Cyrus the Great in the Qur'an - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Cyrus the Great in the Qur'an is a theory that holds that the character of Dhul-Qarnayn

Dhul-Qarnayn

Dhul-Qarnayn , literally "He of the Two Horns" or "He of the two centuries" is a figure mentioned in the Qur'an, the sacred scripture of Islam, where he is described as a great and righteous ruler who built a long wall that keeps Gog and Magog from attacking the people who he met on his journey...

, mentioned in the Qur'an

Qur'an

The Quran , also transliterated Qur'an, Koran, Alcoran, Qur’ān, Coran, Kuran, and al-Qur’ān, is the central religious text of Islam, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God . It is regarded widely as the finest piece of literature in the Arabic language...

, is in fact Cyrus the Great

Cyrus the Great

Cyrus II of Persia , commonly known as Cyrus the Great, also known as Cyrus the Elder, was the founder of the Achaemenid Empire. Under his rule, the empire embraced all the previous civilized states of the ancient Near East, expanded vastly and eventually conquered most of Southwest Asia and much...

. Dhul-Qarnayn

Dhul-Qarnayn

(Arabic

Arabic language

Arabic is a name applied to the descendants of the Classical Arabic language of the 6th century AD, used most prominently in the Quran, the Islamic Holy Book...

for "the two-horned") is mentioned in the Qur'an

Qur'an

. The story of Dhul-Qarnayn appears in sixteen verses of the Qur'an, specifically the 16 verses 18:83-98 (Al Kahf). There is extensive ongoing debate on who exactly was the historical character of Dhul-Qarnayn

Dhul-Qarnayn

. Some classical Muslim scholars believed that Dhul Qarnayn is Alexander the Great in the Qur'an. However, in recent years, alternative theories supporting other explanations have become dominant. The most prominent of these is the theory that Dhul-Qarnayn was none other than Cyrus the Great

Cyrus the Great

of Achaemenid

Achaemenid Empire

The Achaemenid Empire , sometimes known as First Persian Empire and/or Persian Empire, was founded in the 6th century BCE by Cyrus the Great who overthrew the Median confederation...

Persia. This theory has been endorsed by such scholars as Maududi, Javed Ahmed Ghamidi

Javed Ahmed Ghamidi

Javed Ahmad Ghamidi is a well-known Pakistani Muslim theologian, Quran scholar and exegete, and educationist. A former member of the Jamaat-e-Islami, who extended the work of his tutor, Amin Ahsan Islahi. Ghamidi is the founder of Al-Mawrid Institute of Islamic Sciences and its sister...

, the Indian minister Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, Allameh Tabatabaei

Allameh Tabatabaei

Allameh Seyyed Muhammad Husayn Tabatabaei was one of the most prominent thinkers of philosophy and contemporary Shia Islam...

, and Naser Makarem Shirazi

Naser Makarem Shirazi

Grand Ayatollah Naser Makarem Shirazi is an ayatollah in Iran. He is a spiritual guide for many Shia Muslims.-In Iran:He started his formal Islamic studies at the age of 14 in the Agha Babakhan Shirazi seminary....

, among others. Cyrus was also a follower of Zoroastrianism

Zoroastrianism

Zoroastrianism is a religion and philosophy based on the teachings of prophet Zoroaster and was formerly among the world's largest religions. It was probably founded some time before the 6th century BCE in Greater Iran.In Zoroastrianism, the Creator Ahura Mazda is all good, and no evil...

, which has some similarities to Islam

Islam

Islam . The most common are and . : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...

and Judaism

Judaism

Judaism ) is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people...

Analysis

Maududi writes in his Tafsir

Tafsir

Tafseer is the Arabic word for exegesis or commentary, usually of the Qur'an. Ta'wīl is a subset of tafsir and refers to esoteric or mystical interpretation. An author of tafsir is a mufassir .- Etymology :...

The identification of Dhul-Qarnain has been a controversial matter from the earliest times. Generally, commentators have been of the opinion that Dhul-Qarnayn is actually Alexander, but some characteristics of Dhul-Qarnain described in the Qur'an

Qur'an

, it has been argued, are not applicable to the historical Alexander. The fact that the Alexander-as-Dhul-Qarnay theory actually refers to the semi-mythical Alexander described in the Alexander Romance makes the connection even more problematic for some Islamic scholars. Today some commentators are inclined to believe that Dhul-Qarnain was actually Cyrus The Great, an ancient king of Achaemenid Persia.

The characteristics of Dhul-Qarnain in the light of his story as given in the Qur'an now follow:

(1) The title Dhul-Qarnain ("The Two-Horned") should have been quite familiar to the Jews, for it was at their instigation that the disbelievers of Mecca

Mecca

Mecca is a city in the Hijaz and the capital of Makkah province in Saudi Arabia. The city is located inland from Jeddah in a narrow valley at a height of above sea level...

put this question to Mohammad. Therefore one must turn to Judaic literature in order to learn who was the person known as "The Two-Horned" or which was the kingdom known as "The Two-Horned."

The Book of Daniel

Book of Daniel

The Book of Daniel is a book in the Hebrew Bible. The book tells of how Daniel, and his Judean companions, were inducted into Babylon during Jewish exile, and how their positions elevated in the court of Nebuchadnezzar. The court tales span events that occur during the reigns of Nebuchadnezzar,...

Chapter 8 says:

"2 In the vision I was looking and saw myself in Susa

Susa

Susa was an ancient city of the Elamite, Persian and Parthian empires of Iran. It is located in the lower Zagros Mountains about east of the Tigris River, between the Karkheh and Dez Rivers....

the capital, in the province of Elam

Elam

Elam was an ancient civilization located in what is now southwest Iran. Elam was centered in the far west and the southwest of modern-day Iran, stretching from the lowlands of Khuzestan and Ilam Province, as well as a small part of southern Iraq...

, and I was by the river Ulai. 3 I looked up and saw a ram standing beside the river. It had two horns. Both horns were long, but one was longer than the other, and the longer one came up second. 4 I saw the ram charging westward and northward and southward. All beasts were powerless to withstand it, and no one could rescue from its power; it did as it pleased and became strong. 5 As I was watching, a male goat appeared from the west, coming across the face of the whole earth without touching the ground. The goat had a horn between its eyes. 6 It came toward the ram with the two horns that I had seen standing beside the river, and it ran at it with savage force."

The New Revised Standard Version of the Bible

Bible

The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...

gives the following interpretation from Gabriel: "As for the ram that you saw with the two horns, these are the kings of Media

Medes

The MedesThe Medes...

and Persia."

Furthermore, two horns and two horned symbolism was not an unknown emblem of the kingdoms of Persia and its predecessors, for we see that Elam

Elam

ite kings used this symbol routinely in their insignia.

(2) Dhul-Qarnayn must have been a great ruler and a great conqueror whose conquests might have spread from the East to the West and on the third side to the North or to the South. Before the revelation of the Qur'an there had been several historical figures, who are known to have been conquerors of such calibre. So one must confine one's search for Dhul-Qarnayn to one such person. Cyrus The Great is the candidate that fits this description quite fittingly.

(3) This title should be applicable to such a ruler who might have constructed a strong wall across a mountain pass to protect his kingdom from the incursions of the Gog and Magog

Gog and Magog

Gog and Magog are names that appear primarily in various Jewish, Christian and Muslim scriptures, as well as numerous subsequent references in other works. Their context can be either genealogical or eschatological and apocalyptic, as in Ezekiel and Revelation...

. In order to investigate this, one must determine as to who were the Gog and Magog. One must also consider when such a wall was historically built, if at all, and by whom and to which territory it was adjacent to.

(4) Besides possessing the aforementioned characteristics, he should also be a God-worshipper and a just ruler, since the Qur'an has brought into prominence these characteristics more than anything else in the quoted passages.

As mentioned above, the first of these characteristics is easily applicable to Cyrus, for according to the Bible Prophet Daniel saw in his vision that the united kingdom of Media and Persia was like a two-horned ram before the rise of the Greeks. (Dan. 8: 3,"20). The Jews had a very high opinion of "The Two-horned" one, because it was his invasion which brought about the downfall of the kingdom of Babylon

Babylon

Babylon was an Akkadian city-state of ancient Mesopotamia, the remains of which are found in present-day Al Hillah, Babil Province, Iraq, about 85 kilometers south of Baghdad...

and the liberation of the Israelites (also refer to E.N. 8 of Chapter XVII).

The second characteristic is applicable to Cyrus to a great extent but not completely. Though his conquests spread to Syria and Asia Minor in the West and to Bākhtar (Balkh

Balkh

Balkh , was an ancient city and centre of Zoroastrianism in what is now northern Afghanistan. Today it is a small town in the province of Balkh, about 20 kilometers northwest of the provincial capital, Mazar-e Sharif, and some south of the Amu Darya. It was one of the major cities of Khorasan...

) in the East, there is no trace of any of his great expeditions to the North or to the South, whereas the Qur'an makes an explicit mention of his third expedition. However some historians do verify the probability of such a voyage. Nevertheless, this third expedition is not completely out of question for history tells us that Cyrus' kingdom extended to Caucasia

Caucasus

The Caucasus, also Caucas or Caucasia , is a geopolitical region at the border of Europe and Asia, and situated between the Black and the Caspian sea...

in the North. As regards Gog and Magog, it has been established that they were the wild tribes of Central Asia who were known by different names: Scythians, Parthia

Parthia

Parthia is a region of north-eastern Iran, best known for having been the political and cultural base of the Arsacid dynasty, rulers of the Parthian Empire....

ns, Tartars, Mongols

Mongols

Mongols ) are a Central-East Asian ethnic group that lives mainly in the countries of Mongolia, China, and Russia. In China, ethnic Mongols can be found mainly in the central north region of China such as Inner Mongolia...

, and Huns

Huns

The Huns were a group of nomadic people who, appearing from east of the Volga River, migrated into Europe c. AD 370 and established the vast Hunnic Empire there. Since de Guignes linked them with the Xiongnu, who had been northern neighbours of China 300 years prior to the emergence of the Huns,...

, who had been making incursions on various kingdoms and empires from very ancient times. It is also known that strong bulwarks had been built in southern regions of Caucasia, though it has yet to be determined historically whether these were built by Cyrus.

As regards the last characteristic, Cyrus is the only known conqueror among the ancient rulers, to whom this may be applicable, for even his enemies have been full of praise for him for his justice, and, Ezra

Ezra

Ezra , also called Ezra the Scribe and Ezra the Priest in the Book of Ezra. According to the Hebrew Bible he returned from the Babylonian exile and reintroduced the Torah in Jerusalem...

, asserts that he was a God-worshipper and a God-fearing king who set free the Israelites because of his God-worship, and ordered that the Temple of Solomon be rebuilt for the worship of God.

Thus in the light of the above, it is easy to conclude that of all the conquerors who had died before the revelation of the Qur'an, Cyrus alone is the one to whom the characteristics of "Dhul-Qarnain" are most applicable. There is no other conqueror to whom the characteristics stated in the Qur'an are as much applicable as to Cyrus.

The historical Cyrus was a Persian ruler whose rise began about 549 BCE. Within a few years he had conquered the kingdoms of Media

Medes

The MedesThe Medes...

and Lydia

Lydia

Lydia was an Iron Age kingdom of western Asia Minor located generally east of ancient Ionia in the modern Turkish provinces of Manisa and inland İzmir. Its population spoke an Anatolian language known as Lydian....

; by 539 BCE he had conquered Babylon

Babylon

Babylon was an Akkadian city-state of ancient Mesopotamia, the remains of which are found in present-day Al Hillah, Babil Province, Iraq, about 85 kilometers south of Baghdad...

. There was no powerful kingdom left to oppose him. His conquests extended eastward to Turkistan; westward to Ionia

Ionia

Ionia is an ancient region of central coastal Anatolia in present-day Turkey, the region nearest İzmir, which was historically Smyrna. It consisted of the northernmost territories of the Ionian League of Greek settlements...

; northward to Caucasia

Caucasus

The Caucasus, also Caucas or Caucasia , is a geopolitical region at the border of Europe and Asia, and situated between the Black and the Caspian sea...

--covering, in fact, much of the known civilized world.

Journey towards West

According to Ibn Kathir

Ibn Kathir

Ismail ibn Kathir was a Muslim muhaddith, Faqih, historian, and commentator.-Biography:His full name was Abu Al-Fida, 'Imad Ad-Din, Isma'il bin 'Umar bin Kathir, Al-Qurashi, Al-Busrawi...

, it means that he marched to the West conquering one country after the other until he reached the last boundary of the land, beyond which there was ocean. "He found the sun setting in black muddy waters of the sea": if Dhul-Qarnain was Cyrus, then that place would be the western limit of Asia Minor

Asia Minor

Asia Minor is a geographical location at the westernmost protrusion of Asia, also called Anatolia, and corresponds to the western two thirds of the Asian part of Turkey...

and the "black waters" would be the Aegean Sea

Aegean Sea

The Aegean Sea[p] is an elongated embayment of the Mediterranean Sea located between the southern Balkan and Anatolian peninsulas, i.e., between the mainlands of Greece and Turkey. In the north, it is connected to the Marmara Sea and Black Sea by the Dardanelles and Bosporus...

. This interpretation is supported by the use of the word "`ain" instead of "bahr" in the Qur'an.

Journey towards East

That is, when he advanced towards the East in Babylon, the people, who had no shelter were the captured tribes of Israel. The reason the Quran mentions no more on the topic is because the whole epic is written in the Torah (Kings). The Quran simply says at 18:90, "To the extent that when he reached the rising-place of the sun, he found it rising upon a nation for which We had not kept any shelter from it."

Journey towards north/Gog and Magog

The "two mountains" must have been parts of that mountain range which runs between the Caspian Sea

Caspian Sea

The Caspian Sea is the largest enclosed body of water on Earth by area, variously classed as the world's largest lake or a full-fledged sea. The sea has a surface area of and a volume of...

and the Black Sea

Black Sea

The Black Sea is bounded by Europe, Anatolia and the Caucasus and is ultimately connected to the Atlantic Ocean via the Mediterranean and the Aegean seas and various straits. The Bosphorus strait connects it to the Sea of Marmara, and the strait of the Dardanelles connects that sea to the Aegean...

. This must be, for beyond them was the territory of Gog and Magog. "It was difficult to communicate with them: their language was almost foreign to Dhul-Qarnain and his companions, and, as they were quite barbaric, none could understand their language, nor were they acquainted with any foreign language."

As has already been pointed out, Gog and Magog were the wild tribes of North Eastern Asia which, from the very early times had been making inroads on settled kingdoms and empires in Asia and Europe and ravaging them. According to Genesis (Chapter 10), they were the descendants of Japheth

Japheth

Japheth is one of the sons of Noah in the Abrahamic tradition...

, the son of Noah

Noah

Noah was, according to the Hebrew Bible, the tenth and last of the antediluvian Patriarchs. The biblical story of Noah is contained in chapters 6–9 of the book of Genesis, where he saves his family and representatives of all animals from the flood by constructing an ark...

, and the Muslim historians have also accepted this. And according to the book of Ezekiel

Ezekiel

Ezekiel , "God will strengthen" , is the central protagonist of the Book of Ezekiel in the Hebrew Bible. In Judaism, Christianity and Islam, Ezekiel is acknowledged as a Hebrew prophet...

(Chapters 38, 39), they inhabited the territories of Meshech (Moscow

Moscow

Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...

) and Tubal (Tubalsek). According to the Israelite historian Josephus, they were the Scythians and their territory spread to the north and the east of the Black Sea. According to Jerome, Magog inhabited the territory to the north of Caucasia near the Caspian Sea.

He said: "As a ruler it is my duty to protect you from the ravages of your enemies: therefore it is not lawful for me to levy any extra taxes on you for this purpose. The treasury that Allah has placed in my custody, suffices for this purpose. You shall, however, have to help me with your manual labour."

The Wall

He said: "Though I have built a very strong iron-wall, as far as it was possible for me, it is not ever-lasting, for it will last only as long as Allah wills, and will fall down to pieces when the time of my Lord's promise shall come. Then no power in the world shall be able to keep it safe and secure."

Some people have entertained the misunderstanding that the wall attributed here to Dhul-Qarnain refers to the famous Great Wall of China

Great Wall of China

The Great Wall of China is a series of stone and earthen fortifications in northern China, built originally to protect the northern borders of the Chinese Empire against intrusions by various nomadic groups...

, whereas this wall was built between Derbent

Derbent

Derbent |Lak]]: Чурул, Churul; Persian: دربند; Judæo-Tat: דארבּאנד/Дэрбэнд/Dərbənd) is a city in the Republic of Dagestan, Russia, close to the Azerbaijani border. It is the southernmost city in Russia, and it is the second most important city of Dagestan...

and Dar'yal

Darial Gorge

The Darial Gorge is the gorge on the border between Russia and Georgia. It is at the east base of Mount Kazbek, pierced by the river Terek for a distance of 8 metres between vertical walls of rock and is located South of present-day...

, two cities of Daghestan in the Caucasus, the land that lies between the Black Sea and the Caspian

Caspian Sea

The Caspian Sea is the largest enclosed body of water on Earth by area, variously classed as the world's largest lake or a full-fledged sea. The sea has a surface area of and a volume of...

. There are high mountains between the Black Sea and Dar'yal having deep gorges which cannot allow large armies to pass through them. Between Derbent and Dar'yal, however, there are no such mountains and the passes also are wide and passable. In ancient times savage hordes from the north invaded and ravaged southern lands through these passes and the Persian rulers who were fearful of them had to build a strong wall, 50 miles long, 29 feet high and 10 feet wide, for fortification purposes, ruins of which can still be seen (eg.Great Wall of Gorgan

Great Wall of Gorgan

The Great Wall of Gorgan is a series of ancient defensive fortifications located near Gorgan in the Golestān Province of northeastern Iran, at the southeastern part of the Caspian Sea...

). Though it has not yet been established historically who built this wall in the beginning, Muslim historians and geographers assign it to Dhul-Qarnain because its remains correspond with the description of it given in the Qur'an, despite the fact that the wall is in fact Sassanid in origins, and thus is about 1000 years too late to have been built by Cyrus. Carbon dating however, sets the wall at the Parthian era which is closer to the time of Cyrus.

Ibn Jarir Tabari

Muhammad ibn Jarir al-Tabari

Abu Ja'far Muhammad ibn Jarir al-Tabari was a prominent and influential Sunni scholar and exegete of the Qur'an from Persia...

and Ibn Kathir

Ibn Kathir

Ismail ibn Kathir was a Muslim muhaddith, Faqih, historian, and commentator.-Biography:His full name was Abu Al-Fida, 'Imad Ad-Din, Isma'il bin 'Umar bin Kathir, Al-Qurashi, Al-Busrawi...

have recorded the event, and Yaqut al-Hamawi

Yaqut al-Hamawi

Yāqūt ibn-'Abdullah al-Rūmī al-Hamawī) was an Islamic biographer and geographer renowned for his encyclopedic writings on the Muslim world. "al-Rumi" refers to his Greek descent; "al-Hamawi" means that he is from Hama, Syria, and ibn-Abdullah is a reference to his father's name, Abdullah...

has mentioned it in his Mujam-ul-Buldan that: when after the conquest of Azerbaijan, Umar sent Suraqah bin `Amr, in 22 A.H. (643CE) on an expedition to Derbent, the latter appointed `Abdur Rahman bin Rabi`ah as the chief of his vanguard. When 'Abdur Rehman entered Armenia

Armenia

Armenia , officially the Republic of Armenia , is a landlocked mountainous country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia...

, the ruler Shehrbaz surrendered without fighting. Then when `Abdur Rehman wanted to advance towards Derbent, Shehrbaz informed him that he had already gathered full information about the wall built by Dhul-Qarnain, through a man, who could supply all the necessary details and then the man was actually presented before `Abdur Rehman. (Tabari, Vol. III, pp. 235–239; Al-Bidayah wan-Nihayah, Vol. VII, pp. 122–125, and Mu'jam-ul-Buldan, under Bab-ul-Abwab: Derbent).

Two hundred years later, the Abbasid Caliph Al-Wathiq

Al-Wathiq

Al-Wathiq ibn Mutasim was an Abbasid caliph who reigned from 842 until 847 AD .-Biography:...

despatched a party of 50 men under Sallam-ul-Tarjuman to study the wall of Dhul-Qarnain, whose observations have been recorded in great detail by Yaqut al-Hamawi

Yaqut al-Hamawi

in Mu jam-ul-Buldan and by Ibn Kathir

Ibn Kathir

Ismail ibn Kathir was a Muslim muhaddith, Faqih, historian, and commentator.-Biography:His full name was Abu Al-Fida, 'Imad Ad-Din, Isma'il bin 'Umar bin Kathir, Al-Qurashi, Al-Busrawi...

in Al-Bidayah. They write:

this expedition reached Samarrah from where they reached Tbilisi

Tbilisi

Tbilisi is the capital and the largest city of Georgia, lying on the banks of the Mt'k'vari River. The name is derived from an early Georgian form T'pilisi and it was officially known as Tiflis until 1936...

and then through As-Sarir and Al-Lan, they reached Filanshah, from where they entered the Caspian territory. From there they arrived at Derbent and saw the wall. (Al-Bidayah Vol. II, p. 111, Vol. VII, pp. 122–125; Mu jam-ul-Buldan: under Bab-ul-Abwab). This clearly shows that even up until the tenth century, Muslim scholars regarded this wall of the Caucasus as the wall of Dhul-Qarnain.

Yaqut in his Mu jam-ul-Buldan has further confirmed the same view at a number of places. For instance, under Khazar (Caspian

Caspian Sea

The Caspian Sea is the largest enclosed body of water on Earth by area, variously classed as the world's largest lake or a full-fledged sea. The sea has a surface area of and a volume of...

) he writes:

"This territory adjoins the Wall of Dhul-Qarnain just behind Bab-ul-Abwab, which is also called Derbent." In the same connection, he records a report by Ahmad bin Fadhlan, the ambassador of Caliph Al-Muqtadir

Al-Muqtadir

Al-Muqtadir was the Abbasid Caliph in Baghdad from 908 AD to 932 AD .After the previous Caliph, al-Muktafi, was confined for several months to his sick-bed, intrigue was made for some time as to his successor...

, who has given a full description of the Caspian land, saying that Caspian is the name of a country whose capital is Itil (near the present Astrakhan) right through which flows River Itil, which joins the Caspian front Russia and Bulghar.

Regarding Bab-ul-Abwab he says that this city is called both Al-Bab and Derbent, which is a highly difficult passage for the people coming from the northern lands towards the south. Once this territory was a part of the kingdom of Nausherwan, and the Persian rulers paid particular attention to strengthening their frontiers on that side.

About Zul-Qayrnoon, Muhammad Ali says (p586):
{The word qarn means a horn, as also a generation or a century and dhul qarnain literally means the two-horned one, or one belonging to the two generations or two centuries. The reference here seems to be to the two horned ram of Daniel's vision (dan. 8:3), which he interpreted as the Kingdoms of Media and Persia, which were combined into a single kingdom under one ruler, Cyrus, who is erroneousy called Darius in the Bible. The reference in Daniel's vision is, however, not to Cyrus but to Darius I Hystaspes (521-485 B.C.), "who allowed the Jews to rebuild their temple, and is referred to in Ezra 4:5,24;5:5;6:1;Hag1:1;2:10;Zech 1;7, and probably in Neh 12:22. His liberality towards the Jews is in complete accord with what we know otherwise of his general policy in religious matter towards the subject nations"

That the "two horned ram" of Daniel's vision is the king of Media
and Persia is made plain in Daniel's book, where the interpretation of the dream is given in the following words: "The ram which thou sawest having two horns are the Kings of Media and Persia" (Dan8:20). The reference in the Qur'an in the history of Dhulqarnain is to Darius I: "Darius was the organizer of the Persian Empire. His conquests served to round off the boundaries of his realm in Armenia, the Causcasus and India, and along the Turanian steppes and the highland of Central Asia" (Jewish En., Darius I). The following remarks in the En. Br. strengthen this view: "Darius in his
inscriptions appears as a fervent believer in the true religion of Zoroaster. But he was also a great statesman and organizer. The time of conquest had come to an end; the wars which Darius undertook, like those of Augustus, only served the purpose of gaining strong natural frontiers for the empire and keeping down the barbarous tribes on its border. Thus Darius subjugated the wild nations of Caucasus. For the same reason he fought against the Sace and other Turanian tribes." The references in this quotation to
Darius being a fervent believer in the true religion of Zoroaster, to his subduing the barbarous tribes on the border, to his gaining strong natural frontiers for the empire, and to his fighting against the Sacae clearly point him out as the Dhul Qarnain of the Qur'an.

The three journeys alluded to seem to have been undertaken with the
object of strengthening the fronties of the empire, the most important of these being that spoken of in v.93, the part of the frontier between the Caspian and the Black Seas, where the Caucasus afforded a natural protection against the attacks of the Scythians. Darius goes first westward to the Black sea (v.85, 86). Then he undertakes an eastward journey—the land of the rising sun. The description of the people found here, a people who had no shelter from the sun, is a description of the barbarous aboriginal tribes on the shores of the Caspian. The En. Br. says in the article on Media: "The names in the assyrian inscriptions prove that the tribes in the Zagros and the northern parts Media were not Iranians nor Ind-Europeans, but an aboriginal population, like the early inhabitants of Armenia, perhaps connected with the numerous tribes of the Caucasus. We
can see how the Iranian element gradually became dominant: princes with Iranian names occasionally occur as the ruler of these tribes. But the galae, Tapuri, Cadusii, Amardi, Utii and other tribes in Northern Media and on the shores of Caspain, were not Iranians."}
Maududi says:
{Early commenators on the Qur'an were generally inclined to believe that it
referred to Alexander. The characteristics attribute to Dhul Qarnayn,
however, hardly apply to Alexander. In the light of the latest historical
evidence, contemporary commentators on the Qur'an are inclined to believe
that Dhul Qarnayn signifies the Persian Emperor, Cyrus. This, in any case,
seems more plausible. Nevertheless, the info available to date does not
enable one to form a definitive opinion concerning Dhul Qarnayn's identity.

Key points:

The title "The Two-Horned' was at least familiar to the Jews
Jews
The Jews , also known as the Jewish people, are a nation and ethnoreligious group originating in the Israelites or Hebrews of the Ancient Near East. The Jewish ethnicity, nationality, and religion are strongly interrelated, as Judaism is the traditional faith of the Jewish nation...

. This is evident from the fact they had instigated the Mecca
Mecca
Mecca is a city in the Hijaz and the capital of Makkah province in Saudi Arabia. The city is located inland from Jeddah in a narrow valley at a height of above sea level...

n unbelievers to ask the Prophet about him. One must, therefore, inevtiably turn to Jewish literature to find out who this person was or to establish whiat was the kingdom known as 'The Two-Horned.'
(in summary of Maududi) there are only a few people who fit this description
The title of Dhul Qarnayn may be used for a ruler who, being concerned with the defence of his kingdom from the assaults of Gog and magog, had a strong protective wall construceted across a mountain pass.
He is a God conscious person.

Further indications

The book Iranians in the Qur'an and Traditions by Ali Abtahi mentions that a wall with characteristics mentioned in the verses of the Qur'an exists in the Dariel passage
Darial Gorge
The Darial Gorge is the gorge on the border between Russia and Georgia. It is at the east base of Mount Kazbek, pierced by the river Terek for a distance of 8 metres between vertical walls of rock and is located South of present-day...

in the Caucasus mountains, and that there is even a stream nearby which is called "Saeres" by the locals. According to this source, local Armenians called this wall "Behag Gurai" (meaning "The passage of Cyrus").

In Arabic translations of the Old Testament, the word "Dhul Qarnayn" (Hebrew: Ba`al Haqqərānayim בעל הקרנים) appears once in the Old Testament, in the Book of Daniel
Book of Daniel
The Book of Daniel is a book in the Hebrew Bible. The book tells of how Daniel, and his Judean companions, were inducted into Babylon during Jewish exile, and how their positions elevated in the court of Nebuchadnezzar. The court tales span events that occur during the reigns of Nebuchadnezzar,...

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Dhul-Qarnayn expanded his empire in three directions (east, west and north), which is the same as Cyrus' expansions, where he did not make southern expansions (Achaemenid southern exansions began after Cyrus). It should be noted that Alexander made his expansions towards south and east.

Shortcomings of this theory

Torah mentions Cyrus as his name and did not give him a nickname like 'the two-horned one'.
Dhul-Qarnayn, as mention explicitly in Quran, insisted that people believe in a specific religion, however, Cyrus after invading Babylon let people to worship their gods.
There is no evidance that Cyrus built any walls. The walls that are claimed to be built by Cyrus (like Derbent) are made by following kings and they are made of brick (not iron and copper).
There is little similarity between this relief and other reliefs of Achaemenid emperors.

External links

Who Was Zulqarnain?

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Analysis

Journey towards West

Journey towards East

Journey towards north/Gog and Magog

The Wall

Further indications

Shortcomings of this theory

See also

External links