Şeyh Şamil

Folk hero and religious leader, mujahid (T. N. combatant of Islam) (B. 1797-98, Gimry / Dagestan - February 4^th, 1871, Medina). Sheikh Shamil, who is also known as İmam Shamil or with his nickname “Caucasian Eagle”, was from a Kumyk family with Avar origins. His father Dengau Muhammed gave him the name Ali. Ali, who caught a serious disease at an early age, was given the name Shamil as per the tradition and was called by this name from then on. When he was fifteen years old he mounted the horse and girded himself with a sword like a warrior. He had an extraordinary talent and ability in sports branches such as jumping, shooting, wrestling, running and sword with his height that exceeded two meters when he was twenty years old. He began his education by scholar Said Harekani. He became a student of the Naqshbandi Sheikh Cemaleddin Ghazi Kumukî, who was later going to be his father-in-law. He was raised by taking lessons from the ulama (religious scholars) of his time. He became a religious scholar himself by learning the tafsir (interpretation of the Koran), hadith (words of the Prophet Muhammad), fiqh (Islamic law), literature, history and physical sciences until he was thirty years old. This education that he had received by Naqshbandi Tariqa helped him to strive for reviving and spreading the Islam, which the Russians wanted to remove from the Caucasian, and to develop his opinions on freedom, resistance and foundation of Islamic unity.

Ali Shamil pursued his war, which he had started against the Russian Empire in Dagestan, in Chechnya. As a matter of fact, the war once engulfed all of Circassia in Northwestern Caucasian. The attack on the city of Khunzakh, which was defended by Hacı Murad, who was one of the Avar rulers that cooperated with the Russians, by Ghazi Muhammad (Ghazi Mullah) and the mujahids under his command resulted in failure (1830). The wars started against Hacı Murad by the mujahids continued in the following year as well. With the support of the Russian forces that came to help, Hacı Murad captured Tarkun and laid siege on Derbent and Kizliar (1831). Ghazi Muhammad died in the war that was fought against the Russians in front of Gimry and Shamil got heavily wounded (1832). When Ghazi Muhammad’s successor İmam Hamza was killed by Hacı Murad a while later (1834), Shamil was appointed as the imam under the title “Sheikh”.

Sheikh Shamil, who made great effort to resolve the problems between the Muslims such as blood feud, race, language and school differences, defeated the Russian forces under the command of General İveliç in Aşilta and Buçkiyev’s forces in Akhoulgo (1837) with the Chechen, Circassian and Abkhasian folks he had gathered around himself by earning their trust. Upon these achievements, many more Caucasian tribes and people joined Sheikh Shamil. The Russians, who captured Aşilta back afterwards, retreated to Khunzakh (1838) by signing a ceasefire agreement with the mujahids after the War of Tilitl, in which both sides failed to get the upper hand. Meanwhile, Sheikh Shamil established an Islamic regime that was based on intertribal equity in the regions under his dominion. He ensured that military education was attached priority along with normal education. On the other hand, the Russians, who broke the cease fire and attacked with large forces, invaded Arguvan and Akhoulgo (1839). A new peace treaty was signed between both sides by giving Shamil’s son Cemalettin to the Russians as a hostage. Afterwards, Sheikh Shamil, who increased his power as Avars joined him along with Hacı Murad, spread the war of independence to whole Dagestan. Four Russian Forts, Akhoulgo in particular, were captured. Two large attacks on Shamil’s headquarters, Darga, by Vorontsov, the commander of the Russian army in Caucasian, were repelled (1843). However, Vorontsov, who later captured Darga by attacking with a force of twenty thousand men, razed it to the ground (1845). Shamil, who retreated to the mountains upon this and pursued his war from there, had lost significant amount of power as Hacı Murat, with whom he conflicted, escaped from his side and took refuge by the Russians and most of the Avars followed him (1851). He was expelled from the Kabartay region of Circassia, which was under his control (1852).

Sheikh Shamil, who took advantage of the decrease in Russian forces in Caucasian when the Crimean War broke out between the Ottomans and the Russians (1853), marched on Georgia and took two Georgian princes captive here and swapped them with his son Cemaleddin, who was held captive by the Russians. Tsar Alexander II, who lost the Crimean War, appointed Prince Baryatinskiy as the commander of the Caucasian armies (1856) thinking that he could compensate for this defeat with a victory in Caucasian.  Baryatinskiy, who gained control of the southern border of the region, which was controlled by Shamil, prevented Sheikh Shamil and his mujahids from procuring weapons and ammunition from the Ottomans and Iran. After this, he marched on Chechens with his army of hundred and sixty thousand men and invaded whole Chechnya and the fort of Vedeno, in which Sheikh Shamil took shelter (September 6^th, 1859). Shamil, who had retreated to Gunib, which was the last place he took shelter in, with four hundred mujahids on his side, started a hopeless resistance against the superior Russian forces, who had besieged this place. However, as he had no more strength left he had to surrender to Baryatinskiy with his remaining one hundred men and his two sons (1859). Sheikh Shamil was brought to Petersburg, where he was welcomed by Tsar Alexander II, and was settled in Kaluga near Moscow with his family.

After Sheikh Shamil spent ten years in exile, Tsar allowed him to go on pilgrimage. As a measure Tsar held Shamil’s son Muhammed Şefi captive and mandated that he returned to Russia after he fulfilled his pilgrimage task. Shamil was met by Sultan Abdülaziz in Istanbul to where he came after leaving Russia in 1870 and was hosted in the palace. When the word got out that Shamil came to Istanbul the folk rushed into the palace doors to get to see this legendary hero.

Sheikh Shamil, after having gone to Hejaz and fulfilling his pilgrimage task, did not return from Hejaz and stayed in Medina and passed away there. He was buried following the funeral prayer performed by Seyyit Rufaî, the sheikh of Rufaî tariqa, in Cennet-ül Baki graveyard.