Turkish Nation's Trial with History

The known history of humanity dates back to 12,000 BC with the discovery of Göbekli Hill. The known history of the Turks begins with Mete Khan in 200 BC. However, the historical section of what I am going to tell covers the 600s and 800s AD. Because this 200-year period in Turkish history is very important. 

In the 600s after Jesus, humanity was introduced to a new religion: Islam. At that time, ancient civilizations in continental Europe were almost extinct. The Great Roman Empire had collapsed and colonial states had been established in its place. The Eastern Roman Empire had been reduced to a city-state over time. The heart of the center of civilization of that time was beating in Central Asia. And the center of the ancient civilization of us Turks was the geography of Turkistan and its surroundings. One of the dominant powers of that period was China. The narrative of where Central Asia has come from and where it has been is very important in terms of the course of Turkish History and Islamic history. We should all know that Central Asia and Turkistan, the homeland of the Turks, has been the center of culture and civilization of the world for centuries.

I would also like to emphasize the importance of China, India and Iran, which are part of Asian civilization. However, more importantly, communities and descendants, the majority of which are of Turkic origin, have created great civilizations and states in this region, declared their administrative and cultural sovereignty and imposed it on these countries. Dozens of Turkish tribes, clans and communities lived within the Turkish empires and became a part of Turkishness. Within the borders of the Turkish empires, dozens of other communities with very different religions, nationalities and cultures lived together with equal rights and a common legal order. Turks have never been aloof from foreign descendants and races. On the contrary, they built great empires together with them. In short, our ancestors never adopted a racist understanding. Therefore, they have always lived as outward-looking communities, not inward-looking ones. 

Turkestan and the peoples who shared its geography had 4-5 different religious beliefs. All of these were monotheistic religions. The peoples of Turkestan were free-thinkers in analyzing these religions and ideas they encountered and establishing links between them. They knew how to utilize the parts of these religions and cultures that were rational and useful to people. The Turks continued their religious life by living their own historical religion, the belief in "Sky God", together with others. For example, the Uighurs had several religions. Some of them were Buddhists, some were Nestorian Christians, some had the belief in Gök God. However, the Uighurs were the oldest and most civilized developed community on that continent. They were leading a civilized life, which is the pride of Turkish history. For this reason, until the Arabs arrived, no one's nose was ever bloodied in the Uighurs because of differences of belief. For example, the Nestorians, out of respect for other faiths, did not let the bells ring in their churches in order not to disturb other faiths. Because national feelings were more important than anything else.

In Turkish societies, there was no friction or conflict due to differences in beliefs. They absolutely did not allow the clergy to disrupt the national unity that existed in Turkish society for the sake of spreading their beliefs to others. The goal was the common happiness and progress of the Turkish nation. 

The way the Arab invaders, who came to the region later, spread Islam at that time was not aimed at explaining Islam by living it correctly, but to kill, extort, plunder and rob, that is, to obtain booty. The raids into Turkestan in the name of Islam disrupted the peace of the societies living there. Their peaceful coexistence was turned upside down. 

The spread of Islam in Central Asia was not on a healthy basis. In fact, the Umayyad tribal rulers who led these invasions had already moved away from the understanding of Islam in the line of Prophet Muhammad. Even in Arabia, the Umayyads were both sincere followers of the Prophet Muhammad's ideas and members of the sultanate-loving tribe that tried to eradicate the Prophet's lineage. How good a Muslim could Mu'awiya, Yazid and the Umayyad rulers be with this understanding? How could they persuade the Turks to accept the new religion? 

The Umayyads took the hard way and tried to spread the religion of Prophet Muhammad to the Turks not by invitation but by force of the sword. For this purpose, the Arab commander Qutayba did not hesitate to commit the worst massacres in human history in his attacks on Turkish cities.

In some Turkish cities, they massacred all the men and took their women and children to Arabia as booty and slaves. In the genocide that went down in history as the Talkan and Jurjan massacres, more than 100 thousand Turks were killed and tens of thousands of them were hanged from trees on the roadsides, and this great atrocity was exhibited for 20 kilometers in the name of Islam. Qutayba was so spoiled with the power he gained from these massacres that he asked Muslims to swear allegiance only to him and recognize him as "Emir 'ul Muminin". Sadly, the grave of this famous Arab commander, who is said to have rendered great services to Islam, is today in the country of the Turks he slaughtered. He is in the same city as Timur Khan and Hoca Ahmet Yesevi. 

The struggle of the Arabs of that period was never a struggle to explain Islam, the commandments of Allah, the ideas of the Prophet Muhammad! It was a struggle for invasion, booty, concubines and massacres to spread the Arab sultanate. The world was not left to Qutayba, nor Muawiya, nor Yazid. But mankind has never learned a lesson. Qutaybahs, Muawiyas, Yazids kept on spawning and continue to do so today. Perhaps the most notorious Yazids are now ruling their own states in the Arab world. They rule the Muslims. 

Look, what does the famous Turkish scholar Al Biruni from Khwarazm say about this? "Qutayba used every means to destroy those of the Khwarezmites who knew the written language, those who preserved their traditions and almost all the Turkish scholars. Thus, everything went into darkness behind him. As Islam penetrated into the Khwarezmlis, it was no longer possible to learn anything about their history."  

During the Umayyad advances in Turkestan, Muhammad's thoughts, his purpose and his struggle were never properly explained. The Arab-appointed governors did everything that could be bad for this purpose. The revolts in the cities occupied and ruled by the Arabs were usually against these attitudes of the Arab governors. All the societies the Arabs encountered in Central Asia in the seventh and eighth centuries practiced monotheistic religions. These societies practiced Judaism, Christianity, Buddhism, Zoroastrianism and the religion of the Sky God. None of them worshipped idols. While the Arab tribes worshipped stones and idols, the peoples of Turkestan believed in one God, and while they attributed sacredness to nature, the sun and the heavens, they also paid homage to the creator. They lived their beliefs accordingly. 

In the same period, the most backward and primitive culture was the Bedouin culture inhabited by the Arab tribes. The term Jahiliyya period is meant to describe the injustices inflicted on women and girls by the Arab tribes. Because in the same period, in Turkic tribes all over Asia, girls were the most valuable asset. They were cherished and treated as the respected mothers of society from childhood to old age. Prophet Muhammad tried to transform the Arabs from a gangster, robber tribal life to a nation life. To this end, he tried to unite the tribes who lived by robbery and plunder and to teach them the sublime values of Islam. He transformed the Arabs from tribes and clans into an ummah, a nation. With this self-confidence that the Prophet Muhammad gave them, they gained power and almost dominated the world. However, after the Prophet's death, the sons of Umayya, who continued their tribal struggle, seized power by force and massacred many of Muhammad's relatives and sincere followers. In order to spread their understanding of Islam, they continued their wars of palace reign, plunder and booty. 

In this context, the bloody Arab conquests in Turkestan had devastating consequences for Central Asian societies in terms of culture, economy, morality, justice and science. Samarkand, Khorasan, Peykent, Bukhara, the most important cultural and scientific centers of Turkestan were razed to the ground. Libraries in these places were burned and destroyed. Especially in Beruni, the capital of Khwarezm, works of astronomy, history, mathematics and literature written in Khwarezm language were also destroyed. The famous scientist Al Biruni described these destructions: "A great crime against an ancient culture". 

In the 16th century, while Europe was burning alive scientists like Bruno, six hundred years ago, the greatest scientists of medicine, philosophy, physics, chemistry, chemistry and astronomy were shining in Turkestan. Ibn Sina's Law of Medicine (El kanun Fit tıp) became the Bible of modern medicine in the West. The foundation of European medicine was laid with this book. 

Omar Khayyam, the most important scholar and thinker of his time, known to us only for his rubais about wine, was a great mathematician, astronomer, physicist and medical scientist. His works were translated into Western languages and taught in Europe for many centuries. Throughout his life, under different rulers, Omar Khayyam fought a great struggle against the religious authorities who did everything to prevent his scientific work. Before the Arab invasions, each of the cities of Central Asia was famous as a center of culture, history and trade. 

These are: Khorasan, Bukhara, Beykent, Tashkent, Samarkand, Balkh, Kashgar, Karakorum, Nishapur, Otrar, Fergana, Merv, Turfan, Xinjiang, Ghazni, Herat. At the beginning of the Arab invasion, the number of people who could read and write in an important Arab city like Mecca was as few as the fingers of one hand, while there were very important libraries in each of the Central Asian cities. 

We need to understand the difference well. In the 8th century, there were many revolts against the Umayyad practices of looting and booty-taking in Central Asia. Some of these rebels were Turkic groups who had been defeated in Arab attacks and converted to Islam. Another group were the descendants of other tribes of the Arabs, especially the descendants of Abbas, the youngest uncle of the Prophet Muhammad. 

The Abbasids, who were very disturbed by the Umayyad's unfair, unlawful and reigning practices, joined forces. They put an end to the Umayyad reign. They established the Abbasid state. However, although not as much as the Umayyads, injustice, lawlessness and palace reign continued in the Abbasids as well. Imam Azam Abu Hanifa (the founder of the Hanafi sect), who saw the last years of the Umayyad reign and its collapse, expected a state administration in accordance with Islam from the Abbasids. But this did not happen. Imam Azam Abu Hanifa's struggle against injustice continued during the Abbasid period and he was punished. He was thrown into dungeons. But he still did not shut up. He gave his life for this cause. In a way, he became the Socrates of the Islamic world.

Abu Hanifa, who resisted the Abbasids and invited them to the right path in the name of Islam, was not originally Arab. He was of Turkish origin. He based his Islamic faith on morality, justice, equality, law and rationalism. In fact, perhaps the most important thing God has bestowed upon us is reason, and the worst of disasters and evils is ignorance. Among the scientists mentioned in Islamic history, there were many of Turkish origin. Since they lived under Arab rule, they had to write their works in Arabic and Persian. Al-Kindi, Al-Khwarizmi, Zakariya Al-Razi, Ibni Sina, Al-Bununi, Farabi, Ali Kushchi, Jabir, Abul Vefa Buzjani, Mahmud of Kashgarli, Yusuf Has Hajib, Omar Khayyam, Hasan Al-Juzjani, Ahmet Yassawi, Ulug Bey, etc. were scientists of Turkish descent. These scholars lived in almost the same period and influenced each other. I will continue to introduce these scientists to you in my next articles. 

These scientists living in the Islamic world were able to produce science to the extent that they received support from state rulers and had the opportunity to work. The Seljuk period is exemplary in this respect. When the Seljuks started to support scientists, many new scholars and scientists found the opportunity to produce successful works. 

When we look at the recent period, especially in the last two centuries, history records that the Islamic world has been reduced to the most backward, poorest and most unjust situation, and has been dragged to disaster at the hands of dishonest, thieving, perverted religious and political rulers. Today's rulers of the Arab world have been reduced to serving the aims of the global occupying powers because of their love of robbery and reign. In today's Islamic countries, the tribal rulers of the states in the Arabian peninsula, who are supposed to teach Muslims how to live, are each swimming in billions of dollars in wealth. On the other hand, in Yemen, Somalia, Sudan, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Indonesia and many other African countries, Muslims are starving to death and dying in masses. 

If the Muslim world wants to rise up again, it can find the necessary spirit in Central Asia, Turkestan and especially in Anatolia, the most advanced homeland of the Turks. 

I say stay with respect and love.