Richard TR Murphy
"In ancient Syria and Canna, the Moon-god Sin was usually represented
by the moon in its crescent phase. At times the full moon was placed
inside the crescent moon to emphasize all the phases of the moon. The
sun-goddess was the wife of Sin and the stars were their daughters.
For example, Istar was a daughter of Sin. Sacrifices to the Moon-god
are described in the Pas Shamra texts. In the Ugaritic texts, the Moon-
god was sometimes called Kusuh. In Persia, as well as in Egypt, the
Moon- god is depicted on wall murals and on the heads of statues. He
was the Judge of men and gods. The Old Testament constantly rebuked
the worship of the Moon-god (see: Deut. 4:19;17:3; II Kngs. 21:3,5;
23:5; Jer. 8:2; 19:13; Zeph. 1:5.) "
* The moon god
Throughout the Middle East, from Egypt to Persia, the golden calf represented
the moon god, so when the Hebrev's worshiped golden calves, we know this was the
moon god. C. L. Woolley found several images of golden calves in his excavations
of the royal graves at Ur. That these images are of the moon god can be seen a
description found in a Sumero-Akkadian hymn to that god: 'Ferocious bull, whose
horn is thick, whose legs are perfected, who is bearded in lapsis, and filled
with luxury and abundance.' In Exodus, the Hebrev's built a golden calf, which
Moses is said to have destroyed. In 1 Kings chapter 12, we find that the King
Jeroboam made two calves of gold, setting one up in Bethel and one in Dan. He
made priests and ordained a national feast day to the god symbolized by these
calves, and the people came to worship. From this it can be seen that, under
Jeroboam, the moon god brought SIN .
Ibn al-Nadim wrote in his book, al-Fahrisit,
" in the month in which the Harranians fasted for thirty days, they honored the
god Sin, which is the moon, they fast for thirty days, they look toward Yemen
when they fast, and they pray five times a day."
"A temple of the Moon-god has been excavated in Ur by Sir Leonard
Woolley. He dug up many examples of moon worship in Ur and these are
displayed in the British Museum to this day. Harran was likewise noted
for its devotion to the Moon-god. In the 1950's a major temple to the
Moon-god was excavated at Hazer in Palestine. Two idols of the moon
god were found. Each was a stature of a man sitting upon a throne with
a crescent moon carved on his chest".
Many people have been falsely taught that Allah ,is simply, another name, for
the Father of the Torah/Biblical Scriptures. This is not true. History reveals
that Islam is nothing more than a reformed revival of the ancient idolatrous
"moon god" paganism. The crescent moon is the most common symbol of pagan moon
worship. The moon god was also referred to as "al-ilah". Originally this was not
a proper name of a single specific god, but a generic name meaning "the god".
Each local Arab tribe ,would refer to their own, local tribal pagan god, as
"al-ilah".
Encyclopedia of Religion, I:117 Washington DC, Corpus Pub., 1979
"Allah" is a pre-Islamic name . . . corresponding to the Babylonian Bel"
The crescent moon and star symbol pre-dates Islam by several thousand years. The
ancient celestial symbols were in use by the peoples of Central Asia and Siberia
in their worship of sun, moon, and sky gods. The crescent moon and star were
used to represent the Carthaginian goddess Tanit or the Greek goddess Diana.
John Gray
The Canaanites, p. 125
""The worship of the Moon (Yerach) and his consort Nikkal (Mesopotamian Nin-gal)
and the sun goddess (Shepesh) is attested at Ras Shamra (Ugarit) both in
mythological texts and in offering-lists." And even in the Land of Yisrayl, "The
basalt figure of a seated god adjacent to a sculpture of hands upraised to a
crescent and disc in the Late Bronze Age temple at Hazor probably depicts the
Moon-god"
Lunar deity
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
"In mythology, a lunar deity is a god or goddess associated with or symbolizing
the moon. These deities can have a variety of functions and traditions depending
upon the culture, but they are often related to or an enemy of the solar deity."
Moon in mythology
"The monthly cycle of the moon, in contrast to the annual cycle of the sun's
path, has been implicitly linked to women's menstrual cycles by many cultures,
as evident in the links between the words for menstruation and for moon in many
resultant languages.[1] Many of the most well-known mythologies feature female
lunar deities, such as the Greek goddesses Selene and Phoebe and their Olympian
successor Artemis, their Roman equivalents Luna and Diana, Isis of the
Egyptians, or the Thracian Bendis. These cultures also almost invariably
featured a male Sun god.
Male lunar gods are also frequent, such as Nanna or Sin of the Mesopotamians,
Mani of the Germanic tribes, the Japanese god Tsukuyomi, Rahko of Finns and
Tecciztecatl of the Aztecs. These cultures usually featured female Sun
goddesses.
The bull was lunar in Mesopotamia (its horns representing the crescent)."
Sin (mythology)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
"Sin (Akkadian: Su'en, Sîn) or Nanna (Sumerian: DŠEŠ.KI, DNANNA) was the god
of the moon in Mesopotamian mythology. Nanna is a Sumerian deity, the son of
Enlil and Ninlil, and became identified with Semitic Sin. The two chief seats of
Nanna's/Sin's worship were Ur in the south of Mesopotamia and Harran in the
north."The Semitic moon god Su'en/Sin is in origin a separate deity from
Sumerian Nanna, but from the Akkadian Empire period the two undergo
syncretization and are identified. The occasional Assyrian spelling of DNANNA-ar
DSu'en-e is due to association with Akkadian na-an-na-ru "illuminatior, lamp",
an epitheton of the moon god. The name of the Assyrian moon god Su'en/Sîn is
usually spelled as DEN.ZU, or simply with the numeral 30, DXXX.[1]
He is commonly designated as En-zu, or "lord of wisdom." During the period
(c.2600-2400 BC) that Ur exercised a large measure of supremacy over the
Euphrates valley, Sin was naturally regarded as the head of the pantheon. It is
to this period that we must trace such designations of Sin as "father of the
gods", "chief of the gods", "creator of all things", and the like. The "wisdom"
personified by the moon-god is likewise an expression of the science of
astrology, in which the observation of the moon's phases is an important factor.
His wife was Ningal ("Great Lady"), who bore him Utu/Shamash ("Sun") and
Inanna/Ishtar (the planet Venus). The tendency to centralize the powers of the
universe leads to the establishment of the doctrine of a triad consisting of
Sin/Nanna and his children.
"Sin had a beard made of lapis lazuli and rode on a winged bull. The bull was
one of his symbols, through his father, Enlil, "Bull of Heaven", along with the
crescent and the tripod (which may be a lamp-stand). On cylinder seals, he is
represented as an old man with a flowing beard and the crescent symbol. In the
astral-theological system he is represented by the number 30 and the moon. This
number probably refers to the average number of days (correctly around 29.53) in
a lunar month, as measured between successive new moons."
The Golden Calf
"The Canaanites were under Assyro-Babylonian dominance from 2200 (allegedly
3000, see ERE) to 1700 BCE. Even by circa 1400 BCE, their influence was still so
great that all correspondence with Egypt and the Pharaoh was conducted in
Babylonian, and the name of the Moon god Sin formed the basis for the Canaanite
names Sinai and the Wilderness of Sin (ERE, Vol. 3, p. 183). The hand of Sin was
seen in the cause of Catatonia or madness in children – hence, lunacy is
associated with this deity (ibid., p. 527). Sin, Moon god of Harran, was also
worshipped at Sam’al at the foot of Mount Amanus (ibid., Vol. 2, p. 295). Sin
was the Baal of Harran mentioned in the correspondence at the time of
Sennacharib, Esarhaddon and Ashurbanipal. Sargon (722-706 BCE) confirmed the
exemption Harran enjoyed from taxes as the city of Sin (ibid.). Nabonidas, last
king of Babylon (555-539 BCE), rebuilt the temple of Sin at Harran. Sin became
identified with Be’el-shamin the owner of the sky from the Syrian dominance at
Harran combining the Syrian god with the ancient Moon god. This deity was
identified with Zeus by the Greeks from Phoenicia and Palmyra and elsewhere
enjoying their patronage, and spread from Mesopotamia into Armenia. Ultimately,
he became identified with Anu, Lord of Heaven of Babylon (ibid., Vol. 2, p.
295).
From the earliest times (ca. 4000 BCE), there were triads formed of Enlil, Anu
and Enki. The second triad was formed from Ur, Moon god of Ur, Utu, Sun god of
Sippar, and Nana, goddess of Erech (ibid., p. 296). The Moon god of Ur can be
identified with Sin. The Semitic term Bel derived from Baal was used among the
Babylonian Semites in the same sense as it was used by the other Semites, and in
addition, used it as master or lord (ibid.).
The cults of Shamash and Sin there deal with the worship of the sun and the moon
(ibid., p. 310). The second triad referred to above became known as Sin, Shamash
and Ishtar (or also Sin, Shamash and Adad) (ibid., pp. 310-311). So that even by
the middle of the second millennium BCE, Sin was a primary deity in both Ur and
at Harran. Sin is the god of oracles (the word or divine utterance associated
with Messiah and found among the early Sumerians and Babylonians), but Shamash
his son carries this aspect also (ibid. and also cf. Vol. 12, pp. 749-752).
Shamash is regarded as the brother of Ishtar. Shamash becomes supreme divine
judge. Thus, the concept here in the Babylonian system strikes at the concepts
vested in the biblical Messiah. Ishtar is the most prominent of female deities
in the Assyro-Babylonian pantheon, absorbing the place of all others. Her place
as queen of heaven goes back to remote antiquity. She is Venus and appears as
Ashtarte (or Easter in the Anglo-Saxon), Nana and Anunitu (ibid.). She is
goddess of fertility and worshipped everywhere. She is daughter of Sin and also
of Anu. She is also associated with Sirius. She is goddess of sex and
appropriates the attributes of Ninlil and Damkina and as daughter of Sin, and
from her descent to Hades she is represented by temple prostitution. The lion,
normally the symbol of Shamash, is associated with her, as is the dove (cf.
ibid.). In this sequence, she then becomes associated with Tammuz or Dumuzi, as
the bringer of new life in the spring cults.
This name Sin came into the Old English as a concept of transgression against
the Laws of YHVH. It was rendered from the original sunjo as sende in the
old-Frisian, and became sonde in the middle-Dutch (cf. The Oxford Universal
Dictionary, p 1897). It was associated with the foreign nations as an enclave in
transgression against God’s Laws. The Arabs transferred the word to the empire
of China as Sin and it seems that Sinim was understood as a far eastern land in
the Hebrev/Aramaic (ciyniym SHD 5515 from 5512; cf. Isa. 49:12). This probably
came from the concept of the moon and the rising sun with the morning star of
Ishtar, rather than from Chinese mythology. Tien was the Chinese supreme
heavenly deity."
Shiva
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Shiva (pronounced /ˈʃiËvÉ™/; Sanskrit: शिव Åšiva, meaning "auspicious
one";) is a major Hindu deity, and the Destroyer or transformer of the Trimurti,
the Hindu Trinity of the primary aspects of the divine. In the Shaiva tradition
of Hinduism, Shiva is seen as the Supreme God. In the Smarta tradition, he is
regarded as one of the five primary forms of God.
Crescent moon: Shiva bears on his head the crescent moon. The epithet
ChandraÅ›ekhara (Sanskrit: चनà¥à¤¦à¥à¤°à¤¶à¥‡à¤–र "Having the moon as
his crest" - chandra = "moon", śekhara = "crest, crown")refers to this feature.
The placement of the moon on his head as a standard iconographic feature dates
to the period when Rudra rose to prominence and became the major deity
Rudra-Shiva. The origin of this linkage may be due to the identification of the
moon with Soma,
Rachel Schaus
BellaOnline's Middle Eastern Culture Editor
Symbolism of the Crescent Moon
Ancient History
Is the crescent moon Islamic? Archeologists have found evidence that
moon-worship was widespread throughout the whole of the Middle East in ancient
times. Statues, hieroglyphic inscriptions, shrines, and numerous clay tablets
have the crescent moon symbol. The Sumerians, Babylonians, Akkadians, and
ancient Arabians had pagan rituals of worship of the moon god.
In the Ancient Near East, the sun god was the male deity and the moon the
female. Together, their daughters were the stars. The ancient Arabs, however,
considered the moon god, one of their many gods, as a male deity. South Arabia's
stellar religion has always been dominated by the Moon-god in various
variations.
Many scholars have also noticed that the Moon-god's name "Sin" is a part of such
Arabic words as "Sinai," the "wilderness of Sin," . When the popularity of the
Moon-
god waned elsewhere, the Arabs remained true to their conviction that the
Moon-god was the greatest of all gods. While they worshiped 360 gods at the
Kabah in Mecca, the Moon-god was the chief deity. Mecca was in fact built as a
shrine for the Moon-god.
"In ancient Syria and Canna, the Moon-god Sin was usually represented
by the moon in its crescent phase. At times the full moon was placed
inside the crescent moon to emphasize all the phases of the moon. The
sun-goddess was the wife of Sin and the stars were their daughters.
For example, Istar was a daughter of Sin. Sacrifices to the Moon-god
are described in the Pas Shamra texts. In the Ugaritic texts, the Moon-
god was sometimes called Kusuh. In Persia, as well as in Egypt, the
Moon- god is depicted on wall murals and on the heads of statues. He
was the Judge of men and gods. The Old Testament constantly rebuked
the worship of the Moon-god (see: Deut. 4:19;17:3; II Kngs. 21:3,5;
23:5; Jer. 8:2; 19:13; Zeph. 1:5.) "
* The moon god
Throughout the Middle East, from Egypt to Persia, the golden calf represented
the moon god, so when the Hebrev's worshiped golden calves, we know this was the
moon god. C. L. Woolley found several images of golden calves in his excavations
of the royal graves at Ur. That these images are of the moon god can be seen a
description found in a Sumero-Akkadian hymn to that god: 'Ferocious bull, whose
horn is thick, whose legs are perfected, who is bearded in lapsis, and filled
with luxury and abundance.' In Exodus, the Hebrev's built a golden calf, which
Moses is said to have destroyed. In 1 Kings chapter 12, we find that the King
Jeroboam made two calves of gold, setting one up in Bethel and one in Dan. He
made priests and ordained a national feast day to the god symbolized by these
calves, and the people came to worship. From this it can be seen that, under
Jeroboam, the moon god brought SIN .
Ibn al-Nadim wrote in his book, al-Fahrisit,
" in the month in which the Harranians fasted for thirty days, they honored the
god Sin, which is the moon, they fast for thirty days, they look toward Yemen
when they fast, and they pray five times a day."
"A temple of the Moon-god has been excavated in Ur by Sir Leonard
Woolley. He dug up many examples of moon worship in Ur and these are
displayed in the British Museum to this day. Harran was likewise noted
for its devotion to the Moon-god. In the 1950's a major temple to the
Moon-god was excavated at Hazer in Palestine. Two idols of the moon
god were found. Each was a stature of a man sitting upon a throne with
a crescent moon carved on his chest".
Many people have been falsely taught that Allah ,is simply, another name, for
the Father of the Torah/Biblical Scriptures. This is not true. History reveals
that Islam is nothing more than a reformed revival of the ancient idolatrous
"moon god" paganism. The crescent moon is the most common symbol of pagan moon
worship. The moon god was also referred to as "al-ilah". Originally this was not
a proper name of a single specific god, but a generic name meaning "the god".
Each local Arab tribe ,would refer to their own, local tribal pagan god, as
"al-ilah".
Encyclopedia of Religion, I:117 Washington DC, Corpus Pub., 1979
"Allah" is a pre-Islamic name . . . corresponding to the Babylonian Bel"
The crescent moon and star symbol pre-dates Islam by several thousand years. The
ancient celestial symbols were in use by the peoples of Central Asia and Siberia
in their worship of sun, moon, and sky gods. The crescent moon and star were
used to represent the Carthaginian goddess Tanit or the Greek goddess Diana.
John Gray
The Canaanites, p. 125
""The worship of the Moon (Yerach) and his consort Nikkal (Mesopotamian Nin-gal)
and the sun goddess (Shepesh) is attested at Ras Shamra (Ugarit) both in
mythological texts and in offering-lists." And even in the Land of Yisrayl, "The
basalt figure of a seated god adjacent to a sculpture of hands upraised to a
crescent and disc in the Late Bronze Age temple at Hazor probably depicts the
Moon-god"
Lunar deity
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
"In mythology, a lunar deity is a god or goddess associated with or symbolizing
the moon. These deities can have a variety of functions and traditions depending
upon the culture, but they are often related to or an enemy of the solar deity."
Moon in mythology
"The monthly cycle of the moon, in contrast to the annual cycle of the sun's
path, has been implicitly linked to women's menstrual cycles by many cultures,
as evident in the links between the words for menstruation and for moon in many
resultant languages.[1] Many of the most well-known mythologies feature female
lunar deities, such as the Greek goddesses Selene and Phoebe and their Olympian
successor Artemis, their Roman equivalents Luna and Diana, Isis of the
Egyptians, or the Thracian Bendis. These cultures also almost invariably
featured a male Sun god.
Male lunar gods are also frequent, such as Nanna or Sin of the Mesopotamians,
Mani of the Germanic tribes, the Japanese god Tsukuyomi, Rahko of Finns and
Tecciztecatl of the Aztecs. These cultures usually featured female Sun
goddesses.
The bull was lunar in Mesopotamia (its horns representing the crescent)."
Sin (mythology)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
"Sin (Akkadian: Su'en, Sîn) or Nanna (Sumerian: DŠEŠ.KI, DNANNA) was the god
of the moon in Mesopotamian mythology. Nanna is a Sumerian deity, the son of
Enlil and Ninlil, and became identified with Semitic Sin. The two chief seats of
Nanna's/Sin's worship were Ur in the south of Mesopotamia and Harran in the
north."The Semitic moon god Su'en/Sin is in origin a separate deity from
Sumerian Nanna, but from the Akkadian Empire period the two undergo
syncretization and are identified. The occasional Assyrian spelling of DNANNA-ar
DSu'en-e is due to association with Akkadian na-an-na-ru "illuminatior, lamp",
an epitheton of the moon god. The name of the Assyrian moon god Su'en/Sîn is
usually spelled as DEN.ZU, or simply with the numeral 30, DXXX.[1]
He is commonly designated as En-zu, or "lord of wisdom." During the period
(c.2600-2400 BC) that Ur exercised a large measure of supremacy over the
Euphrates valley, Sin was naturally regarded as the head of the pantheon. It is
to this period that we must trace such designations of Sin as "father of the
gods", "chief of the gods", "creator of all things", and the like. The "wisdom"
personified by the moon-god is likewise an expression of the science of
astrology, in which the observation of the moon's phases is an important factor.
His wife was Ningal ("Great Lady"), who bore him Utu/Shamash ("Sun") and
Inanna/Ishtar (the planet Venus). The tendency to centralize the powers of the
universe leads to the establishment of the doctrine of a triad consisting of
Sin/Nanna and his children.
"Sin had a beard made of lapis lazuli and rode on a winged bull. The bull was
one of his symbols, through his father, Enlil, "Bull of Heaven", along with the
crescent and the tripod (which may be a lamp-stand). On cylinder seals, he is
represented as an old man with a flowing beard and the crescent symbol. In the
astral-theological system he is represented by the number 30 and the moon. This
number probably refers to the average number of days (correctly around 29.53) in
a lunar month, as measured between successive new moons."
The Golden Calf
"The Canaanites were under Assyro-Babylonian dominance from 2200 (allegedly
3000, see ERE) to 1700 BCE. Even by circa 1400 BCE, their influence was still so
great that all correspondence with Egypt and the Pharaoh was conducted in
Babylonian, and the name of the Moon god Sin formed the basis for the Canaanite
names Sinai and the Wilderness of Sin (ERE, Vol. 3, p. 183). The hand of Sin was
seen in the cause of Catatonia or madness in children – hence, lunacy is
associated with this deity (ibid., p. 527). Sin, Moon god of Harran, was also
worshipped at Sam’al at the foot of Mount Amanus (ibid., Vol. 2, p. 295). Sin
was the Baal of Harran mentioned in the correspondence at the time of
Sennacharib, Esarhaddon and Ashurbanipal. Sargon (722-706 BCE) confirmed the
exemption Harran enjoyed from taxes as the city of Sin (ibid.). Nabonidas, last
king of Babylon (555-539 BCE), rebuilt the temple of Sin at Harran. Sin became
identified with Be’el-shamin the owner of the sky from the Syrian dominance at
Harran combining the Syrian god with the ancient Moon god. This deity was
identified with Zeus by the Greeks from Phoenicia and Palmyra and elsewhere
enjoying their patronage, and spread from Mesopotamia into Armenia. Ultimately,
he became identified with Anu, Lord of Heaven of Babylon (ibid., Vol. 2, p.
295).
From the earliest times (ca. 4000 BCE), there were triads formed of Enlil, Anu
and Enki. The second triad was formed from Ur, Moon god of Ur, Utu, Sun god of
Sippar, and Nana, goddess of Erech (ibid., p. 296). The Moon god of Ur can be
identified with Sin. The Semitic term Bel derived from Baal was used among the
Babylonian Semites in the same sense as it was used by the other Semites, and in
addition, used it as master or lord (ibid.).
The cults of Shamash and Sin there deal with the worship of the sun and the moon
(ibid., p. 310). The second triad referred to above became known as Sin, Shamash
and Ishtar (or also Sin, Shamash and Adad) (ibid., pp. 310-311). So that even by
the middle of the second millennium BCE, Sin was a primary deity in both Ur and
at Harran. Sin is the god of oracles (the word or divine utterance associated
with Messiah and found among the early Sumerians and Babylonians), but Shamash
his son carries this aspect also (ibid. and also cf. Vol. 12, pp. 749-752).
Shamash is regarded as the brother of Ishtar. Shamash becomes supreme divine
judge. Thus, the concept here in the Babylonian system strikes at the concepts
vested in the biblical Messiah. Ishtar is the most prominent of female deities
in the Assyro-Babylonian pantheon, absorbing the place of all others. Her place
as queen of heaven goes back to remote antiquity. She is Venus and appears as
Ashtarte (or Easter in the Anglo-Saxon), Nana and Anunitu (ibid.). She is
goddess of fertility and worshipped everywhere. She is daughter of Sin and also
of Anu. She is also associated with Sirius. She is goddess of sex and
appropriates the attributes of Ninlil and Damkina and as daughter of Sin, and
from her descent to Hades she is represented by temple prostitution. The lion,
normally the symbol of Shamash, is associated with her, as is the dove (cf.
ibid.). In this sequence, she then becomes associated with Tammuz or Dumuzi, as
the bringer of new life in the spring cults.
This name Sin came into the Old English as a concept of transgression against
the Laws of YHVH. It was rendered from the original sunjo as sende in the
old-Frisian, and became sonde in the middle-Dutch (cf. The Oxford Universal
Dictionary, p 1897). It was associated with the foreign nations as an enclave in
transgression against God’s Laws. The Arabs transferred the word to the empire
of China as Sin and it seems that Sinim was understood as a far eastern land in
the Hebrev/Aramaic (ciyniym SHD 5515 from 5512; cf. Isa. 49:12). This probably
came from the concept of the moon and the rising sun with the morning star of
Ishtar, rather than from Chinese mythology. Tien was the Chinese supreme
heavenly deity."
Shiva
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Shiva (pronounced /ˈʃiËvÉ™/; Sanskrit: शिव Åšiva, meaning "auspicious
one";) is a major Hindu deity, and the Destroyer or transformer of the Trimurti,
the Hindu Trinity of the primary aspects of the divine. In the Shaiva tradition
of Hinduism, Shiva is seen as the Supreme God. In the Smarta tradition, he is
regarded as one of the five primary forms of God.
Crescent moon: Shiva bears on his head the crescent moon. The epithet
ChandraÅ›ekhara (Sanskrit: चनà¥à¤¦à¥à¤°à¤¶à¥‡à¤–र "Having the moon as
his crest" - chandra = "moon", śekhara = "crest, crown")refers to this feature.
The placement of the moon on his head as a standard iconographic feature dates
to the period when Rudra rose to prominence and became the major deity
Rudra-Shiva. The origin of this linkage may be due to the identification of the
moon with Soma,
Rachel Schaus
BellaOnline's Middle Eastern Culture Editor
Symbolism of the Crescent Moon
Ancient History
Is the crescent moon Islamic? Archeologists have found evidence that
moon-worship was widespread throughout the whole of the Middle East in ancient
times. Statues, hieroglyphic inscriptions, shrines, and numerous clay tablets
have the crescent moon symbol. The Sumerians, Babylonians, Akkadians, and
ancient Arabians had pagan rituals of worship of the moon god.
In the Ancient Near East, the sun god was the male deity and the moon the
female. Together, their daughters were the stars. The ancient Arabs, however,
considered the moon god, one of their many gods, as a male deity. South Arabia's
stellar religion has always been dominated by the Moon-god in various
variations.
Many scholars have also noticed that the Moon-god's name "Sin" is a part of such
Arabic words as "Sinai," the "wilderness of Sin," . When the popularity of the
Moon-
god waned elsewhere, the Arabs remained true to their conviction that the
Moon-god was the greatest of all gods. While they worshiped 360 gods at the
Kabah in Mecca, the Moon-god was the chief deity. Mecca was in fact built as a
shrine for the Moon-god.
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