Muhammad and The Jews — Page 25
CHAPTER I THE JEWS OF ARABIA ON THE EVE OF THE HIJRAH By slow infiltration several Arab tribes drifted into Medina and its vicinity, and were hospitably received by the Jewish farmers. By the sixth century, these new arrivals, steadily reinforced from the south and unified under an able leader, Malik ibn Ajlan, eventually prevailed over their hosts. Nevertheless, Mohammed still found vigorous Jewish tribes in and around that centre of northern Arabia, possibly constituting the majority of the settled population. -SALO WITTMAYER BARON The beginnings of the Jewish settlements in the Arab peninsula are "buried in misty tradition". ! There is no reliable historical evidence to establish the approximate date of their arrival. Tayma? was known to the Prophets and may be said to have been the first city in Arabia in which something like a Jewish community had existed in ancient biblical times. 2 Seafaring Israelites and Jewish fugitives escaping from persecution by Nebuchadnezzar and later by the Romans, had, it seems, established their colonies in the Arabian peninsula. In southern Arabia (Yemen) they were scattered and "lived without social or political cohesion". 3 Towards the beginning of the fifth century they had, however, established themselves by their industry and enterprising spirit. They obtained so great an influence over the Arab tribes of Yemen that one of the kings of J:Iimyar, DhU Nuwas, embraced Judaism and assumed the name of Yfisuf. 4. l Graetz, Vol. III, p. 54. 2 Isaiah 21: 24, Jeremiah 25: 23 and Job 6 :19. 3 Graetz, Vol. III, p. 56. 4 See Irfan Shahid, The Martyrs of Najriin: New Documents, (Bruxelles, 1971), pp. 260-68 for his background and "the bewildering variety of names" which he adopted. 25