Before I can explain Ibn Kathir’s account of the two rabbis who protected the Ka’bah, I have to relate something about the Jews in Arabia in the five centuries before the birth of Prophet Muhammad.

In 2014, a French-Saudi expedition studying rock inscriptions around Bir Hima – a site about 100 kilometers north of the city of Najran in southern Saudi Arabia; discovered what could be the oldest texts written in the Arabic alphabet.

At least two of the early Arabic petroglyphs discovered cited dates in an ancient calendar. Expert epigraphists quickly calculated the oldest one to the year 469 or 470 CE in the Western calendar.

The general picture of this period in pre-Islamic Arabia is one of tribal feuds and anarchy, dominated by jahilliyah – ignorance – lawlessness, illiteracy and pagan cults. For generations before Prophet Muhammad’s “hijra” from Mecca to Medina in 622 CE, the societies and centralized states in Europe and the Middle East were weakened by incessant warfare between the Christian Byzantine and Zoroastrian Persian empires.

One key, but often forgotten, player in Arabia at that time was the kingdom of Himyar. Himyar was established around the 2nd century CE, and by the 4th century had become a regional power. Based in today’s Yemen, Himyar had conquered neighboring states, including the ancient kingdom of Sheba (whose queen met with Solomon).

In an article titled “What kind of Judaism was in Arabia?” Christian Robin, a French epigraphist and historian who was also a leader of the expedition at Bir Hima, says most scholars now agree that, around 380 CE, the elites of the kingdom of Himyar converted to Judaism.

The Himyarite rulers may have seen in Judaism a potential unifying force for their new, culturally diverse empire, and an identity to rally resistance against creeping encroachment by Byzantine and Ethiopian Christians, as well as the Zoroastrian empire of Persia.

It is unclear how much of the population converted, perhaps 10-20% perhaps 30-40%. What is sure is that........

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)