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Pre-Islamic Monotheism in Arabia

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 August 2011

Hamilton A. R. Gibb
Hamilton A. R. Gibb
Affiliation:
Harvard University
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Extract

The search for the presumed “sources” of Muhammad's religious ideas, as these are expressed in the Qur'an, has inspired a considerablerange of studies, varying in tone from tentative to polemical. Most writers on the topic seek to demonstrate either a predominantly Jewish or a predominantly Christian “influence.” It is relatively easy, of course, to compile a catena of passages from the Qur'an which can be paralleled by Scriptural texts or by haggadic or apocryphal materials or compared with the practices of Jewish or Christian communities. The argument tends to become inconclusive on the whole; Jewish scholars who argue for a Jewish source or sources are apt to forgetthat the Old Testament was as much a part of Christian as of Jewish Scripture and that even haggadic supplements had long since been taken up into Christian writings; Christian scholars who argue for a Christian source or sources are somewhat embarrassed by Muhammad's decisive rejection of Christological doctrine;and each side can produce valid arguments against the other.

Type
Research Article
Information
Harvard Theological Review , Volume 55 , Issue 4 , October 1962 , pp. 269 - 280
Copyright
Copyright © President and Fellows of Harvard College 1962

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References

1 Cf. Jeffery, A., The Foreign Vocabulary of the Qur'an (Baroda, 1938), 233–234,Google Scholar and the Introduction to the same work, pp. 2–12, for the argument among Muslim scholars for and against the presence of foreign terms in the Qur'an.

2 There are numerous discussions of the possible rôle of such sects as the Collyridians and Docetists in pre-Islamic Arabia. The Elxaites (Elchasaites) and Mandaeans have also been brought under contribution, and Dr. Rabin, Chaim, in his Qumran Studies (Oxford U.P., 1957, pp. 112–130)Google Scholar has argued that the Qur'an may provide evidence for the existence of a non-Rabbinic Jewish sect in Arabia. Dr. Edward Ullendorff has produced suggestive evidence that Christianity in South Arabia and Ethiopia was built upon a foundation of Judaic elements established in South Arabia in the early post-Christian centuries (Journal of Semitic Studies, I [Manchester, 1956], 216–236)Google Scholar.

3 See especially the studies of Rev. O'Shaughnessy, T., S.J.: The Koranic Concept of the Word of God (Rome, 1948),Google ScholarThe Development of the meaning of Spirit in the Koran (Rome, 1953),Google Scholar and ‘The Seven Names for Hell in the Qur'an’ in Bulletin of the School of Oriental & African Studies XXIV (London, 1961), pp. 444–469Google Scholar.

4 It may possibly contain an allusion to the apocryphal Apocalypse of Abraham, which seems to have circulated more widely in Christian than in Jewish circles.

5 Mu'allaqa, v. 58: “Whatever a man possesses of inward nature, though he think it hidden from men, shall surely be made known.”

6 Cf. for example, my translation of the Travels of Ibn Battūtā, vol. I (1958), p.85,Google Scholar notes 68, 69, 72, and p. 143, n. 286, for parallel transpositions.

7 See Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research, 73 (Feb., 1939), pp. 13–15Google Scholar.

8 Sūra II, v. 137/143: ‘We have made of you a median Community’ (ummatan wusṭā).

9 Ed. Schulthess, (see the following note), poem XXIX, v. 9.Google Scholar

10 In addition to the introduction by Friedrich Schulthess to his edition of the diwan of Umayya (Beiträge zur Assyriologie, VIII, 8, Leipzig, 1911)Google Scholar there is a fuller discussion of the relation of his poetry to the Qur'an by Andrae, Tor (French translation, Les Origines de l'lslam et le Christianisme, Paris, 1955, 55–63).Google Scholar While I wholly agree with the view that the poems ascribed to Umayya cannot be regarded as a source of Qur'anic materials or doctrine, Andrae's scepticism on the ground of the expansion of Qur'anic narratives in Umayya's poems does not appear to me wholly convincing. It is natural to suppose that the preachers often embellished their themes with luxuriant detail which finds no place in the corresponding Qur'anic passages (cf. the remarks on v. 52 above).