The Prophets Of Allah

Why Arabia and the Birth Of Prophet Mohammed PBUH

The interesting things about the Jaheleya arabs was that they believed in Allah by the same name, attributes etc. They never depicted Allah as an idol. They made idols of Al-lat and Hubal etc but they never made an idol of Allah becuause they knew Allah was their creator and sustainer. Allah says in the Quran if you were to ask them who created you? They would say 'Allah created us'. If you were to ask who sends the rain from the heavans? They would say 'Allah'. Who sustains you? They would say 'Allah'. The Quran says if you were to ask who is the lord of the heavens and earth? They would say 'Allah. So their paganism is not the paganism of the modern day. They say Allah is our God etc and yet they are not muslims. Even though they say there is no Lord/creator/sustainer other than Allah. So when the prophet PBUH comes to them, it isn't with a new God. They know Allah is the one and only Lord! Yet why aren't they muslim? Well because they worship idols. Well why? They say "we are only worshipping these beings so they can bring us closer to Allah". So the ultimate goal is Allah - these beings are interemediates. Surah Yunus verse 18 "they worship these beings besides Allah that are useless, and they say these beings are our intecessors between us and Allah". They think they are too sinful so they have to 'go through them'. So notice their shirk was not in rejecting Allah, they firmly believe Allah is creator, sustatiner etc. By name! Yet they worship other than Allah.

This is important because in our times muslims fall prey to the EXACT same mentality. They claim Allah is their lord but they think they are too sinful, and so they need intecessors. Change al-lat to peer, shiekh, wali etc. Exact same concept word for word. They think they have to go through the saint or the prophet PBUH. 'We invoke the blessings of this being because he has a higher status and will plead our case to Allah' - this is what they think. This is exactly the same mentality of the jaheleya. Al-lat is exactly the same concept as a peer etc.

Recall Hubal was the original and first idol in Mecca from Syria from the Amlyktes. The second main idol was Al-lat. He was a man who used to feed to the pilgrams a type of soup. And Al-lat was the one who grinds - and he would stand on the road to Mecca and would feed people on the road. When he died they said 'lets commemerate him - he is a good man'. We are not supposed to do this because of this reason. People want to get blessings and slowly but surely it became an idol that they worshipped besides Allah. The most common being that is invoked and worshipped is Jesus pbuh. Is Jesus pbuh a good or evil being? He's one of the greatest of all prophets. And yet billions worship him. You don't go 'through' anybody to get to Allah. You take the prohpet PBUH as a role model and not another God, demi God etc. So the shirk of the Jaheleya is not the shirk of hindus etc because they believe in another God besides Allah. But the God of the arabs was Allah - their shirk was them believing Allah is too holy and thus they thought they needed an intermediary to get to Allah.

Now if Arabia was so bad or evil why did Allah choose them for the prophet PBUH to come? Why not the romans who were a mighty civilisation? Or the persians who had an ancient civilisaton? Why choose a nomadic desert that didn't have anything - not even a government. Why this society?

Well there are many wisdoms we can derive:

1. The arabs and Arabia was in between the two major superpowers - the romans and persians. More correctly the Byzantines and the Sasanians. So Arabia is smack in the middle. Wars were taking place for 400 years between the Byzantines and the Sasanians. So its geographically connected to the superpowers but distinct. And indeed Arabia conquers both superpowers. So by being connected Allah wills the muslims conquers these.

2. The arabs didn't have a history of voilence against the superpowers because they were busy fighting amongst themselves. So when the arab army first marched towards Rome/Persia - these superpowers laughed at them "you want to challenge us with such a pathetic army?" And it's said the Sasanians treated the arabs as children! Because they couldn't believe a group was coming from Arabia. So it was a suprise.