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al-ʿarab, the “lands of the arabs,” who converted to the Jewish reli-
gion. he explains that “Judaism is ancient in the arabian peninsula, for
Jews continued to immigrate to arab lands from their earliest period,
whether fleeing violence or searching for livelihood.” This “earliest pe-
riod” of Jewish history in arabia may well have begun as early as the
pentateuchal period. “It is not unlikely,” he claims, “that a group of
them immigrated there during their wanderings in the wilderness at the
time of Moses.” a Jewish presence in the “lands of the arabs,” in other
words, could be as ancient as the Jewish presence in the holy Land.^45
relying on traditional sources composed between the ninth and
the fifteenth centuries, Zaydan presents his readers with three possi-
ble origins of the Jews in Arab lands. The first source he cites is Abu
al- Faraj al- Iṣfahānī (ninth– tenth centuries). In Kitābal-aghānī, Zaydan
explains, al-Iṣfahānī notes that the first Jews in Arab lands were those
who fought the biblical amalekites. In sparing the amalekite prince,
these Jews failed to annihilate the people completely as had been
commanded and thus were refused entry to “ash- Shām,” i.e., Greater
Syria (including the Land of Israel). they decided to settle the land of
those they had decimated, and this included the city of Yathrib (i.e.,
Madina). Next, Zaydan discusses the theory of al- Maqrizi (fourteenth–
fifteenth centuries) that Jews arrived in Yathrib during the time of
Samuel the prophet, and again after the roman conquest. at the lat-
ter time, al- Maqrizi suggests, Jews undertook to spread their religion
among the native peoples. “By the eighth century ce,” he writes, “the
Jewish religion was widespread in many arab lands.” Finally, Zaydan
mentions the position of Ibn Khaldun (fourteenth– fifteenth centuries),
who argued that the first to bring the Jewish religion to the Arabs was
Dhu Nuwas, a king of Yemen who, along with his people, converted to
Judaism at the end of the fifth century, “though in a different version,
the people of Yemen converted to Judaism at the beginning of the
fourth century.”^46 Whether through immigration or by native conver-
sion, there had been Jews living among arabs, and even arabs living
as Jews, Zaydan argues, beginning no less than a millennium and a
half earlier.
the same year in which Zaydan published his article, Makaryus ad-
dressed the question of the relationship between Jews and arabs in
a fascinating footnote in Tārīkhal-isrāʾīliyyīn. Identifying the biblical
figure Abraham as the paterfamilias of the Jews, Makaryus writes that
(^45) For a modern scholarly account of the Jews in pre- Islamic arabia, see Newby, A
History of the Jews of Arabia.
(^46) al-Hilāl (October 1903– July 1904), 85– 86.