ABSTRACT
The Arabs of the Arabian peninsula in the sixth and seventh centuries were polytheists living in nomadic tribes or settled in urban centres. At the beginning of the seventh century Muhammad, a caravan merchant from Mecca, denounced such paganism as a perversion of God’s will. Claiming to have received a revelation from the one true God, he proclaimed a doctrine of divine reward and punishment. In the first phase of his preaching he stressed that Biblical figures such as Abraham and Moses had been sent by God to warn humankind to abandon idolatry. Those who rejected this message were destroyed except for Jews and Christians who had transmitted the revelations given them in the Torah and the Gospels. According to Muhammad, these earlier revelations were superseded by a new revelation from God which was passed on to them through his prophecy.
