THE INFLUENCE OF ANIMISM ON ISLAM

Even in Arabia, the stern monotheism of the Wahabi Reformers Wahabi Reformers: A movement advocating for a return to the original, puritanical principles of Islam, rejecting later innovations. was unable to eradicate the pagan superstitions of Islam because they are embedded in the Koran and were not altogether rejected by Mohammed himself—much less by his companions.

With regard to the pagan practices prevalent in early Islam, Abu’l Fida Abu’l Fida: A 14th-century Kurdish historian and geographer. calls attention to a number of religious observances that were perpetuated under the new system. "The Arabs of the times of ignorance," he says, "used to do things that the religious law of Islam has adopted; for they used not to wed their mothers or their daughters, and among them it was deemed a most detestable thing to marry two sisters, and they used to revile the man who married his father’s wife, and to call him Daizan Daizan: An archaic term used to describe someone who marries their stepmother.. They used, moreover, to make the pilgrimage (Hajj) to the House (the Ka’aba), and visit the consecrated places, and wear the Ihram Ihram: The sacred state of a pilgrim during the Hajj. (the single garment worn to the present day by a pilgrim when running round the Ka’bah), and perform the Tawwaf Tawwaf: The ritual act of circumambulating the Ka'aba., and run (between the hills As-Safa and Al-Marwa), and make their stand at all the Stations and cast the stones (at the devil in the valley of Mina); and they were accustomed to intercalate a month every third year." He goes on to mention many other similar examples in which the religion of Islam has enjoined as religious observances ancient Arabian customs, for instance, ceremonial washings after certain kinds of defilement, parting the hair, the ritual observed in cleansing the teeth, paring the nails, and other such matters. Cf. Tisdall, "The Sources of the Qur’an," pp. 44–45.

Mohammed also borrowed certain fables current among the heathen Arabs, such as the tales of Ad and Thamud and some others (Surah VII 63–77). Regarding such stories, Al-Kindi well says to his opponent: "And if you mention the tale of Ad and Thamud and the Camel and the Comrades of the Elephant (Surahs CV and XIV: 9) and the like of...