Islam did not suddenly appear on the historical scene as something brand new or divorced from its immediate surroundings. Islam emerged in Mecca and the Hijaz — an area of the Arabian peninsula — in the early 7th-century C.E. As John Esposito wrote, “the Near East [of which the Arabian peninsula is a part, along with other places in the Middle East we might know today such as Palestine, Israel, Egypt, Syria, Jordan, Iraq, and Iran] spawned and nurtured a rich variety of religious traditions.” (Esposito, 2016)
Islam is one of them. And it must be seen against this backdrop. In order to be able to recall and describe significant elements from the life of Muhammad and the early Muslim community, identify the origins of the Medinan state, and the Caliphate, and discuss the significant people, places, and events form early Muslim history we must first start with pre-Islamic Arabia and the Middle East — what has been called “the crucible of Islam.” (Esposito, 2016)
What were the political, social, economic, and religious conditions from which Islam arose in 6th and 7th century Arabia? This is the central question of G.W. Bowersock’s slim little volume The Crucible of Islam. Combing over and compiling a weighty compendium of research on the topic Bowersock is able to offer a condensed overview of the “volatile components from which Islam emerged.” (Bowersock, 2017) As he tells the story of Ethiopian Christians, Arabian Jews, Sassanian Zoroastrians, Byzantine Christians, Qurayshi pagans, and a prophet espousing a belief in the singular Allah Bowersock not only clearly, and succinctly, describes the stage upon which Islam emerged, but also dispels certain rumors, myths, and half-histories that have come to dominate the imagination or persist in scholarship on the period. In broad strokes Bowersock tells us of the various Arabian tribes and kingdoms and their generally polytheistic beliefs. He also describes the connections between Ethiopia and Arabia and the links between Jerusalem, Persia, and the Hijaz. Finally, he gives a nod to the Sassanian empire to the northeast and the Byzantine empire to the northwest of Arabia.
Pre-Islamic Arabia included a vast area stretching from modern-day Yemen in the south to Jordan in the north, the Red Sea and Egypt to the West and to the Persian Gulf to the East. The vast Western sector of Arabia, from below the Sinai peninsula to just south of Mecca is known as the Hijaz. This is the “cradle of Islam.” From the earliest days, Arabia has featured prominently as a “connective space” of trade, political miscellany, and religious exchange. Thus, there is no one pre-Islamic Arabian culture to speak of, for it was influenced by multiple streams and pre-cursors. However, Arab culture generally stems from Semitic sources, which means that they share linguistic and cultural features with Hebrew, Aramaic, and Syriac groups along with ancient Akkadian and Assyrian cultures. They are also linked to broader Afro-Asiatic cultures such as the Berbers of Morocco and Northwest Africa, Amharic in Ethiopia, ancient Egyptian, and Coptic. As we can quickly appreciate, the vast desert of Arabia was not an empty space — instead, it was the breeding ground of a complex tangle of multiple cultures, languages, empires, and — as we will see — religious traditions.
The Hijaz culture into which Muhammad was born and out of which Islam emerged was predominantly pastoralist with peoples more-or-less divided into different independent tribal groups and clan solidarities. These tribes were kin based and there was a complex genealogical tree that united and divided families into clan and tribal allegiances and loyalties. The system was highly regulated along the lines of purity and honor and generally traditional and conservative in its approach to new ideas and customs (Denny, 2011) The loyalties that tied clan, tribe, and family together have been described by the famous Muslim social historian Ibn Khâldun as asabiya — translated as tribal solidarity or “group feeling.” It was the idea that your family, clan, and tribe were your people. You would defend those people to the death. You would give up all else for your people. You would not abandon your people for any person, any other place, or any other idea or thing…including a new religion.You also owed loyalty to your shaikh, or chieftain. Retaliation against those who stole from, or dishonored, your tribe was swift and highly ritualized.
Poetry played an important role in pre-Islamic Arabian culture. Some people have even posited that Muhammad was less of a prophet and more of a poet, but perhaps he was a mixture of both. Poetry was the major form of artistic expression in ancient Arabia. More than art, it was believed to have supernatural inspiration and served as means of telling stories, relating history, pronouncing blessings or curses, and practicing healing. A poet is known in Arabic as sha’ir, meaning “one who knows.” (Denny, 2011)
In broad strokes, the religion of pre-Islamic Arabia “reflected its tribal nature and social structure.” (Esposito, 2016) With that said, we cannot equate Islam with some backwater, tribal, pre-modern world and assume its stagnated there. We are all tribal in one way or another — from the way we protect our families to our patriotism, etc. At the same time, the origins of Islam must be understood in their tribal context. For example, gods and goddesses served as protectors of particular clans and tribes and their spirits were associated with various objects that were important in a particular tribes’ geography — stones, wells, trees, and sacred areas related to the tribe’s origins. These local deities were respected, and occasionally feared, but religious devotion and ritual sacrifice seems to have been more of an obligation than passionate devotion.
It is also important to note that “there were representatives of monotheistic religions in Arabia before Islam”: Christians, Jews, and Zoroastrians (Denny, 2011). There were Jews in the hijaz who were part of the economic, political, and social scene of the day and who will come to play a role in the establishment of the Muslim community in Yathrib, north of Mecca. Not only was there a large, and dominant, Christian empire (Byzantium) to the northwest of Arabia and the Levant, but there were also Christian monks, mendicants, and sects scattered throughout the Arabian peninsula who most likely played a role in Muhammad’s early development. Finally, the declining Sassanian empire to the northeast that had as its state religion, Zoroastrianism. Zoroastrianism is an ethical monotheistic tradition based on a supreme, transcendent creator who will administer a final judgment and who governs an afterlife of heaven and hell. (Esposito, 2003)
With that said, Sassanid Zoroastrianism had clear distinctions from the origins of the tradition. Sassanid religious policies contributed to the flourishing of numerous religious reform movements. There also appear to have been Arabian monotheists who were neither Jewish nor Christian, and known as hanifs. They were opposed to the polytheism of Meccan Arabia, and desired a return to Abrahamic roots, but not much else is known about them. All of these deities, along with many statues, symbols, icons, and idols from trading partners of the Quraysh were stored in the Ka’ba, a cube-shaped building that housed over 360 patron deities. As a site of both economic force and religious piety it was also a site of pilgrimage and great fan-fair in Mecca. A close relationship emerged between the religious practices and economic life in Mecca, specifically around the Ka’ba. Every Meccan trader was expected to circumambulate — or walk around — the Ka’ba when they returned from a caravan trip and Muhammad would have done this many times. The deities stored within the Ka’ba — and the regular respect shown to them in this circumambulation — helped cement the economic and tribal ties that made Mecca a successful pilgrimage and trading center. No Meccan businessman wanted to see that system undermined. That is, except for one trusted caravan trader and Qurayshi tribe member — Muhammad.