Mecca
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Mecca, also known as Makkah al-Mukarramah (مكة المكرمة, lit. "the Blessed Mecca"), is a city located in the Hijaz region of the Arabian Peninsula and is described by Islamic scriptures as the birthplace of Muhammad (b. 570), the founder of Islam. Mecca is host to the Kaaba, the holiest Islamic mosque (and central pagan shrine prior to Muhammad's conquest of Mecca), and thus the site of the annual Islamic pilgrimage called the Hajj which physically and financially able Muslims are required to attend at least once in their lifetimes (one of the Five Pillars of Islam). Practicing Muslims face Mecca as they pray towards the Kaaba (their qibla, or direction of prayer) five times a day (another one of the Five Pillars of Islam).
It is said that upon his conquest of Mecca, the prophet Muhammad received revelation that prohibited non-Muslims (which the revelation describes as najas, or "filthy") from entering the city. This law remains in effect until today.
According to Islamic scriptures
Almost a decade after claiming prophet-hood in Mecca in 610, Muhammad was forced to flee to Medina in 622 after facing prosecution for insulting and criticizing the gods and beliefs of the Meccan pagans. Ultimately, after erecting the Islamic state from his base in Medina, Muhammad was able to return to Mecca, this time as conqueror, in 630. Since Muhammad's death in 632, political leadership of Mecca, the holiest city in Islam, as well as Medina, the second holiest city in Islam, has been a significant basis for political claims of authority.
In the Qur'an, the city is also referred to as "Bakkah" as well as "Umm al-Qura" (lit. "mother of all settlements"). The city is described in Islamic scriptures as having been founded by Abraham as he constructed the Kaaba with his son Ishmael (Ismail), though there is an absence of any archaeological evidence to support this narrative.
Islamic scriptures further maintain that Mecca was the trade capital of the Hijaz and Arabia at large, though even this lacks an archaeological basis.
Early history
Dearth of archaeological evidence
Very little is known through archaeological and historically relied-upon channels about the early and pre-Islamic history of Mecca, as the city is neither referred to unambiguously by any document prior to the rise of Islam, nor is there any architecture in Mecca that has been determined to have persisted from the life of Muhammad at the beginning of the seventh century.[1] Indeed, even while contemporary Romans produced detailed descriptions of Arabia at large and Western Arabia (the Hijaz) in particular, no references can be found to anything that could be described as a pilgrimage or trade-center at Mecca.
A place called Macoraba in Arabia is mentioned in a geographic work by Ptolemy in the 2nd century CE. Many academic scholars believe this is a reference to Mecca (first proposed in the 16th century), and some even think that the name derives from an ancient South Arabian word for temple, mkrb. Others historians such as Patricia Crone and Ian D. Morris have argued that there is no good reason to believe Macoraba and Mecca are the same place. The idea has never been backed by any significant academic investigation, nor has any other ancient source been shown to describe Mecca or its temple.[2]
Historian Patricia Crone is widely considered to have established that Mecca was of no wider importance at the time of Islam's emergence, was not on the major trade route, and traded in goods like leather, wool and other pastoral products.[3]
Petra hypothesis
Among other factors, because geographical descriptions provided of Mecca in Islamic scriptures fail to map reliably onto the geography of the actual city of Mecca, because ample archaeological evidence demonstrates that for roughly a century after Muhammad's death Muslim prayed toward Petra as their qibla[4], and because studies have demonstrated the prevalence of Syriac words in the Qur'an, many critical scholars have been led to hypothesize that the Mecca we know today may not have been the Mecca known by early Muslims. Mounting evidence suggests that the city Muhammad lived in, preached in, and came to conquer, may in fact have been Petra, located in Syria, or at least somewhere in the vicinity of northern Arabia, though this is disputed. This interpretation collides heavily with the explicit statements of Islamic scriptures and conforms more readily with Islamic scriptures' implicit, geographical descriptions of Mecca, as well as with the archaeological evidence available to us today.
Relevant Quotations
Qur'an
96. Lo! the first Sanctuary appointed for mankind was that at Becca, a blessed place, a guidance to the peoples;
97. Wherein are plain memorials (of Allah's guidance); the place where Abraham stood up to pray; and whosoever entereth it is safe. And pilgrimage to the House is a duty unto Allah for mankind, for him who can find a way thither. As for him who disbelieveth, (let him know that) lo! Allah is Independent of (all) creatures.Hadith
See Also
References
- ↑ Robert Schick, Archaeology and the Quran, Encyclopaedia of the Qur'an
- ↑ See the conclusion in Ian D. Morris (2018) Mecca and Macoraba in: al-Usur al-wusta vol. 26 (2018)
- ↑ This was definitively argued by Crone in her 1987 book Meccan Trade and the Rise of Islam, and further defended and refined in her 1992 article Serjeant and Meccan Trade and her 2007 article Quraysh and the Roman Army: Making Sense of the Meccan Leather Trade
- ↑ Numerous videos by Dan Gibson arguing for the Petra hypothesis are available on YouTube, and there is a recent summary of the evidence at nabataea.net.