Muhammad’s Arabia was polytheistic, centered on a Ka’ba housing Allah and three goddesses

Evidence

When Muhammad received the order to recite, his first revelation, around 610, he was about forty years old. He was born in Mecca, a town on the caravan routes of central Arabia centered around the Ka’ba, a temple devoted to the supreme God (Allah) and his three daughters, goddesses whose statues adorned the sanctuary. Little of Muhammad’s previous life indicated his future spiritual role: born into the prestigious and powerful Quraysh tribe of Mecca, orphaned at the age of six, brought up by an uncle, he eventually became a successful merchant, accompanying caravans to Roman Syria, marrying a widow, Khadîja. — John V. Tolan, Saracens, 180

Categorization

• XREF: Context for the vault’s Islam-West opposition claims — pre-Islamic Mecca was polytheistic, so Islam formed partly in reaction against nearby pagan and Christian presence; grounding for scenes in the Sira that later polemicists exploited.