Derived from the earliest traditions of the Prophet Muhammad’s raids against the infidels, the term ghāzī denotes one who fights the enemies of God, whether non-Muslims outside the borders of the Islamic lands or religious dissidents within the lands under Islamic rule. The ghazw differs from the jihad (struggle in the cause of Islam) in that it refers to a campaign that is limited in either scope or duration.
During the age of the original Islamic Conquests (from 634 until 717), the term ghāzī was rarely used. From the 720s and 730s, however, the first famous ghāzīs of Islamic history began to appear, many of them no longer under government sponsorship or control. Some of these ghāzīs, such as the famous Sayyid Battal, about whom epics were written, became legendary figures and religiopolitical models. Due to the influence of such figures, prominent personal engagement in ghazwas also became de facto government policy under the early Abbasid caliphs, the so-called ghāzī-caliphs, who both sponsored and occasionally led summer raids on Byzantium.
Due to the political breakup of the universal caliphate in the ninth century, the best way for the founder of a polity to gain political legitimacy for his rule was to be a ghāzī. Thus most of the founding figures of the great medieval and early modern Islamic kingdoms—including such major ones as the Samanid, Ghaznavid, Seljuq, Ghurid, Mamluk, Mughal, and Ottoman governments—cultivated careers as ghāzīs and also incorporated ghāzīs into their armies. The members of modern Islamist groups view themselves as the heirs and preservers of the ghāzī tradition.
See also Ghaznavids (977–1086); Ghurids (1009–1215); jihad; Mamluks (1250–1517); Mughals (1526–1857); Ottomans (1299–1924); Samanids (819–1005); Seljuqs (1055–1194)
Further Reading
Ali Anooshahr, The Ghāzī Sultans and the Frontiers of Islam: A Comparative Study of the Late Medieval and Early Modern Period, 2009; Khalid Yahya Blankenship, The End of the Jihād State: The Reign of Hishām Ibn ‘Abd al-Malik and the Collapse of the Umayyads, 1994; Michael Bonner, Aristocratic Violence and Holy War: Studies in the Jihad and the Arab-Byzantine Frontier, 1996; Jürgen Paul, The State and the Military: The Samanid Case, 1994; D. G. Tor, Violent Order: Religious Warfare, Chivalry, and the ‘Ayyar Phenomenon in the Medieval Islamic World, 2007; Paul Wittek, The Rise of the Ottoman Empire, 1938.
D. G. TOR