 and hatching a conspiracy for the same.2
Al-Nāșir li-Dīni'Llah died in 622/1225, and a year later Al-Mustansir bi-'Llah
(r. 623-640/1226-1242) ascended the throne.3 He was a just, mild, benevolent,
and pious ruler, recalling the rightly guided caliphs, 4 but unfortunately he did
not get enough time to reform the administration. He was succeeded by his
son Al-Musta'șim bi-'Llah in 640/1242. He too was a pious and just sovereign
who never touched wine or indulged in indecent acts. He had committed
the Qur'an to memory and fasted the Mondays and Thursdays in addition
to the months of Ramadan and Rajab. He is reported to have been punctual
in the performance of prayers but, according to Ibn al-Athir, he was too mild,
lacked foresight, and was greedy and miserly in wealth matters.
In 642/1244, a man by the name of Mu'ayyid al-Din Muhammad ibn
al-Alqamī was appointed prime minister by Caliph Musta sim. Disorders
and disturbances were a source of constant trouble in Baghdad, especially
1 In order to weaken the kingdom of Khwarizm.
2 Al-Tārīkh al-Kāmil, 12:181.
3 Zāhir succeeded Nāșir in 622/1225, while Mustansir ascended the throne a year later in
623/1226, after Zahir's death.
4 Al-Bidāya wa 'I-Nihāya, 13:159.
5 His full name was Mu'ayyid al-Din Abu Țalib Muhammad ibn Ahmad ibn Alī Muhammad
al-'Alqamī.
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SAVIOURS OF ISLAMIC SPIRIT
when quarrel broke out between Sunnis and Shi'ites in 655/1257. It is reported
that in these riots the Shi'ite quarters, including those of the relatives of Ibn
al-'Alqamī, were plundered, which led him to seek revenge from the Sunnīs.1
Although the danger of the Mongol invasion was hovering over Baghdad, a
great reduction was made in the armed forces on the advice of Ibn al-Alqamī.
The cavalry were reduced to a mere 10,000, and their allowances and promo-
tions were withheld. The disbanded soldiers were directed to take to trade,
with the result that many of them were later on seen begging for alms in
bazaars and in front of mosques. Islam was reduced to the state of imbecil-
ity, which led many poets to compose elegies to lament the helplessness of
the Muslim peoples.2
Musta'sim was personally a man of righteous character. He also wanted
to reform the administration and bring peace and prosperity to the realm,
but he unfortunately lacked the courage, zeal, and capability of the found-
ers of empires, which alone could have saved the situation by breathing new
life into the then tottering society and the administration. It has happened
more than once that the last monarch of any ruling dynasty was just and wise,
virtuous, and humane, but that the degeneration of social and political order
had reached a point in his time where decay and downfall of the dynasty
was the only natural outcome. This was the case with Musta'sim, too, whom
divine providence had chosen to wear a badge of infamy, although he was
better than most of his predecessors and desired deeply to set right the fast
deteriorating situation.
It is doubtless true that a group of people, pure in spirit and righteous in
conduct, were there teaching and preaching in the mosques and seminaries
of Baghdad. But those with money and authority had grown so corrupt that
a historian of that age, Abū'l-Hasan al-Khazraji, had this to say in description
of the prevailing conditions:
The desire to acquire estates and possessions has become a craze with these
people, who never think of the community's welfare. They are so engrossed
in feathering their own nests that it can never be deemed as a rightful course.
The officials of the government are all tyrants who are obsessed with the idea
of amassing as much wealth as possible. . .. This is a most dangerous state of
affairs, for a government can coexist with unbelief but never with tyranny.3
1 Ibid., 13:196.
2 Ibid., 13:201.
3 Nājī Ma'rūf, "Așr al-Sharābī bi-Baghdad."
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The Tartars: The Scourge of God
In the eastern part of the Islamic world, the kingdom of Khwarizm, having
risen toward the end of the fifth century of the Muslim era on the ruins of
the Seljuq empire, held sway over a broad span of the Islamic territories,
excluding the dominion of Seljuq sultans over parts of Egypt, Syria, Iraq,
Hijaz, and Asia Minor, and that of the Ghorids in Afghanistan. Sultan 'Ala'
al-Din Muhammad Khwarizm Shah (r. 596-617/1200-1220) was one of the
most powerful Muslim monarchs, perhaps the greatest sovereign of his day.
Harold Lamb writes in his Genghiz Khan:
In the centre of Islam, Mohammed Shah of Kharesm had enthroned himself
as war lord. His domain extended from India to Baghdad, and from the sea of
Aral to the Persian Gulf. Except for the Seljuq Turks, victors over the crusad-
ers and the rising Memluk dynasty in Egypt, his authority was supreme. He
was the emperor, and the Kalif-who quarreled with him but might not deny
him-was restricted to the spiritual authority of a pope.1
Muslim historians have not mentioned any noticeable personal laxity in the
character or moral behavior of Khwarizm Shah. On the other hand, they
speak of him as a brave and chivalrous ruler, just and pious, but there is no
denying that he spent his prowess and capabilities in subjugating the Muslim
kingdoms around his dominions. He forced the Seljuqs in the northwest of
his territory to retreat to the farthest end, while restraining the westward
ambitions of the Ghorids by subjugating Khurasan, Mazandran,2 Kirman,
Ghazni and Transoxiana. These ceaseless wars of Khwarizm Shah had worn
out his troops, who had to strain every nerve in achieving the victories they
had so far. Apart from the phobia normally created by continuous warfare
over a long period of time, the conquest of the most fertile and industrially
developed areas had brought to the capital of Khwarizm Shah all that toll
and labor could produce, along with the attendant vices of opulence and
luxury. It is difficult to find any detailed account of these social ills in the
history of the time, most of which are concerned with the descriptions of
kings and emperors. Unfortunately, however, the treatises, sermons, and
various monographs and discourses of saints and preachers, which would
have thrown a lurid light on the subject, were all destroyed by the Mongolian
onslaught. There is hardly any reason to attribute the following statement by
Harold Lamb to religious prejudice or exaggeration:
1 Lamb, Genghiz Khan, 120.
2 Mazandran was a province to the south of Caspian Sea bounded on the west by Gilan, and
on the south by the province of Astarbad.
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SAVIOURS OF ISLAMIC SPIRIT
It was a martial world, appreciative of song, with an ear not unmusical. A
world beset by inward throes, slave-ridden, wealth gathering, and more than
a little addicted to vice and intrigue. It left the management of its affairs to
extortioners and its women to the custody of eunuchs, and its conscience to
the keeping of Allah.1
The sultans of Khwarizm made the same fatal mistake that the Moors in
Spain made-an unpardonable blunder under the divine law of retribution
governing the historical process. They set body and soul about extending and
strengthening the bounds of their domain and subjugating their enemies, but
they never tried to diffuse the final message of Allah Most High and enlist
adherents to their faith from the neighboring lands, which constituted a
world different from their own. Quite apart from the religious fervor which
should have diverted their energies toward this imperative task, common
sense as well as political foresight dictated the same course, which would
have permanently won over a vast but hostile population to their side, and
thus saved themselves and other Muslims from the tragic fate that was soon
to engulf all of them.
Such were the conditions when the Mongols issued forth from the steppes
of Mongolia under Genghis Khan2 and swooped down upon Iran and
Turkistan, the eastern part of the Islamic world, like a scourge from Allah. By
656/1258, the Mongols had reached the center of Islam, Baghdad, converting
it into a shambles, in seeming fulfillment of the Qur'anic dictum to "Guard
against a chastisement which cannot fall exclusively on those of you who are
wrongdoers, and know that Allah is severe in punishment" (Q 8:25).
Khwarizm Shah's Folly
The events that precipitated this calamity were that Genghis Khan sent a
message to Khwarizm Shah suggesting that, since each of them headed a
vast empire, it would be in their interest to encourage trade between their
subjects. He wanted traders be allowed to move freely between the two realms,
purchasing and selling their goods without any undue restriction. Khwarizm
Shah agreed to the proposal, and tradesmen began to ply freely between the
two kingdoms. The interchange of traders, however, was soon followed by
1 Genghiz Khan, 117.
2 Genghis Khan, whose name was Temujin, was proclaimed Khakan in 602/1206. He attacked
the dominions of Khwarizm Shah in 615/1218, and died in 624/1227. In 656/1258, the Mongols
invaded Baghdad under Hulagu.
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The Tartars: The Scourge of God
an act of folly which has been graphically described by Harold Lamb, whose
accounts agree with those left by Muslim historians.1 He says:
But the Mongol's experiment with trade came to an abrupt end. A caravan
of several hundred merchants from Karakorum was seized by one Inaljuk,2
governor of Otrar, a frontier citadel belonging to the Shah. Inaljuk reported
to his master that spies were among the merchants-which may very well
have been the case. Mohammed Shah, without considering the matter over
much, sent to his governor an order to slay the merchants, and all of them,
accordingly, were put to death. This, in due time, was reported to Genghis
Khan, who dispatched envoys at once to the Shah to protest. And Mohammed
saw fit to slay the chief of the envoys and burn off the beards of the others.
When the survivors of his embassy returned to Genghis Khan, the master
of the Gobi went apart to a mountain to meditate upon the matter. The slay-
ing of a Mongol envoy could not go unpunished; tradition required revenge
for the wrong inflicted. "There cannot be two suns in the heavens," the Khan
said, "or two Kha Khans upon the earth."3
The Tartar Invasion
Thus the storm burst in 616/1219. Bukhara was first razed to the ground and its
inhabitants put to the sword. Samarkand was reduced to ashes and its entire
population passed under the sword. Other important and populous cities like
Rayy,4 Hamdan,5 Zanjan,6 Qazwin,7 Merv,8 and Nishapur9 met the same fate.
The forces of Khwarizm Shah, the most powerful Muslim sovereign of his day,
were simply swept away by the tempest of Mongol arms. Khwarizm Shah was
himself hunted from place to place by the Tartars with ruthless determination.
He ultimately took refuge in an unknown island in the Caspian Sea, where
he died brokenhearted, alone and abandoned.
1 Al-Bidāya wa 'l-Nihāya, 13:200-204; Al-Tārīkh al-Kāmil, 13:149.
N
His name has been given as Kadar Khan ('Uthman, Țabagāt-i Nașīrī, 272).
3 Genghiz Khan, pp. 116-117.
4 Rayy, the ancient town of Ragha, to the southeast of modern Tehran and to the south of a
land spur projecting from Alborz into the plain.
5 Hamdan lies in the fertile plain at the foot of Mt. Elmend in Iran.
6 Zanjan, a town in northern Iran.
7 Qazwin, a town in Iran in the province of Persian Irak, 100 miles south of Tehran, at the
foot of the Alborz.
8 Merv, the principal town and center of culture in the rich oasis which occupied the lower
course of river Murghab, located near today's Mary in Turkmenistan.
9 Nishapur, the most important of the four great cities of Khurasan, it was one of the greatest
cities of the middle ages.
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SAVIOURS OF ISLAMIC SPIRIT
Muhammad Khwarizm Shah had already dismembered the independent
Islamic kingdoms of Iran and Turkistan, so nothing remained in the east to
check the onslaught of the Mongols after his defeat. The Muslims were so
seized with the terrors of the Mongols that often a lonely Tartar attacked a
hundred of them but none had the courage to defend himself: every one of
them was killed by the Tartar without opposition. Once a Mongol woman,
dressed as a man, plundered a house and killed all its inhabitants except
for a captive. It was only later that the captive somehow learned that the
marauder was a woman, and then he could muster his courage to kill her. It
often happened that a Mongol caught hold of a Muslim and asked him to
wait till he brought a saber to slaughter him, and this poor man did not have
the courage to run away in the absence of the Mongol.1
"The scourge of God" was the greatest of calamities before which almost the
entire world of Islam was swept away as by a torrent. It left the Muslims impo-
tent and terror-stricken. The Mongols come to be regarded as so invincible
that an Arabic proverb gained currency to the effect that if anyone tells you
the Tartars have suffered a defeat, don't believe him. Death and destruction
was a foregone conclusion for all the lands through which the Tartar hordes
passed. Palaces, mosques, and mausoleums were all leveled to the ground
and trampled to dust. Historians are normally prone to be objective in their
assessment of past events, but even such a cool and temperate historian as
Ibn al-Athir could not conceal his heartfelt emotion and feelings over the
havoc and ruin caused by the savage ardor of the Mongols for rapine and
slaughter. Speaking of these events in a harrowing strain, Ibn al-Athīr says:
These events are so frightful and heart-rending that for several years I was in
a fix whether I should narrate these happenings or not. But I have written
these facts most reluctantly. In truth and reality, it is not easy to recount the
tale of carnage and atrocities perpetrated on the Muslims, nor can one bear
with equanimity the abasement to which they were subjected. I quite wish
that my mother had not given me birth! Oh, would that I had died before I
had to relate this tale of woe! Some of my friends had insisted that I should
record these events, but I was still irresolute. Later it occurred on me that it
would yield no profit to forgo the task. The invasion of the Tartars was one
of the greatest of calamities and a most terrible visitation to which there is
no parallel in the history of the world. This calamity fell on all nations, but
on the Muslims more than all. If one were to claim that the world, since the
1 For details, see Al-Tārīkh al-Kāmil, vol. 12; Da'irat al-Ma'ārif, vol. 6.
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The Tartars: The Scourge of God
time Allah created it to the present, was never so afflicted, one would speak
truthfully. For history records no other event that approaches it, and perhaps
the world may not see its like again, except the calamity of Gog and Magog,
till the dawn of Judgment Day. The Tartars put to the sword all men, women,
and children, cut open the bellies of the pregnant women and trampled their
babies to death. Verily unto Allah do we belong and unto Him shall we return.
There is no power nor might but from Allah, the Most High, the Great. This
was an affliction which overwhelmed the entire world. Like a severe torrent
it suddenly swept over all the lands.1
The author of Mirsad al-Ibad (The Path of Allah's Slaves), who belonged to
Hamdan and was born in Rayy and was thus an eyewitness to the Mongol
invasion, has left the following account:
The year 617/1220 shall ever remain conspicuous in the histories of the world,
for the hordes of heathen Tartars gained ascendancy over the Muslims in that
year. The way they ravaged lands, killed people, and plundered and burned
cities has a parallel neither in the days of Ignorance nor since. . .. It is enough
to mention that in Rayy, where I was born and lived, in Turkistan, and in the
lands extending from Byzantium to Syria, more than seven hundred thousand
persons were either put to the sword or taken captive. The calamity befalling
Islam and its adherents is beyond description and the holocaust is rather too
well known to require any detailed enumeration. Allah forbid, none of the
monarchs and sovereigns of Islam felt the urge to defend the honor of Islam,
nor were they alive to their duty of coming to the rescue of their subjects, even
as they were like a shepherd unto their own people and would have to render
an account on Judgment Day in regard to their safety. It was their duty to have
strained every nerve to strengthen Islam and defend the faith, as Allah orders,
"Go forth, light-armed and heavy-armed, and strive with your wealth and your
lives in the way of Allah" [Q 9:41]. They should have sacrificed everything they
had-their lives, riches, dominions-for the honor of Islam. This would have
given heart to others and breathed a spirit of enthusiasm into the Muslims
that may have contained and turned back the onslaught of the heathens. But
now nothing remains except to seek the refuge of Allah. Whatever of Islam
is still visible is exposed to the danger of being completely effaced, leaving
no trace of it whatsoever.2
1 Al-Tārīkh al-Kāmil, 12:147-48.
2 Dāya Rāzī, Mirșād al-Ibād, 8-10.
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SAVIOURS OF ISLAMIC SPIRIT
Not the Muslims alone, but the entire civilized world trembled before the
savage Tartar hordes. Their atrocities had caused a flutter even in those
faraway corners of the then world where Tartars could have hardly been
expected to carry their arms. Edward Gibbon writes in his Decline and Fall
of the Roman Empire:
The Latin world was darkened by this cloud of savage hostility: a Russian
fugitive carried the alarm to Sweden; and the remote nations of the Baltic
and the ocean trembled at the approach of the Tartars, whom their fear and
ignorance were inclined to separate from the human species.1
The maddening frenzy for death and destruction aroused by Genghis Khan
among the Mongols and the significance of this upsurge has been well
summed up by the authors of the Cambridge Medieval History:
Unchecked by human valour, they were able to overcome the terrors of vast
deserts, the barriers of mountains and seas, the severities of climate, and the
ravages of famine and pestilence. No dangers could appall them, no stronghold
could resist them, no prayer for mercy could move them. . .. We are confronted
with a new power in history, with a force that was to bring to an abrupt end,
as a deus ex machina, many dramas that would otherwise have ended in a
deadlock, or would have dragged on an interminable course.2
Harold Lamb continues on the impact of Genghis Khan:
This "new power in history"-the ability of one man to alter human civiliza-
tion-began with Genghis Khan and ended with his grandson Kubilai, when
the Mongol empire tended to break up. It has not reappeared since.3
Sack of Baghdad
At last, in 656/1258, the myriad of savages and heathens advanced toward
Baghdad, killing every man that came in their way, setting fire to every habita-
tion, and trampling to dust whatever they could not possess. The metropolis of
1 Gibbon, The History of the Decline, 16. In the year 1238, the inhabitants of Gothia (Sweden)
and Frise were prevented, by their fear or the Tartars, from sending, as usual, their ships to the
herring fishery on the coast of England; and, as there was no exportation, forty or fifty of these
fish were sold for a shilling (Mathew Paris, 396). It is whimsical enough that the orders of a Mogul
Khan, who reigned on the borders of China, should have lowered the price of herrings in the
English markets.
2 Cited in Genghiz Khan, 210.
3 Genghiz Khan, 210.
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The Tartars: The Scourge of God
Islam, celebrated throughout the world as the center of civilization, learning,
and crafts, was reduced to ashes; the account of the sack of Baghdad is too
shocking and lengthy to give in detail here. Those given by contemporary
historians include some eyewitness accounts of the carnage and atrocities
committed by the Mongols. Ibn Kathir writes:
The horrors of rapine and slaughter lasted forty days, and, after the carnage
was over, the most populous and beautiful city of the world was so devas-
tated that only a few people could be seen here and there. All the streets and
markets were strewn with dead bodies; heaps of corpses were to be found
like small mounds from place to place. After the rains, the dead bodies began
to rot, giving off the foul stench of putrid flesh, and then a deadly pestilence
ravaged the town, spreading as far as the lands of Syria. Innumerable people
died of this plague. The ravages of horrid famine and pestilence and soaring
prices reigned over the city thereafter.1
Tāj al-Din al-Subkī gives his own account of the barbarous acts of Mongols:
Hulagu received the caliph [Musta'sim] in a tent while Ibn al-Alqamī invited
the scholars of religion and other notables of the city to be witness to the
agreement between Hulagu and the caliph. When they had repaired to the
Mongol camp, all were passed under the sword. They were called one by one
into a tent and beheaded until none of the caliph's chiefs and counselors
remained alive. It was commonly believed that if the blood of the caliph
fell to the ground, some great calamity would overtake the world. Hulagu
was therefore hesitant, but Nasir al-Din Țusī2 intervened to suggest that the
1 Al-Bidāya wa '1-Nihāya, 8:202-203 (summarized).
2 An Iranian historian (Mudarris Ridawī) confirms the incident in his book Ahwāl wa Āthār-i
Khwājā Nașīr al-Din al-Țusī, which has been published by Tehran University. He says that Țūsī was
at last successful in his endeavor to dismember the caliphate and to reduce the castle of the caliph
to dust. Hulagu had already been commissioned by his brother Mongke Khan to put an end to the
caliphate after destroying the Băținīs. Hulagu sent messages of submission to the caliph, but the
correspondences came to nothing. Thereafter Hulagu consulted his counselors whether or not the
stars were favorable for mounting an attack. They had strong belief in Astrology. A Sunnī astrologer,
Husam al-Din by name, who was in his court, advised Hulagu that the time was most inopportune
for launching an attack on Baghdad, and that anyone who desired to harm the caliph at that hour
would be defeated and suffer a grievous loss. Husam al-Din said that if Hulagu persisted in his
attempt, there would be no rains, torrents and hurricanes would devastate the world, and, what is
more, the khan would be dead. Hulagu was dismayed, but he asked Țūsī (who was also present),
"What would happen if I attack Baghdad?" "Nothing," replied Tusĩ, "except that the khan will be
monarch in place of the caliph." Thereupon Hulagu ordered Țusī and Husam al-Din to debate
the issue before him. "Thousands of the Prophetic Companions were killed," argued Țūsī, "yet
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SAVIOURS OF ISLAMIC SPIRIT
problem could easily be solved. The caliph should be killed, he suggested, in
a way that his blood did not fall on the ground. The caliph was accordingly
rolled up in a carpet and beaten to death.1
Wholesale massacre continued in Baghdad for more than a month. Only
those could save themselves who were able to find a hiding place. Hulagu
then ordered, it is related, to count the dead, who numbered eighteen hun-
dred thousand.2
Christians were asked to take bacon and wine publicly. Although it was the
month of Ramadan, the Muslims of Baghdad were compelled to participate
in these drinking bouts. Wine was sprinkled in the mosques, and the call
for prayer was prohibited. Nothing so despicable had happened since the
foundations of Baghdad were laid: the city had come under heathen rule for
the first time and had never before undergone such humiliation.3
In spite of all its vices and weaknesses, Baghdad was the metropolis of
Islam, a center of learning, arts, and crafts, as well as a city of mosques and
shrines, saints and preachers. Its destruction made the heart of every Muslim
bleed; the heart-rending account of its ruin was rendered by many poets
into songs of mourning. The poet Sa'di of Shiraz, who had lived in Baghdad
during his student days and seen the city in its heyday, describes the fall of
Baghdad in language that shows the depth of his anguish:
The heaven would be justified if it shed tears of blood,
At the destruction of the kingdom of Musta'sim, the Leader of the faithful.
If you will rise on the Day of Judgment, O Muhammad,
Rise now to see the most severe affliction.
The blood of beauties slaughtered in the castle,
Overflows the gates of the palace and our tears stain our garments.
Beware of the turn of time and its vicissitudes;
For who knew the glorious would come to such an abrupt end.
Lo! you had seen the glory of the house of caliphs,
Where the caesars and khakans bowed low in obeisance.
nothing happened. Even if you attribute any special piety and charismatic power to the Abbasids,
look at Tahir, who killed Amin under the orders of Ma'mun, or Mutawakkil, who was strangled to
death by his sons and slaves, or else Muntasir and Mu'tadid, who were done in by their chiefs and
guards. Did any calamity ever overtake the world?" (Ridawī, Ahwal wa Āthār, 9-19).
1 Țabagāt al-Shafi'iyya, 5:114-15.
2 Some historians have given a lower estimate, but the figure should not be greatly off the mark,
for Baghdad had then a population of around two and a half million (Tabaqat al-Shafi'iyya, 5:115).
3 Țabagāt al-Shafi'iyya, 5:115.
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The Tartars: The Scourge of God
The blood of the progeny of Muhammad's uncle
Is shed on the very earth where the sultans placed their heads.
Colored with blood, the waters of the Tigris will turn the ground red
If it flows to irrigate the desert oasis of Batha'.1
Defaced by the calamity it has had to suffer,
Wrinkles of waves are seen on the face of the Tigris.
No elegy is really befitting the elevated souls,
Whose minimum reward is the bliss of Allah in Paradise.
I am shedding my tears only in sympathy,
For Muslims they were, and I hold them dear.2
From Baghdad, the Mongol hordes marched on to Aleppo, sacked the city, and
turned to Damascus. They captured Damascus in Jumādā 'I-Ūla 658 (April
1260). The Christian inhabitants of the city came out with presents to greet
the conquerors. Ibn Kathir, a native of Damascus, portrays the Christians'
elation and the Muslims' helplessness in these words:
The Christians came back by the Gate of Toma, carrying the cross over their
heads and shouting slogans. They were praising Christianity and openly dis-
paraging Islam and the Muslims. They bore flasks of wine, which they sprin-
kled in front of the mosques and on the faces of Muslims they happened to
pass by, ordering the Muslims to pay homage to their emblem. Muslims could
not restrain themselves for long and gathered in large numbers and pushed
them back to the Cathedral of Mary, where a Christian clergyman delivered
a speech praising Christianity and denigrating Islam and its followers.3
Thereafter Ibn Kathir continues his description on the authority of Qutb
al-Din al-Yūnīnī's Dhayl al-Mir'āt,
The Christians then entered the mosque with wine in hand. They intended
to pull down a number of mosques in case the reign of the Tartars continued
for some time more. Scholars, judges, and other Muslim notables repaired to
the citadel of the Tartar governor, Ibil Siyan, to make a complaint about the
excesses of the Christians, but he turned them out. Ibil Siyan gave audience
to the Christians, however. To Allah indeed do we belong and to Him shall
we return.4
1 Madīna Munawwara.
2
Sa'dī, Qașa'id wa Dīwan, 56-57.
3 Al-Bidāya wa 'I-Nihaya, 13:219-20.
4 Ibid., 8:219-20.
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SAVIOURS OF ISLAMIC SPIRIT
After the fall of Syria, the Mongols wanted to carry their arms to Egypt, which
was the only Muslim country still out of their reach. The sultan of Egypt,
Al-Malik al-Muzaffar Sayf al-Din Qutuz, knew that his country would be the
Mongols' next target, and that it would be difficult to hold those savages off
if they were allowed to make adequate preparations for invading his lands.
He therefore decided to attack the Mongols in Syria before they were
able to consolidate their power. The forces of Egypt accordingly met the
Mongols at 'Ayn Jālut, a town below Nazareth in Palestine, on 25 Ramadan
658 (3 September 1260), under the command of Baybars, who afterward
became the sovereign of Egypt. Unlike at previous battles, the Muslims met
the Mongols in hotly contested combat and drove back the stream of sav-
age hordes. The Egyptians pursued the defeated Mongols, slaughtering and
capturing a large number of them, eastward beyond the Euphrates. Suyūtī
writes in Tārīkh al-Khulafa':
The Muslims were victorious, by the grace of Allah, and they inflicted a griev-
ous defeat on the Tartars. A large number of Tartars were put to the sword.
The retreating Tartars were so disheartened that people easily caught hold of
them and despoiled them of their possessions."1
Sultan Al-Malik al-Zahir Baybars defeated the Tartars in many a fierce battles
after the battle of 'Ayn Jalut and thus disproved the proverb that the Tartars
were invincible.
Mongol Conversion
Islam was about to be submerged in a ferocious whirlpool of Mongol slaughter
and destruction that threatened to wipe it out of existence, of which several
Muslim writers had expressed fear. But Islam suddenly began to capture the
hearts of the savage Tartars. The preachers of Islam thus accomplished a
task that the sword-arm of the faith had failed to perform, by carrying the
message of Islam to the barbaric hordes of heathen Mongols.
The Mongol conversion to Islam was indeed one of the few unpredictable
events of history. The Tartar wave of conquest that had swept away the entire
Islamic east within a short period of one year was, in truth, not so astound-
ing as the Mongol acceptance of Islam during the zenith of their glory; for
the Muslims had by the beginning of the seventh century of the Muslim era
imbibed all those vices that are the natural outcome of opulence, luxury, and
1 Suyūțī, Tārīkh al-Khulafā', 191.
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The Tartars: The Scourge of God
fast living. The Mongols were, on the other hand, a wild and ferocious, yet
vigorous and sturdy, race who could have hardly been expected to submit
to the spiritual and cultural superiority of a people who were so completely
subdued, so disdained and despised, by them. The author of the Preaching
of Islam, T. W. Arnold, expresses his amazement at this unbelievable feat:
But Islam was to rise again from the ashes of its former grandeur and through
its preachers win over these savage conquerors to the acceptance of the faith.
This was a task for the missionary energies of Islam that was rendered more
difficult from the fact that there were two powerful competitors in the field.
The spectacle of Buddhism, Christianity and Islam emulously striving to win
the allegiance of the fierce conquerors that had set their feet on the necks of
adherents of these great missionary religions, is one that is without parallel
in the history of the world'. . .
For Islam to enter into competition with such powerful rivals as Buddhism
and Christianity were at that time, must have appeared a well-nigh hope-
less undertaking. For the Muslims had suffered more from the storm of the
Mongol invasions than the others. Those cities that had hitherto been the
rallying points of spiritual organization and learning for Islam in Asia, had
been for the most part laid in ashes: the theologians and pious doctors of
the faith, either slain or carried away into captivity.2 Among the Mongol rul-
ers-usually so tolerant towards all religions-there were some who exhibited
varying degrees of hatred toward the Muslim faith. Jingis Khan ordered all
those who killed animals in the Muhammadan fashion to be put to death,
and this ordinance was revived by Khubilay Khan, who by offering rewards
to informers set on foot a sharp persecution that lasted for seven years, as
many poor persons took advantage of this ready means of gaining wealth,
and slaves accused their masters, in order to gain their freedom.3 During
the reign of Kuyuk Khan (644-646/1246-1248), who left the conduct of
affairs entirely to his two Christian ministers and whose court was filled with
Christian monks, the Muhammadans were made to suffer great severities.
1 Arnold, The Preaching of Islam, p. 219.
2 So notoriously brutal was the treatment they received that even the Chinese showmen
in their exhibitions of shadow figures exultingly brought forward the figure of an old man with
a white beard dragged by the neck at the tail of a horse, as showing how the Mongol horsemen
behaved toward the Musalmans (H. Howorth, History of the Mongols, 1:159).
3 This edict was only withdrawn when it was found that it prevented Muhammadan merchants
from visiting the court and that trade suffered in consequence (History of the Mongols, 1:112, 273;
Țabagāt-i Nașīrī, 1146).
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SAVIOURS OF ISLAMIC SPIRIT
Arghūn (683-690/1284-1291) the fourth Ilkhan persecuted the Musalmans
and took away from them all posts in the departments of justice and finance,
and forbade them to appear at his court.
In spite of all difficulties however, the Mongols and the savage tribes that
followed in their wake were at length brought to submit to the faith of those
Muslim peoples whom they had crushed beneath their feet.1
As unbelievable and of far-reaching significance as the Mongol conversion
to Islam may have been, it is also not less surprising that extremely few and
scant records of this glorious achievement are to be found in the history of the
time. The names of only a few dedicated saviors of Islam who won converts
from the savage hordes are known to the world, but their venture was no less
daring, nor their achievement less significant, than the accomplishment of the
warriors of the faith. Their memory shall always be enriched by the gratitude
of Muslims, for they had, in reality, performed a great service to humanity
in general and to the Muslims in particular, by disseminating knowledge of
faith among those barbarians, winning them over to the service of One God
and making them the standard-bearers of the apostle of peace.
After Genghis Khan's death, the great heritage of that Mongol conqueror
was divided into four dominions headed by the offspring of his sons. The
message of Islam had begun to spread among all these four sections of the
Mongols, who were rapidly converted to the faith. Regarding the conversion
of the ruling princes in the lineage of Batu, the son of Jochi, Genghis Khan's
first-born, who ruled the western portion as khan of the Golden Horde,
Arnold writes:
The first Mongol ruling prince who professed Islam was Baraka Khan, who
was chief of the Golden Horde from 654/1256 to 666/1267. He is said one day
to have fallen in with a caravan coming from Bukhara, and taking two of the
merchants aside, to have questioned them on the doctrines of Islam, and
they expounded to him their faith so persuasively that he became converted
in all sincerity. He first revealed his change of faith to his youngest brother,
whom he induced to follow his example, and then made open profession of
his new belief. After his conversion, Baraka Khan entered into a close alliance
with the Mamlūk Sultan of Egypt, Ruknu-d Din Baybars. The initiative came
from the latter, who had given a hospitable reception to a body of troops, two
hundred in number, belonging to the Golden Horde; these men, observing the
1 The Preaching of Islam, 225-227.
260