Monotheism in pre-Islamic Arabia

Monotheism, the belief in a supreme Creator being, existed in pre-Islamic Arabia. This practice could be found among pre-Islamic Christian, Jewish, and other populations unaffiliated with either one of the two Abrahamic religions at the time. Monotheism became a widespread religious trend in pre-Islamic Arabia in the fourth century, when it began to quickly supplant the polytheism that had been the common form of religion until then.^[1] The transition from polytheism to monotheism in this time is documented from inscriptions in all writing systems on the Arabian Peninsula (including those in Nabataean, Safaitic, and Sabaic), where polytheistic gods and idols cease to be mentioned. Epigraphic evidence is nearly exclusively monotheistic in the fifth century,^[2] and from the sixth century and until the eve of Islam, it is solely monotheistic.^[3] Pre-Islamic Arabic poetry is also monotheistic or henotheistic.^[4]

An important locus of pre-Islamic Arabian monotheism was in the Himyarite Kingdom that ruled over South Arabia, whose ruling class converted to Judaism in the fourth century (roughly when official polytheistic inscriptions stop appearing in the area) who nevertheless present a neutral outwards monotheism in engagement with the public. This monotheism that came to be prevalent among populations unaffiliated with either Abrahamic religion has been called by many terms by historians, including "gentile monotheism," "pagan monotheism," "Himyarite monotheism," "Arabian monotheism," "hanifism," "Rahmanism," and so on.^[5] In the sixth century, the Aksumite invasion of Himyar leads to Christian rule in the region.

In Islamic tradition, Arabia is described as being dominated by polytheism and idolatry before the mission of Muhammad such as in the Book of Idols by Hisham ibn al-Kalbi. These representations are important to the Islamic idea of pre-Islamic Arabia as the Jahiliyyah ("Age of Ignorance"). Monotheism was confined to small pockets, like the Christian community of Najran or Jewish tribes such as Banu Qurayza. There was also the occasional hanif. The awāʾil ("firsts") genre of literature frequently attributes the status of the first true monotheist to sixth and early seventh-century figures like Quss Ibn Sa'ida al-Iyadi, Waraqah ibn Nawfal, and Zayd ibn Amr.^[6]