Origin of the Ottomans & a Miraculous Prophecy of Prophet Muhammad ﷺ

This is the beginning of a series that will cover the history of the Ottoman Empire, from beginning to end, insha’Allah. In this first article we will see how the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ miraculously foretold the coming of certain events related to this topic.

The Prophet Muhammad  ﷺ  said: 

لاَ تَقُومُ السَّاعَةُ حَتَّى تُقَاتِلُوا التُّرْكَ صِغَارَ الأَعْيُنِ، حُمْرَ الْوُجُوهِ، ذُلْفَ الأُنُوفِ، كَأَنَّ وُجُوهَهُمُ الْمَجَانُّ الْمُطَرَّقَةُ
وَلاَ تَقُومُ السَّاعَةُ حَتَّى تُقَاتِلُوا قَوْمًا نِعَالُهُمُ الشَّعَرُ (عن أبي هريرة. صحيح البخاري 2928)

“The Hour will not be established until you fight the Turks; people with small eyes, red faces, and flat noses. Their faces will look like shields coated with leather. And the Hour will not be established till you fight with people whose shoes are made of fur.” [Saheeh Al-Bukhari 2928]

In describing the Turks, Wahb ibn Munabbih, who was a student of Abu Hurayra, the Companion of Allah’s Messenger ﷺ, said:

وقال وهب بن منبه: هُمْ بَنُو عَمِّ يأجوجَ ومأجوجَ، لما بنى ذو القرنينِ السدَّ، كان بعضُ يأجوجَ ومأجوجَ غائبينَ

فَتَرَكوا - لم يَدْخُلوا مع قومِهِم - فَسُمُّوا الترك (فتح الباري شرح صحيح البخاري، 95، ص 104، باب قتال الترك)

“They are the cousins on Gog and Magog. When Dhul-Qarnayn built the barrier, some of Gog and Magog were absent and therefore did not enter behind the barrier with their people. And that is why they are called ‘Turk’ (i.e. from the Arabic root: t-r-k / yatruk - to be left alone or left out. i.e. those that were left outside the barrier of Dhul-Qarnayn).”

This statement should not be taken as creed since Wahb ibn Munabbih may have been recalling from the israliyat, or traditions of bani Israel, the truth of which we may not be able to determine without corroboration from the Qur’an or Sunnah. However, it does illustrate an idea that was prevalent amongst the earliest Muslim community.

Recalling the devastation wrought by the Tatar-Mongols in his day, Imam al-Qurtubi / قرطبي  (d. 1273) wrote about the Turks: 

 كأنهم يأجوج ومأجوج أو مقدمتهم

“It is as if they are Gog and Magog or their predecessors.”

Early Muslim scholars understood Gog and Magog to be nations related to the Turks and Mongols, therefore, by extrapolation, co-members of the Altaic ethno-linguistic family of nations.  The Altaic peoples  – named after the Altai mountains in NE central Asia, on geographic Mongolia’s western border region - comprise the Tungus, Mongols, Turks and two other nations.  All Altaic peoples in their archetypal forms exhibit a similar physiology, speak in similar lexical structures, and share a number of cultural traits, including traditions of wearing winter boots made of animal hair or fur.

In the report of Abu Hurayra, the Prophet ﷺ appears to separate out two distinct groups of people who will be at war with the Muslims. Those with particular physical traits whom the Prophet explicitly named as Turks and another group, who wear boots made of hair. 

I will argue that the first group the Prophet described were the Khazars rather than any other group of Turks that Muslims fought – and they fought many - and that the second group is a specific reference to the Mongols of Chingis Khan.

Khazars

When the armies of the Companion Umar b. al-Khattab رضي الله عنه conquered Caucasian Albania, AKA Arran, they found themselves at the border of a formative new empire, that of the Turkic Khazars. 

Sometime during the rightly-guided caliphate of the Companions, the Khazars established their first capital at Balanjar, in the country of the Avars. (In 642) Umar b. al-Khattab had placed the Companion, AbdurRahman b. Rabeea (عَبْدُ الرَّحْمنِ بنُ رَبِيعَةَ الباهليّ) in charge of the war against the Khazars. From his base at Derbent, AbdurRahman made clear his intention: “أُرِيدُ مَلِكَ التُّرْكِ بَلَنْجَرَ” (“I want the king of the Turks at Balanjar”).

Thus began the First so-called Arab-Khazar Wars as Western historians label it. In terms more dear to us, this was the first war between the Muslims – no less, the best of Muslims, the Companions of Allah’s Messenger - and the disbelieving Turks. 

AbdurRahman would begin a series of daring raids against the Khazars. The enemy was shocked at their apparent inability to inflict any losses on the Muslims, until they started to believe AbdurRahman and his men invincible. Judging by the roll call of some of the battle’s participants, then this should not come as such a big surprise. For according to Tabari, amongst the luminous Companions would take part in the battle, were such luminaries as Abu Hurayra, Salman al-Farisi and Hudhayfa bin al-Yamaan رضي الله عنهم. 

Ten years later, during the reign of Uthman bin Affan رضي الله عنه , the Muslims were still raiding deep into Khazar territory. As if by some divinely-inspired premonition, Uthman expressed his concern with the ongoing policy, writing to AbdurRahman:

إنَّ الرَّعِيَّـةَ قد أَبْطَرَ كثيرا منهم البِطنَةُ، فقَصِّرْ ولا تَـقْتَحِم بالمسلمين، فإني خاشٍ أَنْ يُـبْـتَـلَوا  (الطبري، تاريخ الرسل والملوك، السنة 32)

“Verily, gluttony has made many of the subjects reckless. Curtail [your campaign] and do not plunge ahead with the Muslims so boldly, for I fear they will face severe trials.”

Uthman’s letter did not restrain AbdurRahman b Rabeea, who was determined to take the Khazar capital once and for all. And so, in the 9th year of Uthman’s reign (652/32), AbdurRahman mounted another expedition against the Khazars, besieging Balanjar with mangonel (majānīq) and ballista (arrādāt). Although this time, the native North Caucasians fought alongside their Khazar overlords against the Muslims. Needless to say, the battle ended in a disaster, as AbdurRahman’s winning streak finally ended as some 4,000 Muslims fell in battle. The idea of Muslim invincibility was broken, AbdurRahman was martyred, and his corpse carried off by the Khazars, who used it for baraka, believing the Companion to be holy. Uthman’s ominous premonition proved true. Not for nothing did the Prophet ﷺ caution: 

sl20  وَاتْرُكُوا التُّرْكَ مَا تَرَكُوكُمْ

 “…and leave alone the Turks as long as they leave you alone.” ‏(رجل من الصحابة. سنن أبي داود 4302)

Mongols

Jumping ahead some six centuries, Chingis Khan (1162-1227), his children and his grandchildren burst out of Mongolia, ravaging the eastern Muslim lands and decimating their great metropoles – Bukhara, Balkh and Baghdad to name but three. The great Khans would dispatch their armies from their new and first ever capital, Karakorum – a city of tents deep within Mongolia – where the freezing cold winters would have dictated the continued expediency of donning shoes made of hair. 

This then is how we can account for the distinction in the words of the Messenger of Allah, the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ. When he described the wars of his followers with the Turks, he prophesised the jihad of his companions against the Khazars – an Altaic people who had abandoned the wearing of hair-boots as they settled down in Southern Europe. But when he ﷺ added that his followers would also fight a people who wore shoes of hair, he was likely prophesising the much later jihad of the umma against the Mongols who retained the Altaic fashion of fury footwear as they launched their medieval blitzkrieg whilst remaining headquartered deep within/on the cold open steppe. 

If our interpretation is correct, then it demonstrates how the specificity of the wording in the hadith is even more miraculous than it first suggests. For it testifies to the precision of the prophetic speech, the meticulousness of Allah’s Messenger ﷺ in describing terms of both space and time, and in specifying the custom of a particular clime, while referencing the anthropology of future, of as yet unknown encounters with as yet unknown enemies of Islam. 

Remember, Khazaria as a political entity did not even exist until 630. The Prophet ﷺ foretold of the fighting of Muslims with the Turks perhaps at least five years before the Khazars were even a thing. And more than 500 years before the Mongols were known to anyone west of the Altai mountains.  Imam an-Nawawi (d. 1277) concluded:

وهذه كلها معجزات لرسول الله صلى الله عليه وسلم فقد وجد قتال هؤلاء الترك بجميع صفاتهم التى ذكرها صلى الله عليه وسلم...  فوجدوا بهذه الصفات كلها فى زماننا وقاتلهم المسلمون مرات وقاتلهم الآن. ونسأل الله الكريم إحسان العاقبة للمسلمين في أمرهم وأمر غيرهم وسائر أحوالهم و إدامة اللطف بهم والحماية، وصلى الله على رسوله الذي لا ينطق عن الهوى إن هو إلا وحي يوحي

“All of these [words] are miracles of the Messenger of Allah ﷺ, for the fighting has taken place with those Turk [and Mongols] possessing all of the attributes that he ﷺ mentioned… they were found to have all of these attributes during our time, and the Muslims fought them on numerous occasions including now. We ask Allah, Most Generous, a good ending for the Muslims in this and all other affairs and for the continuation of His grace and protection. And may Allah send His peace and blessings upon His Messenger; who does not speak from his own desires, but only through revelation revealed to him.” Sl24

(شرح صحيح مسلم، النووي18:248-9 )

﴾وَمَا يَنطِقُ عَنِ الْهَوَى * إِنْ هُوَ إِلَّا وَحْيٌ يُوحَى﴿

And nor does he speak of (his own) desire. It is but revelation that is revealed. (Quran, 53:4)

Article adapted from the following video: