T he I dentit y of the S abi ans : S ome I nsights *

Hag gai Ma zuz

Introduction

In the third part of The Guide of the Perplexed, Moses Maimonides mentions
the Sabians frequently. He believed that by studying Sabian ritual he would
gain insight into the logic behind the commandments (Heb. ta‘amei ha-
mizvot) and their meanings.1 Maimonides ascribed many variant beliefs
and customs to the Sabians. As a result, some scholars have argued that, for
Maimonides, the name “Sabians” was simply a general term for idolatry. 2
To justify his arguments regarding the Sabians, Maimonides
cited the various sources he used. One of these sources was The Book of
Nabatean Agriculture (kitāb al-Filāḥa al-Nabaṭiyya), ascribed to Aḥmad
b. Waḥshiyya,3 who claimed to have translated the book from Chaldean
into Arabic. Modern scholars disagree as to the authenticity of the book,

*  I would like to thank Professor Dov Schwartz, Professor Raphael Jospe, and Professor David
Powers for their invaluable comments.
1  “I shall now return to my purpose and say that the meaning of many of the laws became clear
to me and their causes became known to me through my study of the doctrines, opinions,
practices, and cult of the Sabians, as you will hear when I explain the reasons for the
commandments that are considered to be without cause.” See Maimonides, Dalālat al- Ḥ ā’irīn,
3:29. Translation taken from Moses Maimonides, The Guide for the Perplexed, translated and
with Introduction and Notes by Shlomo Pines (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1963).
2  E.g., Shlomo Pines, “The Philosophic Sources of Maimonides,” in Idem (ed.), Studies in the
History of Jewish Philosophy: The Transmission of Texts and Ideas (Jerusalem: Magnes Press,
1977), 103-173, at 164.
3  “I shall mention to you the books from which all that I know about the doctrines and opinions
of the Sabians will become clear to you so that you will know for certain that what I say about
the reasons for the laws is correct. The most important book about this subject is the ‘Nabatean
agriculture’ translated by Ibn Wa ḥ shiyya.” See Maimonides, Dalālat al- Ḥ ā’irīn, 3:29.
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with some claiming that it is genuine while others hold that Ibn Waḥshiyya
himself composed it in the tenth century. 4
According to Maimonides, most of the sources dealing with the
Sabians are lost, and only a small part of the remainder was translated into
Arabic. Nonetheless, he held that the extant literature contained a great
deal of information on the Sabians and their religion. 5 He concluded that
despite his efforts, there were many details of the Sabian religion that he
had yet to discover: “To sum up: Just as, according to what I have told you,
the doctrines of the Sabians are remote from us today, the chronicles of
those times are likewise hidden from us today. Hence if we knew them and
were cognizant of the events that happened in those days, we would know
in detail the reasons of many things mentioned in the Torah.” 6
The Sabians’ identity and religion were subjects of investigation
among Muslim scholars prior to the time of Maimonides. Among those

4  Etienne Marc Quatremère believed it to be a translation of a Chaldean work of the period of

Nebuchadnezzar II (605-562 BC). E. Meyer dates it to the first century CE. Daniel Chwolson went
so far as to claim that the book is an authentic work written at the beginning of the fourteenth
century B.C. This theory has been subject to a great deal of criticism. By contrast, scholars such
as Alfred Von Gutschmid and Theodor Nöldeke have argued strongly against authenticity. For
a detailed discussion, see Encyclopedia of Islam, Second Edition [Henceforward EI 2] (Leiden:
Brill, 1986-2004), s.v. Ibn Wa ḥ s hiyya (T. Fahd). For a criticism of Chwolson, see Pines, “The
Philosophic Sources of Maimonides,” 163.
5  “All the books that I have mentioned to you are the books of idolatry that have been translated
into Arabic. But there is no doubt that they are but a very small part of this literature if compared
to the writings that have not been translated and are not even extant, but have perished and
been lost in the course of the years. However, the books extant among us today contain an
exposition of the greatest part of the opinions and practices of the Sabians; some of the latter
are generally known at present in the world.” See Maimonides, Dalālat al-Ḥ ā’irīn, 3:29.
6  Maimonides, Dalālat al- Ḥ ā’irīn, 3:50. See also, “In the case of most of the statutes whose
reason is hidden from us, everything serves to keep people away from idolatry. The fact that
there are particulars the reason for which is hidden from me and the utility of which I do
not understand, is due to the circumstance that things known by hearsay are not like things
that one has seen. Hence the extant of my knowledge of the ways of the Sabians drawn from
the books is not comparable to the knowledge of one who saw their practices with his eyes;
this is even more the case since these opinions have disappeared two thousand years ago or
even before that. If we knew the particulars of those practices and heard details concerning
those opinions, we would become clear regarding the wisdom manifested in the details of
the practices prescribed in the commandments concerning the sacrifices and the forms
of uncleanness and other matters whose reason cannot, to my mind, be easily grasped.”
Maimonides, Dalālat al- Ḥ ā’irīn, 3:49.
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who pursued the subject were ‘Alī b. al-Ḥusayn al-Mas‘ūdī (896-956), ‘Abd
al-Jabbār al-Asadābādī (935-1025), Muḥammad al-Bīrūnī (973-1048),
‘Alī b. Aḥmad b. Ḥazm (994-1064), and Muḥammad al-Shaharastānī
(1086-1153). Muslim scholars also continued to investigate the issue after
Maimonides’ death. We find, for example, a short treatment of the subject
in fourteenth-century historian ‘Abd al-Raḥmān b. Ḥaldūn’s (1332-1406)
Muqaddima.
The first Muslims lived side by side with non-Muslims, and as a result,
the issue of how to relate to non-Muslims appears as early as the Qur’ān itself.
Most Qur’ānic references to non-Muslims refer to Jews and Christians, who
are usually called People of the Book (ahl al-kitāb). The Qur’ān also refers,
albeit only once, to the Zoroastrians (Qur’ān [henceforth Q.] 22:17), who
resided in Persia. In addition to the People of the Book, the Qur’ān also refers
to the non-monotheistic religion of the idolatrous Quraysh tribe, which had
settled in the city of Mecca and persecuted Muḥammad. The subject of this
paper is another religious sect that is mentioned three times in the Qur’ān—
the enigmatic people referred to as the Sabians (Q. 2:62, 5:69, 22:17).
The paucity of details provided by the Qur’ān led to a great deal of
speculation on the identity of the Sabians by medieval Muslim scholars.
While the Muslim scholars’ theories on the subject are plentiful, they are
also confusing and often contradictory.7 As a result, the question of the
Sabians and their religion has also plagued modern western scholars of
Islam, who have proffered numerous opinions on the subject.8 For the

7  See Sarah Stroumsa’s summary, “The Sabians of Ḥarrān and the Sabians of Maimonides: On
Maimonides’ Theory of the History of Religions,” Sefunot 7/22 (1999): 277-295 [Hebrew].
8  The scholarly literature on the Sabians is very rich and varied. Although not the subject of this
article, a brief survey of the most prominent scholars on the subject follows: Daniel Chwolsohn
argued that the Sabians were Mandaeans, a Christian sect that emphasized baptism. The
Mandaeans were based in Mesopotamia and included aspects of Jewish and Persian religion
in their belief system. Certain scholars have proposed that the Syriac word ṣ ābā , which
means “to baptize,” indicates a connection between the Sabians mentioned in the Qur’ān
and the Mandaeans, who worshipped John the Baptist. See Shlomo Dov Goitein, The Islam of
Mu ḥ ammad: How a New Religion Came Into Being in the Shadow of Judaism (Jerusalem: The
Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 1975), 86 [Hebrew].
According to François De Blois, the Sabians were Manicheans (zanādiqa sg. zindīq) who lived
among the Quraysh tribe. see EI 2, s.v. Ṣ ābī (F.C. De Blois). De Blois criticizes Chwolsohn’s
theories and laments that, for years, students in the West unquestioningly accepted his
baseless conclusions. See François De Blois, s.v. Sabians, in Jane Dammen McAuliffe (ed.)
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most part, modern scholars have concluded that the Sabians described by
Muslim scholars of the ‘Abbāsid period are not the Sabians mentioned in
the Qur’ān.9 There has been no major scholarly research, however, into the
earliest period of Muslim scholarship—beginning with ‘Abd Allāh b. ‘Abbās
(d. 688), known as the father of Qur’ānic commentary, and continuing
through the tābi‘ūn (the second generation of Muslim authorities) and tābi‘ū
tābi‘īn (the third generation of Muslim authorities)—and their opinions on
the Sabians. To the best of my knowledge, the only modern scholar who has
researched the issue of the Sabians in the Muslim exegetical tradition is Jane
Dammen McAuliffe.10 In her article on the subject, McAuliffe presents the
writings of various interpreters of the Qur’ān (mufassirūn) on the subject
of the Sabians’ identity; though she does not cite any of the earliest Muslim
scholars by name.

Encyclopedia of the Qur’ān (Leiden: Brill, 2001), 4:511.

In the second century AD, a Jewish-Christian sect sometimes referred to as Sabians resided on
the east bank of the Jordan. There are some indications that they eventually immigrated to an
Arab country. According to Shlomo Dov Goitein, “This was probably a tradition that continued
up till the days of Mu ḥ ammad, that is, a tradition of baptizers who believed in Judaism and,
in some ways, in Christianity, who practiced baptism just as Mu ḥ ammad insisted upon doing
at the beginning of his journey.” See Goitein, The Islam of Mu ḥ ammad, 86-87; Charles Cutler
Torrey, The Jewish Foundation of Islam (New York: Jewish Institute of Religion Press, 1933), 3.
J. Pedersen adopts both De Blois’s and Chwolsohn’s theories on the basis that both Manichaeism
and Mandaeism included elements drawn from Gnosticism, especially a dualistic worldview.
See Stroumsa, “The Sabians”, 279. Judaism has generally regarded Gnosticism as a religion
based on emotion and imagination—both of which are considered misleading—and as
a threat to the basic principles of Judaism. During the first century C.E., a special prayer
against heretics and informers was added to Jewish liturgy by Shmuel ha-Q aṭ an (literally:
little Samuel). It appears that the concept of “heretics” referred, in part, to various Gnostic
sects, which are also described as heretical in Rabbinic literature. It is possible that, during
the earliest period of Christianity, the Rabbis did not distinguish between Gnosticism and
Christianity, and may have believed that Christianity was a Gnostic sect. The early Muslim
commentators appear to have had similar difficulties in regard to the Sabians.
9  The city of Ḥ arrān, close to the Euphrates river on the border between Syria and Asia Minor, was
home to a syncretistic sect that combined worship of the stars and constellations with Hellenistic
philosophy. During the medieval period, members of the sect succeeded in convincing Muslims
that they were the Sabians referred to in the Qur’ān. As a result, they were permitted to practice
their religion. See EI, s.v. Ṣābī (F.C. De Blois). The Sabians of Ḥ arrān fall outside the scope of this
article. For more about them, see the article by Stroumsa mentioned above.
10   Jane Dammen McAuliffe, “Exegetical Identification of the Ṣābi’ūn,” The Muslim World 72
(1982): 95-106.
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In this article, I intend to examine the opinions that are attributed

to Ibn ‘Abbās and his students as well as to their immediate successors, on
the question of the Sabians’ identity. This is not a simple task, for several
reasons: the earliest Qur’ānic commentators were not in agreement on the
identity of the Sabians; the Islamic sources often present their ideas on the
subject in a cryptic and self-contradictory manner; and, sometimes, the
sources combine separate theories on the Sabians into a synthesis, which is
then presented as a theory in its own right. As we shall see, the problematic
nature of the early Qur’ānic commentaries on the Sabians exercised a
detrimental influence on attempts by later Muslim scholars to deal with
the subject.
Maimonides stated that he had read many monographs on the
Sabians and claimed that a great deal had been known about the Sabian
religion in the past; but this knowledge had since been lost. Modern
scholars have examined Maimonides’ sources in depth,11 but I believe that
research into the opinions of the earliest Qur’ānic commentators might
expose another, very early, source of information on the Sabian religion;
a source that has been relatively unexamined thus far and which may help
to clarify Maimonides’ views on the subject.
A comparison between the third part of The Guide of the Perplexed
and the various partial descriptions of the Sabians given by Maimonides
to the opinions of the earliest Qur’ānic commentators reveals some
interesting parallels. This raises a question I will attempt to answer below:
was Maimonides familiar with the opinions of the earliest Qur’ānic
commentators on the subject of the Sabians?

The Earliest Qur’anic Commentators

Islamic literature cites the early Qur’ānic commentator Abī al-Ḥajjāj

Mujāhid b. Jabr al-Makkī (Mecca, 642-722) as the source of several
contradictory opinions on the Sabians. According to one citation, Mujāhid

11   For example, see Dov Schwartz, Amulets, Properties and Rationalism in Medieval Jewish Thought
(Ramat-Gan: Bar-Ilan University Press, 2004), 22-34. For details on the sources Maimonides
used, see Idem, Astral Magic in Medieval Jewish Thought (Ramat-Gan: Bar-Ilan University
Press 1999), 99-101; Stroumsa, “The Sabians,” 285-292; Pines, ”The Philosophic Sources of
Maimonides,” 103-173.
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claimed that the Sabians were a religious sect that mixed Zoroastrian and
Jewish practices (al-Ṣābi’ūn: bayna al-majūs wa’l-yahūd).12 Mujāhid wrote
the same in his tafsīr and added that the Sabians had no religion,13 by which
he meant that the Sabians had no religion unique to themselves.14
According to a different citation, however, Mujāhid reported that the
Sabians combined Zoroastrianism with Christianity rather than Judaism,
though he maintained his claim that they had no religion of their own (qawm
bayna al-naṣārā wa’l-majūs, laysa lahum dīn).15 Mujāhid’s description of
Sabian rituals in the latter citation, however, indicates that they were similar
to the rituals of Manichaeism. Mani (216-276), the founder of Manichaeism,
tried to combine the teachings of previous prophets, especially Zoroaster
and Jesus. Despite Mani’s attempt at syncretism, the Manichaean religion
was primarily based on Zoroastrianism, which embraced dualism and saw
the world as the scene of a metaphysical battle between good and evil.16

12   Abū Ja‘far Mu ḥ ammad b. Jarīr al-Ṭabarī, Jāmi‘ al-Bayān fī Tafsīr al-Qur’ān, (Cairo: Dār al-
Ma‘ārif, 1953), 2:146; Abū ‘Abd Allāh Mu ḥ ammad b. A ḥ mad b. Abī Bakr al-An ṣ ārī al-Qur ṭ ubī,
al-Jāmi‘ li-A ḥ kām al-Qur’ān, 10 vols. (Beirut: Dār al-Turāth al-‘Arabī, 1965), 1:434; ‘Imād al-
Dīn Ismā‘īl b. ‘Umar Ibn Kathīr, Tafsīr al-Qur’ān al-Karīm, 4 vols. (Cairo: Dār I ḥ yā’ al-Kutub
al-‘Arabiyya, 1950), 1:104.
13   Abī al-Ḥajjāj Mujāhid b. Jabr al-Makkī al-Makhzūmī, Tafsīr Mujāhid, 2 vols. (Beirut: al-
Manshūrāt al-‘Ilmiyya, n.d.), 77.
14   Modern scholars have demonstrated that Judaism and Zoroastrianism share many
characteristics, especially in regard to issues of impurity and purification. See e.g. Haggai
Mazuz, “Qur’ānic Commentators on Jewish and Zoroastrian Approaches to Menstruation,” 
The Review of Rabbinic Judaism 15/1 (2012), 89-98. Some of the scholars have concluded that,
for the most part, these similarities are the result of Persian influence on Judaism. George
William Carter claims that, just as Greek culture influenced Judaism during the period of the
Hellenistic empires, the same was the case during Persian rule. See George William Carter,
Zoroastrianism and Judaism (New York: AMS Press, 1970), 34-35. For a detailed study of Persian
influence on Judaism, see Shaul Shaked, “Iranian Influence on Judaism” in The Return to Zion—
Under Persian Rule, ed. Haim Tadmor (Jerusalem: ‘Am ‘Oved Press, 1983), 236-250 [Hebrew].
For further information, see James Barr, “The Question of Religious Influence: The Case of
Zoroastrianism, Judaism, and Christianity,” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 53/2
(1985), 201-35.
15   ‘Abd al-Ra ḥ mān b. ‘Alī b. Mu ḥ ammad Ibn al-Jawzī, Zād al-Masīr fī ‘ilm al-Tafsīr, 9 vols. (Beirut:
al-Maktab al-Islāmī li’l-Ṭibā‘a wa’l-Nashr, 1984), 1:92; ‘Abd Allāh b. ‘Umar al-Bay ḍāwī, Anwār
al-Tanzīl wa-Asrār al-Ta’wīl, 2 vols. (Osnabrück: Biblio Verlag, 1968), 12; Ibn Kathīr, Tafsīr, 1:104.
16   A.V. Williams Jackson, Researches in Manichaeism 13 (Columbia University Indo-Iranian Series.
New York: Columbia University Press, 1965), 102, 165.
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Mujāhid’s description of Sabian customs as essentially Manichaean is

supported by Yazīd b. Abū al-Ziyād (667-753), who claimed that the Sabians
believed in the teachings of all previous prophets, fasted thirty days a year,
and prayed five times a day facing the direction of Yemen, i.e., south.17 This
is in accord with Mujāhid’s description of Sabian rituals and beliefs.18 Yet
another tradition holds that Mujāhid described the Sabians’ religion as a
mixture of Judaism, Christianity, and Zoroastrianism.19
It is possible that all three descriptions of the Sabian religion attributed
to Mujāhid are accurate. Mujāhid may have observed a Sabian ritual that,
in addition to Zoroastrian elements, contained remnants of Jewish customs
that had not yet been removed from Christianity. If Mujāhid had doubts
about which religion the Sabians were imitating, he may have ascribed their
rituals to both Christian and Jewish origins.
Nonetheless, it seems clear that Mujāhid was certain that many Sabian
customs were of Zoroastrian origin. A mixture of Zoroastrianism and
Judaism would be similar to Mandaeism; while a mixture of Zoroastrianism
and Christianity would be similar to Manichaeism. The issue becomes
still more complicated when we consider another statement attributed to
Mujāhid: “The Sabians are not Jews and not Christians and they have no
religion.”20 If this statement is accurate, then the only possible answer to the
question of the Sabians’ religion is that they were Zoroastrians. However, it
is unlikely that the Qur’ān intended to identify the Sabians as Zoroastrians
because, as mentioned above, the Qur’ān clearly refers to the Sabians and
the Zoroastrians as separate religious sects. (Q. 22:17).
Yet another theory is attributed to both Mujāhid and Wahb b.
Munabbih (Yemen, d. 728). It states that the Sabians did not follow the
customs of the Jews, the Christians, the Zoroastrians, or the idolaters.21

17   Ibn Kathīr, Tafsīr, 1:104.

18   On fasting among the Manichaeans, see Shlomo Dov Goitein, Studies in Islamic History and
Institutions (Leiden: Brill, 1968), 92.
19   Mu ḥ ammad b. ‘Alī al-Shawkānī, Tafsīr Fat ḥ al-Qadīr, 5 vols. (Cairo:‘Ālam al-Kutub, 1964), 1:76.

20   Al-Ṭabarī, Jāmi‘ al-Bayān, 2:146.

21   The sects referred to in this list include practitioners of pure monotheism (Judaism), a more
controversial form of monotheism (Christianity), dualism (Zoroastrianism), and polytheism
(idolaters). Thus, Mujāhid and Wahb b. Munabbih included all religious beliefs known to them
at the time.
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Instead, the commentators assert that the Sabians were remnants of the
fiṭra and had no fixed religion (lā dīn muqarrar lahum yatba‘ūnahu).22
The fiṭra is a term mentioned in the Qur’ān23 that, according to Qur’ānic
commentators, is a divine religion imprinted on man at the moment of his
creation (dīn Allāh alladhī faṭara khalkatan).24 This interpretation of fiṭra is
based on a quote from Muḥammad that is cited in the ḥadīth, “Every infant
is born in the state of fiṭra” (kull mawlūd yūladu ‘alā al-fiṭra).25 According
to many opinions that appear in the Islamic tradition, the fiṭra is the religion
of Islam; that is, every human being is given the potential to become
a Muslim at birth, and only because they are taught to adopt other religions,
they become non-Muslims.26 Most commentators, however, assert that
fiṭra is simply the recognition of God (al-iqrār bi-Allāh wa’l-ma‘rifa bihi).27
According to Mujāhid and Wahb b. Munabbih, then, the Sabians practiced
a primordial form of monotheism.
A different opinion as to the identity of the Sabians is given under the
name of ‘Abd al-Raḥmān b. Zayd b. Aslam al-‘Adawī al-Madanī (Medina,
d. 798). Although Islamic literature presents ‘Abd al-Raḥmān b. Zayd’s view
of the Sabians as independent of other commentators’ ideas on the subject,
it in fact elaborates on the opinions of Mujāhid and Wahb b. Munabbih.
‘Abd al-Raḥmān b. Zayd claims that the Sabians were members of a religion
that was common in Mosul (jazīrat al-mawṣil), Iraq.28 The practitioners of

22   Ibn Kathīr, Tafsīr, 1:104.

23   “So set thy face for religion, being upright, the nature made by Allāh in which He has created
men (fi ṭ rata Allāh allatī fa ṭ ara al-nās). There is no altering Allāh’s creation. That is the right
religion—but most people know not” (Q. 30:30). The Arabic root f. ṭ .r. has a number of
permutations, such as “having a certain inborn characteristic,” “natural,” and “ancient.”
24   E.g., see Abū al-Ḥasan ‘Alī b. Mu ḥ ammad al-Māwardī, Tafsīr al-Māwardī: al-Nukat wa’l-‘Uyūn,
4 vols. (Kuwait: Wizārat al-Awqāf wal-Shu’ūn al-Islāmiyya, al-Turāth al-Islāmī, 1982), 1:266
25   Ibn al-Jawzī, Zād al-Masīr, 6:300.

26   For example, see Abū Zakariyya Ya ḥ yā b. Sharaf Mu ḥ yī al-Dīn al-Nawawī, Ṣ a ḥ ī ḥ Muslim

bi-Shar ḥ al-Nawawī, 10 vols. (Beirut: Dār al-Kutub al-‘Ilmiyya, 1990), 1:212. One can assume
that, if the Sabians were Muslims, the Qur’ān would not have described them as a separate
sect.
27   Ibn al-Jawzī, Zād al-Masīr, 6:301.

28   Yāqūt b. ‘Abd Allāh al-Ḥamawī al-Rumī al-Baghdādī, Mu‘jam al-Buldān, 7 vols. (Beirut: Dār
al-Kutub al-‘Ilmiyya, 1990), 5:258-59.
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this religion were monotheists who believed in a single, unique God, and
referred to him with the phrase: “There is no other God than Allāh, alone
(faqaṭ).”29 This concept of Allāh is considered acceptable to Muslims.
According to the ḥadīth, members of the idolatrous Quraysh tribe
would become confused when Muḥammad’s Companions (ṣaḥāba) would
pronounce the “testament” (shahāda, i.e., “There is no other God than Allāh
and Muḥammad is Allāh’s messenger”), thinking that the Companions had
become Sabians. It appears, then, that one of the major differences between
the Muslims and the Sabians was the Muslims’ recognition of Muḥammad
as Allāh’s messenger and prophet, the acknowledgement of which composes
the final part of the “testament.”30 In addition, the Sabians were different
from the Muslims in that they had no unique religious customs (‘amal),
book (kitāb), or prophet (nabī).31
‘Abd al-Raḥmān b. Zayd’s description of the Sabians matches
the traditional Islamic depiction of the fiṭra. The Sabians, like the fiṭra,
recognized the uniqueness of God but lacked any unique customs, book,
or prophet. According to Islamic tradition, then, the Sabians practiced
a primitive monotheism identical to that of humanity when it was first
created. ‘Abd al-Raḥmān b. Zayd’s description of the Sabians also indirectly
negates the possibility that the Sabians were Mandaeans, Manichaeans,
or People of the Book, because all of these groups had unique customs,
prophetic books, and prophets of their own. As we shall see, he was not the
only one who thought so.
Another theory regarding the Sabians was expressed by al-Khalīl
b. Aḥmad (d. 787), who claimed that the Sabian religion was similar to
Christianity. Al-Khalīl b. Aḥmad also states that the Sabians practiced the
“religion of Noah” (dīn Nūḥ) and prayed facing “the way the wind blew

29   We can conclude from this that the Sabians did not recognize Mu ḥ ammad as a prophet. See
al-Ṭabarī, Jāmi‘ al-Bayān, 2:146.
30   This is expressed in the following story by Rabī‘a b. ‘Ubbād: “I saw the All ā h’s messenger (i.e.,
Mu ḥ ammad) when I was a pagan. He was saying to people, ‘If you want to save yourselves,
accept there is no god but Allāh.’ At this moment I noticed a man behind him, saying: ‘He is
a Sabian.’ When I asked somebody who he was he told me he was Abū Lahab, his uncle.” See
Ibn Ḥanbal, A ḥ mad b. Mu ḥ ammad, Musnad al-Imām A ḥ mad Ibn Ḥ anbal (Beirut: al-Maktab
al-Islāmī li’l-Ṭibā‘a wa’l-Nashr, 1969), 4:341.
31   Ibn al-Jawzī, Zād al-Masīr, 1:92.
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in the middle of the day” (inna qiblatahum naḥwa mahabb al-janūb ḥiyāl
muntaṣaf al-nahār ).32
The expression “religion of Noah” refers to Q. 42:13, which states,
“He has made plain to you the religion which He enjoined upon Noah.”33
According to Islamic tradition, Noah was the first prophet to receive laws
from Allāh.34 Among other things, these laws prohibited marriage to
sisters and mothers (i.e., incest), stipulated that God is unique, and banned
idolatry (taḥrīm al-ākhawāt wa’l-ummahāt wa’l-tawḥīd wa-tark al-shirk).35
According to Muqātil b. Sulaymān (Balkh, d. 767), “The Sabians are
a cult which separated from the Christians because of a desire to practice
the ‘religion of Noah’ (ṣabā’ū ilā dīn Nūḥ), but they erred and were not
successful because the ‘religion of Noah’ was like the religion of Islam” (wa-
za‘amū annahum ‘alā dīn Nūḥ ‘alayhi al-salām wa-ākhṭā’ū li-ānna dīn Nūḥ
‘alayhi al-salām kāna ‘alā dīn al-Islām).36 If this description is accurate, it
appears that the terms fiṭra and “religion of Noah” actually refer to Islam.
This raises the question, however, of why Islamic tradition identified the
Sabians as an independent group in the first place? One possible answer
is that the Sabian religion was not Islam but, as other arguments suggest,
a religion that existed at the dawn of humanity.
According to Islamic tradition, the pre-Islamic era can be divided
into two sub-periods. There are two schools of thought on the first of these
pre-Islamic periods (al-jāhiliyya al-ūlā). According to one of them, this
period began with Adam and continued until Noah. The second school
of thought holds that this period began with the life of Noah and ended
with Idrīs (generally identified as the Biblical Enoch).37 According to

32   Al-Māwardī, al-Nukat wa’l-‘Uyūn, 1:117.

33   Translation taken from Mu ḥ ammad ‘Alī Maulana, The Holy Qur’ān: Arabic Text, English
Translation and Commentary (Lahore: The Lahore A ḥ madiyya Movement in Islam, 1998 [First
Edition, 1917]).
34   Jalāl al-Dīn Mu ḥ ammad b. A ḥ mad al-Ma ḥ allī and Jalāl al-Dīn ‘Abd al-Ra ḥ mān b. Abū Bakr al-
Suyū ṭ̣ ī , Tafsīr al-Jalālayn (Cairo: Mu’assasat al-Mukhtār, 2004), 465.
35   Ibn al-Jawzī, Zād al-Masīr, 7:276.

36   Muqātil Ibn Sulaymān, Tafsīr Muqātil Ibn Sulaymān, 3 vols. (Beirut: Dār al-Kutub al-‘Ilmiyya,
2003), 1:312.
37   Ignaz Goldziher, Muslim Studies, ed. S.M. Stern, trans. C.R. Barber and S.M. Stern (Piscataway,
NJ: Aldine Transaction, 2006), 202.
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243

both theories, however, the life of Noah demarcates the first pre-Islamic
period, and only Noah and his family survive it; making Noah the father
of a “new humanity”—the generation born after the Flood. As a result,
Islamic tradition sees Noah’s personal behavior, together with the laws he
received from Allāh—especially regarding the uniqueness of God—as the
first religion in human history. It appears, then, that according to many of
the Qur’ānic commentators, the fiṭra is recognition of the existence of one
God and is therefore synonymous with the “religion of Noah” itself.38
As mentioned above, according to ‘Abd al-Raḥmān b. Zayd, the
Sabians lived in Mosul, Iraq. ‘Aṭā’ b. Abī Rabāḥ (Mecca, 647-732) and his
student ‘Abd al-Malik b. ‘Abd al-‘Azīz b. Jurayj (Mecca, d. 767) also indicated
the geographic location of the Sabians, but claimed that they lived in the
Sawād, an area south of Mosul.39 Ibn Abū Ziyād, citing his father, reported
that the Sabians lived in Kūthā, Iraq. According to the geographer Yāqūt b.
‘Abd Allāh al-Ḥamawī al-Rūmī al-Baghdādī (1179-1229), there were three
different places referred to as Kūthā. One of these three was a Kūthā located
in the Sawād in Iraq. There appears to be agreement, then, between ‘Aṭā’
b. Abī Rabāḥ, Ibn Jurayj, and Ibn Zayd as to the Sabians’ location.40
The river Kūthā is named after one of the sons of Arfaḥshad (Heb.
Arpakhshad), the son of Sham (Heb. Shem), who was, in turn, one of the
sons of Nūḥ (Noah) and grandfather of Abraham. Yāqūt’s claim, as well
as the fact that he takes the trouble to point out that Kūthā belonged to
the family of Noah, the father of the “new humanity,” appears to confirm
al-Khalīl b. Aḥmad and Muqātil b. Sulaymān’s statement that the Sabians
practiced the “religion of Noah.” Yāqūt also writes that Abraham himself
was born and buried in Kūthā, and it was there that Abraham was
miraculously saved from the fiery furnace into which he was thrown by
Nimrod.41 Therefore, according to the commentators mentioned above, the
homeland of the Sabians in Kūthā is directly connected to both Noah and
Abraham. Muslims believe that Noah was the first man to receive a direct
revelation of God’s uniqueness; and that Abraham was the first man who,

38   Ibn al-Jawzī, Zād al-Masīr, 7:276.

39   Yāqūt, Mu‘jam al-Buldān, 3:309.

40   Ibid., 4:553-54.

41   Ibid., 4:554.
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after the many idolatrous generations that followed the life of Noah, chose
to return to monotheism (Q. 3:76; 37:84).
Another commentator, Qatāda b. Di‘āma al-Sadūsī (Baṣra, d. 736),
rejects the opinions of al-Khalīl b. Aḥmad and Muqātil b. Sulaymān regar-
ding the Sabians by claiming that the Sabians were actually the Chaldeans
(kaldānīyūn),42 from whom Abraham was descended. The Chaldeans, he
claims, worshipped the heavens (aflāk) and the stars. Astrology, he tells
us, was not only widely practiced among them but dictated their lives.
Abraham, however, rejected these beliefs, which eventually led him to leave
the Chaldeans and embrace belief in Allāh.43
It seems, therefore, that although the commentators mentioned
above agree that the Sabians lived in Iraq, this has not helped us clarify their
identity. While the commentators agree on the location of the Sabians, they
do not agree on the characteristics of their religion. Ibn Jurayj states that the
Sabians were not Zoroastrians, Jews, or Christians, but does not mention
any religious characteristics that would help identify them.44 Similarly,
Ibn Zayd claims that they had no religious customs, book, or prophet.45

42   An Aramaic tribe residing in Babylon during the seventh century BCE. had the city of Ūr
Kaśdīm as its capital, from which Abraham set forth. See Gen. 12:32. While the Torah states
that Abraham set forth from Ūr Kaśdīm, al-Rāzī used the word “Chaldeans.” The Chaldeans
are not referred to in the Bible, but the Talmud mentions them as Keldaēy, which means
“seeing in the stars” (Heb. rō’īm ba-kōkhavīm). See BT, Sanhedrin, 95a; BT, Yevamōt,
21b; BT, Shabbat, 119a, 156b; BT, Berakhōt, 64a. It appears that worship of the stars and
the practice of astrology was fundamental to Chaldean culture, as was the case in many
surrounding cultures. The Talmud states that Abraham, the first monotheist, continued to
practice astrology until God forbad him from doing so: “Abraham pleaded before the Holy One,
blessed be He, ‘Sovereign of the Universe! One born in mine house is mine heir.’ ‘Not so,’ He
replied, ‘but he that shall come forth out of thine own bowels.’ ‘Sovereign of the Universe!’
cried he, ‘I have looked at my constellation and find that I am not fated to beget child.’ ‘Go
forth from [i.e., cease] thy planet [gazing], for Israel is free from planetary influence.’” See BT, 
Shabbat, 156a.
43   Fakhr al-Dīn Mu ḥ ammad b. ‘Umar al-Rāzī, al-Tafsīr al-Kabīr, 17 vols. (Tehran: Dār al-Kutub
al-‘Ilmiyya, n.d.), 3:105.
44   Ṭabarī, Jāmi‘ al-Bayān, 2:146.

45   The claim that the Sabians lived in Kūthā was eventually combined with Ibn Zayd’s
suggestion that they practiced a primordial form of monotheism. As mentioned above,
however, Ibn Zayd originally argued that the Sabians lived in the region of Mosul (jazīrat
al-Maw ṣ il).
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Ibn Abū Ziyād, on the other hand, does give us a few indications as to Sabian
customs, claiming that they believed in all the prophets, fasted thirty days
every year, and prayed five times a day facing Yemen.
Ḥasan al-Baṣrī (Medina-Baṣra, 642-728/737), appears to have been
open to several possibilities regarding the identity of the Sabians. According
to some sources, Ḥasan al-Baṣrī believed that the Sabians practiced
Zoroastrianism (qawm ka’l-majūs).46 Qatāda quotes Ḥasan al-Baṣrī as
saying that the Sabians combined Jewish beliefs with Zoroastrianism and
that they had no religion.47 ‘Abd Allāh b. Abī Najīḥ (Meccan, d. 749) agreed
with this,48 as did Mujāhid, as mentioned above.
In contrast to Mujāhid and Ḥasan al-Baṣrī, who emphasized Zoroas-
trianism as the primary element in Sabian ritual, other commentators em-
phasize the Christian and Jewish aspects of the Sabian religion. The greatest
of the Qur’ānic commentators, Ibn ‘Abbās, reported that the Sabians were
Christian pilgrims who shaved the centers of their heads (al-sā’iḥūn al-
muḥallaqa awsāṭ ru’ūsihim), a common identifying practice among Chris-
tians; while Sa‘īd b. Jubayr (Kūfa, 665-714) claimed that the Sabians mixed
Judaism and Christianity.49
As noted above, the Qur’ān mentions the Sabians three times. Each
time, the Sabians are referred to in relation to believers (i.e. Muslims), Jews,
and Christians. In Q. 2:62, the Sabians are mentioned after the Christians;
while in Q. 5:69 and Q. 22:17, they are mentioned after the Jews and before
the Christians. This variation in the Sabians’ order of appearance caused
certain difficulties of interpretation, and a study of the tafsīr shows that the
Qur’ānic commentators found it confusing.
As we have seen, many of the early Qur’ānic commentators believed
that the Sabians were a sect of Judaism or Christianity. We can assume
from this that the commentators considered the Sabians to be People of the
Book. For example, a story is told about Ismā‘īl b. ‘Abd al-Raḥmān al-Suddī
(Kūfa, d. 745), who was asked about the Sabians and replied that they were

46   Ibn Kathīr, Tafsīr, 1:10; Ibn al-Jawzī, Zād al-Masīr, 1:92.

47   Ṭabarī, Jāmi‘ al-Bayān, 2:146.

48   Qur ṭ ubī, al-Jāmi‘, 1:434.

49   Ibn al-Jawzī, Zād al-Masīr, 1:92.

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People of the Book.50 Abū al-‘Āliya Rufay‘ b. Mihrān al-Riyāḥī (d. 709) also
held that the Sabians were People of the Book because, he claimed, they
used to read from the Book of Psalms (yaqra’ūna al-zabūr).51
Ibn ‘Abbās, however, who believed the Sabians were a group of
Christian pilgrims (ṣinf min al-naṣārā) who shaved the centers of their
heads,52 stated that it was forbidden to eat from the Sabians’ sacrifices or
to marry their wives.53 This indicates that Ibn ‘Abbās did not believe that
the Sabians were People of the Book. Moreover, if we cross-reference Ibn
‘Abbās’ statement with the Qur’ānic verses “marry not the idolatresses until
they believe” (Q. 2:221) and “forbidden to you is that which dies of itself,
and blood, and flesh of swine, and that on which any other name than that
of Allāh has been invoked . . . and that which is sacrificed on stones set
up for idols” (Q. 5:3), it appears that Ibn ‘Abbās considered the Sabians
idolaters. If true, under Islamic law the Sabians would have been given
a choice between death and conversion to Islam.54
It is possible that Ibn ‘Abbās excluded the Sabians from the People of
the Book because they shaved the centers of their heads. This opinion may
have been based on an order given by Muḥammad just before embarking
on a military campaign in the year 630 CE. Muḥammad instructed his army
not to harm monks who were hermits, but to decapitate those who shaved
the centers of their heads because, he claimed, they worshipped Satan.55
Ziyād b. Abū Sufyān (i.e., Ziyād b. Abīhi. d. 672),56 who served as
governor of Iraq under the first Umayyad caliph, rendered an opinion

50   Al-Ṭabarī, Jāmi‘ al-Bayān, 2:146.

51   Ibn al-Jawzī, Zād al-Masīr, 1:92.

52   Ibid., 1:92.

53   Qur ṭ ubī, al-Jāmi‘, 1:434.

54   This law was derived from the following verse: “So when the sacred months have passed, slay
the idolaters, wherever you find them, and take them captive and besiege them and lie in
wait for them in every ambush. But if they repent and keep up prayer and pay the poor-rate,
leave their way free. Surely Allāh is Forgiving, Merciful” (Q. 9:5). This verse is referred to in
traditional Islamic sources as the “verse of the sword” (āyat al-sayf).
55   Mu ḥ ammad b. ‘Umar al-Wāqidī, Kitāb al-Maghāzī, 3 vols. (London: Oxford University Press,
1966), 2:310.
56   The literal meaning of Ziyād’s name is “Ziyād the son of his father.” On the identity of Ziyād’s
 The Identity of the Sabians: Some Insights
Haggai Mazuz
247

that may help explain the early commentators’ confusion regarding

whether the Sabians were People of the Book. According to Ziyād b. Abū
Sufyān, Muḥammad discovered that the Sabians prayed five times daily
while facing the qibla (i.e., Mecca). Because this was similar to Muslim
practice, Muḥammad agreed to include the Sabians in the People of the
Book in exchange for payment of a poll tax (jizya). At a later date, however,
Muḥammad was informed that the Sabians worshipped angels. As a result,
he removed them from the People of the Book.57
Qatāda gives a similar opinion on the Sabians. He claims that the
Sabians worshipped a number of beings and that their rituals included
customs from five different religions. Of these five religions, “four of them
are from Satan (al-shayṭān) and one of them from the Merciful One” (al-
Raḥmān, one of the ninety-nine beautiful names for Allāh). According
to Qatāda, the Sabians worshipped the angels and practiced the rituals
of the Zoroastrians—who “worship fire” (wa-hum ya‘budūna al-nār);
[the rituals] of the idolaters “who worship graven images” (wa-alladhīna
ashrakū ya‘budūna al-awthān), [the rituals] of the Jews, and [the rituals]
of the Christians.58 It appears that these four religions (Judaism and
Christianity were considered a single religion) are “from Satan,” while that
of the “Merciful One,” left unmentioned in the text, is Islam. If Qatāda’s
description is correct, then it seems that the early Muslims found it difficult
to understand the Sabians and their religion because the Sabians practiced
a mixture of rituals drawn from all the major faiths of the time Islam was
founded.

Al-Qurtubi’s Confusion

The question of the Sabians and their identity continued to concern later
generations of Qur’ānic commentators, who struggled with the issue thro-
ughout the Middle Ages. Abū ‘Abd Allāh Muḥammad b. Aḥmad b. Abī
Bakr al-Anṣārī al-Qurṭubī (d. 1237) interpreted Q. 22:17 as indicating that

father, see Uri Rubin, “‘Al-Walad li’l-Firāsh’: On the Islamic Campaign against Zinā,” Studia
Islamica 77-78 (1993), 5-26, at 13-14.
57   Al-Ṭabarī, Jāmi‘ al-Bayān, 2:147.

58   Al-Rāzī, al-Tafsīr al-Kabīr, 3:105.

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the Sabians worshipped the stars (qawm ya‘budūna al-nujūm).59 In his

commentary on Q. 5:69, however, he held that they converted to Judaism
(qad dakhalū fi’l-yahūdiyya).60 It may be possible to reconcile al-Qurṭubī’s
statements if we posit that the Sabians began as a pagan sect, but later
embraced Judaism. This theory becomes problematic in light of al-Qurṭubī’s
commentary on Q. 2:62, in which he claims that the Sabian religion was
not that of the People of the Book (qad kharajū min dīn ahl al-kitāb). If
the Sabians did accept Judaism, as al-Qurṭubī stated in his commentary on
Q. 5:69, they should have been considered People of the Book.61
Al-Qurṭubī’s commentaries on the Sabians may also be reconcilable
by examining the Qur’ānic passages in which they appear according to
the order of their appearance. Qur’ānic commentator ‘Aṭā’ al-Khurāsānī
(d. 757) claimed that the three Qur’ānic chapters that mention the Sabians
were revealed to Muḥammad during his time in Medina. The first chapter
to be revealed was Chapter 2, followed by Chapter 22, and finally Chap-
ter 5.62 Examining al-Qurṭubī’s commentaries in the order set out by ‘Aṭā’
al-Khurāsānī appears to confirm the theory that the Sabians originally
worshipped the stars, but later embraced Judaism. However, this does not
answer the question of why the Qur’ān does not identify the Sabians as
Jews, or why the Sabians are consistently described as an independent sect.
Possibly, the answer may be found in Muḥammad b. ‘Alī al-Shawkānī’s
(1759-1839) opinion on the matter. Al-Shawkānī sought to establish “the
order of things” regarding the Qur’ānic chapters referring to the Sabians,
and thus alleviate the confusion surrounding the issue. In his commentary
on Q. 2:62, he reversed the narrative described above, and stated that the
Sabians were a sect of Judaism or Christianity that began to worship angels.
As a result, they were no longer considered People of the Book (wa-sammū
hādhihi al-firqa ṣābi’a, li-ānnahā kharajat min dīn al-yahūd wa’l-naṣārā wa-
‘abadū al-malā’ika).63

59   Al-Qur ṭ ubī, al-Jāmi‘, 12:22.

60   Ibid., 6:246.

61   Ibid., 1:434.

62   Mu ḥ ammad b. Ayyūb Ibn al-Ḍurays, Fa ḍ ā’il al-Qur’ān (Damascus: Dār al-Fikr, 1987), 33-34.

63   Al-Shawkānī, Fat ḥ al-Qadīr, 1:76.

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Al-Qurṭubī and other commentators attempted to reconcile these

contradictions through an etymological examination of the Sabians’
Arabic name, specifically the Arabic root ṣ.b.’., which, they argued, means
“converting religion.” As a result, these commentators argued that a Sabian
was someone who changed his religion in favor of another (man kharaja wa-
māla min dīn ilā dīn). As evidence for this claim, the commentators cited
various traditions according to which Muḥammad, after he abandoned
idolatry, was referred to as a Sabian.64
Other commentators attempted to analyze the individual verses
that refer to the Sabians instead of comparing the verses to each other.
Maḥmūd b. ‘Umar al-Zamakhsharī (1074-1144), for example, analyzed
Q. 22:17 by dividing the religions it cites into two groups: the believers
[i.e., Muslims] and the Jews in one group, and the Sabians and Christians
in the other. According to al-Zamakhsharī, Allāh referred to the Sabians
and the Christians as a single group because the Sabians were a sect of
Christianity (ju‘ila al-Ṣābi’ūn ma‘a al-naṣārā li-ānnahum naw‘un minhum).65
In their commentaries on Q. 2:62, Jalāl al-Dīn al-Maḥallī (1389-
1459) and Jalāl al-Dīn al-Suyūṭī (1445-1505) argue that the Sabians were
a sect (ṭā’ifa) of Judaism or Christianity.66 By contrast, their commentaries
on Q. 5:69 and Q. 22:17 identify the Sabians as a Jewish sect (firqa).67 The
commentators divided the religions mentioned in Q. 22:17 into three
groups: the believers in one group, the Jews and Sabians in a second
group, and the Christians in a third group. The differences between the
commentaries of al-Jalālayn seem to indicate that the Christians they refer
to were actually an early Judaizing sect of Christianity that still followed
many Jewish customs.68

64   Al-Qur ṭ ubī, al-Jāmi‘, 1:434.

65   Ma ḥ mūd b. ‘Umar al-Zamakhsharī, al-Kashshāf ‘an Ḥ aqā’iq al-Tanzīl wa-‘Uyūn al-Ta’wīl fī

Wujūh al-Ta’wīl, 3 vols. (Egypt: Mu ṣṭ afā al-Nātī al-Ḥalabī wa-Awlāduhu, 1948), 1:343.
66   Al-Ma ḥ allī, Tafsīr al-Jalālayn, 13.

67   Ibid., 157.

68   It is interesting that many of the late Qur’ānic commentators argued that the Sabians were 
a Christian sect, while some of the above mentioned early Qur’ānic commentators specifically
stated that they were not Christians. The argument according to which the Sabians are not
Christians can be found among later scholars such as the Mu‘tazilite theologian ‘Abd al-Jabbār
al-Asadābādī (935-1025). He argued that we can not deny the possibility that the Sabians
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The Sabians According to Maimonides

A study in the third part of The Guide of the Perplexed, as well as the various
partial descriptions of the Sabians given by Maimonides, along with a com-
parison to the opinions mentioned above, reveals some interesting
similarities. We have seen that in all the opinions given by Mujāhid, he
mentions a Zoroastrian element in the Sabians’ religion. Ḥasan al-Baṣrī
also claims that the Sabians practiced Zoroastrianism (qawm ka’l-majūs).
In the forty-seventh chapter of the third part of The Guide of the Perplexed,
Maimonides describes the Sabians as the remnants of the Zoroastrians
(baqiyyat al-majūs).69
Qatāda, as we saw above, claimed that the Sabians were the Chaldeans
(kaldānīyūn), Abraham’s ancestors. This view was shared by Maimonides’
view as well.70 The Chaldeans, according to Qatāda, worshipped the
heavens and the stars, and used astrology to dictate the course of their
lives. Some of Maimonides’ references to the Sabians also accuse them
of practicing astrology and witchcraft.71 Ibn Abū Ziyād, citing his father,
reported that the Sabians lived in Kūthā, Iraq. Maimonides wrote that the
Sabians believed Abraham had been raised in Kūthā.72
Maimonides claimed that his research into Sabian ritual relied
extensively on Ibn Waḥshiyya’s Book of Nabatean Agriculture.73 In ancient
times, according to Maimonides, agriculture was intimately connected
with idolatrous rituals. When they discussed the Sabians, the early Qur’ānic
commentators also dealt, albeit indirectly, with the subject of agriculture.
This appears to be revealed by studying the details given in separate Qur’ānic
commentaries. ‘Aṭā’ b. Abī Rabāḥ and his student Ibn Jurayj claimed that
the Sabians lived in the Sawād, a large and fertile center of agriculture in

mentioned by Muslim jurists had become extinct. See ‘Abd al-Jabbār al-Asadābādī, Kitāb
al-Mughnī fī Abwāb al-Taw ḥ īd wa’l-‘Adl (Cairo: al-Dār al-Mi ṣ riyya li’l-Ta’līf wa’l-Tarjama,
1961), 5:152-154. Translation taken from Schwartz, Amulets, 283-285.
69   Maimonides, Dalālat al- Ḥ ā’irīn, 3:47.

70   Ibid., 3:47.

71   Ibid., 1:63; 3:37.

72   Ibid., 3:29.

73   Ibid., 3:29.
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Iraq. Ibn Abū Ziyād, for his part, held that Kūthā is in the Sawād. Qatāda
and Maimonides agreed that Abraham originally came from Kūthā, a place
of idolatry. Kūthā, as we have seen, is in the Sawād. After the Muslims
conquered the Sawād they allowed the original residents—who, according
to some of the above mentioned commentators, were Sabians—to remain,
so they could work the land and provide the conquerors with tax payments.
A second claim ascribed to Qatāda holds that the Sabians worshipped
a number of beings, and that their rituals included customs from five
different religions. They worshipped the angels and graven images, and they
practiced rituals taken from Zoroastrianism, Judaism, and Christianity.
Maimonides claims that the Sabians built a statue for the stars, golden
statues for the sun, and silver statues for the moon.74 He also asserted that
some of them worshipped demons.75
Ibn ‘Abbās argued that the Sabians were Christian pilgrims who
shaved the centers of their heads. Yet he forbade eating from the Sabians’
sacrifices because he did not believe that the Sabians were People of the
Book. As we have seen, this opinion may have been based on an order
given by Muḥammad that called on Muslim soldiers to decapitate those
who shaved the centers of their heads because, Muḥammad claimed,
they worshipped Satan. Maimonides wrote that even though the Sabians
considered blood to be highly impure, they ate it because it was the food of
the devils.76
Despite the apparent similarities between Maimonides’ and the ear-
liest Qur’ānic commentators’ views on the Sabians, there is one aberration.
Muqātil b. Sulaymān and al-Khalīl b. Aḥmad argued that the Sabians prac-
ticed the “religion of Noah,” or at least tried to. Maimonides claims that the
Sabians condemned Noah because he never worshipped an idol.77
Based on the similarities cited above, can we argue that Maimonides
was familiar with the literature that cited the earliest Qur’ānic commentators

74   Ibid., 3:29. It is noteworthy that the well-known Cordovan Qur’ānic commentator Mu ḥ ammad
b. A ḥ mad al-Qur ṭ ubī (d. 1237)—more than fifty years after Maimonides—also claimed (and
he was not the only one) that the Sabians worshipped the stars (qawm ya‘budūna al-nujūm).
75   Ibid., 3:46.

76   Ibid., 3:46.

77   Ibid., 3:47.
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on the Sabians’ identity? In his missive to the sages of Provence, Maimonides

declares that there is no monograph in Arabic that deals with astrology
(an art ascribed to the Sabians) that he has not read and fully understood.
According to Dov Schwartz, “It is likely that if Maimonides troubled
himself to read negligible monographs, as he testifies of himself, he also
read common theological monographs that contained heresiographic
descriptions of different forms of idolatry.”78
Schwartz mentions the Jewish and Islamic sources that might have
shaped Maimonides’ perspective on the motives of idolaters79 and points
out that, as opposed to other scholars and philosophers, Maimonides cites
his sources. Indeed, Maimonides cited various sources on the subject, such
as Ibn Waḥshiyya, but he did not mention the Qur’ānic commentators.
Thus, we cannot say for sure that he was familiar with their views regarding
the Sabians. It is interesting, however, that so many of the opinions ascribed
to the early Qur’ānic commentators are collected in chapters forty-six and-
forty seven of the third part of The Guide of the Perplexed.
Sara Stroumsa’s article, “The Sabians of Ḥarrān and the Sabians of
Maimonides,” includes a possible explanation:

Maimonides’ knowledge of Arabic opened before him a world

of philosophic and heresiographic literature, through which he
knew about the Sabians—not those being searched for by modern
research, but the confusing myth of the Sabians as a collective
name that includes various familiar nations of the twelfth century,
a myth in which Maimonides believed he discovered the essence of
idolatry.80

Conclusion

As we have seen, the early and late Qur’ānic commentators provided

many answers to the question of the Sabians and their identity. Sometimes

78   Schwartz, Amulets, 22-23. For details on the sources that Maimonides used, see Schwartz,
Astral Magic, 99-101.
79   Ibid., 24-32. Possible influences are discussed until 34. See also Stroumsa, “The Sabians,” 285-
292; Pines, ”The Philosophic Sources of Maimonides,” 103-173.
80   Stroumsa, “The Sabians,” 290.
 The Identity of the Sabians: Some Insights
Haggai Mazuz
253

there was agreement and synthesis between them, sometimes profound

disagreement. As a result, Islamic tradition presents the Sabians as
everything from monotheists to idolaters to syncretists, to a sect lacking
any religion at all.
Muslim scholars were scattered throughout the Muslim empire, from
Khawarizm and Baṣra to Cordova. The day-to-day life of these scholars was
taken up with religious polemic and discussion, as well as studying with their
teachers. As a result they were rarely “in the field,” so to speak.81 Therefore,
it appears that they based their ideas about the outside world on reports
they received from wanderers, merchants, and Islamic missionaries, all of
whom traveled in the lands of the Sawād, which comprised an enormous
territory.
Because of the Sawād’s great size, it was quite religiously and
ethnically diverse. The tābi‘ūn and tābi‘ū tābi‘īn, therefore, would have
received extremely varied reports about the various religious sects
and peoples living in the region. Although it is not possible to arrive at
an unambiguous conclusion to the question of the Sabians’ identity, the
description which is likely closest to the truth and combines all the ideas
and interpretations presented in this article regarding the identity of the
Sabians is that of historian Abū Ḥayyān ‘Alī b. Muḥammad al-Tawḥīdī (d.
1023). Al-Tawḥīdī’s description of the Sabians matches Qatāda’s second
description of the Sabians mentioned above, and may help explain the
varied opinions expressed by Mujāhid. According to al-Tawḥīdī, “The
Sabians, more than anybody else, are interested in different religions and
the study of them and they try to achieve knowledge of their truths.”82
We have seen that Maimonides believed the Sabians to be an ancient
nation that had existed since the days of Shet, the son of Adam. During the
three millennia between the time of Shet and the appearance of Christianity
(and then Islam), Judaism was the only non-idolatrous religion in the
world. Thus, the world in that era was divided between the Children of
Israel and the idolaters—us and them. Maimonides referred to idolaters

81   Mujāhid is exceptional in that he was known to be willing to go to great lengths to discover the
true meaning of a Qur’ānic verse, and was considered a well-traveled man (ra ḥḥ āl).
82   Abū Ḥayyān ‘Alī b. Mu ḥ ammad al-Taw ḥ īdī, Kitāb al-Imtā‘ wa’l-Mū’ānasa, 3 vols. (Cairo: Lajnat
al-Ta’līf wa’l-Tarjama wa’l-Nashr, 1939), 81.
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of all kinds as Sabians. The Sabians, then, were the antithesis of Judaism.
Through opposition to and differentiation from the Sabians, the Jew
defines his identity.83 This theory, it seems, was the reason Maimonides was
so eager to discover the truth about the Sabian religion.
The early Qur’ānic commentators ascribed to the Sabians all the
religions and beliefs that were common to the Semitic territory of their
era: Zoroastrianism, Judaism, Christianity, a pure monotheism unrelated
to any religion, and, finally, idolatry. According to one of their theories,
the Sabians prayed five times a day facing Mecca, fasted thirty days a year,
and believed in a single, unique God, referring to him with the phrase:
“There is no other God than Allāh.” This is half of the Muslim “testament”
(shahāda). The other half recognizes Muḥammad as Allāh’s messenger. The
prayer, the fast and the “testament” are three of the five pillars of Islam
(arkān al-Islām).84 They are also the most frequently practiced of the five
pillars. This description appears to indicate that Sabian practice was almost
totally Islamic. Yet in all of the various opinions given by the early Qur’ānic
commentators, the Sabian is everything but a Muslim. It appears, then,
that in addition to the apparent similarities between Maimonides’ and the
earliest Qur’ānic commentators’ views on the Sabians, both of them had
the same perception of the Sabians. They used them as a tool to define their
own identity regarding the other and as a symbol of all outside and exterior
beliefs and perceptions.

83   It is worth pointing out that the Muslims had a similar principle. Islamic sources indicate that
Muslims often sought to distance and differentiate themselves from other religions such as
Judaism, as well as Christianity and Zoroastrianism. This principle was called mukhālafa, i.e.,
doing the opposite of those around you. On Islam’s desire to differentiate itself from other
religions, see Haggai Mazuz, “Menstruation and Differentiation: How Muslims Differentiated
Themselves from Jews Regarding the Laws of Menstruation,” Der Islam 87 (2012), 204-223;
Idem, Menstruation and Its Legislation: The Evolution and Crystallization of the Law of Menses
in the Islamic Juristic Tradition. With an introduction by Moshe Sharon (Ramat-Gan: Bar-Ilan
University Press, forthcoming) [Hebrew]; Idem, “The Relationship between Islam and Judaism:
A Neglected Aspect,” The Review of Rabbinic Judaism (Forthcoming).
84   The other two pillars are the pilgrimage to Mecca ( ḥ ajj) and alms-giving (zakāh). The
pilgrimage to Mecca is a pillar that the Muslim has to perform only once in his lifetime. If he
can not perform it—physically or financially—he is not required to do so. We have seen that,
according to one of the opinions mentioned above, the Sabians prayed towards Mecca. In other
words, the city had a ritual and a mystical significance for them; just as it did for Muslims.