Ruḍāʾ is a

deity A deity or god is a supernatural being considered to be sacred and worthy of worship due to having authority over some aspect of the universe and/or life. The ''Oxford Dictionary of English'' defines ''deity'' as a God (male deity), god or god ...

that was of paramount importance in the

Arab Arabs (, , ; , , ) are an ethnic group mainly inhabiting the Arab world in West Asia and North Africa. A significant Arab diaspora is present in various parts of the world. Arabs have been in the Fertile Crescent for thousands of years ...

pantheon of gods worshipped by the North Arabian tribes of

pre-Islamic Arabia Pre-Islamic Arabia is the Arabian Peninsula and its northern extension in the Syrian Desert before the rise of Islam. This is consistent with how contemporaries used the term ''Arabia'' or where they said Arabs lived, which was not limited to the ...

.Lipinski, 2000, pp. 618-619. He is first mentioned in the annals of

Esarhaddon Esarhaddon, also spelled Essarhaddon, Assarhaddon and Ashurhaddon (, also , meaning " Ashur has given me a brother"; Biblical Hebrew: ''ʾĒsar-Ḥaddōn'') was the king of the Neo-Assyrian Empire from 681 to 669 BC. The third king of the S ...

in the early 7th century BCE. He served as a protective deity. According to modern scholarly interpretations, Ruda was a

moon deity A lunar deity or moon deity is a deity who represents the Moon, or an aspect of it. These deities can have a variety of functions and traditions depending upon the culture, but they are often related. Lunar deities and Moon worship can be foun ...

Etymology

The

etymology Etymology ( ) is the study of the origin and evolution of words—including their constituent units of sound and meaning—across time. In the 21st century a subfield within linguistics, etymology has become a more rigorously scientific study. ...

of his name gives the meaning "well disposed" an indication of his function as a protective deity.

Attestations

Pre-Islamic era

The oldest reference to Ruda is found in the annals of

who ruled over the

Neo-Assyrian Empire The Neo-Assyrian Empire was the fourth and penultimate stage of ancient Assyrian history. Beginning with the accession of Adad-nirari II in 911 BC, the Neo-Assyrian Empire grew to dominate the ancient Near East and parts of South Caucasus, Nort ...

from 681 to 669 BC. The name is transliterated into Latin script from the original Akkadian as ''Ru-ul-da-a-a-ú'' and he is mentioned among the gods of the Arabs. Known as Arsu among the Palmyrenes, in a later

Palmyrene Aramaic Palmyrene Aramaic was a Middle Aramaic dialect, exhibiting both Eastern and Western Aramaic grammatical features, and is therefore often regarded as a dialect continuum between the two branches. It was primarily documented in Palmyra itself, bu ...

inscription, Arsu/Ruda is paired with the

Syrian Syrians () are the majority inhabitants of Syria, indigenous to the Levant, most of whom have Arabic, especially its Levantine and Mesopotamian dialects, as a mother tongue. The cultural and linguistic heritage of the Syrian people is a blend ...

god Resheph, a protective deity for his worshippers from the 3rd millennium BC. An

ancient North Arabian Languages and scripts in the 1st Century Arabia Ancient North Arabian (ANA) is a collection of scripts and a language or family of languages under the North Arabian languages branch along with Old Arabic that were used in north and central Ara ...

inscription found in the region of

Najd Najd is a Historical region, historical region of the Arabian Peninsula that includes most of the central region of Saudi Arabia. It is roughly bounded by the Hejaz region to the west, the Nafud desert in Al-Jawf Province, al-Jawf to the north, ...

refer to Ruda and other gods of the

pantheon, providing evidence of how all things good and bad were attributed to the agency of gods.Hoyland, 2001, p. 207. Examples of such inscriptions referring to Ruda include, "by Ruda are we" and "by Ruda is weeping".

Islamic era

Ruda is mentioned in

Hisham ibn al-Kalbi Hishām ibn al-Kalbī (), 737 – 819 CE / 204 AH, also known as Ibn al-Kalbi (), was an Arab historian. His full name was Abu al-Mundhir Hisham ibn Muhammad ibn al-Sa'ib ibn Bishr al-Kalbi. Born in Kufa, he spent much of his life in Baghdad. L ...

's ''

Book of Idols The ''Book of Idols'' ('), written by the Arab scholar Hisham ibn al-Kalbi (737–819), is the most popular Islamic work about the religion in pre-Islamic Arabia. Arabian religion before Muhammad is described as polytheistic and idolatrous. Ibn a ...

''. The name ''Abd-Ruda'' was said to be known at the time. Al-Kalbi reports that some traditionists relate Ruda to a temple belonging to the Banu Rabi’ah ibn Sa’d ibn Zayd ibn Manat tribe. During the early days of

Islam Islam is an Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the Quran, and the teachings of Muhammad. Adherents of Islam are called Muslims, who are estimated to number Islam by country, 2 billion worldwide and are the world ...

, the temple was destroyed.

Scholarly interpretations

Dierk Lange writes that Ruda formed part of a trinity of gods worshipped by the Assyrian-attested Yumu´il confederation of northern Arabian tribes, which he identifies with the

Ishmaelites The Ishmaelites (; ) were a collection of various Arab tribes, tribal confederations and small kingdoms described in Abrahamic tradition as being descended from and named after Ishmael, a prophet according to the Quran, the first son of Abraha ...

.Lange, 2004, pp. 268-269. According to Lange, Ruda was the

, Nuha the sun deity, and Atarsamain the main deity was associated with

Venus Venus is the second planet from the Sun. It is often called Earth's "twin" or "sister" planet for having almost the same size and mass, and the closest orbit to Earth's. While both are rocky planets, Venus has an atmosphere much thicker ...

. A trinity of gods representing the sun, moon and Venus is also found among the peoples of the South Arabian kingdoms of

Awsan The Kingdom of Awsan, commonly known simply as Awsan (; ), was a kingdom in Ancient South Arabia, centered around a wadi called the Wadi Markha. The wadi remains archaeologically unexplored. The name of the capital of Awsan is unknown, but it is ...

Ma'in Ma'in (; ) was an ancient South Arabian kingdom in modern-day Yemen. It was located along the strip of desert called Ramlat al-Sab'atayn, Ṣayhad by medieval Arab geographers, which is now known as Ramlat al-Sab'atayn. Wadd was the national ...

Qataban Qataban () was an ancient Yemenite kingdom in South Arabia that existed from the early 1st millennium BCE to the late 1st or 2nd centuries CE. It was one of the six ancient South Arabian kingdoms of ancient Yemen, along with Sabaʾ, Maʿīn ...

and

Hadramawt Hadhramaut ( ; ) is a geographic region in the South Arabia, southern part of the Arabian Peninsula which includes the Yemeni Governorates of Yemen, governorates of Hadhramaut, Shabwah Governorate, Shabwah and Al Mahrah Governorate, Mahrah, D ...

between the 9th and 4th centuries BC. There, the deity associated with Venus was

Astarte Astarte (; , ) is the Greek language, Hellenized form of the Religions of the ancient Near East, Ancient Near Eastern goddess ʿAṯtart. ʿAṯtart was the Northwest Semitic languages, Northwest Semitic equivalent of the East Semitic language ...

, the sun deity was Yam, and moon deity was variously called

Wadd Wadd () (Ancient South Arabian script: 𐩥𐩵) or Ved, if translated to English, was the national god of the Kingdom of Ma'in, inhabited by the Minaean peoples, in modern-day South Arabia. Wadd is mentioned once in the Quran as part of a l ...

, Amm and

Sin In religious context, sin is a transgression against divine law or a law of the deities. Each culture has its own interpretation of what it means to commit a sin. While sins are generally considered actions, any thought, word, or act considered ...

References

Bibliography

* *
at Google Books
* * Arabian gods Stellar gods Lunar gods {{MEast-myth-stub