Export translations
Jump to navigation
Jump to search
Settings
Group
Allāh
Allāt
Alʿuzza
Banquets
Dahr
Divination
Hellenization
List of Deities
Main Page
Manāt
Manāyā
Observances, Festivals, and Holy Months
Priesthood
The Pantheon of Qedar
The Pantheon of Tayma’
The Parable of the Camel and the Lion
Ḏušarē
Language
aa - Afar
ab - Abkhazian
abs - Ambonese Malay
ace - Achinese
ady - Adyghe
ady-cyrl - Adyghe (Cyrillic script)
aeb - Tunisian Arabic
aeb-arab - Tunisian Arabic (Arabic script)
aeb-latn - Tunisian Arabic (Latin script)
af - Afrikaans
ak - Akan
aln - Gheg Albanian
alt - Southern Altai
am - Amharic
ami - Amis
an - Aragonese
ang - Old English
anp - Angika
ar - Arabic
arc - Aramaic
arn - Mapuche
arq - Algerian Arabic
ary - Moroccan Arabic
arz - Egyptian Arabic
as - Assamese
ase - American Sign Language
ast - Asturian
atj - Atikamekw
av - Avaric
avk - Kotava
awa - Awadhi
ay - Aymara
az - Azerbaijani
azb - South Azerbaijani
ba - Bashkir
ban - Balinese
ban-bali - ᬩᬲᬩᬮᬶ
bar - Bavarian
bbc - Batak Toba
bbc-latn - Batak Toba (Latin script)
bcc - Southern Balochi
bci - Baoulé
bcl - Central Bikol
be - Belarusian
be-tarask - Belarusian (Taraškievica orthography)
bg - Bulgarian
bgn - Western Balochi
bh - Bhojpuri
bho - Bhojpuri
bi - Bislama
bjn - Banjar
blk - Pa'O
bm - Bambara
bn - Bangla
bo - Tibetan
bpy - Bishnupriya
bqi - Bakhtiari
br - Breton
brh - Brahui
bs - Bosnian
btm - Batak Mandailing
bto - Iriga Bicolano
bug - Buginese
bxr - Russia Buriat
ca - Catalan
cbk-zam - Chavacano
cdo - Min Dong Chinese
ce - Chechen
ceb - Cebuano
ch - Chamorro
cho - Choctaw
chr - Cherokee
chy - Cheyenne
ckb - Central Kurdish
co - Corsican
cps - Capiznon
cr - Cree
crh - Crimean Tatar
crh-cyrl - Crimean Tatar (Cyrillic script)
crh-latn - Crimean Tatar (Latin script)
cs - Czech
csb - Kashubian
cu - Church Slavic
cv - Chuvash
cy - Welsh
da - Danish
dag - Dagbani
de - German
de-at - Austrian German
de-ch - Swiss High German
de-formal - German (formal address)
din - Dinka
diq - Zazaki
dsb - Lower Sorbian
dtp - Central Dusun
dty - Doteli
dv - Divehi
dz - Dzongkha
ee - Ewe
egl - Emilian
el - Greek
eml - Emiliano-Romagnolo
en - English
en-ca - Canadian English
en-gb - British English
eo - Esperanto
es - Spanish
es-419 - Latin American Spanish
es-formal - Spanish (formal address)
et - Estonian
eu - Basque
ext - Extremaduran
fa - Persian
ff - Fulah
fi - Finnish
fit - Tornedalen Finnish
fj - Fijian
fo - Faroese
fon - Fon
fr - French
frc - Cajun French
frp - Arpitan
frr - Northern Frisian
fur - Friulian
fy - Western Frisian
ga - Irish
gaa - Ga
gag - Gagauz
gan - Gan Chinese
gan-hans - Gan (Simplified)
gan-hant - Gan (Traditional)
gcr - Guianan Creole
gd - Scottish Gaelic
gl - Galician
gld - Nanai
glk - Gilaki
gn - Guarani
gom - Goan Konkani
gom-deva - Goan Konkani (Devanagari script)
gom-latn - Goan Konkani (Latin script)
gor - Gorontalo
got - Gothic
grc - Ancient Greek
gsw - Swiss German
gu - Gujarati
guc - Wayuu
gur - Frafra
guw - Gun
gv - Manx
ha - Hausa
hak - Hakka Chinese
haw - Hawaiian
he - Hebrew
hi - Hindi
hif - Fiji Hindi
hif-latn - Fiji Hindi (Latin script)
hil - Hiligaynon
ho - Hiri Motu
hr - Croatian
hrx - Hunsrik
hsb - Upper Sorbian
hsn - Xiang Chinese
ht - Haitian Creole
hu - Hungarian
hu-formal - Hungarian (formal address)
hy - Armenian
hyw - Western Armenian
hz - Herero
ia - Interlingua
id - Indonesian
ie - Interlingue
ig - Igbo
ii - Sichuan Yi
ik - Inupiaq
ike-cans - Eastern Canadian (Aboriginal syllabics)
ike-latn - Eastern Canadian (Latin script)
ilo - Iloko
inh - Ingush
io - Ido
is - Icelandic
it - Italian
iu - Inuktitut
ja - Japanese
jam - Jamaican Creole English
jbo - Lojban
jut - Jutish
jv - Javanese
ka - Georgian
kaa - Kara-Kalpak
kab - Kabyle
kbd - Kabardian
kbd-cyrl - Kabardian (Cyrillic script)
kbp - Kabiye
kcg - Tyap
kea - Kabuverdianu
kg - Kongo
khw - Khowar
ki - Kikuyu
kiu - Kirmanjki
kj - Kuanyama
kjp - Eastern Pwo
kk - Kazakh
kk-arab - Kazakh (Arabic script)
kk-cn - Kazakh (China)
kk-cyrl - Kazakh (Cyrillic script)
kk-kz - Kazakh (Kazakhstan)
kk-latn - Kazakh (Latin script)
kk-tr - Kazakh (Turkey)
kl - Kalaallisut
km - Khmer
kn - Kannada
ko - Korean
ko-kp - Korean (North Korea)
koi - Komi-Permyak
kr - Kanuri
krc - Karachay-Balkar
kri - Krio
krj - Kinaray-a
krl - Karelian
ks - Kashmiri
ks-arab - Kashmiri (Arabic script)
ks-deva - Kashmiri (Devanagari script)
ksh - Colognian
ksw - S'gaw Karen
ku - Kurdish
ku-arab - Kurdish (Arabic script)
ku-latn - Kurdish (Latin script)
kum - Kumyk
kv - Komi
kw - Cornish
ky - Kyrgyz
la - Latin
lad - Ladino
lb - Luxembourgish
lbe - Lak
lez - Lezghian
lfn - Lingua Franca Nova
lg - Ganda
li - Limburgish
lij - Ligurian
liv - Livonian
lki - Laki
lld - Ladin
lmo - Lombard
ln - Lingala
lo - Lao
loz - Lozi
lrc - Northern Luri
lt - Lithuanian
ltg - Latgalian
lus - Mizo
luz - Southern Luri
lv - Latvian
lzh - Literary Chinese
lzz - Laz
mad - Madurese
mai - Maithili
map-bms - Basa Banyumasan
mdf - Moksha
mg - Malagasy
mh - Marshallese
mhr - Eastern Mari
mi - Maori
min - Minangkabau
mk - Macedonian
ml - Malayalam
mn - Mongolian
mni - Manipuri
mnw - Mon
mo - Moldovan
mr - Marathi
mrh - Mara
mrj - Western Mari
ms - Malay
ms-arab - Malay (Jawi script)
mt - Maltese
mus - Muscogee
mwl - Mirandese
my - Burmese
myv - Erzya
mzn - Mazanderani
na - Nauru
nah - Nāhuatl
nan - Min Nan Chinese
nap - Neapolitan
nb - Norwegian Bokmål
nds - Low German
nds-nl - Low Saxon
ne - Nepali
new - Newari
ng - Ndonga
nia - Nias
niu - Niuean
nl - Dutch
nl-informal - Dutch (informal address)
nmz - Nawdm
nn - Norwegian Nynorsk
no - Norwegian
nod - Northern Thai
nov - Novial
nqo - N’Ko
nrm - Norman
nso - Northern Sotho
nv - Navajo
ny - Nyanja
nyn - Nyankole
nys - Nyungar
oc - Occitan
ojb - Northwestern Ojibwe
olo - Livvi-Karelian
om - Oromo
or - Odia
os - Ossetic
pa - Punjabi
pag - Pangasinan
pam - Pampanga
pap - Papiamento
pcd - Picard
pdc - Pennsylvania German
pdt - Plautdietsch
pfl - Palatine German
pi - Pali
pih - Norfuk / Pitkern
pl - Polish
pms - Piedmontese
pnb - Western Punjabi
pnt - Pontic
prg - Prussian
ps - Pashto
pt - Portuguese
pt-br - Brazilian Portuguese
pwn - Paiwan
qqq - Message documentation
qu - Quechua
qug - Chimborazo Highland Quichua
rgn - Romagnol
rif - Riffian
rm - Romansh
rmc - Carpathian Romani
rmy - Vlax Romani
rn - Rundi
ro - Romanian
roa-tara - Tarantino
rsk - Pannonian Rusyn
ru - Russian
rue - Rusyn
rup - Aromanian
ruq - Megleno-Romanian
ruq-cyrl - Megleno-Romanian (Cyrillic script)
ruq-latn - Megleno-Romanian (Latin script)
rw - Kinyarwanda
sa - Sanskrit
sah - Sakha
sat - Santali
sc - Sardinian
scn - Sicilian
sco - Scots
sd - Sindhi
sdc - Sassarese Sardinian
sdh - Southern Kurdish
se - Northern Sami
se-fi - davvisámegiella (Suoma bealde)
se-no - davvisámegiella (Norgga bealde)
se-se - davvisámegiella (Ruoŧa bealde)
sei - Seri
ses - Koyraboro Senni
sg - Sango
sgs - Samogitian
sh - Serbo-Croatian
shi - Tachelhit
shi-latn - Tachelhit (Latin script)
shi-tfng - Tachelhit (Tifinagh script)
shn - Shan
shy - Shawiya
shy-latn - Shawiya (Latin script)
si - Sinhala
simple - Simple English
sjd - Kildin Sami
sje - Pite Sami
sk - Slovak
skr - Saraiki
skr-arab - Saraiki (Arabic script)
sl - Slovenian
sli - Lower Silesian
sm - Samoan
sma - Southern Sami
smn - Inari Sami
sms - Skolt Sami
sn - Shona
so - Somali
sq - Albanian
sr - Serbian
sr-ec - Serbian (Cyrillic script)
sr-el - Serbian (Latin script)
srn - Sranan Tongo
ss - Swati
st - Southern Sotho
stq - Saterland Frisian
sty - Siberian Tatar
su - Sundanese
sv - Swedish
sw - Swahili
szl - Silesian
szy - Sakizaya
ta - Tamil
tay - Tayal
tcy - Tulu
te - Telugu
tet - Tetum
tg - Tajik
tg-cyrl - Tajik (Cyrillic script)
tg-latn - Tajik (Latin script)
th - Thai
ti - Tigrinya
tk - Turkmen
tl - Tagalog
tly - Talysh
tly-cyrl - толыши
tn - Tswana
to - Tongan
tpi - Tok Pisin
tr - Turkish
tru - Turoyo
trv - Taroko
ts - Tsonga
tt - Tatar
tt-cyrl - Tatar (Cyrillic script)
tt-latn - Tatar (Latin script)
tum - Tumbuka
tw - Twi
ty - Tahitian
tyv - Tuvinian
tzm - Central Atlas Tamazight
udm - Udmurt
ug - Uyghur
ug-arab - Uyghur (Arabic script)
ug-latn - Uyghur (Latin script)
uk - Ukrainian
ur - Urdu
uz - Uzbek
uz-cyrl - Uzbek (Cyrillic script)
uz-latn - Uzbek (Latin script)
ve - Venda
vec - Venetian
vep - Veps
vi - Vietnamese
vls - West Flemish
vmf - Main-Franconian
vmw - Makhuwa
vo - Volapük
vot - Votic
vro - Võro
wa - Walloon
war - Waray
wls - Wallisian
wo - Wolof
wuu - Wu Chinese
xal - Kalmyk
xh - Xhosa
xmf - Mingrelian
xsy - Saisiyat
yi - Yiddish
yo - Yoruba
yrl - Nheengatu
yue - Cantonese
za - Zhuang
zea - Zeelandic
zgh - Standard Moroccan Tamazight
zh - Chinese
zh-cn - Chinese (China)
zh-hans - Simplified Chinese
zh-hant - Traditional Chinese
zh-hk - Chinese (Hong Kong)
zh-mo - Chinese (Macau)
zh-my - Chinese (Malaysia)
zh-sg - Chinese (Singapore)
zh-tw - Chinese (Taiwan)
zu - Zulu
Format
Export for off-line translation
Export in native format
Export in CSV format
Fetch
<languages /> <div lang="en" dir="ltr" class="mw-content-ltr"> == Introduction == Priests and priestesses are the guardians of the gods and goddesses’ interests, protectors of their temples and sacred areas, supervisors of offerings, sacrifices, weddings, births, funerals, ceremonies and rituals, and mediators between gods and worshippers. They were exorcists, oracles, healers, bankers, archivists and writers and readers of hymns and poems. Although no Safaitic inscription discovered so far indicates that sacrifice in the wilderness required the officiation of a priest, if we take the texts at face value, sacrifice among nomads was performed by the worshippers directly as individual acts of devotion or involving a small number of people. Sacrifice in temples, however, probably did require a priest. The temple itself was pretty self-sufficient being a commercial center, archive, as well as the home of the priests with its own source of water as seen in Khirbet Et-Tannur, a Nabataean temple. Sacred areas out in the open such as high places, groves and springs don’t necessarily need to be staffed but at many there would be a guardian such as a palm grove mentioned by Diodorus that was “in the care of a man and a woman who hold the sacred office for life” and also in the case of a mountain where a cult statue was set up and a “priest (sacerdos) also lives there, and he wears a dalmatic and linen cloak” according to Antoninus Placentinus. </div> <div lang="en" dir="ltr" class="mw-content-ltr"> == History == Priests in Arabia appear under many different titles which may mean these are ranks in a hierarchy, different roles, or regional variations. These include kāhin, kamar or kumra, rabb, sadin, passim and afkal. In the Hejaz, afkal was the usual term, in the Sinai and Hisma region it was kāhin, in southern Syria it was kumra, and in the caravan cities of Palmyra and Hatra it was passim. Afkal comes from the Akkadian apkallu meaning wise or sage and its found in the Hejaz and Sinai peninsula. This was probably the highest authority if these titles were ranks and not just regional variation because the builders of a sanctuary at Wadi Ramm call themselves the servants of the afkal. Priestesses were known in Arabia, the most famous being [[Zarqah Al-Yamama]]. </div> <div lang="en" dir="ltr" class="mw-content-ltr"> Although a kāhin seems to be a priest like the others mentioned above as seen in ancient inscriptions which mention a kāhin of Allat in Ramm and a kāhin of Al-'Uzza in the Sinai, in Islamic-period texts the kāhin was a seer, oracle, and dream interpreter who used the aid of jinn. The title and the function are cognate with those of the ancient Hebrew kohen, their ability to divine what others could not perceive came from their tendency to be alone in wild places, to spend a lot of time in reflection, and to view the world with ‘the eye of enlightenment’ according to the historian al-Mas’udi. In addition, al-Mas’udi says, many of them were physically deformed, and made up in spirit for what they lacked in body: the celebrated legendary kāhin Satih, for example, supposedly had no bones in his body, and could be ‘rolled up like a gown’. When Mohammad first started experiencing his so-called revelation he suspected he was turning into a kāhin and to show why its enough to compare an oath of the kāhin Al-Khuza’i with an early chapter of the Quran: </div> <div lang="en" dir="ltr" class="mw-content-ltr"> أحلف بالنور والظلمة، وما بتهامة من بهمة ، وما بنجد من أكمة ، لقد خبأتم لي أطباق جمجمة، مع الفلندح أبي همهمة </div> <div lang="en" dir="ltr" class="mw-content-ltr"> قالوا: أصبت فاحكم بين هاشم بن عبد مناف وبين أمية بن عبد شمس أيهما أشرف </div> <div lang="en" dir="ltr" class="mw-content-ltr"> فقال: والقمر الباهر، والكوكب الزاهر، والغمام الماطر، وما بالجو من طائر، وما اهتدى بعلم مسافر، منجد أوغائر، لقد سبق هاشم أمية إلى المفاخر، أول منها وآخر </div> <div lang="en" dir="ltr" class="mw-content-ltr"> I swear by the light and the darkness, and by the boulders in Tihama, and by the hills in Najd, you have hidden for me plates of wooden cups, with Al-Falandah Abi Humaya. </div> <div lang="en" dir="ltr" class="mw-content-ltr"> So they said: You are right. So judge between Hashim bin Abd Manaf and Umayyah bin Abd Shams, which of them is more honorable? </div> <div lang="en" dir="ltr" class="mw-content-ltr"> He answered: By the moon that shines brightly, by the star that shows clearly, by the clouds that give rain, by all the birds in the air, by who is guided by the knowledge of a traveler, by the savior or attacker, Hashem has preceded Umayyah in feats, the first and the last </div> <div lang="en" dir="ltr" class="mw-content-ltr"> Now the first few verses of Surah Ash-Shams: </div> <div lang="en" dir="ltr" class="mw-content-ltr"> وَٱلشَّمْسِ وَضُحَىٰهَا, وَٱلْقَمَرِ إِذَا تَلَىٰهَا, وَٱلنَّهَارِ إِذَا جَلَّىٰهَا, وَٱلَّيْلِ إِذَا يَغْشَىٰهَا </div> <div lang="en" dir="ltr" class="mw-content-ltr"> By the sun and its forenoon brightness, by the moon when it follows it, by the day revealing it, by the night veiling it </div> <div lang="en" dir="ltr" class="mw-content-ltr"> Later, however, Mohammad tried to distance himself from the kāhin’s rhyming speech (سجع الكهان). But linguistically the Quran is uttered in the same high Arabic language that the rhymed speech of the seers and oracles shared with their poetry. The fact that Mohammad feared he was “turning into” a kāhin tells us a lot about what it was like to become one. Parallels can be drawn with how one would become a shaman among the Yurak of Siberia. Toward the approach of maturity the shamanic candidate begins to have visions, sings in his sleep, likes to wander in solitude, and so on; after this incubation period he attaches himself to a senior shaman to be taught. Among the Kazakh and Kyrgyz there’s the baqça, a singer, poet, musician, diviner, priest, and doctor, who appears to be the guardian of religious traditions. We must not take these comparisons too far, however, because these are unrelated traditions, because we know very little about how one was initiated into kāhinhood, and in order to not conflate kāhins with shamans who may have completely different religious roles. </div> <div lang="en" dir="ltr" class="mw-content-ltr"> == Sources == </div> <div lang="en" dir="ltr" class="mw-content-ltr"> # [//brill.com/view/title/61413 The Religion and Rituals of the Nomads of Pre-Islamic Arabia] # [//www.academia.edu/22452106/_Kamkam_the_Nabataean_Priestess_Priesthood_and_Society_in_Ancient_Arabia_Ugarit_to_Nabataea_Studies_in_Honor_of_John_F_Healey_eds_George_Anton_Kiraz_and_Zeyad_al_Salameen_Gorgias_Press ‘Kamkam the Nabataean Priestess] # [//archive.org/details/ARABIAANDTHEARABSFromTheBronzeAgeToTheComingOfIslamRobertG.Hoyland/ Arabia and the Arabs] # [//archive.org/details/arabsa3000yearhistoryofpeoplestribesandempires Arabs: A 3000 Year History] </div>
Navigation menu
Personal tools
English
Log in
Namespaces
Translate
English
expanded
collapsed
Views
Language statistics
Message group statistics
Export
More
expanded
collapsed
Search
Navigation
Main page
Recent changes
Random page
Help about MediaWiki
Tools
Special pages
Printable version