Today we begin 1st Kings Chapter 10.
For the Complete Jewish Bible, click HERE.
For the King James Bible, click HERE.
“When the queen of Sh’va heard what was being said about Shlomo because of the name of Adonai, she came to test him with difficult questions.”- 1 Kings 10:1
Chapter 10 kicks off rapid-fire with the entrance of the Queen of Saba onto Solomon’s court.
What’s that?
You’re wondering why I’m calling her Queen Saba instead of Queen Sheba.
Well, homie, it turns out there’s a very valid reason why.
The Hebrew name is שְׁבָא (Sh’va/Sheva), and the Masoretic text gives it an “sh” sound.
But there’s an interesting wrinkle here.
The ancient Hebrew spelling system didn’t clearly show the difference between an “s” sound and an “sh” sound.
And ancient Greek translations render her name as SABA.
On top of that, the historical South Arabian kingdom was known as SABA.
So that’s why I’m calling her the Queen of SABA instead of SHEBA.
Now, can I prove some ancient Hebrew copyist was smoking too much marijuana when he wrote a SH instead of an S?
Nope.
But that’s where I stand.
Onward.
So, Saba was the capital city of the Sabeans, an ancient Arabian culture.
They were deeply involved in pagan worship, including the worship of the moon and other ancient Arabian deities.
Now here’s where things get interesting.
The Queen of Saba doesn’t just appear in the Bible.
Her story also shows up in the Qur’an, in Sura 27.
And that raises a much bigger question:
What exactly was the religious world of Arabia before Islam came along?
Because the Queen of Saba lived hundreds of years before Muhammad.
She came from a kingdom where people worshipped pagan gods.
And centuries later, the Qur’an tells her story as part of its own account of Solomon.
So let’s take a closer look at the gods of ancient Arabia.
Because the world Muhammad was born into was not a religious vacuum.
Arabia was already filled with temples, idols, priests, sacrifices, and different gods.
And one of the most important gods was Allah.
Yep.
Allah.
Now, here’s where things get interesting.
Muslims will tell you that Allah is simply the Arabic name for the one true God.
And technically, the word Allah does mean “God” in Arabic.
But that doesn’t automatically tell us how the word was used in Arabia before Islam.
Remember, Muhammad didn’t invent the Arabic language.
He didn’t invent the word Allah.
And he didn’t invent the religious culture of Arabia.
Those things were already there.
In fact, pre-Islamic Arabs already knew the name Allah.
The real question is:
What did they believe about Allah before Muhammad?
And this is where the Qur’an tells us something verrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrry interesting.
The Qur’an describes Muhammad’s pagan opponents as acknowledging Allah as the Creator.
In other words, they weren’t simply saying:
“We don’t believe in Allah.”
They acknowledged Allah.
But they also worshipped other gods alongside Him.
That’s a humongo distinction, homie!
And that leads to our takeaway for today.
True biblical monotheism didn’t come from Arabia.
It came through the Hebrews.
Before Christianity, with its freaky Trinity theology.
And before Islam…
There was Israel.
Israel received the revelation of the one true God of the universe and carried that truth through the generations.
Never forget that.
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