There are books full of accounts about the increase of the descendants of Esma’il, in course of time to such an extent that the city of Mekkah could no longer contain them. Consequently some of them left the sanctuary for the purpose of settling in various parts of Arabia, and every individual who intended to depart took one stone from the sanctuary, deposited it in a clean place wherever he settled, and circumambulated it as he would have done in a pilgrimage in the house of Allah. This custom was practised to such a degree that at last the people took up any stone which appeared to be handsome, placed it in a proper spot, visited and circumambulated it. At last the book of Ebrahim fell into oblivion among them, and they, having been misled and seduced by Satan, began to worship statues, imagining idolatry to be a very laudable religion. Despite of this abominable custom, they acted in some instances according to the law of Ebrahim, performed the ceremonies of the pilgrimage in the usual way, and considered it necessary and incumbent upon themselves to magnify the sanctuary of the Lord, and to honour the house of the Ka’bah.
Some people are of opinion that idolatry originated in the following manner: There was a man called Asâf, and a woman whose name was Nâila, both belonging to the tribe of Jorham. On a certain occasion both were overpowered by lust, and committed adultery with each other in the very house of the Ka’bah, but the mighty Lord and powerful Avenger instantly changed them into a stone whilst in the very act. Then the inhabitants of Mekkah bore the two bodies of stone out of the Ka’bah, and, as a warning to the people, they erected the body of Asâf on the top of mount Safâ, and that of Nâila at Marva. In course of time the descendants of the Lord Esma’il abandoned the religion of Ebrahim, and began to worship the two statues. The first man who altered the orthodox faith of the Friend of the Merciful, and invited the people to worship Asâf and Nâila, was A’mru Bin Lahi Khozaa’i; it is recorded in some books that he brought a statue of Hobal from Syria, erected it on a mountain near Mekkah, and advised the inhabitants to adore it. The record of Hobal, which was the chief idol of the Qoraish, will—if it pleaseth Allah—be inserted in the second section of this work. After A’mru had introduced his abominations, idolatry became current among the Arabs, so that the tribe Zu-A’ineen worshipped Manah,* whose statue they placed in a house near the seashore. This idol was also worshipped by the tribe Ansâr during the time of ignorance [i.e. before Muhammad]. For U’zza, which was one of the principal idols, they built a house at Nakhlah; the Beni Khozaa’ and the Qoraish went on pilgrimages to it in the same way as to the Ka’bah, to obtain worldly and eternal grandeur. The Thaqeef, who were of the noblest among the Arabs, also girded their loins of obedience to Lât,* which idol they considered to be the means for attaining their desires, and idolatry flourished among the Arabs until the propitious standard of Muhammad was raised.