Pre-Islamic Arabia
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Pre-Islamic Arabia is studied by Islamic scholars because it is the context in which Islam, as practiced today, was formed. However, there is little consensus on many matters relating to the history and ethnography of pre-Islamic Arabia.
Material for the history of Arabia before the rise of Islam in the 7th century CE is limited. Archaeological exploration in the Arabian peninsula has been sparse; indigenous written sources are limited to a few inscriptions and coins from southern Arabia. Existing material consists primarily of written sources from other traditions (such as Egyptians, Greeks, Persians, Romans, etc.) and oral traditions later recorded by Islamic scholars. It could be argued that such material is distorted through bias.
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[edit] Kingdoms of southern Arabia
[edit] Nabateans
- Main article: Nabateans
These Nabateans are not to be found among the tribes that are listed in Arab genealogies. They were likely a mixed group led by an Arab elite. Although they used Aramaic heavily in their inscriptions, their names are in Arabic, and so, probably, was their everyday speech. They settled east of the Syro-African rift between the Dead Sea and the Red Sea, that is, in the land that had once been Edom. And although the first sure reference to them dates from 312 BC, it is possible that they were present much earlier. In the early 6th century BC, when the Edomites (Idumeans) exploited Judah's weakness in the south, it may be that the Nabateans were pressuring them. The relations between the two groups were not entirely hostile. Herod, for example, had Edomite genes from his father's side and Nabatean from his mother's. (See Dan Gibson on the Nabateans.)
[edit] Petra
- Main article: Petra
Petra (from the Latin petrae, meaning 'of rock') lies in a great rift valley east of Wadi 'Araba in Jordan about 80 kilometers south of the Dead Sea. It came into prominence in the late first century BCE (BC) through the success of the spice trade. The city was the principal city of ancient Nabataea and was famous above all for two things: its trade and its hydraulic engineering systems. It was locally autonomous until the reign of Trajan, but it flourished under Roman rule. The town grew up around its Colonnaded Street in the first century CE (AD) and by the mid-first century had witnessed rapid urbanization. Following the flow of the Wadi Musa, the city-center was laid out on either sides of the Colonnaded Street on an elongated plan between the theater in the east and the Qasr al-Bint in the west. The quarries were probably opened in this period, and there followed virtually continuous building through the first and second centuries CE.
[edit] Palmyra
- Main article: Palmyra
[edit] Bedouin culture
- Main article: Bedouin
[edit] Political history of sixth and seventh century Arabia
[edit] Byzantine empire
- Main article: Byzantine Empire
[edit] Sassanids
- Main article: Sassanid Empire
[edit] Ethiopia
- Main article: History of Ethiopia
[edit] Ghaznavids
- Main article: Ghaznavid Empire
[edit] Lakhmids
- Main article: Lakhmids
[edit] Controversies
[edit] Pre-Islamic religion
There is very little material on which to base a description of pre-Islamic religion, particularly in Mecca and the Hijaz. The Qur'an and the hadith, or recorded oral traditions, give some hints as to this religion. Islamic commentators have elaborated these hints into a coherent account that most academics doubt in part or in whole.
[edit] Muslim view
Islamic scholars say that the Kaaba, the sacred edifice towards which all Muslims pray, was built by the patriarch Abraham and his son Ishmael. One of the cornerstones of the Kaaba, the Black Stone, was sent down from heaven. The Kaaba was the center of Islam, as revealed to Abraham and Ishmael, and it was maintained by Ishmael's descendants for generations. However, Ishmael's descendants, the Arabian tribes, fell into idolatry and filled the Kaaba with idols. They still remembered Allah, the one god, but accepted idols as his "associates". There were a few hanif who still maintained the pure Abrahamic faith, but they were few and had no power to cleanse the Kaaba. Then came Muhammad,the last prophet of Islam, and denounced idolatry. After he took power in Mecca, he destroyed the idols in the Kaaba and re-established the pure and ancient worship.
(Shi'a Muslims -- as well as a few Sunni -- believe that Muhammad and his family, including his cousin Ali, were hanif and thus never sullied by worship of idols.)
The Muslim view of the pre-Islamic religion, then, is that it was pagan, barbaric, and idolatrous. The most important gods were evidently Hubal and the three "daughters of God", Manat, Allat, and al-Uzza. Islamic traditions supply the names of hundreds of other gods as well. The Arabians sacrificed animals to the gods and made pilgrimages to cult centers. Mecca was only one of many cult centers.
[edit] Academic views
Academics believe that the stories of Abraham and Ishmael and the divine origin of the Kaaba are myths. Most academics do accept that the Kaaba was a cult center housing a number of gods, that it was a pilgrimage center, and that the Black Stone was a feature of the pre-Islamic Kaaba.
[edit] Pre-Islamic warfare
The raid of other tribes (especially the bedouin)of goods or the caravan was one reason for confrontation. The ambush and surprise attacks were very important tactics usually utilized. Arab warriors usually tried to avoid killing during these fights in order to not have a blood feud erupt. Individual fighters would come forth and anounce who he was and the name of his ancestors and their deeds. Also there were regular armies such as those of the Ghassanids and the Lakhmids.
[edit] Shura
- Main article: Shura
[edit] Meccan trade
- See also: Meccan Trade And The Rise Of Islam
[edit] Sociology
There existed several pre-Islamic marriage forms. Aisha is quoted as saying there was four kinds of marriage in the pre-Islamic era, one of them being a form of polyandry called Nikah Ijtimah.
They would not eat, drink, or sit with women who were menstruating and would send them to separate dwelling just as the Jews and Zoroastrians did [1].
[edit] See also
[edit] References
[edit] Books
- Berkey, Jonathan P. -- The Formation of Islam, Cambridge University Press, 2003, ISBN 0-5212-58813-8
- Bulliet, Richard W. -- The Camel and the Wheel, Harvard University Press, 1975, ISBN 0-674-09130-2
- Crone, Patricia -- Meccan Trade and the Rise of Islam, Blackwell, 1987, as reprinted by Gorgias Press, 2004, ISBN 1-59333-102-9
- Donner, Fred -- The Early Islamic Conquests, Princeton University Press, 1981, ISBN 0-691-10182-5
- Hawting, G.R. -- The Idea of Idolatry and the Emergence of Islam: From Polemic to History, Cambridge University Press, 1999
- Hoyland, Robert G. -- Arabia and the Arabs: From the Bronze Age to the Coming of Islam, Routledge, 2001
