There’s a particular bit of terminology Muslims use to describe the time before Islam. Age of Jahiliyah. That is, the “Time of Ignorance”. The time before the supposed revelation of the Quran. Modern historians (and apologists of Islam, even Atheistic ones) will try to describe Arabia of the time as something ripe for the winds of change. They’ll try to say there wasn’t much of anything, and that Muhammad’s word was accepted with open arms.
Lies. The Prophet Muhammad, even in the text of his own glorification, makes it apparent the real nature of his jihad. It wasn’t revelation that swayed the people of Arabia. It wasn’t stirring dialogue. It wasn’t spiritual enlightenment. And it certainly wasn’t because they were ignorant and lacked for meaning.
Muhammad only succeeded in his task after a crusade of violence and terror. Again, look to their own history. Many of the Arabs who “submitted” to Muhammad became “apostates” the moment he died. It was only through the Apostasy Wars of Abu Bakr that Arabia was once again, brought under the suffocating Islamic boot heel.
No matter what the Muslims try to, Arabia was not, until their arrival, a bleak, ignorant place with nothing, merely awaiting something better to come along.
Once upon a time, the Romans had a name for a great part of the Arabian Peninsula. And that was “Felix Arabia.” In Latin, that is “Arabia the Happy.” During the time of antiquity, here was a place that traded in highly desirable incense and cinnamon. In fact, so notable was the wealth of this land, that the opulent “Queen of Sheba” was considered to have come from this land. Though this is little else than an Abrahamic myth, it, like most things, was a pilfered tale rooted in distorted fact, and the writers of this myth held an association with Felix Arabia that rooted it in notions of spices, gems, gold and other riches.
It’s said that even Alexander the Great, towards the latter end of his legacy, wished to launch an expedition here. After the fact, trade was common, by land and sea alike. Wars were fought over the area, land changed hands, trade routes were variously closed and re-opened. All this activity alone would imply the existence of some sort of thriving culture.
To quote the father of history, Herodotus, from The Histories (Book 3):
There are no men who respect pledges more than the Arabians. This is how they give them: a man stands between the two pledging parties, and with a sharp stone cuts the palms of their hands, near the thumb; then he takes a piece of wood from the cloak of each and smears with their blood seven stones that lie between them, meanwhile calling on Dionysus and the Heavenly Aphrodite; after this is done, the one who has given his pledge commends the stranger (or his countryman if the other be one) to his friends, and his friends hold themselves bound to honor the pledge. They believe in no other gods except Dionysus and the Heavenly Aphrodite; and they say that they wear their hair as Dionysus does his, cutting it round the head and shaving the temples. They call Dionysus, Orotalt; and Aphrodite, Alilat.
Muslims will try to lay claim to the notion that Pagans were devoid of morality or integrity before their “enlightenment” by Islamic hands. Nevermind the hypocrisy involved, given the rampant violent, rape, pedophilia and deception. Yes, from the modern perspective, certain traditions involving oaths and the cutting of hair may seem strange, but in the context of the time, they display the very integrity Muslims try to deny they had.
Time and time again, in reading about the history of this land, you’ll see references most of all to its abundant material wealth and trade. There’s little to suggest the Islam-fuelled violence of later history was at all endemic. These were, by all accounts, a people far more interested in commerce and husbandry than any sort of jihad.
To quote Herodotus’ work once more:
Arabia is the last of inhabited lands towards the south, and it is the only country which produces frankincense, myrrh, cassia, cinnamon, and laudanum. The Arabians do not get any of these, except the myrrh, without trouble. The frankincense they procure by means of the gum styrax, which the Greeks obtain from the Phoenicians; this they burn, and thereby obtain the spice.
Having earlier mentioned the Queen of Sheba, one should understand the actual historical source of this myth, as well as the corruption of the facts. The historical kingdom, Saba, holds a particularly pivotal symbolic point within Islam. As discussed in other articles, the term “Sabean” is often considered a byword for Pagan.
In the scheme of the area once considered Arabia, Saba was, by all accounts, the wealthiest and most fertile.
To quote the Greek historian Strabo:
By the trade in these aromatics both the Sabaeans and the Gerrhaei have become the richest of all the tribes, and possess a great quantity of wrought articles in gold and silver, as couches, tripods, basins, drinking-vessels, to which we must add the costly magnificence of their houses; for the doors, walls, and roofs are variegated with inlaid ivory, gold, silver, and precious stones…
Interestingly, Saba’s true time of splendour only came after the implied time given by the Biblical Sheba storyline, which is fitted around the 7th century BCE. Again, one does not need to be an expert in history to see basically every tale offered in Abrahamic religion is inaccurate folklore.
Wealth and opulence does not, of course, necessarily imply a culture without any issues whatsoever (although wealth can sometimes correlate to a well-off people). Though it goes without saying that most any Polytheistic people were likely to be more moral than the Abrahamics that displaced them, things were, of course, not always without flaw across the ages.
Why this matters is simple. Islamists will often try to claim the Quran is uniquely inspired, birthed from a vacuum, that Muhammad’s ideas were bequeathed to him from divine inspiration and the hand of Allah himself.
An inspection of religious traditions in Saba, however, paint a different picture. They made a pilgrimage to the Kaaba (which Muslims, incorrectly, try to claim was built by Abraham), made seven circulations around the Kaaba in ritual tradition, habitually washed themselves after sexual intercourse, and other traditions claimed to be ‘Islamic’.
This, for the record, was all confessed by Ottoman scholar Mahmud al-Alusi. Just like with Christianity and its own rituals of Mass and baptism, there’s nothing inherently unique about Islam. It’s nothing more than stolen traditions, degenerated further and further.
Although elements of these pre-Islamic practices may show evidence of corruption by Jewish elements in Arabia, this isn’t to say one should look upon Saba with scorn. Any misgivings committed by polytheists of the time held no candle to the horrors of Islam and its siblings. Saba was, in comparison to the absolute lack of culture that came later, still a desert jewel.
Indeed, if one looks back to the Quran, it’s plain to see the loathing they had for the earlier cities of the region. Iram, of which little is known other than it’s association with Zufar (courtesy of the Roman geographer Ptolemy of Alexandria, was another city of apparent wealth and splendor here.
أَلَمْ تَرَ كَيْفَ فَعَلَ رَبُّكَ بِعَادٍ ذَاتِ الْعِمَادِ الَّتِي لَمْ يُخْلَقْ مِثْلُهَا فِي الْبِلَادِ وَثَمُودَ الَّذِينَ جَابُوا الصَّخْرَ بِالْوَادِ وَفِرْعَوْنَ ذِي الْأَوْتَادِ الَّذِينَ طَغَوْا فِي الْبِلَادِ فَأَكْثَرُوا فِيهَا الْفَسَادَ فَصَبَّ عَلَيْهِمْ رَبُّكَ سَوْطَ عَذَابٍ
Did you not see how your Lord dealt with ‘Aad, the people of Iram, with lofty pillars, the like of whom had never been created in the land? And with Thamud, who carved out the rocks in the valley? And with Pharaoh, owner of the stakes, who all transgressed in the lands, and increased corruption therein. So your Lord poured upon them a scourge of punishment.
Quran 89:6-14
As was typical of YHVH/Jehova/Allah, prosperous nations were inflicted with great blood libels, and curses were heaped upon them. One should naturally assume this place was, in comparison to Islamic immorality at the very least, a righteous place with a strong culture that at some point or another, slighted the Abrahamic menace. Sodom and Gomorrah were probably such places themselves.
Even if Saba, or any of the Arabian cities or towns of the age had their issues (be those of war over resources or sub-optimal social practices) one thing was at least for certain. Arabia was, in the time before Islam, happy. Even the highest Empires of the time, the Greeks and the Romans, thought so, and called them Felix Arabia as such.
They were educated enough to have their own writing system. The locally famous dam in the ancient city of Marib irrigated not one but two oases, owing to a network of canals, which displayed the building ingenuity of the peoples in the region.
Well into the Roman era (and even enhanced because of it), Kingdoms like the Nabataeans continued trade in undiminished degrees. These were not a people held back by superstition and tyranny, and created beautiful things, all the way until the end.
But what was that end? It goes without saying that, to anyone versed enough in history, that the collapse of the Roman Empire had a domino effect on many of the civilizations once within its borders. However, despite a Christianized Rome’s best efforts, polytheism lived on in the Arabian Peninsula, and would, even into the time of Muhammad.
Even after a societal decline, the people here gripped tightly to their polytheism. Muhammad’s preaching for the first 13 years of his life fell on deaf ears. A mere 70-80 people converted. Most of his own Quraysh tribe didn’t even listen to him, and this is all confessed in Islamic material itself. It was only after the move from Mecca to Medina (known in Islam as the Hijrah).
Medina itself, by Islamic claim, was founded by Jews in protest of Rome (though it is possible this is an allegory). How true that is, it cannot be said, but what is known is that Muhammad’s words took a different tone here. Gone was the supposed messenger of peace, as Muhammad came to the realization the Pagans of his homeland would never convert from mere discussion. No, he had to put a sword to their collective throat. Convert, or die.
It was in Medina that the Islamic “brotherhood” was birthed. Ties to one’s family or culture were rendered unimportant. Loyalty to Muhammad and his dogma took extreme precedent. What did they call this oath? One requires only a single guess. The pledge of war.
Muhammad and his cronies were all but pirates of the sand. It was mafia, but in the world of Medina. What Pagans remained there were chased out or murdered. The few that remained came under heavy taxation, the “jizya”.
His most despicable act was still to come, however. What do you think Muhammad had to offer his Meccan Qurayshi brothers, now that he had power behind him. Was it mercy? Peace?
No. It’s been told in this article the great trading enterprises of this region. It had continued, even until this time. Muhammad and his 300 degenerates struck a caravan on its return from Syria. Islamists will tell you this was a grand victory, as they faced a supposed 1000. In reality, Muhammad showed his true colors and committed his penultimate blasphemy.
He struck the caravan during the Pagan holy month of truce. These Pagan men were forbidden from raising arms. Their love of their faith cost them everything.
From here, one might already know the rest of the story. One success snowballed into an era of bloodshed. Wealth was plundered. People converted out of fear. Muhammad tore down everything that made his own homeland beautiful to begin with, and appropriated what little remained. Mecca today stands as a monument of something great, twisted and defiled by a bloodthirsty, greedy pedophile.
Even the idiot Jews of Medina who took Muhammad in and shielded him from his old Meccan enemies when nobody gave a single solitary care about who the “Prophet” was or had to say were supposedly plundered for their wealth and tossed aside. They were consumed by their own monster, but Pagans, as we all know, paid the far higher price.
I remarked earlier upon the similarity between some of the old Saban traditions and the later Islamic ones. Even at the edge of life with everything taken away from them, in many cases the only way many of the Pagans converted was by Muhammad brainwashing them by incorporating recognizable elements of their religion.
When all was said and done, the only peace treaties Muhammad really drafted were those with the Jews and Christians. His old Pagan enemies were, for the most part, all but destroyed.
And so was the end of Arabia, once happy. It’s safe to say, with Islam the dominant force there onwards, that the people here never knew that happiness again. Only can only hope, that the Pagans of once-great Arabia, will one day have their vengeance. At the very least, their Gods have not forgotten.
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