Friday, July 13, 2018

Petra Origin

Petra Origin --- ===

Controversial and unproven theory has attracted some attentionl  While researching the history of the Arabian Peninsula, Dan Gibson of nabataea.net noticed that anumber of early mosques did not point to Mecca. Theory presented in the book “Quranic Geography” By Dan Gibson who is an expert on Nabatean studies and spent his life researching in Jordan.

gibson-nabatea
Dan Gibson’s Book on The Nabateans

He was not out to study Islam but this is something he found out while he was there and decided to spend some time looking into it. He is a not just a respectable historian, but his father was a historian too.


*Sources


Is this a joke? - Nabataea.net
nabataea.net/joke.html
While researching the history of the Arabian Peninsula, Dan Gibson of nabataea.net noticed that anumber of early mosques did not point to Mecca. He carefully ...

The Mecca Question | Dan R Gibson - Academia.edu
www.academia.edu/1776803/The_Mecca_Question
His website: http://nabataea.net has gained worldwide attention, both for its scope .... II In the book Qur'anic Geography, Gibson lists as many early mosques as he could .... Gibson aptly points out that Mecca today does not have thaniyas or city walls. .... The following year (65 AH) Ibn Zubayr claimed hediscovered the real ...

From Petra back to Makka – From “Pibla” back to Qibla | Muslim Heritage
www.muslimheritage.com/article/from-petra-back-to-makka
 critique of Dan Gibson, Early Islamic Qiblas: A Survey of mosques built between ... The author and Muslim Heritage are grateful to Mr. Gibson for pointing out an error ... Gibson was inspired to undertake his survey of early mosques not only ..... in numbers will recognise that Gibson has “discovered” that certain mosques ...


(PDF) Suggested Solutions for Issues Concerning The Location of ...
https://www.researchgate.net/.../256702804_Suggested_Solutions_for_Issues_Concer...
Some point to Macoraba (73 20 22 -AP) and some point to Centos village (69 20 21 30 AP) ... The Geography is composed of eight books with the first volume explaining the method ... Dan Gibson, 2013 ... As far as we know Ptolemy did not draw a map, but rather .... (See http://nabataea.net/arabia.html for more information).

PDF | Response to David King with attached article from http ...
https://www.researchgate.net/.../321708416_Response_to_David_King_with_attached_a...Dec 9, 2017 - PDF | Response to David King. by Dan Gibson September 2017. ... undertaking a study to discover how many mosques pointed to ... Gibson is not competent to write on early Islamic history and often ..... website www.nabataea.net over the past few years. ...... knew already what we had justdiscovered.

Makkah is the centre of a cult created after Muhammad • Quranite
https://www.quranite.com › Blog › ARTICLE
Sep 9, 2015 - Dan Gibson is a historian and a Middle-East specialist. ... line of Ismāʿīl. He convincingly places Muḥammad in Nabatea at Petra – at least ... He points to Petra, not Makkah as both the place of the origin of the .... In their Internet article Islamic Awareness, The Qibla of Early Mosques, Jerusalem or Makkah?


[PDF]Supporting Evidence that Petra was the original ... - The Sacred City
thesacredcity.ca/Supporting%20Evidence.pdf
Dan Gibson ... Many of the early Islamic writers mention the original city of Mecca. ... Since all early mosque Qiblas pointed to Petra in Jordan, and ... The twenty four points below are not arranged in any particular order but are numbered to ...... group of us tried to catalogue our own findings at theNabataea.net website:.

Dan Gibson (author) - Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_Gibson_(author)
Daniel "Dan" Gibson (born 1956) is a self-published Canadian author studying the early history ... Gibson has developed the theory that Islam's prophet Muhammad did not ... whether Gibson's central claim ofearly mosques pointing towards Petra is ... Nabataea.net Research page of various researchers on the Nabatean ...
Missing: noticed


Early Islamic Qiblas: A survey of mosques built between 1AH/622 C.E. ...
https://www.amazon.com/Early-Islamic-Qiblas-mosques-C/dp/1927581222
Early Islamic Qiblas: A survey of mosques built between 1AH/622 C.E. and 263 ... that early Islamicmosques were not erroneously oriented as previously thought. ... Canadian historian Dan Gibson hasdiscovered that early Islamic mosques were ... The Nabataeans: Builders Of Petra by Dan GibsonPaperback $21.99.

Qibla - IslamiCity Forum - Islamic Discussion Forum - Page 3
www.islamicity.org/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=31944&PN=3&title=qibla
Oct 13, 2014 - Whenever the "Sacred Mosque" is mentioned, the context always shows ... This article I found explains a lot in that regard, but that is not how I found it. ... While there is little evidence of anearly shrine at Mecca, Gibson points out that ... were always made to the Nabataean city of Petra, which was known as ...

Nabataeans - Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nabataeans
An ally of the Roman Empire, the Nabataean kingdom flourished throughout the 1st century. Its power extended far into Arabia along the Red Sea to Yemen, and Petra was a cosmopolitan marketplace, though its commerce was diminished by the rise of the Eastern trade-route from Myos Hormos to Coptos on the Nile.
Origins · ‎Religion · ‎Agriculture · ‎Nabataean Kingdom


Nabataean Kingdom - Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nabataean_Kingdom
The Nabataean Kingdom (Arabic: المملكة النبطية‎), also named Nabatea (/ˌnæbəˈtiːə/), was a political state of the Arab Nabataeans during classical antiquity. Nabataea remained independent from the 4th century BC until it was annexed by the Roman Empire in AD 106, which renamed it Arabia Petraea.
History · ‎Nabataeans · ‎Emergence · ‎Nabataeans and ...


Nabataea: Who were the Nabataeans - Nabataea.net
nabataea.net/who.html
A short time later, Alexander the Great's generals divided their kingdom, with Antigonus The-One-Eyed briefly in power in Syria and Ptolemy in power in Egypt. It is against this background that the Nabataeansstep firmly into written history and begin to build their empire.


Solving the Enigma of Petra and the Nabataeans - Biblical ...
https://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/.../solving-the-enigma-of-petra-and-the-nabataea...
May 19, 2018 - Who were the Nabataeans, the industrious Arab people who built the city of Petra and its towering rock-cut monuments over 2000 years ago?


Jordan - History - The Mysterious Nabateans - King Hussein
www.kinghussein.gov.jo/his_nabateans.html
Before Alexander's conquest, a thriving new civilization had emerged in southern Jordan. It appears that a nomadic tribe known as the Nabateans began ...


Nabataeans - Livius
www.livius.org › Articles › People
Apr 12, 2018 - The first reference to Arabs of the Nabataean tribe, which may have lived as nomadic pastoralists near Hegra (modern Mada'in Salih in the ...


Nabataean | people | Britannica.com
https://www.britannica.com/topic/Nabataean-people
Nabataean: Nabataean, member of a people of ancient Arabia whose settlements lay in the borderlands between Syria and Arabia, from the Euphrates River to ...


Nabataean religion - Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nabataean_religion
The Nabataean religion is the form of Arab polytheism practiced in Nabataea, an ancient Arab ... Most of the deities in Nabataean religion were part of the pre-Islamic Arab pantheon, with the addition of foreign deities such as Isis and Atargatis.
Gods and goddesses · ‎Places of worship · ‎Betyls · ‎Rituals

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allah_as_a_lunar_deity
The claim that Allah historically originates as a moon god worshipped in pre-Islamic Arabia is a ... It is clear from Nabataean and other inscriptions that Allah meant 'the god'. The word "Allah" was used by Arabic-speaking Christians and Jews ...
Evidence adduced · ‎Scholarly views · ‎Christian proponents · ‎Islamic tradition


The Identity of the pre-Islamic Allah at Mecca [Part 2] - Answering Islam
https://www.answering-islam.org/authors/shamoun/preislamic_allah2.html
Now this creates problems for the Muslim assertion that Allah was the ..... A similar arrangement is met in Nabataean inscription from Petra that speaks of ...

The pagan origin of the word, "Allah". Islam is paganism in ... - Bible.ca
www.bible.ca/islam/islam-allah-pre-islamic-origin.htm
If this correspondence proved the Muslim god was the same as the Christian ...... 48); "Origin-Nabataean and Arabic: Derived from the western Semitic god Il. .
pagan origin of the word,  Pre-Islamic literature has proved this." (Who Is This Allah?, G. J. O. Moshay, 1994, p 138)

"But history establishes beyond the shadow of doubt that even the pagan Arabs, before Muhammad's time, knew their chief god by the name of Allah and even, in a sense, proclaimed his unity...Among the pagan Arabs this term denoted the chief god of their pantheon, the Kaaba, with its three hundred and sixty idols." (The Moslem Doctrine of God, Samuel M. Zwemer 1905, p 24-25)

In fact, he did not at first intend to establish a new religion, but rather to reform the belief in Allah which already existed, and to show what this belief truly signified and rightfully demanded. (Mohammed: The man and his faith, Tor Andrae, 1936, Translated by Theophil Menzel, 1960, p13-30)

The pre-Islamic origin of "Allah"
There is absolutely no question that Allah was worshipped by the pagan Arabs as one of many polytheistic gods.
Allah was worshipped in the Kabah at Mecca before Muhammad was born. Muhammad merely proclaimed a god the Meccans were already familiar with. The pagan Arabs never accused Muhammad of preaching a different Allah than the one they already worshipped.

Nabataean Religion: Pantheon - Nabataea.net
nabataea.net/gods.html
The problem with this is that Isis does not appear in any Nabataean god-lists, nor .... Even at the founding of Islam, an image of Allat, along with one of Al-'Uzza, ...


Staring at the View: Was it the Thamudians or the Nabateans?
staringattheview.blogspot.com/2009/05/was-it-thamudians-or-nabateans.html
May 19, 2009 - I recently watched Muslim Christian Dialogue About the Quran, ... They were idolaters, and Allah sent one of their own, the prophet Saleh, ...

Islam, Babylonian Religion, Exposed: “Allah” (Ba'al ...
https://comingworldwar3.wordpress.com/.../allah-pre-arabic-pagan-moon-god-an-exp...
Jul 27, 2010 
“The Arabs, before the time of Mohammed, accepted and worshipped, after a fashion, a supreme god called Allah” – (Encyclopedia off Islam, I:302, Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1913, Houtsma)
“The name Allah, as the Quran itself is witness, was well known in pre-Islamic Arabia. Indeed, both it and its feminine form, Allat, are found not infrequently among the theophorous names in inscriptions from North Africa” – (Islam: Muhammad, and His Religion, New York: The Liberal Arts Press, 1958, p. 85)
The word “Allah” comes from the compound Arabic word, al-ilah. Al is the definite article “the” and ilah is an Arabic word for “god.” It is not a foreign word. It is not even the Syriac word for God. It is pure Arabic. – (There is an interesting discussion of the origins of Allah, in “Arabic Lexicographical Miscellanies” by J. Blau in the Journal of Semitic Studies, Vol. XVII, #2, 1972, pp. 173-190)
Neither is Allah a Hebrew or Greek word for God as found in the Bible. Allah is a purely Arabic term used in reference to an Arabian deity. Hastings’ Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics I:326, T & T Clark, states:
‘”Allah” is a proper name, applicable only to their [Arabs’] peculiar God.’
Astral Religions
In Arabia, the sun god was viewed as a female goddess and the moon as the male god. As has been pointed out by many scholars such as Alfred Guilluame, the moon god was called by various names, one of which was Allah! – (Islam, p. 7)
The name Allah was used as the personal name of the moon god, in addition to other titles that could be given to him.
Allah, the moon god, was married to the sun goddess. Together they produced three goddesses who were called “the daughters of Allah.” These three goddesses were called Al-Lat, Al-Uzza, and Manat.
Allah – the Moon God
The Archeology of The Middle East

The religion of Islam has as its focus of worship a deity by the name of “Allah.” The Muslims claim that Allah in pre-Islamic times was the biblical God of the Patriarchs, prophets, and apostles. The issue is thus one of continuity. Was “Allah” the biblical God or a pagan god in Arabia during pre- Islamic times? The Muslim’s claim of continuity is essential to their attempt to convert Jews and Christians 
Piecing Together the Religion of the Nabataeans - Wiley Online Library
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/rec3.12148/pdfQos is Allah, appears as a Nabataean personal name in the Khirbet Tannur .... Before the rise of Islam, Arabs frequently set up and worshipped stones and ... Unlike their neighbors to the north in ancient Judea, the Nabataeans did not leave a written history of themselves, and what is known about them is mainly derived from non‐Nabataean sources: the reports of Greeks and Romans and the Jewish historian, Flavius Josephus. Our knowledge of the religion of the Nabataeans must be pieced together from fragmentary historical and epigraphic evidence as well as the mute evidence provided by the archeological record.


Petra Wikipedia

Religion[edit]


The Theatre
The Nabataeans worshipped Arab gods and goddesses during the pre-Islamic era as well as a few of their deified kings. One, Obodas I, was deified after his death. Dushara was the primary male god accompanied by his three female deities: Al-‘UzzáAllat and Manāt. Many statues carved in the rock depict these gods and goddesses. New evidence indicates that broader Edomite, and Nabataean theology had strong links to Earth-Sun relationships, often manifested in the orientation of prominent Petra structures to equinox and solstice sunrises and sunsets.[43]
stele dedicated to Qos-Allah 'Qos is Allah' or 'Qos the god', by Qosmilk (melech – king) is found at Petra (Glueck 516). Qos is identifiable with Kaush (Qaush) the God of the older Edomites. The stele is horned and the seal from the Edomite Tawilan near Petra identified with Kaush displays a star and crescent (Browning 28), both consistent with a moon deity. It is conceivable that the latter could have resulted from trade with Harran (Bartlett 194). There is continuing debate about the nature of Qos (qaus – bow) who has been identified both with a hunting bow (hunting god) and a rainbow (weather god) although the crescent above the stele is also a bow.
Nabatean inscriptions in Sinai and other places display widespread references to names including Allah, El and Allat (god and goddess), with regional references to al-Uzza, Baaland Manutu (Manat) (Negev 11). Allat is also found in Sinai in South Arabian language. Allah occurs particularly as Garm-'allahi – god dedided (Greek Garamelos) and Aush-allahi – 'gods covenant' (Greek Ausallos). We find both Shalm-lahi 'Allah is peace' and Shalm-allat, 'the peace of the goddess'. We also find Amat-allahi 'she-servant of god' and Halaf-llahi 'the successor of Allah'.[44]


Star and crescent

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Ancient design of the star and crescent symbol as used in Byzantium in the 1st century BCE
The modern red star and crescent (a heraldic decrescent) design used as the de facto Emblem of Turkey.
The star and crescent is an iconographic symbol used in various historical contexts but most well known today as a symbol of the former Ottoman Empire and, by popular extension, the Islamic world. It develops in the iconography of the Hellenistic period (4th–1st centuries BCE) in the Kingdom of Pontus, the Bosporan Kingdom and notably the city of Byzantium by the 2nd century BCE. It is the conjoined representation of the crescent and a star, both of which constituent elements have a long prior history in the iconography of the Ancient Near East as representing either Sun and Moon or Moon and Morning Star (or their divine personifications). Coins with crescent and star symbols represented separately have a longer history, with possible ties to older Mesopotamian iconography. The star, or Sun, is often shown within the arc of the crescent (also called star in crescent, or star within crescent, for disambiguation of depictions of a star and a crescent side by side);[1] In numismatics in particular, the term crescent and pellet is used in cases where the star is simplified to a single dot.[2]
In Byzantium, the symbol became associated with its patron goddess Artemis/Hecate, and it is used as a representation of Moon goddesses (Selene/Luna or Artemis/Diana) in the Roman era. Ancient depictions of the symbol always show the crescent with horns pointing upward and with the star (often with eight rays) placed inside the crescent. This arrangement is also found on Sassanid coins beginning in the 5th or 6th century CE.
The combination is found comparatively rarely in late medieval and early modern heraldry. It rose to prominence with its adoption as the flag and emblem of the Ottoman Empire and some of its administrative divisions (eyalets and vilayets) and later in the 19th-century Westernizing tanzimat (reforms). The Ottoman flag of 1844, with a white ay-yıldız (Turkish for "crescent-star") on a red background, continues to be in use as the flag of the Republic of Turkey, with minor modifications. Other states formerly part of the Ottoman Empire also used the symbol, including Libya (1951–1969 and after 2011), Tunisia (1956) and Algeria (1958). The same symbol was used in other national flags introduced during the 20th century, including the flags of Azerbaijan (1918), Pakistan (1947), Malaysia (1948), Singapore (1959) and Mauritania (1959).
In the later 20th century, the star and crescent have acquired a popular interpretation as a "symbol of Islam",[3] occasionally embraced by Arab nationalism or Islamism in the 1970s to 1980s, but often rejected as erroneous or unfounded by Muslim commentators in more recent times.[4]

  1.  Cyril Glassé , The New Encyclopedia of Islam (revised ed. 2001), s.v. "Moon" (p. 314).
  2. Jump up to:a b "many Muslim scholars reject using the crescent moon as a symbol of Islam. The faith of Islam historically had no symbol, and many refuse to accept it." Fiaz Fazli, Crescentmagazine, Srinagar, September 2009, p. 42.

Star and crescent[edit]

The Ottoman Flag
The star and crescent symbol became strongly associated with the Ottoman Empire in the 19th century, a symbol that had been used throughout the Middle East extending back to pre-Islamic times, especially in the Byzantine Empire and Crusader States which occupied the lands later assumed by the Ottoman Empire. By extension from the use in Ottoman lands, it became a symbol also for Islam as a whole, as well as representative of western Orientalism. "Star and Crescent" was used as a metaphor for the rule of the Islamic empires (Ottoman and Persian) in the late 19th century in British literature.[4] This association was apparently strengthened by the increasingly ubiquitous fashion of using the star and crescent symbol in the ornamentation of Ottoman mosques and minarets.[5] The "Red Crescent" emblem was adopted by volunteers of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) as early as 1877 during the Russo-Turkish War; it was officially adopted in 1929.
After the collapse of the Ottoman Empire in 1922, the star and crescent was used in several national flags adopted by its successor states. The star and crescent in the flag of the Kingdom of Libya (1951) was explicitly given an Islamic interpretation by associating it with "the story of Hijra (migration) of our Prophet Mohammed"[6] By the 1950s, this symbolism was embraced by movements of Arab nationalism or Islamism, such as the proposed Arab Islamic Republic (1974) and the American Nation of Islam (1973).[7]


From Petra back to Makka – From “Pibla” back to Qibla | Muslim Heritage
www.muslimheritage.com/article/from-petra-back-to-makka
Gibson purports to document when the qibla was changed away from (his true) Kaaba at Petra to (everybody else's true) Kaaba at Makka. Most Muslims and ...


The Qibla Question - Nabataea.net
nabataea.net/qibla.html
Therefore the gods worshiped in Petra were not necessarily the same gods worshiped in Hijra or Tā'if. For instance, worship of the God Hubal was mostly ...


Were all the early mosques in Islam facing the Qibla of Petra ...
https://www.quora.com/Were-all-the-early-mosques-in-Islam-facing-the-Qibla-of-Petra-i...Oct 2, 2017 - According to Dan Gibson, the man who originated this theory, Mecca was located in what is now called Petra, was razed in an earthquake, and was subject to a ...
Why do you think that Muhammad was not from Mecca ...
Jul 10, 2017
Agha Talal, B.S.Honors Islamic Sharia Law & Political Science, International Islamic University, Islamabad
Muhammad (Peace be upon him) was from Mecca. There is AMPLE historical evidence to support this and no historian muslim or otherwise contests this. He belonged to the Meccan tribe of the Quraysh who were responsible for the custody of the Kabah, which is in Mecca. His grandfather Abdul Muttalib had the keys to the Kabah. He was born in Mecca, grew up in Mecca and is buried in Mecca.”
Jamie Cawley, Author of the guide to religions "Beliefs and the World they have Created'
No, he was quite certainly from Mecca - we know his family, we know his Uncle that brought him up after the death of both is parents (Abu Talib) we know his Meccan clan, we know his (first) Meccan wife, Kalijah, we know he said he was from http://Mecca.It is of no political or religious significance where he was from but he was from Mecca.”
From these two marvellous peoples answer to this you can easily determine he was not from Petra.
Ataul Mukit
Ataul Mukit, I have been brought up in a mix of Sunni and Sufi Spiritual environment
The verses in Quran talks about trees, fruits and olives that matches more with Petra than Mecca. Also the earliest constructions of mosques had Qibla directed to Petra. Apart from these, there probably is not too much evidence for the Petra case. You can search with Tom Holland and his writings regarding this in the net.
Were the earlier mosques pointed towards City of Petra ...
Jun 8, 2017
If qiblas of all known early mosques (incl. al-Aqsa) point ...
Jun 8, 2017
Why is the Qibla in Islam not dome-shaped like all other ...
Jan 27, 2017

The Facts About Islam: Refuting the Claim Petra was the Qibla Before ...
thefactsaboutislam.blogspot.com/2016/10/refuting-claim-petra-was-qibla-before.html
Oct 5, 2016 - The revisionist theory of Petra being an earlier qibla (prayer direction) for Muslims prior to Mecca is essentially part of a larger conspiracy theory ...


2:27
Shocking: Qibla Change from Petra to Mecca Only after 725 AD!!!

Positron Channel
YouTube - Oct 13, 2016



1:20:23
Was Petra the historical Mecca? (Dan Gibson documentary)

Abu Molhid Asscandinawi
YouTube - Jul 21, 2017



9:22
From Petra to Mecca changes to the direction of prayer response

Learn about Islam
YouTube - Sep 16, 2016



11:02
"Early mosques facing petra not mecca" Jay smith exposed

Eight Bones
YouTube - Dec 12, 2016



12:10
Scandal: Muslim Ends Jay Smith's Career - Was Petra The Original ...

Yahya Snow
YouTube - Oct 5, 2016



12:39
From Petra to Mecca - Changes to the Direction of Muslim Prayer - Jay ...

Dean Gibson - Grainstore
YouTube - Nov 14, 2016



1:11
Petra Or Mecca - Qibla From "Dome of the Rock" in Jerusalem

Bilmelisen
YouTube - Apr 21, 2018



8:34
Why Earliest Qiblas Face PETRA, NOT Mecca

Good Ground Ministries
YouTube - Sep 15, 2017

ApoLogika: Why Did the First Muslims Pray Towards Petra?
https://apologika.blogspot.com/2014/.../why-did-first-muslims-pray-towards-petra.ht...



Mar 22, 2014 - Here is a satellite view of the Great Mosque of Guangzhou which was built in 630 AD, and whose Qibla points Muslims to pray towards Petra.


The First Qibla: Jerusalem or Petra? - The Search for Mecca
searchformecca.com/Jerusalem.html
Did the original qibla point to Jerusalem or to Petra? ... Then Allāh ordered him to turn his face towrds the qibla (in Mecca): “And from whence-so-ever you start ...

Was Muhammad from Petra or Makkah? – Abdullah Sameer
abdullahsameer.com/blog/was-muhammad-from-petra-or-makkah/
Sep 18, 2015 - Was Prophet Muhammad living in Petra? Or was he living in what is now Mecca, Saudi Arabia? The best write up of this is in the book “Quranic ...
Abdullah, the founder of LightUponLight and VerseByVerseQuran discusses why he left Islam after promoting it for 15 years.  I was Sunni last 15 years.


'The Prophet came from Jordan' | RNW Media
https://www.rnw.org/archive/prophet-came-jordan



Islam didn’t arise in Mecca but in the Jordanian city of Petra. The Arab conquests came first, and only then the Muslims. In his new book The Fourth Beast, British historian Tom Holland makes some shocking claims.


Was Muhammad from Petra and not Mecca? - Quora
https://www.quora.com/Was-Muhammad-from-Petra-and-not-MeccaJul 9, 2017 - Muhammad (Peace be upon him) was from Mecca. ... He belonged to the Meccan tribe of the Quraysh who were responsible for the custody of the Kabah, which is in Mecca. ... Do you think that Prophet Muhammad "escaped" from Makkah (Mecca) to Madinah (Medina)?
What evidence is there that Muhammad came from Petra rather ...
Apr 30, 2018
A group of western scholars, such as Dan Gibson and Tom Holland ...
Mar 3, 2018
Were all the early mosques in Islam facing the Qibla of Petra ...
Oct 2, 2017
Why do you think that Muhammad was not from Mecca but from ...
Jul 10, 2017



Gibson’s Quranic Geographies makes a powerful case for Petra from archaeology history, and literature--one worth taking on, point by point:
Tradition asserts that the Quran was compiled not long after Muhammed’s death, during the caliphate of Uthman. But the earliest Quranic manuscripts date from the ninth century, two hundred years after Muhammed. This long gap in the written record raises questions about the accuracy of the information transmitted across those generations, especially where we find inconsistent, contradictory, or implausible details. For example:
While tradition venerates Mecca as the Prophet's birthplace and the site of the Kaaba, the Quran cites Meccca by name only once. Could this be a later interpolation?
How is Muhammed's home city described in the Quran? We read that Muhammed dwells in a rich walled city, a trade hub and ancient pre-Islamic pilgrimage site. Fertile soil and regular rain support trees and agriculture. Caves in the nearby mountains face toward the city. And tradition holds that the city lay a day's ride from Jerusalem--where Muhammed ascended to heaven.
Petra fits this description much more closely than Mecca. In Muhammed’s time, Petra was a walled city, the Arab world’s premier pilgrimage site, and one of its three main trading centers. Petra’s ruins contain temples to the very pre-Islamic deities described in the Quran. Seventh century Petra lay in a fertile valley that received regular rainfall and supported agriculture. The cliffs around Petra contain numerous caves facing down into the city--like the one in which Muhammed heard the angel's command to “Recite!” Like the city described in the Quran (but unlike today’s Mecca), Petra is a day's ride from Jerusalem.
By contrast, there is no record of Mecca before the ninth century--two hundred years after Muhammed. And while Petra and Medina appear on ancient trading maps, Mecca does not. Petra and Medina a contain substantial archaeological material dating to Muhammed’s time and earlier. But Mecca does not. Mecca stands in a much more arid corner of the Arabian peninsula. Paleobotanists find no evidence of trees or agriculture in the vicinity of Mecca. Mecca is of course many days' away from Jerusalem by horse or camel. In short, this desert outpost doesn't really match the Quranic description of the Prophet's home--more than that, it's not clear that any substantial city existed in this location during his lifetime.
But perhaps Gibson’s most intriguing line of evidence comes from the orientation of qiblas in early mosques, which he argues were built pointing worshippers devotions toward Petra, not Mecca. Comparing the orientations of every known mosque built during Islam's first century, he finds that these structures consistently orient worshippers not toward Mecca, nor toward Jerusalem (see next paragraph), but toward Petra. All lines drawn from these early qibla walls seem to converge on Petra.
A key Quranic passage changes Islam's original direction of prayer from a unnamed holy place to a “Masjid al Haram.” Tradition holds that the original direction of prayer was toward Jerusalem, holy city of Jews and Christians. However, the site is not specified. And the earliest extant Qurans--from the ninth century--do not even contain this verse, suggesting that it is a later addition.
So Gibson questions the identification of Jerusalem as the original direction of prayer: Petra had been sacred to the Arabs for centuries. The valley walls are covered with the graffiti of Arab pulgrims to pre-Islamic shrines. If Petra was indeed where Muhammed received his mission, its sacral character would have then transcended these roots. Jerusalem, he argues, only later took on special significance to Arabs. These lines of evidence point instead toward Petra as the unnamed original direction of prayer.
So, how did Mecca come to assume such central importance in Islam?
Gibson's argument from here turns primarily on accounts of the second Islamic civil war:
Early in this conflict, the Ummayid dynasty besieged rebels in the holy city, catapulting stones onto the Kaaba. The caliph's death forces the Ummayids to withdraw. The rebels dismantle the damaged shrine, gather horses and camels from their allies, then, mysteriously, rebuild.
Gibson suggests that something has been omitted from this obscure sequence of events: In short, the rebels took apart the shrine and assembled beasts of burden to evacuate the city before the Ummayids could return from Damascus. They removed the Kaaba from its ancient shrine in Petra to a new one in faraway Mecca. The decision was not misjudged: Over the following years, Petra was destroyed by war and earthquake.
After the Ummayids caliphate finally collapsed, the new Abbasid caliphate redirected prayer toward Mecca. Petra's legacy would be suppressed in the acrimony and confusion of prolonged civil conflict. The old direction of prayer would be remembered as generally toward the former Byzantine Syria (the vicinity of both Petra and Jerusalem). Mecca took on sacred significance as the new dynasty’s approved shrine of the Kaaba, and Petra's memory would fade. Jerusalem took on new sacral meaning for Muslims as large numbers of formerly Byzantine Christians and Jews came came under their rule.
There's quite a bit of evidence and some very plausible argument there.



Your illustration is beautiful looking but the content is utterly wrong. where did you get these lies from.??
Nonetheless let me explain the change of the focal point for prayer (the Qiblah).
First. Let me clarify a mistake you mentioned that some mosques faced “Petra” ( Whatever you mean by that). The First Qibla was the holy city of Jerusalem , Palestine(The Jews also prayed in that direction btw), the later Qibla is the direction of Mecca city. So there is no this “Petra” thing you are mentioning .
The change of Qiblah (direction of prayer) happened in the life time of the prophet Mohammed, precisely after 20 months of his migration to the city of Medinah. The prophet was praying the noon prayer and as he was leading the prayer he was ordered to turn to the new Qiblah and he did, and the companions followed him.
At that time there was just a couple of Mosques in the city as the Muslim society was still small. and they were very simple structures.
After that change of Qiblah, all newer mosques only faced Mekkah, as there is no need for newer mosque to face Jerusalem any more.



No.
Mainly because architecture and navigation were not that good.
It is, however, a matter of tradition that the first quibla was intended to be Jerusalem, though there is archaeological evidence supporting the idea that the very first qibla was actually Petra. The trouble is that Petra and Jerusalem are close enough together relative to most early mosques that the intended direction is unclear.
Some Muslims even dispute that any place other than the Kaaba was the intended first qibla.


Videos




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www.answering-christianity.com/blog/index.php?topic=2911.0
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www.guidedislam.com/muhammad-was-from-petra-not-from-mecca.html
Muhammad Was From Petra, Not From Mecca. ... Muhammad Was From Petra, Not From Mecca ​. Picture. ​ ​ © 2018 Guided Islam - All rights reserved.

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