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They
had to move every few days to seek fresh pasture and
had to forever be ready to fight other clans to guard
their rights. These clashes forced the clans to live
in isolation without any chance of interaction with
other neighboring clans. The nomadic life precluded
schools and consequently, literacy. The end result
was a superstitious and ignorant people and a life
of extreme hardship, practically at starvation level.
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The Arabs had childish beliefs about divinity and
worshiped many Gods and Godlings and religion was
more superstition than any dogma. Though, Allah was
accepted to be a powerful or even a supreme God, there
were many other Godlings whose powers were restricted
to a particular area or function. There were stones
representing ancestors, grotesque figurines governing
fertility, and rag dolls. There were 'Gods' like Hubbal
or fearsome Moloch, who even, demanded an occasional
child sacrifice. By far the most popular deities were
the three 'daughters' of Allah - Lat, Mannat and Uzza,
who were considered very effective as intercessors
with Allah. The Arabs bowed to them all.
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In
spite of two super powers of that era, namely, Persia
and Byzantium, being their immediate neighbors, the
Arabs had the distinction of never being ruled by
outsiders. Though these mighty neighbors were constantly
at war with each other, neither bothered to have anything
to do with the Arabs. In any case the barren stretches
held nothing that these rich powers coveted and both
despised the ragged Arabs as an uncouth and loutish
people of no account.
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