pre-islamic arabia:poetry,tribal rivalry and heroism 13the mid fourth to the beginning of the sixth century A.C. The reli-
gion in the area was initially of a planetary astral system in which
the prevailing moon-god was referred to by various references accord-
ing to the different tribes, such as, love, lover, father, health giving
God and paternal uncle. The first sign of religious changes began
with the first official Christian missionary sent by the Emperor
Constantius in 356 A.C. which is said to have carried political impli-
cations instigated by the rivalry between the Roman and Persian
empires to control such a strategic area (Hitti, 1963). The mission-
aries, and other less official ones, succeeded in promoting Christianity
in the area and in building up churches in different locations. Judaism
also spread in the area and the last of the Œimyarite kings, Dhu-
Nuwas, became a Jew. Rivalry between the followers of the two reli-
gions began. In October 523 A.C. Dhu-Nuwas, the Jewish king,
massacred the 20,000 Christians of Najran by throwing them in a
trench which was then set on fire (Al- ̨abarì). The Qur"àn refers to
this massacre by saying, “By the heaven with its constellations! By
the Promised Day! By the Witness and that which is witnessed!
Cursed be the diggers of the trench, who lighted the consuming fire
and sat around it to watch the faithful being burnt to death! Nor
did they torture them for any reason save that they believed in God,
the Mighty, the Praised One; the Sovereign of the heavens and the
earth, the Witness of all things”, (Qur"àn 85:1–9). This dramatic
event led to a major political change in the area. As the protector
of Christianity the Roman Emperor, Justin I, asked the Negus of
Abyssinia, the nearest Christian force to the area, to intervene. The
Abyssinian army crossed the Red Sea, conquered the kingdom and
occupied the land from 525 to 575 A.C. (Hitti, 1963). Furthermore,
to circumscribe the religious influence of the Ka"aba in the north
as opposed to his newly built church in the south, the Abyssinian
commander, Abraha, led a military expedition to Makkah to destroy
the Ka"ba. The expedition did not succeed and the army was destroyed
by smallpox. This is said to have happened in 570 or 571 A.C., the
year when the Prophet of Islam was born.
The year 575 A.C. witnessed a new political power in South
Arabia, the Persians. As the struggle continued between the Christian
Arabians on the one hand and the Jewish and Pagan Arabians on
the other, and since the former were backed by the Abyssinians rep-
resenting Christian Byzantine, the latter sought help from a rival
empire—the Persian. The Persians must have found it the right