The word Arab is derived from the word Arbah which mean desert . It also means eloquent as the Arabs considered themselves and their language superior then others. It was not an empire that the Arabs built but a culture as well. No people in the early Middle Ages contributed to human progress so much as the Arabs. Arab scholars were studying Aristotle when Charlemagne and his lords were reportedly learning to write their names.
When the dyke of Ma’rib (Yemen) burst out the Yemenite tribes fled to various parts of Arabia and a group of them named Bani Khuzaah led by their chief Amr bin Luhayy had settled in and around Makkah. He was a generous person by nature that he once slaughtered ten thousand camels to feed the pilgrims and in addition to feeding them he gave them each a robe to wear. It was due to his generosity that he was very much respected and revered.
About him the apostle of Allah said to one named Aktham that he saw Amr bin Luhayy in hell dragging his intestines and he was like Aktham in resemblance. At this Akhtam overcome with fright asked the apostle weather he would also meet the same fate because of his resemblance. “No” said the Holy Prophet “He was an infidel ; you are a believer. It was he who had first instituted idol-worship by changing the religion Ishmael and Abraham.
The Kaabah the Holy abode dedicated to worship of Allah by Adam and Abraham had become an asylum for a multitude of gods and goddesses. A horde of three hundred and sixty man made idols had been installed there in the high pedestal of Allah as omnipotent deities receiving adoration and worship of innumerable devotees and votaries.
An ignoramus from Makkah named Amr bin Luhayy who went to Moab or Mesopotamia wonder- struck by the idols worshipped by the people of that area asked them inquisitively what they were. When he was informed that they were omnipotent and could answer any prayer of the devotees in time of war give them victory ‘in time of famine send them rain and in difficulties grant them aid’ he was immensely pleased. He dashed post-haste to the market place and purchased some idols which were kept there ready for sale. Then he returned to Makkah and informed the Quraish in sugar-coated words that the wonder power of those stone images. The Quraish ‘who by nature were susceptible to the bacillus of idolatry fell easy prey to the contagion of times. The result was that the Kaabah the Holy abode consecrated to the worship of Allah was desecrated within a short time by the installation of three hundred and sixty stony and wooden idols . This happen about four hundred years before the birth of the Prophet Muhammad Saw.
