# Is the Dhul Qarnayn story based on the legend of Alexander? *The Alexander legend: a Byzantine Christian origin for the Dhul Qarnayn story* - URL: https://muftiabulayth.org/r/zasz48lx_wi/s/30/ - Date: 2020-12-11 · Kind: discussion · Transcript tier: machine · Recording: Dr Javad T. Hashmi | Axis of Morality & Archetypal Myths in the Quran | MindTrap 46 |Mufti Abu Layth (2:06:50–2:11:24) - Status: a view quoted in order to be discussed, not a position held - Watch from the start of the segment: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZAsz48lX_WI&t=7610s - Recording page: https://muftiabulayth.org/r/zasz48lx_wi/ **Topics:** The ancient Near East and scripture; Tafsir and verse study; Christians and other faiths **Summary (not a quotation; machine-made, unchecked):** The guest says scholarship shows the Dhul Qarnayn story derives from a Byzantine Christian legend of Alexander walling in Gog and Magog, known to the Quran's first audience; Mufti Abu Layth asks why the Quran then tells it so ambiguously. ## Longer summary The guest says the story was no mystery to its first audience, because Western scholars, he believes Sidney Griffith [?] among them, have shown with historical-critical methods that it refers to Alexander and originated in Byzantium around the Prophet's time, already circulating in Arabia. Mufti Abu Layth asks what relevance Alexander would have for the Jewish questioners. The guest describes the original Christian legend: Alexander travelled across the world and walled in Gog and Magog, savages barely human, who would break out near the end times, after which Byzantium would usher in an age of Christian peace and prosperity, a story meant to reassert the Byzantine empire after its losses to Persia, which he likens to the traditionalist story of the Mahdi. Mufti asks why, if this is a legend retold for a lesson, the Quran does not tell it plainly rather than in ambiguous terms. ## Sources and names cited - Dr Javad T. Hashmi (guest) - Alexander the Great - Sidney Griffith [?] - the Byzantine Empire - Ya'juj and Ma'juj (Gog and Magog) - Mahdi ## Transcript (machine tier, 2:06:50–2:11:24) [2:06:23] Have you noticed that how many different things that you have to on an ad hoc basis respond to and it's always oh this word is not clear this could mean this. Well, it doesn't explicitly say this. Look how many stories you have to do that. But does that not just just saying but does that not add because I would argue that adds the element of mystery which reflects the dynamism in human uh cognition. [2:06:49] But what I would say is it wasn't a mystery for the people at the time at which this was revealed because we know as western scholars have found we not only know uh what they were talking about we know when that legend was created. So that legend was I believe it was um a scholar professor Sydney Griffith I believe he has written on this uh I might be mistaken on the name of the I might might have been another scholar but um he basically says and he's proved actually that uh we can say with pretty good certainty that the or first of all that number and number two [2:07:27] sorry say number one again sorry it just went actually there no carry it's good yeah Okay. So, so this scholar has shown that we can say with some certainty that this story actually refers to Alexander in its original to its original audience and we know that because we know where this uh story originated from. So we know that this story originated using historical critical method and certain other uh uh critical historical uh scholarly tools. [2:07:58] We know that this story originated in Byzantium around the time of the prophets and that it was it it had already penetrated into the Arabian milu and the story was a little bit different than the one that the Quran narrates but that doesn't make sense much does it because because the people asking are Jewish yes so now what what what relevance does Alexander have to the Jewish people okay so first let me just tell you what the story was and then we'll get to that if you don't mind. [2:08:30] Sure. So, so the the initial story was a Christian story in which um it was uh a tale of how it was supposed to explain how Bzantium would triumph and and and usher in this end end time of peace and prosperity. So they had Gog and Magog in this story which they had taken from previous stories and they put it in this story and said that Alexander had put locked them up made a wall uh put them to the exact same Quranic story and that he had traveled across the globe. [2:09:05] same exact story. He built this wall and then near the end times this wall would collapse and these tribes would come and invade and they also described them as savages and barbarians who barely looked human like human. Why? Because this was how they were describing the uh kind of people from that Mongolian descent sort of uh that they like they you can think I'm not talking historically here but historically like when the Mongols came down people thought this was an aab from God, right? [2:09:33] This was like um these didn't look like human beings, right? It because I I don't believe that but they believed that, right? Mhm. Was the story and it ended with the fact that Bzantium would then usher in this Christian age of peace and prosperity. Basically our story that Islamic traditionalists say about the Mdi and the coming. So this is the story and it was meant to reassert the primacy of the Byzantium Empire which had suffered losses against the Persian Empire. [2:10:04] But if that's the case, if that's the case, right? Then first of all, if Allah is mentioning the story just because it's let's say it's just a legend and you're going to take some lesson from it, right? Because this person is grateful to God and it's Alexander. Why are the stories then ambiguous? Why not just tell the story as it is as the legend is? Why even use a such an ambiguous term like for example? [2:10:34] So that's where I'm saying that I I disagree with you that it's uh ambiguous. So what I'm saying is and western scholars in Quranic studies agree with this and this is the recent turn is it's ambiguous to mus later Muslims because they divorced because of a theological imperative they divorced the Quran and the Islamic stories from the pre-Quranic Christian and Jewish stories and the millu in which that existed and because of that they no longse things became unknown to them and then they had to rethink these things but at that time it was not [2:11:12] ambiguous and that's and okay and that comes to your question about why the story was narrated in the Quran it says they ask you about it was people of the book who asked him about do you know about and they were and and the reason is and and now going back to this author he says that the Jews of that time and the people of the book of that time they used the criterion of differentiating between a true prophet and a false prophet knowledge of these sacred stories because they thought they were a scriptured people and and they should ## Cite Mufti Abu Layth Archive, segment ZAsz48lX_WI/s/30. https://muftiabulayth.org/r/zasz48lx_wi/s/30/ Not a fatwa: these answers were given to specific people at specific times. Ask a qualified scholar about your own situation.