MOON GOD IN MARIB (SHEBA)?
Nielsen's views also influenced the archaeologists who excavated the Mahram Bilqis (also known as the Temple Awwam) near Marib.[28] Mahram Bilqis, an oval-shaped temple, was dedicated to Ilmaqah, the chief god of Sheba.[29] This temple was excavated by the American Foundation for the Study of Man (AFSM) in 1951-52[30] and again more recently in 1998.[31] According to the archaeologist Frank Albright, the Temple Awwam (i.e., Mahram Bilqis) was "dedicated to the moon god Ilumquh, as the large inscription of the temple itself tells us".[32] Albright cited the inscription MaMB 12 (= Ja 557) to support his claim that Temple Awwam was "dedicated to the moon god Ilumquh".[33] However, the inscription Ja 557 in its entirety reads:
Abkarib, son of Nabatkarib, of [the family] Zaltān, servant of Yada'il Bayyin and of Sumhu'alay Yanūf and of Yata'amar Watar and of Yakrubmalik Darih and of Sumuhu'alay Yanūf, has dedicated to Ilumquh all his children and his slaves and has built and completed the mass of the bastion [by which] he has completed and filled up the enclosing wall of Awwām from the line of this inscription and in addition, all its masonry of hewn stones and its woodwork and the two towers Yazil and Dara' and their [the two towers] recesses, to the top, and he has raised up the possessions of his ancestors, the descendents of Zaltān. By 'Attar and by Ilumquh and by Dāt Himyān and by Dāt Ba'dān. And Abkarib has made known, in submission to Ilumquh and to the king of Mārib, Š[...[34]
Although the dedication to Ilmaqah is mentioned, nowhere does the inscription say that Ilmaqah is called the Moon-god! In fact, none of the inscriptions at the Mahram Bilqis mention Ilmaqah as the Moon-god. Moreover, the collective mentioning of the pantheon of gods by formulae such as "by 'Athtar", "by Ilumquh", "by Shams", "by Hawbas", "by Dhāt Himyān", "by Dhāt Ba'dān", "by Dhāt Ba'dānum", "by Dhāt Zahrān", etc. occur quite frequently in the inscriptions from Mahram Bilqis.[35] As Ryckmans had pointed out, many of these gods are pure appellations, with no defining nature and sex. Following the logic of Nielsen of reducing the Arab pantheon of gods to a triad, Albright and others have considered Ilmaqah as the Moon-god, although no evidence of such a triad exists. Scholars like Alexander Sima have drawn attention to the fact that very little is known about the Sabaean deities. He says that while Shams was most certainly a solar goddess, the lunar nature of Ilmaqah is "speculative" and lacks "any epigraphic evidence".[36]
The nature of the Sabaean chief deity Ilmaqah was studied in considerable detail by J. Pirenne[37] and G. Garbini[38] in the 1970s. They have shown that the motifs associated with Ilmaqah such as the bull's head, the vine, and also the lion's skin on a human statue are solar and dionysiac attributes. Therefore, Ilmaqah was a Sun-god, rather than a Moon-god. Concerning Ilmaqah, J. Ryckmans in The Anchor Bible Dictionary says:
Along with the main god 'Attar, each of the major kingdoms venerated its own national god. In Saba this was the god named Almaqah (or Ilmuqah), whose principal temple was near Marib, the capital of Saba, a federal shrine of the Sabaean tribes. According to the widely contested old theory of the Danish scholar D. Nielsen, who reduced the whole South Arabian pantheon to a primitive triad: father Moon, mother Sun (sun is feminine in Arabic) and son Venus, Almaqah was until recently considered a moon god, but Garbini and Pirenne have shown that the bull's head and the vine motif associated with him are solar and dionysiac attributes. He was therefore a sun god, the male counterpart of the sun goddess Šams, who was also venerated in Saba, but as a tutelary goddess of the royal dynasty.[39]
Ilmaqah was also discussed by A. F. L. Beeston. Writing in the Encyclopaedia Of Islam, he says:
For the period down to the early 4th century A.D., few would now agree with the excessive reductionism of D. Nielsen, who in the 1920s held that all the many deities in the pagan pantheon were nothing more than varying manifestations of an astral triad of sun, moon and Venus-star; yet it is certainly the case that three deities tend to receive more frequent mention than the rest....
But just as the Greek local patron deities such as Athene in Athens, Artemis in Ephesus, etc., figure more prominently than the remoter and universal Zeus, so in South Arabia the most commonly invoked deity was a national one, who incorporated the sense of national identity. For the Sabaeans this was 'lmkh (with an occasional variant spelling 'lmkhw). A probable analysis of this name is as a compound of the old Semitic word 'l "god" and a derivative of the root khw meaning something like "fertility" (cf. Arabic kahā "flourish"); the h is certainly a root letter, and not, as some mediaeval writers seem to have imagined, a tā marbūta, which in South Arabian is always spelt with t...
Many European scholars still refer to this deity in a simplistic way as "the moon god", a notion stemming from the "triadic" hypothesis mentioned above; yet Garbini has produced cogent arguments to show that the attributes of 'lmkh are rather those of a warrior-deity like Greek Herakles or a vegetation god like Dionysus.[40]
Elsewhere, Beeston writes:
Among the federal deities, the case for Syn being a moon god rests on identifying him with Akkadian Su-en, later Sin; an equation which, attractive though it may seem, is not without problems. At all events, even if this was so with the Hadramite deity, it is unlikely that it tells the whole story. In the case of Ilmqh, 'Amm and Wadd, there is nothing to indicate lunar qualities. Garbini has presented a devastating critique of such a view in relation to Ilmqh, for whom he claims (much more plausibly) the attributes of a warrior-god and of a Dionysiac vegetation deity, with solar rather than lunar associations. In the case of Wadd, the presence of an altar to him on Apollo's island of Delos points rather to solar than lunar associations. For 'Amm we have nothing to guide us except his epithets, the interpretation of which is bound to be highly speculative.[41]
While discussing various gods of southern Arabia, and Ilmaqah (or Almaqah) in particular, Jean-François Breton says:
Almaqah was the god of agriculture and irrigation, probably for the most part of the artificial irrigation which was the basis of successful farming in the oasis of Ma'rib. The god's animal attributes were the bull and, in later times, the vine. Almaqah was a masculine sun god; the divinity Shams (Sun), who was invoked as protector of the Sabaean dynasty, was his feminine counterpart.[42]
Such views concerning Ilmaqah can also be seen in the Encyclopaedia Britannica which says:
Next to 'Athtar, who was worshiped throughout South Arabia, each kingdom had its own national god, of whom the nation called itself the "progeny" (wld). In Saba' the national god was Almaqah (or Ilmuqah), a protector of artificial irrigation, lord of the temple of the Sabaean federation of tribes, near the capital Ma'rib. Until recently Almaqah was considered to be a moon god, under the influence of a now generally rejected conception of a South Arabian pantheon consisting of an exclusive triad: Father Moon, Mother Sun (the word "sun" is feminine in Arabic), and Son Venus. Recent studies underline that the symbols of the bull's head and the vine motif that are associated with him are solar and Dionysiac attributes and are more consistent with a sun god, a male consort of the sun goddess.[43]
While discussing the relationship between the Chaldaeans and the Sabianism, the Encyclopedia Of Astrology says:
From this arose Sabianism, the worship of the host of heaven: Sun, Moon and Stars. It originated with the Arabian kingdom of Saba (Sheba), when came the Queen of Sheba. The chief object of their worship was the Sun, Belus. To him was erected the tower of Belus, and the image of Belus.[44]
It is clear from this discussion that Ilmaqah was the patron deity of the people of Sheba due to the fact they invoke him frequently in their inscriptions, and almost always before other deities if at all featured. From the inscriptions themselves it is not clear what sort of deity Ilmaqah was. He has many epithets, but none which link him explicitly with the sun or moon. The simple linkages between deities and natural phenomena as put forth by Nielsen, have been rejected of late in explaining the nature and function of deities. Instead, the study of the motifs show that Ilmaqah had attributes that are more consistent with a Sun god.[45]
MOON GOD IN HUREIDHA (HADRAMAUT)?
Let us now move to Hadramaut. During excavations in Southern Arabia, G. Caton Thompson found a temple of the Hadramitic patron deity Sin in Hureidha.[46] She claimed that Sin was a Moon-god.[47] Following her footsteps, Morey says:
In 1944, G. Caton Thompson revealed in her book, The Tombs and Moon Temple of Hureidha, that she had uncovered a temple of the Moon-god in southern Arabia (see Map 3). The symbols of the crescent moon and no less than twenty-one inscriptions with the name Sin were found in this temple (see Diagram 5). An idol which may be the Moon-god himself was also discovered (see Diagram 6). This was later confirmed by other well-known archeologists.[48]
There are several serious problems associated with G. Caton Thompson's claim that Sin was a Moon god. Firstly, the name of the Hadramitic patron deity according to the epigraphic evidence is and it is transcribed as SYN.[49] The case for SYN being a Moon-god rests on identifying him with the Akkadian Su-en, later Sin: the well-known north semitic Moon deity. This equation which may seem attractive, is beset with problems. Secondly, Pliny reported that in Shabwa, they worshipped the god Sabin.[50] Sabin was pronounced as Savin according to the Latin phonetic rules of the 1st century CE.[51] Christian Robin proposed the reading of Sayīn for SYN which is now widely accepted among scholars.[52] Commenting on the Hadramitic patron god SYN, Alexander Sima says:
The Hadramitic pantheon is the least known in southern Arabia owing to the fact that the number of known Hadramitic inscriptions is - compared to the three other states/languages - still very limited. At the top of the Hadramitic pantheon stood the deity whose name was constantly written SYN. This name was previously thought to be vocalized as Sīn and thus connected with the well-known north Semitic moon deity, Sīn. However, the South Arabian orthography and the testimony of the Natural History of Pliny the Younger points to a vocalization, Sayīn, so the form Sīn should be abandoned. The Hadramitic sources give no hint of his nature and even his connection with the moon is merely speculative.[53]
In other words, the Hadramitic patron deity Sayīn is different from the north semitic deity Sin and the former's connection with the Moon is speculative.
(a)
(b)
Figure 3: (a) Couple of Hadramitic coins mentioning the patron deity SYN (obverse) and showing an eagle with open wings (Reverse).[54] (b) The coin 1 is sketched to make the depiction more lucid.[55]
However, the numismatic evidence from Hadramaut suggests something more interesting. In some coins from Hadramaut, Sayīn appears as an eagle [Figure 3(a)],[56] a solar animal, and this clearly points to him as being the Sun god. John Walker, who first published the Hadramitic coins, was perplexed by the presence of an eagle and the mention of SYN, which he assumed to be the deity Sin. Although he was aware that the monuments in North Arabia and Syria regarded the eagle as a solar deity, he insisted on giving a lunar association to the depiction of eagle on Hadramitic coins, which is clearly in contrary to the evidence.[57] Modern scholars regard Sayīn as a solar deity. For example, Jean-François Breton says:
The national god of Hadramawt was known as Sayîn, a Sun god. As in Qataban, the inhabitants of Hadramawt referred to themselves as the "children of Sayîn"; the state itself was described through the formula using two divine names which also referred to a double tribe: "Sayîn and Hawl and [king] Yada'il and Hadramawt." We have only meagre information from classical authors about Sayîn and his cult. Theophrastus reported that frankincense was collected in the temple of the Sun, which he erroneously placed in Saba.[58]
Similarly Jacques Ryckmans points out:
In Hadramawt, the national god Syn, in the temple in the capital Shabwah, has generally been assimilated to the Moon-god. But remarks by Theophrastes and Pliny, and some coins on which he appears as an eagle (a solar animal!) point him out as a Sun-god, a male counterpart of Shams.[59]
Such views are also seen in The Anchor Bible Dictionary[60] and the Merriam-Webster's Encyclopedia Of World Religions. The latter says:
In Hadramawt the national god Syn was also a sun god.[61]
Given that Morey claims to have conducted "groundbreaking research on the pre-Islamic origins of Islam", one finds oneself most taken aback by the complete absence of contemporary scholarship in his book. Morey's haphazard consideration of the sources would justifiably prompt one to fear that he was not even aware of the relevant critical literature in the first place! All this leaves the apologist's credibility in serious dispute.
Let us look at his arguments concerning the "Moon temple" in Hureidha. Morey says that "symbols of the crescent moon and no less than twenty-one inscriptions with the name Sin were found in this temple (see Diagram 5)." The presence of crescent moon does not automatically suggest that Sayīn was a Moon-god. Müller had photographed an incense altar from Southern Arabia containing both crescent moon and the Sun. This object was dedicated to the Sun-goddess.[62] Clearly the presence of a crescent moon does not warrant drawing hasty conclusions. Moreover, Morey pointed to the diagram 5 containing the inscriptions to support his viewpoint. This diagram is reproduced with a translation in Figure 4.
(a)