Arabian Jews in Late Antiquity

In Islam-studies Gordon Newby is known for extracting (probably) the Ibn Ishaq bible Mubtada from its later reëmergence in Tabari and Ibn Hisham. I'd only found out about Making of the Last Prophet from Conrad's negative review which review, a few more years later, in the late 1990s, Ibn Warraq republished. Shortly thereafter in 2001 Newby signed this vapid petition. The review and Newby's general silliness, I suspect, had an effect; because Newby's book soon ended up at the Half Price Books in Houston.

Newby is still around. He's got an article in LAMINE-3 Scripts and Scripture; here arguing for a Jewish presence in the Ḥijaz. Newby had written a History of the Jews of Arabia so feels a need to defend the earlier parts thereof. He is here to carry Robert Serjeant's torch.

Other articles in LAMINE-3 had already noted that, as of 2017, we own in the Ḥijaz no Qumran. MacDonald, 28-9 notes instead a pagan Arab para-sukkot over in Dedan. Nehmé, 51, 54, 55, 62, 79 (also al-Jallad, 99) accepts that some Jews wrote graffiti in Ḥijaz but Nehmé, 51 debunks that the Ḥimyars' "Lord of Heaven" should refer to anything particularly Jewish (so Nehmé agrees more with... Durie). There's also Donner, 13-14 - if we accept his pre-hijrî context.

Newby concedes the paucity of direct evidence p. 118. P. 121 lays out this article's ethos: the problems with texts and the solutions to these problems are not sufficient to drive one away from assaying our available evidence to make tentative and plausible historical claims. So at least he's no Wansbroughian nihilist; Crone and Cook (and Nevo) couldn't have put it better themself. This blogger wonders what Newby'd make of House of War. Let's investigate to what degree the rest of us may consider Newby objectively plausible.

Newby p. 120-1 is further aware of Gabriel Said Reynolds and Emran Badawi. He rates them as successors to Crone and to Wansbrough c'est-a-dire, not well.

Against these "new biblicists" Newby relies first on Devin Stewart. Newby also cites Lecker, "Conversion of Ḥimyar". And Azmeh, Emergence of Islam in Late Antiquity and, er, Bowersock. Newby might further recruit fellow-contributor Robert Hoyland, e.g. "The Jews of the Ḥijaz"; but Hoyland goes uncited! There's no Sidney Griffith here either, maybe to suggest the existence or not of an Arabic Psalter (this is an argument that needs having, cf Christmas in the Koran).

We shall grant to Newby his due. Unlike Hoyland's article here which assumes Newby's consensus (for all Newby's reciprocal non-notice), Newby is making that argument; unlike Bowersock, Newby isn't claiming his droit du seigneur to Settle The Science.

On to the argument, pp. 122-9. Lecker demonstrated [that] the conversion of Ḥimyar to Judaism in the fifth century CE was under the influence of the Jews of Yathrib/Medina. The rest of its paragraph goes on to the larger story of Christianity and Judaism in Yemen, Yathrib having done its work.

As to what Lecker intended to "demonstrate" luckily we - you and I both since I've linked it - can read the original. Lecker's only(!) source was Ibn Ishâq. Ibn Ishâq cited Abû Malik b. Tha'laba b. Abî Malik al-Qurâzî. Lecker: His grandfather was a Jew of Kinda, i.e., a Yemenite, who emigrated to Medina from the south. The remainder of that six-page article (biblio makes seven) argues to swap "al-Qurâzî" for "al-Hadlî". So: Abû Malik was indeed Kindite and Jewish. That doesn't mean that Abu Malik was correct. I must point out that the Kinda although of Yemenite ancestry had - by the time of Islam - settled heavily in the Sawad of the 'Iraq, indeed sometimes supplanting the more-famed Lakhmid monarchy. Lecker goes no further than arguing that, yes, Kindite Jews propounded that Yathrib proselytised the Yemen - especially after arriving to Yathrib. Lecker admits that the Muslims in Yathrib found that this story flattered their Islamic monotheism against the pagans and muskrikoon of antique Yemen and Arabia. Lecker refers to that account as a semi-legendary story. So: Lecker did not demonstrate, and Lecker did not intend to demonstrate, what Newby says he demonstrated.

Moving on, p. 123-4 offers the Jewish poets, such as Samau'al b. 'Adaya, al-Rabî' bin Abû [sic; Abî] Ḥuqayq, and Ka'b b. Ashraf, among others. I'd strike Samuel; he looks like a contemporary to al-Hajjaj in bolstering the mythos behind the Quranic Solomon.

As to Qurân pp. 124f presents its more-celebrated Hebrew loanwords. (This is the part which is of real value to us.) Here are suwar 2, 7 (bûr), 5 (behima), 12 (jubb), 25, 48 (hitta). Witztum "Joseph among the Ishmaelites" informs that sura 12 is Aramaic Christian (or Samaritan!) more than Hebrew Jewish so, strike that one. The other suwar are late and might have taken on their Hebrew either via Targum or, like sura 12, via Christian intermediaries. Certainly the mere plural of "rabbi" Q. 3:79 / 5:44,63 can be had from anybody including a Gospel-reader.

All I see left over is p. 126's note of Q. 89:12 sawt. Maybe Ka'b and al-Rabî'.

Ultimately what Newby offers here is speculation; bolstered by authoriteh but not upon solid authoriteh.