Yājūj and Mājūj

▪ Islamic mythology

 in Islamic eschatology, two hostile forces who will ravage the earth before the end of the world. The Qurʾān relates that a certain people terrorized by Yājūj and Mājūj induced Dhū al-Qarnayn (commonly believed to be Alexander the Great) to construct a great wall between them. Yājūj and Mājūj, thus trapped between two mountains until the last days of the world, dig under the wall every night trying to escape, only to find each morning that the wall has been restored by God (Allah).

      Tradition provides several descriptions of Yājūj and Mājūj, who are Muslim counterparts of the biblical Gog and Magog. Some are as tall as cedars, others as wide as they are tall, and some completely covered by their ears. They will appear in large numbers in the northeast of the ancient world as portents of the end, then proceed south toward Israel, drinking up the waters of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers or the Sea of Galilee and killing everyone along the way. When there are no more human targets left for their arrows, Yājūj and Mājūj will shoot at the sky, but God will either fill their ears and noses and throats with worms and destroy them in a single night or send a flock of birds to drown them in the sea.

* * *