CHAPTER VIII.
THE SPREAD
OF ISLAM AMONG
THE MONGOLS AND TATARS.
There is no event in the history of Islam that for
terror and desolation can be compared to the Mongol conquest. Like an
avalanche, the hosts of Chingīz Khān swept over the centres of Muslim
culture and civilisation, leaving behind them bare deserts and shapeless ruins
where before had stood the palaces of stately cities, girt about with gardens
and fruitful corn-land. When the Mongol army had marched out of the city of
Herāt, a miserable remnant of forty persons crept out of their hiding-places
and gazed horror-stricken on the ruins of their beautiful city—all that were
left out of a population of over 100,000. In Bukhārā, so famed for its
men of piety and learning, the Mongols stabled their horses in the sacred
precincts of the mosques and tore up the Qur'āns to serve as litter; those of
the inhabitants who were not butchered were carried away into captivity and
their city reduced to ashes. Such too was the fate of Samarqand, Balkh and
many another city of Central Asia, which had been the glories of Islamic
civilisation and the dwelling-places of holy men and the seats of sound
learning —such too the fate of Baghdād that for centuries had been the
capital of the 'Abbāsid dynasty.
Well might the Muhammadan historian shudder to relate
such horrors; when Ibn al-Athīr comes to describe the inroads of the
Mongols into the countries of Islam, " for many years," he tells us,
" I shrank from giving a recital of these events on account of their
magnitude and my abhorrence. Even now I come reluctant to the task, for who
would deem it a light thing to sing the death-song of Islam and of the Muslims,
or find it easy to tell this tale ? O that my mother had not given me birth ! '
Oh would that I had died ere this, and been a thing forgotten, forgotten quite
!'[1] Many friends have urged me and still I stood
irresolute; but I saw that it was of no profit to forego the task and so I thus
resume. I shall have to describe events so terrible and calamities so
stupendous that neither day nor night have ever brought forth the like; they
fell on all nations, but on the Muslims more than all; and were one to say that
since God created Adam the world has not seen the like, he would but tell the
truth, for history has nothing to relate that at all approaches it. Among the
greatest calamities in history is the slaughter that Nebuchadnezzar wrought
among the children of Israel and his destruction of the Temple; but what is
Jerusalem in comparison to the countries that these accursed ones laid waste,
every town of which was far greater than Jerusalem, and what were the children
of Israel in comparison to those they slew, since the inhabitants of one of the
cities they destroyed were greater in numbers than all the children of Israel ?
Let us hope that the world may never see the like again."[2]
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.
Before entering on a recital of this struggle, it will
be well in order to the comprehension of what is to follow briefly to glance at
the partition of the Mongol empire after the death of Chingīz Khān, when
it was split up into four sections and divided among his sons. His third son,
Ogotāy, succeeded his father as Khāqān and received as his share the eastern
portion of the empire, in which Qūbīlāy afterwards included the whole of China.
Chaghatāy the second son took the middle kingdom. Bātū, the son of his
first-born Jūjī, ruled the western portion as Khān of the Golden Horde;
Tulūy the fourth son took Persia, to which Hūlāgū, who founded the dynasty of
the Īlkhāns, added a great part of Asia Minor.
The primitive religion of the Mongols was Shamanism,
which while recognising a supreme God, offered no prayers to Him, but
worshipped a number of inferior divinities, especially the evil spirits whose
powers for harm had to be deprecated by means of sacrifices, and the souls of
ancestors who were considered to exercise an influence on the lives of their
descendants. To propitiate these powers of the heaven and of the lower world,
recourse was had to the Shamans, wizards or medicine-men, who were credited
with possessing mysterious influence over the elements and the spirits of the
departed. Their religion was not one that was calculated to withstand long the
efforts of a proselytising faith, possessed of a systematic theology capable
of satisfying the demands of the reason and an organised body of religious
teachers, when once the Mongols had been brought into contact with civilised
races, had responded to their civilising influences and begun to pass out of
their nomadic barbarism. It so happened that the civilised races with which the
conquest of the Mongols brought them in contact comprised large numbers of
Buddhists, Christians and Muhammadans, and the adherents of these three great
missionary faiths entered into rivalry with one another for the conversion of
their conquerors. When not carried away by the furious madness for destruction
and insult that usually characterised their campaigns, the Shamanist Mongols
showed themselves remarkably tolerant of other religions, whose priests were
exempted from taxation and allowed perfect freedom of worship. Buddhist priests
held controversies with the Shamans in the presence of Chingīz Khan;
and at the courts of Mangū Khān and Qūbīlāy the Buddhist and Christian
priests and the Muslim Imāms alike enjoyed the patronage of the Mongol prince.[3]
In the reign of the latter monarch the Mongols in China began to yield to the
powerful influences of the surrounding Buddhism, and by the beginning of the
fourteenth century the Buddhist faith seems to have gained a complete ascendancy
over them.[4]
It was the Lamas of Tibet who showed themselves most zealous in this work of
conversion, and the people of Mongolia to the present day cling to the same
faith, as do the Kalmuks who migrated to Russia in the seventeenth century.
Although Buddhism made itself finally supreme in the
eastern part of the empire, at first the influence of the Christian Church was
by no means inconsiderable and great hopes were entertained of the conversion
of the Mongols. The Nestorian missionaries in the seventh century had carried
the knowledge of the Christian faith from west to east across Asia as far as
the north of China, and scattered communities were still to be found in the
thirteenth century. The famous Prester John, around whose name cluster so many
legends of the Middle Ages, is supposed to have been the chief of the Karaïts,
a Christian Tartar tribe living to the south of Lake Baikal. When this tribe
was conquered by Chingīz Khān, he married one of the daughters of the
then chief of the tribe, while his son Ogotāy took a wife from the same family.
Ogotāy's son, Kuyūk, although he did not himself become a Christian, showed
great favour towards this faith, to which his chief minister and one of his
secretaries belonged. The Nestorian priests were held in high favour at his
court and he received an embassy from Pope Innocent IV.[5]
The Christian powers both of the East and the West looked to the Mongols to
assist them in their wars against the Musalmans. It was Hayton, the Christian
King of Armenia, who was mainly instrumental in persuading Mangū Khān
to despatch the expedition that sacked Baghdād under the leadership of
Hūlāgū,[6]
the influence of whose Christian wife led him to show much favour to the
Christians, and especially to the Nestorians. Many of the Mongols who occupied
the countries of Armenia and Georgia were converted by the Christians of these
countries and received baptism.[7]
The marvellous tales of the greatness and magnificence of Prester John, that
fired the imagination of mediaeval Europe, had given rise to a belief that the
Mongols were Christians—a belief which was further strengthened by the false
reports that reached Europe of the conversion of various Mongol princes and
their zeal for the Christian cause. It was under this delusion that St. Louis
sent an ambassador, William of Rubruck, to exhort the great Khāqān to
persevere in his supposed efforts for the spread of the Christian faith. But
these reports were soon discovered to be without any foundation in fact, though
William of Rubruck found that the Christian religion was freely tolerated at
the court of Mangū Khān, and the adhesion of some few Mongols to this
faith made the Christian priests hopeful of still further conquests. But so
long as Latins, Greeks, Nestorians and Armenians carried their theological
differences into the very midst of the Mongol camp, there was very little hope
of much progress being made, and it is probably this very want of union among
the preachers of Christianity that caused their efforts to meet with so little
success among the Mongols; so that while they were fighting among one another,
Buddhism and Islam were gaining a firm footing for themselves. The haughty
pretensions of the Roman Pontiff soon caused the proud conquerors of half the
world to withdraw from his emissaries what little favour they might at first
have been inclined to show, and many other circumstances contributed to the
failure of the Roman mission.[8]
As for the Nestorians, who had been first in the
field, they appear to have been too degraded and apathetic to take much
advantage of their opportunities. Of the Nestorians in China, William of
Rubruck[9]
says that they were very ignorant and could not even understand their service
books, which were written in Syriac. He accuses them of drunkenness, polygamy
and covetousness, and makes an unfavourable comparison between their lives and
those of the Buddhist priests. Their bishop paid them very rare
visits—sometimes only once in fifty years : on such occasions he would ordain
all the male children, even the babies in their cradles. The priests were eaten
up with simony, made a traffic of the sacred rites of their Church and
concerned themselves more with money-making than with the propagation of the
faith.[10]
In the western parts of the Mongol empire, where the
Christians looked to the newly-risen power to help them in their wars with the
Musalmans and to secure for them the possession of the Holy Land, the alliance
between the Christians and the Īlkhāns of Persia was short-lived, as the
victories of Baybars, the Mamlūk Sultan of Egypt (1260—1277) and his alliance
with Baraka Khān, gave the Īlkhāns quite enough to do to look after
their own interests. The excesses that the Christians of Damascus and other
cities committed during the brief period in which they enjoyed the favour of
this Mongol dynasty of Persia, did much to discredit the Christian name in
Western Asia.[11]
In the course of the struggle, the adherents of either
faith were at times guilty of much brutality. One example may be taken from the
middle of the thirteenth century as told by al-Jūzjānī, who claims to have
heard the story, while in Delhi, from the lips of a certain Sayyid Ashraf
al-Dīn who had come there from Samarqand. "The eminent Sayyid thus
related, that one of the Christians of Samarqand attained unto the felicity of
Islam, and the Musalmans of Samarqand, who are staunch in their faith, paid him
great honour and reverence, and conferred great benefits upon him.
Unexpectedly, one of the haughty Mongol infidels of China, who possessed power
and influence, and the inclinations of which accursed one were towards the
Christian faith, arrived at Samarqand. The Christians of that city repaired to
that Mongol, and complained saying: ' The Musalmans are enjoining our children
to turn away from the Christian faith and from serving Jesus—on whom be
peace—and calling upon them to follow the religion of Muṣṭafặ[12]—on
whom be peace— and, in case that gate becomes unclosed, the whole of our
dependents will turn away from the Christian faith. By thy power and authority
devise a settlement of our case. The Mongol commanded that the youth, who had
turned Musalman, should be produced, and they tried with blandishment and
kindness, and money and wealth to induce the newly-converted Musalman to
recant, but he refused to recant, and put not off from his heart and spirit
that garment of freshness—the Muslim faith. The Mongol ruler then turned over a
leaf in his temper, and began to speak of severe punishment; and every
punishment, which it was in his power to inflict, or his severity to devise, he
inflicted upon the youth, who, from his great zeal for the faith of Islam, did
not recant, and did not in any way cast away from his hand the sweet draught of
religion through the blow of infidel perverseness. As the youth continued firm
in the true faith, and paid no heed to the promises and threats of that
depraved company, the accursed Mongol commanded that they should bring the
youth to public punishment; and he departed from the world in the felicity of
religion—may God reward and requite him !—and the Musalman community in
Samarqand were overcome with despondency and consternation in consequence. A
petition was got up, and was attested with the testimony of the chief men and
credible persons of the Musalman religion dwelling at Samarqand, and we
proceeded with that petition to the camp of Baraka Khān, and presented to him
an account of the proceedings and disposition of the Christians of that city.
Zeal for the Muslim religion was manifested in the mind of that monarch of
exemplary faith, and the defence of the truth became predominant in his
disposition. After some days, he showed honour to this Sayyid, appointed a body
of Turks and confidential persons among the chief Musalmans, and commanded that
they should slaughter the Christian company who had committed that dire
oppression, and despatch them to hell. When that mandate had been obtained, it
was preserved until that wretched sect had assembled in the church, then they
seized them all together, and despatched the whole of them to hell, and
reduced the church again to bricks."[13]
For Islam to enter into competition with such powerful
rivals as Buddhism and Christianity were at the outset of the period of Mongol
rule, must have appeared a well-nigh hopeless 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 organisation 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.[14]
Among the Mongol rulers—usually so tolerant towards all religions—there were
some who exhibited varying degrees of hatred towards the Muslim faith. Chingīz
Khān ordered all those who killed animals in the Muhammadan fashion to
be put to death, and this ordinance was revived by Qūbīlāy, 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.[15]
During the reign of Kuyūk (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.[16]
A contemporary historian, al-Jūzjānī, gives the
following account of the kind of treatment to which a Muhammadan theologian
might be exposed at the court of Kuyūk. "Trustworthy persons have related
that Kuyūk was constantly being incited by the Buddhist priests to acts of
oppression towards the Musalmans and the persecution of the faithful. There was
an Imām in that country, one of the men of learning among the Muslims . . .
named Nūr-al-Dīn, al-Khwārazmī. A number of Christian laymen and priests
and a band of idol-worshipping Buddhist priests made a request to Kuyūk, asking
him to summon that Imām of the Musalmans that they might hold a
controversy with him and get him to prove the superiority of the
faith of Muḥammad and his prophetic mission—otherwise, he should
be put to death. The Khan agreed, the Imām was
sent for, and a discussion ensued upon the claim of Muḥammad
to be a prophet and the manner of his life as compared with that of other
prophets. At length, as the arguments of those accursed ones were
weak and devoid of the force of truth, they withdrew their hand from
contradiction and drew the mark of oppression and outrage on
the pages of the business and asked Kuyūk Khān to tell
the Imām to perform two genuflexions in prayer,
according to the rites and ordinances of the Muhammadan law,
in order that his unbecoming movements in the performance
of this act of worship might become manifest to them and
to the Khān." Kuyūk gave the
order accordingly, and the Imam and another Musalman who was with him performed
the ritual of the prayer according to the prescribed forms.
"When the godly Imam and the other Musalman who was with him,
had placed their foreheads on the ground in the act of
prostration, some infidels whom Kuyūk had summoned, greatly
annoyed them and knocked their heads with force upon the
ground, and committed other abominable acts against them.
But that godly Imām endured all this oppression and annoyance and
performed all the required forms and ceremonies of the prayer
and in no way curtailed it. When he had repeated the salutation, he
lifted up his face towards heaven and observed the form of '
Invoke your Lord with humility and in secret,' and having asked
permission to depart, he returned unto his own house."[17]
Arghūn (1284-1291) the fourth Īlkhān 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.[18]
In spite of all difficulties, however, the Mongols and the savage tribes that followed in their wake[19]
were at length brought to submit to the faith of those Muslim peoples whom
they had crushed beneath their feet. Unfortunately history sheds little light
on the progress of this missionary movement and only a few details relating to
the conversion of the more prominent converts have been preserved to us.
Scattered up and down throughout the length and breadth of the Mongol empire,
there must have been many of the followers of the Prophet who laboured
successfully and unknown, to win unbelievers to the faith. In the reign of Ogotāy
(1229-1241), we read of a certain Buddhist governor of Persia, named Kurguz,
who in his later years abjured Buddhism and became a Musalman.[20]
In the reign of Tīmūr Khān (1323-1328), Ānanda, a grandson of Qūbīlāy
and viceroy of Kan-Su, was a zealous Musalman and had converted a great many
persons in Tangut and won over a large number of the troops under his command
to the same faith. He was summoned to court and efforts were made to induce him
to conform to Buddhism, and on his refusing to abandon his faith he was cast
into prison. But he was shortly after set at liberty, for fear of an insurrection
among the inhabitants of Tangut, who were much attached to him.[21]
The author of the Muntakhab
al-Tawārīkh asserts that Ānanda built four mosques in Khānbāligh
(the modern Peking), which provided accommodation for 1,000,000 men at the time
of the Friday prayer; but no credence can be given to this or to his other
statements regarding the spread of Islam in China, in view of the fact that he
represents Ānanda to have been the successor of Tīmūr Khān on the
imperial throne and gives an entirely fictitious account of his descendants,
several of whom are represented as having professed Islam, though none of the
five had any existence except in the imagination of the writer.[22]
The first Mongol ruling
prince who professed Islam was Baraka Khān, who was chief of the Golden
Horde from 1256 to 1267.[23]
According to Abu'l-Ghazi he was converted after he had come to the throne. He
is said one day to have fallen in with a caravan coming from Bukhārā,
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.[24]
But, according to al-Jūzjanī, Baraka Khān was brought up as a Musalman
from infancy, and, as soon as he was old enough to learn, was taught the Qur'an
by one of the 'Ulamā of the city of Khujand.[25]
The same author (who compiled his history during the lifetime of Baraka Khān),
states that the whole of his army was Musalman. "Trustworthy persons have
also related that, throughout his whole army, it is the etiquette for every
horseman to have a prayer-carpet with him, so that, when the time for prayer
arrives, they may occupy themselves in their devotions. Not a person in his
whole army takes any intoxicating drink whatever; and great 'Ulamā, consisting
of commentators, traditionists, jurists, and disputants, are in his society. He
has a great number of religious books, and most of his receptions and debates
are with 'Ulamā. In his place of audience debates on ecclesiastical law
constantly take place; and, in his faith, as a Musalman, he is exceedingly
strict and orthodox."[26]
Baraka Khān entered into a close alliance with the Mamlūk Sultan
of Egypt, Rukn al-Dīn 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 growing enmity between
their Khān and Hūlāgū, the conqueror of Baghdād, in whose army
they were serving, took flight into Syria, whence they were honourably conducted
to Cairo to the court of Baybars, who persuaded them to embrace Islam.[27]
Baybars himself was at war with Hulagu, whom he had recently, defeated and
driven out of Syria. He sent two of the Mongol fugitives, with some other
envoys, to bear a letter to Baraka Khān. On their return these envoys
reported that each princess and amir at the court of Baraka Khān had an
imām and a mu'adhdhin, and the children were taught the Qur'an in the
schools.[28]
These friendly relations between Baybars and Baraka Khān brought many of
the Mongols of the Golden Horde into Egypt, where they were prevailed upon to
become Musalmans.[29]
In Persia, where Hūlāgū
founded the dynasty of the Ilkhāns, the progress of Islam among the
Mongols was much slower. In order to strengthen himself against the attacks of
Baraka Khān and the Sultan of Egypt, Hūlāgū accepted the alliance of the
Christian powers of the East, such as the king of Armenia and the Crusaders.
His favourite wife was a Christian and favourably disposed the mind of her
husband towards her co-religionists, and his son Abāqā Khān married the
daughter of the Emperor of Constantinople. Though Abāqā Khān did not
himself become a Christian, his court was filled with Christian priests, and he
sent envoys to several of the princes of Europe—St. Louis of France, King
Charles of Sicily and King James of Aragon—to solicit their alliance against
the Muhammadans; to the same end also, an embassy of sixteen Mongols was sent
to the Council of Lyons in 1274, where the spokesman of this embassy embraced
Christianity and was baptised with some of his companions. Great hopes were
entertained of the conversion of Abāqā, but they proved fruitless. His brother
Takūdār,[30]
who succeeded him, was the first of the Īlkhāns who embraced Islam. He
had been brought up as a Christian, for (as a contemporary Christian writer[31]
tells us), "he was baptised when young and called by the name of Nicholas.
But when he was grown up, through his intercourse with Saracens of whom he was
very fond, he became a base Saracen, and, renouncing the Christian faith,
wished to be called Maḥammad Khān, and strove with all his might that
the Tartars should be converted to the faith and sect of Muḥammad,
and when they proved obstinate, not daring to force them, he brought about
their conversion by giving them honours and favours and gifts, so that in his
time many Tartars were converted to the faith of the Saracens." This
prince sent the news of his conversion to the Sultan of Egypt in the following
letter:—" By the power of God Almighty, the mandate of Aḥmad to the Sultan
of Egypt. God Almighty (praised be His name!) by His grace preventing us and by
the light of His guidance, hath guided us in our early youth and vigour into
the true path of the knowledge of His deity and the confession of His unity,
to bear witness that Muḥammad (on whom rest the highest blessings !) is the
Prophet of God, and to reverence His saints and His pious servants. 'Whom God
shall please to guide, that man's breast will He open to Islam.[32]
We ceased not to incline our heart to the promotion of the faith and the
improvement of the condition of Islam and the Muslims, up to the time when the
succession to the empire came to us from our illustrious father and brother,
and God spread over us the glory of His grace and kindness, so that in the
abundance of His favours our hopes were realised, and He revealed to us the
bride of the kingdom, and she was brought forth to us a noble spouse. A Qūriltāy
or general assembly was convened, wherein our brothers, our sons, great nobles,
generals of the army and captains of the forces, met to hold council; and they
were all agreed on carrying out the order of our elder brother, viz. to summon
here a vast levy of our troops whose numbers would make the earth, despite its
vastness, appear too narrow, whose fury and fierce onset would fill the hearts
of men with fear, being animated with a courage before which the mountain peaks
bow down, and a firm purpose that makes the hardest rocks grow soft. We
reflected on this their resolution which expressed the wish of all, and we
concluded that it ran counter to the aim we had in view—to promote the common
weal, i.e. to strengthen the ordinance of Islam; never, as far as lies in our
power, to issue any order that will not tend to prevent bloodshed, remove the
ills of men, and cause the breeze of peace and
prosperity to blow on all lands, and the kings of other countries to rest upon
the couch of affection and benevolence, whereby the commands of God will be
honoured and mercy be shown to the people of God. Herein, God inspired us to
quench this fire and put an end to these terrible calamities, and make known to
those who advanced this proposal (of a levy) what it is that God has put into
our hearts to do, namely, to employ all possible means for the healing of all
the sickness of the world, and putting off what should only be appealed to as
the last remedy. For we desire not to hasten to appeal to arms, until we have
first declared the right path, and will permit it only after setting forth the
truth and establishing it with proofs. Our resolve to carry out whatever
appears to us good and advantageous has been strengthened by the counsels of
the Shaykh al-Islām, the model of divines, who has given us much
assistance in religious matters. We have appointed our chief justice, Qutb al-Dīn
and the Atābak, Bahā al-Dīn, both trustworthy persons of this flourishing
kingdom, to make known to you our course of action and bear witness to our good
intentions for the common weal of the Muslims; and to make it known that God
has enlightened us, and that Islam annuls all that has gone before it, and that
God Almighty has put it into our hearts to follow the truth and those who
practice it. ... If some convincing proof be required, let men observe our
actions. By the grace of God, we have raised aloft the standards of the faith,
and borne witness to it in all our orders and our practice, so that the
ordinances of the law of Muḥammad may be brought to the fore and firmly
established in accordance with the principles of justice laid down by Aḥmad.
Whereby we have filled the hearts of the people with joy, have granted free
pardon to all offenders, and shown them indulgences, saying, ‘May God pardon
the past!’ We have reformed all matters concerning the pious endowments of
Muslims given for mosques, colleges, charitable institutions, and the
rebuilding of caravanserais; we have restored their incomes to those to whom
they were due according to the terms laid down by the donors. . . . We have
ordered the pilgrims to be treated with
respect, provision to be made for their caravans and for securing their safety
on the pilgrim routes; we have given perfect freedom to merchants, travelling
from one country to another, that they may go wherever they please; and we have
strictly prohibited our soldiers and police from interfering with them in their
comings or goings." He seeks the alliance of the Sultan of Egypt " so
that these countries and cities may again be populated, these terrible
calamities be put down, the sword be returned to the scabbard; that all peoples
may dwell in peace and quietness, and the necks of the Muslims be freed from
the ills of humiliation and disgrace."[33]
To the student of the
history of the Mongols it is a relief to pass from the recital of nameless
horrors and continual bloodshed to a document emanating from a Mongol prince
and giving expression to such humane and benevolent sentiments, which sound
strange indeed coming from such lips.
This conversion of
their chief and the persecutions that he inflicted on the Christians gave great
offence to the Mongols, who, although not Christians themselves, had been long
accustomed to intercourse with the Christians, and they denounced their chief
to Qūbīlāy Khān as one who had abandoned the footsteps of his
forefathers. A revolt broke out against him, headed by his nephew Arghun, who
compassed his death and succeeded him on the throne. During his brief reign
(1284-1291), the Christians were once more restored to favour, while the
Musalmans had to suffer persecution in their turn, were dismissed from their
posts and driven away from the court.[34]
The successors of Takūdār
were all heathen, until, in 1295, Ghāzān, the seventh and greatest of
the Īlkhāns, became a Musalman and made Islam the ruling religion of
Persia. During the last three reigns the Christians had entertained great hopes
of the conversion of the ruling family of Persia, who had shown them such distinguished
favour and entrusted them with so many important offices of state. His
immediate predecessor, the insurgent Baydu Khān, who occupied the throne
for a few months only in
1295, carried his predilection for Christianity so
far as to try to put a stop to the spread of Islam among the Mongols, and
accordingly forbade any one to preach the doctrines of this faith among them.[35]
Ghāzān himself before his
conversion had been brought up as a Buddhist and had erected several Buddhist
temples in Khurāsān, and took great pleasure in the company of the
priests of this faith, who had come into Persia in large numbers since the
establishment of the Mongol supremacy over that country.[36]
He appears to have been naturally of a religious turn of mind, for he studied the
creeds of the different religions of his time, and used to hold discussions
with the learned doctors of each faith.[37]
Rashīd al-Dīn, his learned minister and the historian of his reign, maintained
the genuineness of his conversion to Islam, the religious observances of which
he zealously kept throughout his whole reign, though his contemporaries (and
later writers have often re-echoed the imputation) represented him as having
only yielded to the solicitations of some Amīrs and Shaykhs.[38]
"Besides, what interested motive," asks his apologist, "could
have led so powerful a sovereign to change his faith : much less, a prince
whose pagan ancestors had conquered the world ? " His conversion, however,
certainly won over to his side the hearts of the Persians, when he was
contending with Baydū for the throne, and the Muhammadan Mongols in the army of
his rival deserted to support the cause of their co-religionist. These were the
very considerations that were urged upon Ghāzān by Nawruz, a Muhammadan Amīr
who had espoused his cause and who hailed him as the prince who, according to a
prophecy, was to appear about this time to protect the faith of Islam and
restore it to its former splendour : if he embraced Islam, he could become the
ruler of Persia: the Musalmans, delivered from the grievous yoke of the Pagan
Mongols, would espouse his cause, and God, recognising in him the saviour of
the true faith from utter destruction, would bless his arms with victory.[39]
After hesitating a little, Ghāzān made a public profession of the
faith, and his officers and soldiers followed his example : he distributed alms
to men of piety and learning and visited the mosques and tombs of the saints
and in every way showed himself an exemplary Muslim ruler. His brother, Uljāytu,
who succeeded him in 1304, under the name of Muḥammad Khudābandah, had
been brought up as a Christian in the faith of his mother and had been baptised
under the name of Nicholas, but after his mother's' death, while he was still a
young man, he became a convert to Islam through the persuasions of his wife.[40]
Ibn Baṭūṭah says that his example exercised a great influence on the Mongols.[41]
From this time forward Islam became the paramount faith in the kingdom of the Īlkhāns.
The details that we
possess of the progress of Islam in the Middle Kingdom, which fell to the lot
of Chaghatāy and his descendants, are still more meagre. Several of the
princes of this line had a Muhammadan minister in their service, but they
showed themselves unsympathetic to the faith of Islam. Chaghatāy
harassed his Muhammadan subjects by regulations that restricted their ritual
observances in respect of the killing of animals for food and of ceremonial
washings. Al-Jūzjānī says that he was the bitterest enemy of the Muslims among
all the Mongol rulers and did not wish any one to utter the word Musalman
before him except with evil purpose.[42]
Orghana, the wife of his grandson and successor, Qarā-Hūlāgū, brought up her son
as a Musalman, and under the name of Mubarak Shah he came forward in 1264 as
one of the claimants of the disputed succession to the Chaghatāy Khānate;
but he was soon driven from the throne by his cousin Burāq Khān, and
appears to have exercised no influence on behalf of his faith, indeed judging
from their names it would not appear that any of his own children even adopted
the religion of their father.[43]
Burāq Khān is said to have "had the blessedness of receiving the
light of the faith" a few days before his death in 1270, and to have taken
the name of Sultan Ghiyāth al-Dīn,[44]
but he was buried according to the ancient funeral rites of the Mongols, and
not as a Musalman, and those who had been converted during his reign relapsed
into their former heathenism. It was not until the next century that the
conversion of Ṭarmāshīrīn Khān, about 1326, caused Islam to be at all
generally adopted by the Chaghatāy Mongols, who when they followed the
example of their chief this time remained true to their new faith. But even now
the ascendancy of Islam was not assured, for Būzun who was Khān in the
next decade— the chronology is uncertain—drove Ṭarmāshīrīn from his throne, and
persecuted the Muslims,[45]
and it was not until some years later that we hear of the first Musalman king
of Kāshgar, which the break-up of the Chaghatāy dynasty had erected into
a separate kingdom. This prince, Tūqluq Timūr Khān (1347-1363), is said
to have owed his conversion to a holy man from Bukhārā, by name Shaykh
Jamāl al-Dīn. This Shaykh, in company with a number of travellers, had
unwittingly trespassed on the game-preserves of the prince, who ordered them to
be bound hand and foot and brought before him. In reply to his angry question,
how they had dared interfere with his hunting, the Shaykh pleaded that
they were strangers and were quite unaware that they were trespassing on
forbidden ground. Learning that they were Persians, the prince said that a dog
was worth more than a Persian. "Yes," replied the Shaykh,
"if we had not the true faith, we should indeed be worse than the
dogs." Struck with his reply, the Khan ordered this bold Persian to be brought before him on his return
from hunting, and taking him aside asked him to explain what he meant by these
words and what was "faith." The Shaykh then set before him the
doctrines of Islam with such fervour and zeal that the heart of the Khān
that before had been hard as a stone was melted like wax, and so terrible a
picture did the holy man draw of the state of unbelief, that the prince was
convinced of the blindness of his own errors, but said, "Were I now to
make profession of the faith of Islam, I should not be able to lead my subjects
into the true path. But bear with me a little; and when I have entered into the
possession of the kingdom of my forefathers, come to me again." For the
empire of Chaghtāy had by this time been broken up into a number of
petty princedoms, and it was many years before Tūqluq Tīmūr succeeded in
uniting under his sway the whole empire as before. Meanwhile Shaykh Jamāl
al-Dīn had returned to his home, where he fell dangerously ill: when at the
point of death, he said to his son Rashīd al-Dīn, "Tūqluq Tīmūr will one
day become a great monarch; fail not to go and salute him in my name and
fearlessly remind him of the promise he made me." Some years later, when Tūqluq
Tīmūr had re-won the empire of his fathers, Rashid al-Din made his way to the
camp of the Khān to fulfil the last wishes of his father, but in spite
of all his efforts he could not gain an audience of the Khān. At length
he devised the following expedient: one day in the early morning, he began to
chant the call to prayers, close to the Khān's tent. Enraged at having his
slumbers disturbed in this way, the prince ordered him to be brought into his
presence, whereupon Rashīd al-Dīn delivered his father's message. Tūqluq Khān
was not unmindful of his promise, and said: “Ever since I ascended the throne I
have had it on my mind that I made that promise, but the person to whom
I gave the pledge never came. Now you are welcome." He then repeated the
profession of faith and became a Muslim. "On that morn the sun of bounty
rose out of the east of divine favour and effaced the dark night of unbelief. .
. . They then decided that for the propagation of Islam they should interview
the princes one by one, and it should be well
for those who accepted the faith, but those who refused should be slain as
heathens and idolaters." The first to be examined was a noble named Amīr Tūlik.
The Khān asked him, "Will you embrace Islam?” Amir Tulik burst into
tears and said: " Three years ago I was converted by some holy men at Kāshgar
and became a Musalman, but from fear of you I did not openly declare it."
Then Tūqluq Khān rose up and embraced him, and the three sat down again
together. In this manner they examined the princes one by one, and they all accepted
Islam, with the exception of one named Jaras, who suggested a trial of strength
between the Shaykh and his servant, an infidel who was above the
ordinary stature of man and so strong that he could lift a two-year-old camel.
The Shaykh accepted the challenge, saying: "If I do not throw him,
I will not require you to become a Musalman. If it is God's wish that the
Mongols become honoured with the blessed state of Islam, He will doubtless give
me sufficient power to overcome this man. "Tūqluq Khān and those
who had become Musalmans with him tried to dissuade the holy man, but he
persisted in his purpose. "A large crowd assembled, the infidel was
brought in, and he and the Shaykh advanced towards one another. The
infidel, proud of his own strength, advanced with a conceited air. The Shaykh
looked very small' and weak beside him. When they came to blows, the Shaykh
struck the infidel full in the chest, and he fell senseless. After a little he
came to again, and having raised himself, fell again at the feet of the Shaykh,
crying out and uttering words of belief. The people raised loud shouts of
applause, and on that day 160,000 persons cut off the hair of their heads and
became Musalmans. The Khān was circumcised, and the lights of Islam
dispelled the shades of unbelief." From that time Islam became the
established faith in the settled countries under the rule of the descendants of
Chaghatāy.[46]
But many of the nomad Mongols appear to have remained outside the pale of Islam
up to the early part of the fifteenth century, judging from the violent methods
adopted for their conversion by Muhammad Khān, who was Khān of
Mughalistān[47]
about 1416. "Muḥammad Khān was a wealthy prince and a good
Musalman. He persisted in following the road of justice and equity, and was so
unremitting in his exertions, that during his blessed reign most of the tribes
of the Mongols became Musalmans. It is well known what severe measures he had
recourse to, in bringing the Mongols to be believers in Islam. If, for
instance, a Mongol did not wear a turban, a horseshoe nail was driven into his
head: and treatment of this kind was common. May God recompense him with
good."[48]
Even such drastic measures were ineffectual in bringing
about a general acceptance of Islam, for as late as at the close of the
following century,[49]
a dervish named Ishaq Wali found scope for his proselytising activities in
Kashgar, Yarkand and Khotan, where he spent twelve years in spreading the
faith;[50]
he also worked among the Kirghiz and Kazaks, from among whom he made 180 convert
and destroyed eighteen temples of idols.[51]
In the preceding pages some attempt has been made to
indicate some of the steps by which the Muslims won over to their faith the
savage hordes who had destroyed their centres of culture. By slow degrees,
Islam thus began to emerge out of the ruins of its former ascendancy and take
its place again as a dominant faith, after more than a century of depression.
In the course of the struggle between the followers of rival creeds for the
adherence of the Mongols, considerations of political expediency undoubtedly
operated in favour of the Muslim party, and the intrigues of Western
Christendom caused the Christians to become suspect, as agents of a foreign
power; but at the beginning such of the Mongols as were Nestorians could put
forward a better claim to be the national party and could attack the Musalmans
as adherents of a foreign faith. Ahmad Takūdār was denounced by Arghūn
as a traitor to the law of his fathers, in that he had followed the way of the
Arabs which none of his ancestors had known.[52]
The insurrection that caused Ṭarmāshīrīn to be driven into exile, gained
strength from the complaint that this monarch had disregarded the Yassāq or
ancient code of Mongol institutes.[53]
But though the issue of the struggle long remained doubtful, Islam gradually
gained ground in the lands of which it had been dispossessed. The means whereby
this success was achieved are obscure, and the scanty details set forth above
leave much of the tale untold, but enough has been recorded to indicate some of
the proselytising agencies that led to individual conversions. Ānanda drank in
Islam with his foster-mother's milk;[54]
and the remnant of the faithful, especially the older families of Muhammadan
Turks, exercised an almost insensible influence on the Mongols who settled
down in their midst. But of special importance among the proselytising agencies
at work was the influence of the pīr and his spiritual disciples. In the midst
of the profound discouragement which filled the Musalmans after the flood of
the Mongol conquest had poured over them, their first refuge was in mysticism,
and the pīr, or spiritual guide, and religious orders—such as the Naqshbandī,
which in the fourteenth century entered on a new period of its
development—breathed new life into the Muslim community and inspired it with
fresh fervour. "In the hands of the pīr and his monks, the Musalman in
Asia came to be an agent, at first passive and unconscious, later on the
adherent of a party—the party of the national faith, in opposition to the rule
of the Mongols, which was at once foreign, barbaric and secular."[55]
Let us now return to the history of Islam in the Golden
Horde. The chief camping ground of this section of the Mongols was the grassy
plain watered by the Volga, on the bank of which they founded their capital
city Serai, whither the Russian princes sent their tribute to the khān.
The conversion of Baraka Khan, of which mention has been made above, and the
close intercourse with Egypt that subsequently sprang up, contributed
considerably to the progress of Islam, and his example seems to have been
gradually followed by those of the aristocracy and leaders of the Golden Horde
that were of Mongol descent. But many tribes of the Golden Horde appear to have
resented the introduction of Islam into their midst, and when the conversion of
Baraka Khān was openly proclaimed, they sent to offer the crown, of
which they considered him now unworthy, to his rival Hūlāgū. Indeed, so strong
was this opposition, that it seems to have largely contributed to the formation
of the Nogais as a separate tribe. They took their name from Nogāy, who was the
chief commander of the Mongol forces under Baraka Khān. When the other
princes of the Golden Horde became Musalmans Nogāy remained a Shamanist and
thus became a rallying point for those who refused to abandon the old religion
of the Mongols. His daughter, however, who was married to a Shamanist, became
converted to Islam some time after her marriage and had to endure the
ill-treatment and contempt of her husband in consequence.[56]
To Ūzbek Khān,
who was leader of the Golden Horde from 1313 to 1340, and who distinguished himself
by his proselytising zeal, it was said, "Content yourself with our
obedience, what matters our religion to you? Why should we abandon the faith of
Chingīz Khān for that of the Arabs" But in spite of the strong
opposition to his efforts, Ūzbek Khān succeeded in winning many converts
to the faith of which he was so ardent a follower and which owed to his efforts
its firm establishment in the country under his sway.[57]
A further sign of his influence is found in the tribes of the Ūzbeks of Central
Asia, who take their name from him and were probably converted during his
reign. He is said to have formed the design of spreading the faith of Islam
throughout the whole of Russia,[58]
but here he met with no success. Indeed, though the Mongols were paramount in
Russia for two centuries, they appear to have exercised very little influence
on the people of that country, and least of all in the matter of religion.
It is noticeable, moreover, that in spite of his zeal for the spread of his own
faith, Ūzbek Khān was very tolerant towards his Christian subjects, who
were left undisturbed in the exercise of their religion and even allowed to
pursue their missionary labours in his territory. One of the most remarkable
documents of Muhammadan toleration is the charter that Ūzbek Khān
granted to the Metropolitan Peter in 1313:—"By the will and power, the
greatness and mercy of the most High! Ūzbek to all our princes, great and
small, etc., etc. Let no man insult the metropolitan church of which Peter is
the head, or his servants or his churchmen; let no man seize their property,
goods or people, let no man meddle with the affairs of the metropolitan
church, since they are divine. Whoever shall meddle therein and transgress our
edict, will be guilty before God and feel His wrath and be punished by
us with death. Let the metropolitan dwell in the path of safety and rejoice,
with a just and upright heart let him (or his deputy) decide and regulate all
ecclesiastical matters. We solemnly declare that neither we nor our children
nor the princes of our realm nor the governors of our provinces will in any way
interfere with the affairs of the church and the metropolitan, or in their
towns, districts, villages, chases and fisheries, their hives, lands, meadows,
forests, towns and places under their bailiffs, their vineyards, mills, winter
quarters for cattle, or any of the properties and goods of the church. Let the
mind of the metropolitan be always at peace and free from trouble, with
uprightness of heart let him pray to God for us, our children and our nation.
Whoever, shall lay hands on anything that is sacred, shall be held guilty, he
shall incur the wrath of God and the penalty of death, that others may be
dismayed at his fate. When the tribute or other dues, such as custom duties,
plough-tax, tolls or relays are levied, or when we wish to raise troops among
our subjects, let nothing be exacted from the cathedral churches under the
metropolitan Peter, or from any of his clergy: . . . whatever may be exacted
from the clergy, shall be returned threefold. . . Their laws, their churches,
their monasteries and chapels shall be respected; whoever condemns or blames
this religion, shall not be allowed to excuse
himself under any pretext, but shall be punished with death. The brothers and
sons of priests and deacons, living at the same table and in the same house,
shall enjoy the same privileges."[59]
That these were no
empty words and that the toleration here promised became a reality, may be
judged from a letter sent to the Khān by Pope John XXII in 1318, in
which he thanks the Muslim prince for the favour he showed to his Christian
subjects and the kind treatment they received at his hands.[60]
The successors of Ūzbek Khān do not appear to have been animated
by the same zeal for the spread of Islam as he had shown, and could not be
expected to succeed where he failed. So long as the Russians paid their taxes,
they were left free to worship according to their own desires, and the
Christian religion had become too closely intertwined with the life of the
people to be disturbed, even had efforts been made to turn them from the faith
of their fathers; for Christianity had been the national religion of the
Russian people for well-nigh three centuries before the Mongols established
themselves in Russian territory.
Another race many years
before had tried to win the Russians to Islam but had likewise failed, viz. the
Muslim Bulgarians who were found in the tenth century on the banks of the
Volga, and who probably owed their conversion to the Muslim merchants, trading
in furs and other commodities of the North; their conversion must have taken
place some time before a.d. 921,
when the caliph al-Muqtadir sent an envoy to confirm them in the faith and
instruct them in the tenets and ordinances of Islam.[61]
These Bulgarians attempted the conversion of Vladimir, the
then sovereign of Russia, who (the Russian chronicler tells us) had found it
necessary to choose some religion better than his pagan creed, but they failed
to overcome his objections to the rite of circumcision and to the prohibition
of wine, the use of which, he declared, the Russians could
never give up, as it was the very joy of their life. Equally unsuccessful were
the Jews who came from the country of the Khazars on the Caspian Sea and
had won over the king of that people to the Mosaic faith.[62]
After listening to their arguments, Vladimir asked them where their country
was. "Jerusalem" they replied, "but God in His anger has
scattered us over the whole world."
"Then you are cursed of God,” cried the king, " and yet want
to teach others: begone ! we have no wish, like you, to be without a
country." The most favourable impression was made by a Greek priest who,
after a brief criticism of the other religions, set forth the whole scheme of
Christian teaching beginning with the creation of the world and the story of
the fall of man and ending with the seven oecumenical councils accepted by the
Greek Church; then he showed the prince a picture of the Last Judgment with the
righteous entering paradise and the wicked being thrust down into hell, and
promised him the heritage of heaven, if he would be baptised. But Vladimir was
unwilling to make a rash choice of a substitute for his pagan religion, so he
called his boyards together and having told them of the accounts he had
received of the various religions, asked them for their advice. "
Prince," they replied, " every man praises his own religion, and if
you would make choice of the best, send wise men into the different countries
to discover which of all the nations honours God in the manner most worthy of
Him." So the prince chose out for this purpose ten men who were eminent
for their wisdom. These ambassadors found among the Bulgarians mean-looking
places of worship, gloomy prayers and solemn faces; among the German Catholics
religious ceremonies that lacked both grandeur and magnificence. At length they
reached Constantinople: " Let them see the glory of our God," said the
Emperor. So they were taken to the church of Santa Sophia, where the Patriarch,
clad in his pontifical robes, was celebrating mass. The magnificence of the
building, the rich vestments of the priests, the ornaments of the altars, the
sweet odour of the incense, the reverent
silence of the people, and the mysterious solemnity of the ceremonial filled
the savage Russians with wonder and amazement. It seemed to them that this
church must be the dwelling of the Most High, and that He manifested His glory
therein to mortals. On their return to Kief, the ambassadors gave the prince an
account of their mission; they spoke with contempt of the religion of the
Prophet and had little to say for the Roman Catholic faith, but were
enthusiastic in their eulogies of the Greek Church. "Every man," they
said, "who has put his lips to a sweet draught, henceforth abhors anything
bitter; wherefore we having come to the knowledge of the faith of the Greek
Church desire none other." Vladimir once more consulted his boyards, who
said unto him, " Had not the Greek faith been best of all, Olga, your
grandmother, the wisest of mortals, would never have embraced it."
Whereupon Vladimir hesitated no longer and in a.d.
988 declared himself a Christian. On the day after his baptism he threw
down the idols his forefathers had worshipped, and issued an edict that all the
Russians, masters and slaves, rich and poor, should submit to be baptised into
the Christian faith.[63]
Thus Christianity became the national religion of the
Russian people, and after the Mongol conquest, the distinctive national
characteristics of Russians and Tatars that have kept the two races apart to
the present day, the bitter hatred of the Tatar yoke, the devotion of the
Russians to their own faith and the want of religious zeal on the part of the
Tatars, kept the conquered race from adopting the religion of the conqueror.
Especially has the prohibition of spirituous liquors by the laws of Islam been
supposed to have stood in the way of the adoption of this religion by the
Russian people.
It would appear that
not until after the promulgation of the edict of religious toleration in 1905
throughout the Russian empire and the active Muslim propaganda that followed
it, were cases observed of Russians being converted to Islam, and those that
have occurred are ascribed to the strong attraction of the material help
offered by the Tatars to such converts and the influence of the moral strength of
the Muslims themselves.[64]
Not that the Tatars in Russia had been altogether inoperative
in promoting the spread of Islam during the preceding centuries. The distinctly
Hellenic type of face that is to be found among the so-called Tatars of the
Crimea has led to the conjecture that these Muhammadans have absorbed into
their community the Greek and Italian populations that they found settled on
the Crimean peninsula, and that we find among them the Muhammadanised
descendants of the indigenous inhabitants, and of the Genoese colonists.[65]
A traveller of the seventeenth century tells us that the Tatars of the Crimea
tried to induce their slaves to become Muhammadans, and won over many of them
to this faith by promising them their liberty if they would be persuaded.[66]
Conversions to Islam from among the Tatars of the Crimea are also reported after
the proclamation of religious liberty in 1905.[67]
A brief reference may here be made to the Tatars in
Lithuania, where small groups of them have been settled since the early part of
the fifteenth century; these Muslim immigrants, dwelling in the midst of a
Christian population, have preserved their old faith, but (probably for
political reasons) do not appear to have attempted to proselytize. But they
have been in the habit of marrying Lithuanian and Polish women, whose children
were always brought up as Muslims, whereas no Muhammadan girl was permitted to
marry a Christian. The grand dukes of Lithuania in the fifteenth century
encouraged the marriage of Christian women with their Tatar troops, on whom
they bestowed grants of land and other privileges.[68]
One of the most curious incidents in the missionary history
of Islam is the conversion of the Kirghiz of Central Asia by Tatar mullas, who
preached Islam among them in the eighteenth century, as emissaries of the
Russian government. The Kirghiz began to come under Russian rule about
1731, and for 120 years all diplomatic correspondence was carried on with them
in the Tatar language under the delusion that they were ethnographically the
same as the Tatars of the Volga. Another misunderstanding on the part of the
Russian government was that the Kirghiz were Musalmans, whereas in the
eighteenth century they were nearly all Shamanists, as a large number of them
were still up to the middle of the nineteenth century. At the time of the
annexation of their country to the Russian empire only a few of their Khāns
and Sulṭāns had any knowledge of the faith of Islam - and that very confused
and vague. Not a single mosque was to be found throughout the whole of the
Kirghiz Steppes, or a single religious teacher of the faith of the Prophet, and
the Kirghiz owed their conversion to Islam to the fact that the Russians,
taking them for Muhammadans, insisted on treating them as such. Large sums of
money were given for the building of mosques, and mullās were sent to open schools
and instruct the young in the tenets of the Muslim faith: the Kirghiz scholars
were to receive every day a small sum to support themselves on, and the fathers
were to be induced to send their children to the schools by presents and other
means of persuasion. An incontrovertible proof that the Musalman propaganda
made its way into the Kirghiz Steppes from the side of Russia, is the
circumstance that it was especially those Kirghiz who were more contiguous to
Europe that first became Musalmans, and the old Shamanism lingered up to the
nineteenth century among those who wandered in the neighbourhood of Khiva, Bukhārā
and Khokand, though these for centuries had been Muhammadan countries.[69]
This is probably the
only instance of a Christian government co-operating in the promulgation of
Islam, and is the more remarkable inasmuch as the Russian government of this
period was attempting to force Christianity on its Muslim subjects in Europe,
in continuation of the efforts made in the sixteenth century soon after the
conquest of the Khanate of Kazan.
At the beginning of the
nineteenth century many of the Kirghiz dwelling in the vast plains stretching
southwards from the district of Tobolsk towards Turkistan were still heathen,
and the Russian government was approached for permission for a Christian
mission to be established among them. But this request was not granted, on the
ground that "these people were as yet too wild and savage to be accessible
to the Gospel. But soon after other missionaries, not depending on the
good-will of any government, and having more zeal and understanding, occupied
this field and won the whole of the Kirghis tribe to the faith of Islam." [70]
After the conquest of
Kazan by the Russians in the sixteenth century, the occupation of the former
Tatar Khanate was followed up by an official Christian missionary movement, and
a number of the heathen population of the Khanate were baptised, the labours of
the clergy being actively seconded by the police and the civil authorities, but
as the Russian priests did not understand the language of their converts and
soon neglected them, it had to be admitted that the new converts
"shamelessly retain many horrid Tartar customs, and neither hold nor know
the Christian faith." When spiritual exhortations failed, the government
ordered its officials to "pacify, imprison, put in irons, and thereby
unteach and frighten from the Tartar faith those who, though baptised, do not
obey the admonitions of the Metropolitan."
In the eighteenth century the Russian government made fresh
efforts to convert the heathen tribes and the relapsed Tatars, and held out
many inducements to them to become baptised. Catherine II in 1778 ordered that
all the new converts should sign a written promise to the effect that
"they would completely forsake their infidel errors, and, avoiding all
intercourse with unbelievers, would hold firmly and unwaveringly the Christian
faith and its dogmas." But in spite of all, these so-called "baptised
Tartars " were Christians only in name, and soon began to try to escape from the
propagandist efforts of the Orthodox Church and abandoned Christianity for
Islam, their so-called conversion merely serving as a stepping-stone to their
entrance into the faith of the Prophet.
They may, indeed, have been inscribed in the official
registers as Christians, but they resolutely stood out against any efforts that
were made to Christianise them. In a semi-official article, published in 1872,
the writer says : " It is a fact worthy of attention that a long series of
evident apostasies coincides with the beginning of measures to confirm the
converts in the Christian faith. There must be, therefore, some collateral
cause producing those cases of apostasy precisely at the moment when the
contrary might be expected." The fact seems to be that these Tatars having
all the tune remained Muhammadan at heart, resisted the active measures taken
to make their nominal profession of Christianity in any way a reality.[71]
But in the latter part of the nineteenth century efforts were made to
Christianise these heathen and Muslim tribes by means of schools established in
their midst. In this way it was hoped to win the younger generation, since
otherwise it seemed impossible to gain an entrance for Christianity among the
Tatars, for, as a Russian professor said, "The citizens of Kazan are hard
to win, but we get some little folk from the villages on the steppe, and train
them in the fear of God. Once they are with us they can never turn
back."[72]
For the Russian criminal code used to contain severe enactments against
those who fell away from the Orthodox Church,[73]3
and sentenced any person convicted of converting a Christian to Islam to
the loss of all civil rights and to imprisonment with hard labour for a term
varying from eight to ten years. In spite, however, of the edicts of the
government, Muslim propagandism succeeded in winning over whole villages to the
faith of Islam, especially among the tribes of northeastern Russia.[74]
The town of Kazan is
the chief centre of this missionary activity; a large number of Muslim
publications are printed here every year, and mullās go forth from the
University to convert the pagans in the villages and bring back to Islam the
Tatars who have allowed themselves to be baptised. The increasing number of
these Christian Tatars, who have gone to swell the ranks of Islam, has alarmed
the clergy of the Orthodox Church, but their efforts have failed to check the
success of the mullās.[75]
Especially since the edict of toleration in 1905, mass conversions have been
reported, e.g. in 1909, ninety-one families in the village of Atomva are said
to have become Muhammadan,[76]
and as many as 53,000 persons between 1906 and 1910.[77]
This propaganda is said to owe much of its success to the higher moral level of
life in Muslim society, as well as to the stronger feeling of solidarity that
prevails in it;[78]
moreover, the methods adopted by the Russian clergy, supported by the
government, to make the so-called Christian Tatars more orthodox, have caused
the Christian faith to become unpopular among them.[79]
On the other hand, the propaganda of Islam is very zealously carried forward;
"every simple, untaught Moslem is a missionary of his religion, and the
poor, dark, untaught heathen or half-heathen tribes cannot resist their force.
In many villages of baptised aborigines the men go away for the winter to work
as tailors in Moslem villages. There they are converted to Islam, and they
return to their villages as fanatics bringing with them Moslem ideas with which
to influence their homes."[80]
The tribes that have
chiefly come under the influence of this missionary movement are the Votiaks,
the greater part of whom are baptised Christians, but many became Muslims in
the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth centuries; and the influence
of Islam is continually growing both among those that are Christian and among
the small remnant that is still heathen. The Cheremiss, like the
Votiaks, are a Finnish tribe, about a quarter of whom are still heathen, but
many have already embraced Islam and it is probable that most of them will soon
adopt the same religion. The movement of the Cheremiss towards Islam made
itself manifest in the nineteenth century and though many of them were
nominally Christian, whole villages of them became Muhammadan despite the laws
forbidding conversion except to the Orthodox Church.[81]
They became Muhammadan through their immediate contact with the Bashkirs and
Tatars, whose family and social customs were very similar to their own. The
process sometimes began with intermarriages with Muhammadans—e. g. in one
village a Cheremiss family intermarried with some Bashkirs and adopted their
faith; the converts being persecuted as " circumcised dogs " in their
own village, moved away and founded a new settlement some miles off, some
wealthy Bashkirs helping them with money; but as they were officially
registered as heathen, they could not get permission for the building of a
mosque, so a few Bashkir families in the neighbourhood moved into the new
settlement, in order to make up the number requisite for obtaining the
necessary official permission.[82]
A similar process has several times occurred in other villages in which Muhammadans
have come to settle and have intermarried with Cheremiss.[83]
In other cases there has been a definite missionary movement—e. g. in the
beginning of the nineteenth century the village of Karakul was inhabited by
Christian Cheremiss, but shortly after the middle of the century some families
were converted to Islam by a Cheremiss who had become a mullā; on his death he
was succeeded by a Bashkir from another village. Later on, the converts moved
away to Tatar and Bashkir villages, their place being taken by Tatars, until
the whole village became practically Tatar, few of the younger generation retaining
any knowledge of the Cheremiss language, and intermarriages taking place only
with Tatars.[84]
Apart from this proselytising activity, there has been a very distinct spread
of Tatar influence in speech and manners among
the Cheremiss. The Tatar language has spread among them, bringing with it the
moral and religious ideas of Islam; the adoption of the Tatar dress is held to
be a sign of superior culture, and if a Cheremiss does not dress like a Tatar
he runs the risk of being laughed at by the first Tatar he meets or by his
fellow Cheremiss; all this cultural movement tends to the ultimate adoption of
the Tatar religion.[85]
After their conversion, the Cheremiss are said to be very zealous in the
propagation of their new faith and receive the assistance of wealthy Tatars;[86]
on the other hand, the Russians despise the Cheremiss as an inferior race and
apply opprobrious epithets even to those among them who are Christians.[87]
About one-fourth of the Cheremiss are still heathen, but Muslim
influences are so powerful among them that it is probable that in course of
time they will for the most part become Muhammadans.[88]
The Chuvash, who number about 1,000,000, have nearly all been baptised; there
are about 20,000 of them that are still heathen but these are gradually being
absorbed by Islam, while some of the Christian Chuvash have become Muhammadans
and the rest are coming under Muslim influences. The extent of their zeal for
their converts may be judged from the instance of a Christian Chuvash village,
the priest of which had spent several years in collecting the 300 roubles
necessary for the repair of the church; eight Chuvash families became
Muhammadan and in the course of a few months 2000 roubles were collected for
the building of a mosque.[89]
Such ready activity is characteristic of the Muslim propaganda now being
carried among the aboriginal tribes. Each family that accepts Islam receives
help either in money or in kind: a house is built for one; a field, cattle,
etc., are purchased for another; when several families in a village are
converted, a mosque is built for them and a school established for their
children.[90]
Of the spread of Islam
among the Tatars of Siberia, we have a few particulars. It was not until the
latter half of the sixteenth
century that it gained a footing in this country, but even before this period
Muhammadan missionaries had from time to time made their way into Siberia with
the hope of winning the heathen population over to the acceptance of their
faith, but the majority of them met with a martyr's death. When Siberia came
under Muhammadan rule, in the reign of Kūchum Khān, the graves of seven
of these missionaries were discovered by an aged Shaykh who came from Bukhārā
to search them out, being anxious that some memorial should be kept of the
devotion of these martyrs to the faith : he was able to give the names of this
number, and up to the last century their memory was still revered by the Tatars
of Siberia.[91]
When Kūchum Khān (who was descended from Jūjī Khān, the eldest
son of Chingīz khān) became Khān of Siberia (about the year
1570), either by right of conquest or (according to another account) at the
invitation of the people whose Khān had died without issue,[92]
he made every effort for the conversion of his subjects, and sent to Bukhārā
asking for missionaries to assist him in this pious undertaking. One of the
missionaries who was sent from Bukhārā has left us an account of how he
set out with a companion to the capital of Kūchum Khān, on the bank of
the Irtish. Here, after two years, his companion died, and, for some reasons
that the writer does not mention, he went back again; but soon afterwards
returned to the scene of his labours, bringing with him another coadjutor, when
Kuchum Khan had appealed for help once more to Bukhara.[93]
Missionaries also came to Siberia from Kazan. But the advancing tide of
Russian conquest soon brought the proselytising efforts of Kūchum Khān
to an end before much had been accomplished, especially as many of the tribes
under his rule offered a strong opposition to all attempts made to convert
them.
But though interrupted
by the Russian conquest, the progress of Islam was by no means stopped. Mullās
from Bukhārā and other cities of Central Asia and merchants from Kazan
were continually active as missionaries of Islam in Siberia. In 1745 an
entrance was first effected among the Baraba Tatars (between the
Irtish and the Ob), and though at the beginning of the nineteenth century many
were still heathen, they have now all become Musalmans.[94]
The conversion of the Kirghiz has already been spoken of above: the history of
most of the other Muslim tribes of Siberia is very obscure, but their
conversion is probably of a recent date. Among the instruments of Muhammadan
propaganda at the present time, it is interesting to note the large place taken
by the folk-songs of the Kirghiz, in which, interwoven with tale and legend,
the main truths of Islam make their way into the hearts of the common people.[95]
[9]
Of
this writer Yule says, " He gives an unfavourable account of the
literature and morals of their clergy, which deserves more weight than such
statements regarding those looked upon as schismatics generally do; for the
narrative of Rubruquis gives one the impression of being written
by a thoroughly honest and intelligent person. (Cathay and the Way Thither,
vol. i. p. xcviii.)
[12] The Chosen One—Muḥammad.
[14]
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 towards the Musalmans. (Howorth, vol. i. p. 159.)
[15]
Raverty, p. 1146. Howorth, vol. i. pp. 112, 273. This edict was only withdrawn when it was
found that it prevented Muhammadan merchants from visiting the court and that
trade suffered in consequence.
[17] Jūzjānī, pp. 404-5. Raverty, p. 1160 sqq.
[18] De Guignes, vol. iii.
p. 265.
[19] In the thirteenth century, three-fourths of the
Mongol hosts were Turks. (Cahun, p. 279.)
[23] It is of interest to note that Najm al-Dīn Mukhtār
al-Zāhidī in 1260 compiled for Baraka Khān a treatise which gave the proofs of the divine
mission of the Prophet, a refutation of those who denied it, and an account of
the controversies between Christians and Muslims. (Steinshneider pp. 63-4.)
[24] Abu'l-Ghāzī, tome ii. p. 181.
[25] Jūzjānī, p. 447. Raverty, pp. 1283-4.
[26] Jūzjānī, p. 447.
Raverty, pp. 1285-6.
[27] Maqrīzī (2), tome i. pp. 180-I, 187.
[28] Maqrīzī (2), tome i. p. 215.
[29] Id. p. 222
[30] Waṣṣāf calls him Nikūdār before, and Aḥmed after,
his conversion.
[31] Hayton. (Ramusio, tome II. p. 60, c.)
[32] Qur'ān, vi, 125.
[33] Waṣṣāf, pp. 231-4.
[34] De Guignes, vol. iii. pp. 263-5.
[35] C. d'Ohsson, tome iv. pp. 141-2.
[36] Id. ib. p. 148.
[37] Id. ib. p. 365.
[38] Id. ib.pp. 148, 354. Cahun, p. 434.
[39] C. d'Ohsson, tome iv. pp. 128, 132.
[40] Hammer-Purgstall: Geschichte der Ilchanen, vol. ii.
p. 182. It is not improbable that the captive Muslim women took a considerable
part in the conversion of the Mongols to Islam. Women appear to have occupied
an honoured position among the Mongols, and many instances might be given of
their having taken a prominent part in political affairs, just as already
several cases have been mentioned of the influence they exercised on their
husbands in religious matters. William of Rubruck tells us how he found the
influence of a Muslim wife an obstacle in the way of his proselytising labours:
" On the day of Pentecost a certain Saracen came to us, and while in
conversation with us, we began expounding the faith, and when he heard of the
blessings of God to man in the incarnation, the resurrection of the dead, the
Last judgment, and the washing away of sins in baptism, he said he wished to be
baptised; but while we were making ready to baptise him, he suddenly jumped on
his horse saying he had to go home to consult with his wife. And the next day
talking with us he said he could not possibly venture to receive baptism, for
then he could not drink cosmos" (mare's milk). (Rubruck, pp. 90-1.)
[41] Ibn Baṭūṭah, vol.
ii. p. 57.
[42] Jūzjānī, pp. 381, 397. Raverty, pp. 1110, 1145-6.
[43] Rashīd al-Dīn, pp. 173-4. 188.
[44] Abu'l Ghāzi, tome ii. p. 159.
[45] Ibn Baṭuṭah, tome iii. p. 47.
[46] Abu'l-Ghāzī, tome ii. pp. 166-8. Muhammad Ḥaydar,
pp. 13-15.
[47] When the power of the Chaghatāy Khāns
declined, a portion of the eastern division of their realm became practically
independent under the name of Mughalistān, a pastoral country suited to
the habits of nomad herdsmen, in what is now known as Chinese Turkistan.
[48] Muḥammad Ḥaydar, pp. 57-8.
[50] Martin Hartmann : Der Islamische Orient, vol. i. p.
203. (Berlin, 1899.)
[51] Id. p. 202.
[52] Assemani, tome iii. pars. ii. p. cxvi.
[53] Ibn Baṭūṭah, vol. iii. p. 40.
[54] Rashīd al-Dīn, p. 600, 1. I.
[55] Cahun, p. 410.
[56] Howorth, vol ii. p. 1015.
[57] Abu-l Ghāzī, tome ii. p. 184.
[58] De Guignes, vol iii.
p.351.
[59] Karamzin, vol. iv. pp. 391-4.
[60] Hammer-Purgstall: Geschichte der Goldenen Horde in
Kiptschak, p. 290.
[61] De Baschkiris quae memoriae prodita sunt ab
Ibn-Foszlaao et Jakuto, interprete C. N.Fraehoio. (Mémoires de l'Académie Impériale
des Sciences de St. Pétersbourg, tome viii. p. 626. 1822.)
[62] Abu 'Ubayd al-Bakri, pp. 470-I
[63] Karamsin, tome i. pp. 259-71.
[64] Bobrovnikoff, p. 13
[65] Reclus, tome v. p. 831. R. du M. M., tome iii. pp. 76, 78.
[66] Relation des Tartares, par Jean de Luca, p.
17. (Thevenot, tome i.)
[67] Islam and Missions, p.
257.
[68] Gasztowtt, pp. 321-3. R.du M. M., xi. (1910),
pp. 287 sqq.
[69] The Russian Policy Regarding Central Asia. An
historical sketch. By Prof. V. Grigorief. (Eugene Schuyler : Turkistan, vol.
ii. pp. 405-6. 5th ed. London, 1876); Franz von Schwarz : Turkestan, p. 58.
(Freiburg, 1910.)
[70] Islam and Missions, pp.[251-2, 255.
[71] D. Mackenzie Wallace : Russia, vol. i. pp. 242-4. (London, 1877, 4th ed.) R. du M. M., vol. ix. (1909), p. 249. Bobrovnikoff, p. 5 sqq.
[72] W. Hepworth Dixon: Free Russia, vol. ii. p.
284. (London, 1870.)
[73] E. g. " En 1883, des paysans Tatars du village
d'Apozof étaient pour-suivis, devant le tribunal de Kazan, pour avoir abandonné
1'orthodoxie. Les accusés déclaraient
avoir toujours été musalmaans; sept d'entre eux n'en furent pas moins condamnés,
comme apostats, aux travaux forcés, . . . Beaucoup de ces relaps ont été déportés
en Sibérie." Anatole
Leroy-Beaulieu: L'Empire des Tsars et les Russes, tome iii. p. 645. (paris, 1889-93.)
[74] D. Mackenzie Wallace: Russia, vol. i. p. 245.
[75] Palmieri, pp. 85-6. R. du M. M., i. (1907), pp. 162 sq.
[76] R. du M. M., ix. (1909), p. 294.
[77] Id. X. (1910), p. 413. Id, i, (1907), p. 273.
[78] Id. ix. p. 252.
[79] Id. p. 249.
[80] Bobrovnikoff, p. 12.
[81] Reclus, tome v. pp. 746, 748.
[82] Eruslanov, pp. 3, 6.
[83] Id. pp. 7-8.
[84] Id. pp. 5-6.
[85] Eruslanov, pp. 9, 13
[86] Id. pp. 17, 20, 36.
[87] Id. pp. 38-9.
[88] Bobrovnikoff, p. 22.
[89] Id. pp. 21-2, 31.
[90] Id. p. 13. Islam and Missions, p. 257.
[91] G. F. Muller: Sammlung Russischer Geschichte, vol.
vii, p. 191.
[92] Id. vol. vii. pp. 183-4.
[93] Radloff, vol. i. p. 147.
[94] Jadrinzew, p. 138. Radloff, vol. 1. p. 241.
[95] Radloff, vol. i. pp. 472, 497.
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