Religion
For more details on the ancient Semitic religion, see Arabian mythology.There are some materials on which to base a description of pre-Islamic religion, particularly in Mecca and the Hejaz. The book originally compiled by Ibn Ishaq around 740 A.D "The biography of the Prophet" passed on through notable transmitter Ibn Hisham translated by A. Guillaume 1st edition in 1955 gives an insight into the conditions pervailing in Mecca around Prophet's time. The Qur'an and the hadith, or recorded oral traditions, give some hints as to this religion. Islamic commentators have elaborated these hints into an account that, while coherent, is doubted by academics in part or in whole.
Many of the tribes in Arabia had practiced Judaism. Christianity is known to have been active in the region before the rise of Islam, especially unorthodox, possibly gnostic forms of it.
Read more about this topic: Pre-Islamic Arabia
Famous quotes containing the word religion:
“All the sweetness of religion is conveyed to children by the hands of storytellers and image-makers. Without their fictions the truths of religion would for the multitude be neither intelligible nor even apprehensible; and the prophets would prophesy and the philosophers celebrate in vain. And nothing stands between the people and the fictions except the silly falsehood that the fictions are literal truths, and that there is nothing in religion but fiction.”
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)
“Their religion was sweetness and peace amidst toil and tears.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“There is nothing in our book, the Koran, that teaches us to suffer peacefully. Our religion teaches us to be intelligent. Be peaceful, be courteous, obey the law, respect everyone; but if someone puts his hand on you, send him to the cemetery. That’s a good religion.”
—Malcolm X (1925–1965)