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Pre-Islamic Arab Religion in Islam: Difference between revisions
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→Beliefs of the Quranic Mushrikeen: Added a section on the name Allah in pre-Islamic poetry, citing and linking to Nicolai Sinai's article on this.
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(→Beliefs of the Quranic Mushrikeen: I have expanded the Judeo-Christian monotheism link with a summary of the high levels of penetration it had into Arabia by the time of Islam, which I think is an important point to highlight and explain here to show it's beyond dispute (which is why I've added it over the small allusions above), and the stories were likely well-known. Many reported settlements in Arabia are listed and the academic sources are cited (themselves taken from an academic book).) |
(→Beliefs of the Quranic Mushrikeen: Added a section on the name Allah in pre-Islamic poetry, citing and linking to Nicolai Sinai's article on this.) |
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===Beliefs of the Quranic Mushrikeen=== | ===Beliefs of the Quranic Mushrikeen=== | ||
Historian Patricia Crone in a detailed article on the Quranic mushrikeen pointed out that | Historian Patricia Crone in a detailed article on the Quranic mushrikeen pointed out that many believed in Allāh as the Judeo-Christian creator god, but associated with him one or more lesser partners, usually described as gods but sometimes his offspring, and that he took female angels for himself. Sometimes these gods are named, most of which have also been found in rock inscriptions. The mushrikeen also believed in jinns and demons, and some worshipped heavenly bodies. Ahab Bdaiwi adds that only rarely is outright paganism found of the kind described in later sources (like Ibn al-Kalbi).<ref>Patricia Crone' [https://www.ias.edu/sites/default/files/hs/Crone_Articles/Crone_Quranic_Deities.pdf The Religion of the Quranic Pagans: God and the Lesser Deities], Arabica 57 (2010) 151-200</ref><ref>See Dr Ahab Bdaiwi's blog post summarizing his findings [https://drahabbdaiwi.com/2021/10/26/arabian-monotheism-before-islam-some-notes-on-the-mushrikun-of-the-qur%ca%bean/ Arabian Monotheism before Islam: Some Notes on the Mushrikūn of the Qurʾan] - 26 October 2021</ref><ref>See also this earlier [https://twitter.com/abhistoria/status/1293641557531414528 Twitter.com thread] by Dr Ahab Bdaiwi - 12 August 2020 ([https://web.archive.org/web/20220816120902/https://twitter.com/abhistoria/status/1293641557531414528 archive]) [https://twitter.com/abhistoria/status/1397609517052006404 and this one] - 26 May 2021 ([https://web.archive.org/web/20220814092519/https://twitter.com/abhistoria/status/1397609517052006404 archive])</ref> | ||
=== Allāh in pre-Islamic poetry === | |||
Nicolai Sinai notes in his 2019 paper ''Rain-Giver, Bone-Breaker, Score-Settler: Allāh in Pre-Quranic Poetry'', that Allāh also appears in authentic pre-Islamic poetry as the name of an extremely powerful, perhaps best described as a 'high god' of the pagans, and not just the Christian-Judeo God as recognised by Crone. As previous scholars have recognized, for the Qur'anic pagans, Allāh was a creator god with a wide range of powers. In pre-Islamic Arabic poetry we see they considered Allāh a creator of the heavens and Earth, the master of human destinies, provider of rain, and as a God who will avenge oaths not kept. Prayers and Sacrifices were addressed to Allāh, who determines outcome of present goings-on, which overlaps with the Qur'ans proclamation of the pagan opponents. And similarly the Qur'anic pagans, nor the mainstream of pagan pre-Islamic poets, view Allāh as playing an eschatological role (i.e. - the idea of a universal judgment of the resurrected).<ref>''[https://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:977914cb-d783-4949-aed4-f0b6c2eaa562/files/m34f1a166246ec073a79d42ea09d9cc1a Rain-Giver, Bone-Breaker, Score-Settler: Allāh in Pre-Quranic Poetry,]'' New Haven, Connecticut: American Oriental Society, 2019. Essay 15. Nicolai Sinai.</ref> | |||
=== General Judeo-Christian Monotheism in Arabia === | === General Judeo-Christian Monotheism in Arabia === | ||