moon god in marib (sheba)?

The

# i was talking with a "god-aloner" on pal-talk, the subject being "allah and moon god," and he was insisting on a dialgue based on "authentic" archeological proofs! it turned out that his proofs, besides morey's propogated myth, were lies spread by some anti-islamic websites!

## after some wrangling he admitted that the "archeological proofs" were a "bit" dubious, whereupon i offered an examination of the claim in the light of the text of the quran! and he tells me, "You can fall back on the old man's lies, I only accept authentic and researched material."

...and this after his sponsored lies! :-S

# anyway...

MOON GOD IN MARIB (SHEBA)?

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:
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-FranÃ????????Ã???????Ã??????Ã?????Ã????Ã???Ã??Ã?Â§ois 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]

# how desperate is the munafiq attempt at distorting islam by means of "history" and "archeology" -- feeding off the lies of their gurus: the anti-islamists! :-S

**AhmedBahgat**

Salam bro

I guess he is not a God alone tyoe of of guy, he sounds like a Kafir to be honest

I hate PalTalk bro

Salam

The

**AhmedBahgat**

The