Fetichism in Central Arabia in the First Half of the 18th Century (on the Basis of Early Wahhabi Religious and Historical Works)

Article in Elibrary

Received: 07/06/2023

Accepted: 10/26/2023

Keywords: Arabian Peninsula; Najd; Al-‘Arid; religion; pagan cults; fetishism; Wahhabism

Available in the on-line version with: 29.12.2023

To cite this article

Fedor Y. Matveev Fetichism in Central Arabia in the First Half of the 18th Century (on the Basis of Early Wahhabi Religious and Historical Works). // Lomonosov Oriental Studies Journal. 2023. Vol. 67. N 3,67 p.77-85 https://doi.org/10.55959/MSU0320-8095-13-67-3-5.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribiution - NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0)

Fedor Y. Matveev (Lomonosov Moscow State University)

Abstract

The article focuses on the main features of the spiritual life of Central Arabia in the first half of the 18th century including non-Islamic cults widely spread in Najd during the period before the rise of the first Wahhabi state. The study is based on works of the founder of Wahhabism Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab (1703–1792) including his personal correspondence and public messages as well as the historical works of early Wahhabi scholars. Its study became the basis for the reconstruction of the religious situation in this part of the Arabian Peninsula and its comprehensive analysis allows to conclude that pagan cults represented by different variations of fetishism were one of the main components of the spiritual life of these agricultural regions. In addition to that its significance was comparable to the traditional and deviant forms of Islam.

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