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The Elkesaites were a Judeo-Christian baptismal sect that originated in the Transjordan and were active between 100 and 400 CE. [113] The members of this sect, like the Mandaeans, performed frequent baptisms for purification and had a Gnostic disposition. [113] [37]: 123 The sect is named after its leader Elkesai. [114]
Venezuela hosts the largest Druze communities outside the Middle East, [179] [180] estimated at 60,000 individuals. [83] Most of them trace their ancestry back to Lebanon and Syria. More than 200,000 people from the Suwayda area hold Venezuelan citizenship, the majority of whom belong to the Syria's Druze sect and immigrated to Venezuela in the ...
Pre-Islamic Arabic poetry is also monotheistic or henotheistic. [ 6 ] An important locus of pre-Islamic Arabian monotheism, the Himyarite Kingdom , ruled over South Arabia , whose ruling class converted to Judaism in the fourth century [ citation needed ] (roughly when official polytheistic inscriptions stopped appearing in the area) and who ...
Mandaeans are a closed ethno-religious community, practicing Mandaeism, which is a monotheistic, Gnostic, and ethnic religion [64]: 4 [126] [127] (Aramaic manda means "knowledge," and is conceptually related to the Greek term gnosis.) [127] Its adherents revere Adam, Abel, Seth, Enosh, Noah, Shem, Aram, and especially John the Baptist.
From the fourth to sixth centuries, Jewish, Christian, and other monotheistic populations developed. Until recent decades, it was believed that polytheism remained the dominant belief system in pre-Islamic Arabia, [2] but recent trends suggest that henotheism or monotheism was dominant from the fourth century onwards. [3] [4] [5]
Druze faith: an esoteric, monotheistic ethnic religion whose tenets include reincarnation and the eternity of the soul. It was founded by the Persian Hamza ibn Ali ibn Ahmad , an Ismaili mystic from Khorasan, and another important early preacher and 'prophet' of the religion was the Persian ad-Darazi , after whom the religion has taken its name.
These Mandaean Sabians, whose most important religious ceremony is baptism, [20] are monotheistic, and their holy book is known as the Ginza Rabba. [21]: 1 Mandaean Sabian prophets include Adam, Seth, Noah, Shem and John the Baptist with Adam being the founder of the religion and John being the greatest and final prophet. [22]: 45
One of the first actions performed by Ismā'īl I of the Safavid Empire was the proclamation of the Twelver denomination of Shia Islam as the official religion of Iran, causing sectarian tensions in the Middle East when he destroyed the tombs of the Abbasid caliphs, the Sunnī Imam Abū Ḥanīfa al-Nuʿmān, and the Ṣūfī Muslim ascetic ...