1. Introduction

The saga of ascribing lunar characteristics to Allah has become a very common habit of the Christian missionaries and apologists. One of the first proponents of this "hypothesis" was Robert Morey who claimed that "Allah" of the Qur'an was in fact a pagan Arab "Moon god" of pre-Islamic times. This claim was refuted utilising the archaeological evidence and it was shown that Morey's claims were nothing but a grand fraud. After this the claim was made that Allah and Hubal – the principal idol located in Makkah – were one and the same entity. Furthermore, they added that Hubal was a Moon god. This contention was also refuted and suffered the same fate. One would hope that those would engage in a more studious approach by learning the history of the Ancient Near East in general and Arabia in particular, before starting yet another round of their Moon god myths. However, perhaps under the false impression that the more you repeat something the more likely people are to believe you (i.e., argumentum ad nauseum), those have wasted no time in embarking on yet another lunar fable. Their latest round of claims now say that al-Rahman, one of Allah's names, was known in South Arabia before of the advent of Islam and that it "signified" a Moon god. Those say:

The fact is that even 'Allah's' most frequently used title, ar-Rahman (the Merciful) was known in South Arabia well before the advent of Islam, and signified a moon-god, whom Muhammed even occasionally confused with or used as a substitute for 'Allah'. The Koran mentions ar-Rahman occasionally, for example in sura 43:19, which most translators have renamed as God or Allah, since they, as Muhammed, found no difference between these two South Arabian moon-gods.

Clearly, those have lifted the above statement from another like-minded website. That al-Rahman was a South Arabian Moon god was again mentioned by those in the context of Allah being the one and only God. According to the Christian missionaries' claim:

According to the Koran, 'Allah' is one and no other god can be associated with him. This concept was most likely adopted from the South Arabian moon-god ar-Rahman (the Merciful), whose name was later adopted by Muslims as one of 'Allah's' titles.

Not surprisingly, this material is lifted from the same website. With regard to the claim that al-Rahman was a South Arabian Moon god, those have not provided any evidence. This is not surprising since the website from which they lifted the material did not do so either! This is sufficient to cast doubt over their entire allegation that al-Rahman was a South Arabian Moon god. Nevertheless, what does the scholarly literature say about the origin of "the Rahman" or "the Merciful" in the South Arabia? Was he a lunar deity? Who worshipped him? The purpose of this article is to examine the claims of the Christian missionaries in the light of modern scholarship and provide a brief overview of the religion in South Arabia before the advent of Islam.

2. Rahm