Arab Culture - Religions

Religions

Before the coming of Islam most Arabs inhabiting the area of modern-day Saudi Arabia followed a religion featuring the worship of a number of deities, including Hubal, Wadd, Al-Lat, Manat, and Uzza, while some tribes had converted to Christianity or Judaism, and a few individuals, the hanifs, had apparently rejected polytheism in favor of monotheism. The most prominent Arab Christian kingdoms were the Ghassanid and Lakhmid kingdoms. With the expansion of Islam, the majority of Arabs rapidly entered into Islam and became Muslims, and the pre-Islamic polytheistic traditions disappeared.

At present, most Arabs in Saudi Arabia are Muslims by religion. Sunni Islam dominates the Muslims in most areas, overwhelmingly so in North Africa with other religions; Shia Islam is prevalent in Bahrain, north-east and southern Iraq (sharing the religion with many other faiths like Cristian,and Mandai in the south and Gargari, Kakai, and Yazidi in the north), and adjacent parts of Saudi Arabia(East or the country), southern Lebanon, parts of Syria, and northern Yemen. Ibadi are primarily in Oman and are also present in Algeria and Libya. There are some religious minorities like the Druze, Ismaaili Shia and other offshoots of Islam.

Reliable estimates of the number of Arab Christians, which in any case depends on the definition of "Arab" used, vary. According to Fargues 1998, "Today Christians only make up 9.2% of the population of the Near East". In Lebanon they now number about 41% of the population, in Syria they make up about 10 to 15%, in the Palestinian territories the figure is 3.8%, and in Israel Arab Christians constitute 2.1% (or roughly 10% of the Israeli Arab population). In Egypt, they constitute 5.9% of the population, and in Iraq they presumably comprise 2.9% of the populace. Most North and South American and Australian Arabs (about two-thirds) are Arab Christians, particularly from Syria, Palestine, and Lebanon.

Jews from Arab countries—mainly Mizrahi Jews and Yemenite Jews—are today usually not categorised as Arab. Sociologist Philip Mendes asserts that before the anti-Jewish actions of the 1930s and 1940s, overall Iraqi Jews "viewed themselves as Arabs of the Jewish faith, rather than as a separate race or nationality". Prior to the emergence of the term Mizrahi, the term "Arab Jews" (Yehudim ‘Áravim, יהודים ערבים) was sometimes used to describe Jews of the Arab world; the term is rarely used today. The few remaining Jews in the Arab countries reside mostly in Morocco and Tunisia. Between the late 1940s and early 1960s, following the creation of the state of Israel, most of these Jews left their countries of birth and are now mostly concentrated in Israel. Some also immigrated to France (where they form the largest Jewish community, outnumbering European Jews) (see Jewish exodus from Arab lands).