Nadene Goldfoot
There is the saying about G-d going to all the nations and people of the world seeing how many would accept the 10 Commandments and it was only the Jews who would accept all 10 unconditionally. The story is that it was the Jews, who were the stiff-necked people, who would stay the course with G-d about his other 613 laws to be accepted. That's why the Jews came to be called, the Chosen people. They accepted G-d's Laws. They were told to beware of prophets who would try to make them follow other religions.
These same Chosen People were chosen by Rome to lose their country, Judea, which contained Jerusalem, their capital. It happened in 70 CE when they ruthlessly burned down the city and their 2nd Temple of Solomon. The people were not only starved to death, but whoever was left, taken as slaves to Rome. The few who escaped fled to the surrounding country-sides or hid out successfully in the crags and crannies of Judea.
Many such Jewish tribes made it to Arabia for many reasons. Some lived in Medina, one of the larger cities. From 70 CE until about 590, Jews lived there in peace. There were at least 5 different Jewish tribes living in Arabia;
- 1. Banu Harith or Bnei Chorath.
- 2. Banu Qaynuqa.
- 3. Banu Shutayba.
- 4. Jafna Clan of the Banu Tha'laba who were exiled members of the Banu Ghassan - while both tribes were not Jewish, they did have Jewish members; whereas the Jafna Clan was solely Jewish.
- 5. Banu Zaura.
- What brought them there were several reasons:
- 1. After the collapse of Kingdom of Judah in 586 BCE.
- 2. After the Roman conquest of Judea in 70 CE.
- After the Jewish rebellion in 66 CE, and the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus in 70 CE, exiles found a home in the desert.
- 3. Survivors of the Bar Kochba Revolt, in 135 CE, who sought religious freedom in the Arabian desert rather than live under the yoke of the Romans.
- 4. Immigration, around 300 CE, by people who are known in Islamic literature as the Banu Aus and the Banu Khazraj who fled the Ghassanids in Syria.
- 5. Migration from Judea into southern Arabian Peninsula to ride the ascent of the Himyarite Kingdom around 380 CE.
- This was taken from a 13th-century Persian manuscript (most likely a different edition of al-Biruni's The Remaining Signs of Past Centuries) housed at the Edinburgh University Library, Scotland.
In 570 CE, Mohammed was born, probably in Mecca, who was to become a prophet of his Middle Eastern people. In his early days, he accompanied the Meccan trade caravan and often met Jews and Christians who probably first turned his interests into religious questions.
Therefore, it's possible that there were these migrations continuing to come into Arabia.
By the time he was 40 years old in 610, he was doing a lot of meditating about G-d, the hereafter and the Day of Judgement. He felt such a day was close at hand. He knew about the Jewish prophets as he heard the stories as they were told outside when he passed by the Jewish storytellers of Medina. Mohammed was illiterate; could neither read nor write. At any rate, he had convinced himself that G-d had come to him and revealed himself to him. So he thought he had been chosen as the first Arab prophet.
Annunciation is a painting on wood that is attributed to the Italian Renaissance artist Leonardo da Vinci and dated to circa 1472–1475. It is housed in the Uffizi gallery of Florence, Italy. Christianity also includes Gabriel in the Catholic denomination.
Mohammed then proclaimed himself in public and started preaching in 613 of his revelation and that he had the experience of an intermediation of the angel, Gabriel, the leader of the angels found in the Tanakh (Dan. 8-10) of the Jews. Gabriel's messages to him eventually were written down as Mohammed told his scribe to write as he reiterated them. In the Hebrew Bible, Gabriel appears to the prophet Daniel to explain his visions (Daniel 8:15–26, 9:21–27). The archangel also appears in the Book of Enoch and other ancient Jewish writings. Alongside archangel Michael, Gabriel is described as the guardian angel of Israel, defending its people against the angels of the other nations.
In 620 Mohammad experienced his NIGHT JOURNEY where he reported that he had been carried to Paradise on his flying horse and had met the other prophets. As the Koran/Quran has it, Prophet Muhammad took a night trip to heaven aboard a trusty winged pony-horse-mule-ish creature called Buraq. It's an episode that's inspired Islamic art ever since, because few artists can resist a theologically sound reason to draw a winged horse.
For one night, Muslims commemorate the Prophet Muhammad’s journey in 620 from Mecca to the “Farthest Mosque” in Jerusalem, which is the al Aqsa Mosque-3rd holiest to Muslims, and then, finally, to heaven, where he was purified and given instructions from Allah to pray five times per day. Muslim tradition also describes the prophet, accompanied by the archangel Gabriel, meeting other prophets during his journey: Adam, John the Baptist, Moses and Abraham, just to name a few. The events of this night are recorded in both the Quran and the Hadith (the sayings of the Prophet).
Up to this point, the religion of Saudis was paganism. Religion in pre-Islamic Arabia was a mix of polytheism, Christianity, Judaism, and Iranian religions. Arab polytheism, the dominant belief system, was based on the belief in deities and other supernatural beings such as djinn. Gods and goddesses were worshipped at local shrines, such as the Kaaba in Mecca.
Keeping well spaced during COVID 19 at Kaaba
The Kaabais believed by Muslims to have been rebuilt several times throughout history, most famously by Ibrahim (Abraham) and his son Ismail (Ishmael), when he returned to the valley of Mecca several years after leaving his wife Hajar (Hagar) and Ismail there upon Allah's command.
Jews first introduced Abram who went through a name change to Abraham as he mentally developed. Sarai, whose name was also changed to Sarah, seemed to be barren, so as they both aged without children, This went against the dictum that Abraham had received from G-d about having many children. Abraham took Hagar as wife to produce a child. Hagar was Sarah's Egyptian handmaid. Problems arose between the women but Hagar produced a son, Ishmael. Then Sarah conceived (this often happens-pressure was off of her), and they named Sarah's son, Isaac. This even happened in biblical days before the Exodus, which is dated sometime around 1579 BCE, which would be about 2,179 years before Mohammed was born. Isaac was the father of Jacob who gave birth to 12 sons who became the fathers of the 12 Tribes of Israel.
One can see that Judaism made a great influence on Mohammed. We see Judaism in his revelation stories, in his tenets of faith and his religious precepts of the Koran. He did believe in One G-d to a point.
He himself held that all Holy Books were copies of a heavenly model and that all revelations were essentially one, but distorted in several ways by the respective people. He said that his mission was only to confirm what had been revealed to former prophets, and to correct their distortions.
Mohammed understood that there was no differences between Judaism and Islam, so hoped that Jews would now follow him and accept the new faith he was offering. In his sales pitch to the Jews, he even added a Jewish ritual in Medina to his Islam. He added a 3rd daily prayer practiced by Jews. He introduced a day of fast corresponding to Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement; and a day of public prayer like the Jewish Sabbath. Then he directed his people to face Jerusalem when praying.
An angry and disappointed Mohammed saw that Jews were not buying into his new religion. He altered his Islam by taking out the Jewish clauses he had added. He was now hostile to the Jews of Medina. Gradually, Mohammed had these same Jews of Medina either annihilated or expelled.
Mohammed's relationship ended with the Quraysh tribe of Jews. There had been many raids on this tribe's caravans by the new Islamic warriors. Mohammed heard about one of their caravans coming from Syria that was laden with money and goods. He said that it was likely that Allah may give it to you as booty. "He told these warriors to fight fiercely and behead the Jews.
There were still other Jews living in Arabia. He treated them better, possibly from political and economical considerations. Mohammed was a warrior, a leader with his own army of men.
One of his wives, Sofia or Safiyya, was born in a Jewish family. She was the daughter of Huyayy bin Akhtab, who had induced the Banu Quatayzah Jews of Arabia to repudiate their alliance with Mohammed after the Khaybar Pass was conquered.
Sofia had been married to a Jewish leader, when Mohammed was now going to give her to his friend, Dihya and had killed her father along with the rest of the other Jews in the battle. Her husband had been Kinana ibn Rabi, who had been tortured and killed by Mohammed's men. Sofia was a beautiful woman. When he saw her he told dihya to take any slave girl other than her from the captives. He then freed her and married her himself-since she agreed to convert to Islam, she was able to be elevated beyond the position of a slave. That night, Sofia was dressed as a bride and a wedding feast was hastily arranged. On the way out of Khaybar that night, Mohammed halted the caravan as soon as they were outside the oasis, pitched a tent, and consummated the marriage. Here she had been the wife of a Jewish chieftain, to a widow, to a captive,, to the wife of the Prophet of Islam in the course of a single day.
Circling the Kaaba seven times counterclockwise, known as Tawaf (Arabic: طواف, romanized: tawaaf), is a Fard (obligatory) rite for the completion of the Hajj and Umrah pilgrimages. The area around the Kaaba on which pilgrims circumambulate is called the Mataaf. 
The Kaaba is a windowless building at the center of Islam's most important mosque, the Masjid al-Haram in Mecca, Saudi Arabia. It is the most sacred site in Islam. It is considered by Muslims to be the Bayt Allah (Arabic: بَيْت ٱللَّٰه, lit. 'House of God') and is the qibla (Arabic: قِبْلَة, direction of prayer) for Muslims around the world when performing salah.
In early Islam, Muslims faced in the general direction of Jerusalem as the qibla in their prayers before changing the direction to face the Kaaba, believed by Muslims to be a result of a Quranic verse revelation to Muhammad. A good Muslim is to make the trip to Mecca and walk the walk. For that they will receive a title to their name of Haj.
"It was only in 1932 when Arabia became Saudi Arabia. Since King Abdulaziz Al-Saud established the modern Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in 1932, its transformation has been astonishing. In a few short decades, the Kingdom has turned itself from a desert nation to a modern, sophisticated state and a major player on the international stage." The discovery of oil helped that to happen. no Jews are allowed to step foot in Saudi Arabia. Their population is 100% Muslim. They follow the Sunni sect and Hanbali fiqh. It is an Islamic State, and the 14th largest in population. The land area is of approximately 2,150,000 km² or 830,000 sq mi. Saudi Arabia is the largest country in the Middle East, and the second-largest country in the Arab world. Their population had been 27,601,038 in 2011. The current population of Saudi Arabia is 35,304,697 as of Sunday, May 30, 2021, based on Worldometer elaboration of the latest United Nations data.
Compare that to 8,019---8,522 sq mi for Israel. and the current population of Israel is 8,777,703 as of Saturday, May 29, 2021, based on Worldometer elaboration of the latest United Nations data.
Resource:
The New Standard Jewish Encyclopedia
https://www.saudiembassy.net/history
https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/AG.LND.TOTL.K2?locations=SA
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annunciation_(Leonardo)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gabriel
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_tribes_of_Arabia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Saudi_Arabia
https://www.worldometers.info/world-population/saudi-arabia-population/#:~:text=The%20current%20population%20of%20Saudi,the%20latest%20United%20Nations%20data.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaaba
https://courses.lumenlearning.com/boundless-worldhistory/chapter/pre-islamic-arabia/#:~:text=Overview,as%20the%20Kaaba%20in%20Mecca.
The Truth about Muhammad by Robert Spencer
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Aqsa_Mosque
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