Birth of John the Baptist

“Tell us now, what name shall we give him? Shall we give him for name, 'Yaqif of Wisdom' that he may teach the Book in Jerusalem? Or shall we give him the name 'Zatan the Pillar' so that the Jews may swear by him and commit no deceit."

"When Enishbai hear this she cried out and she said: "Of all these names which you name will I not give him one: but the name Yahya-Yohana will I give him (the name) which Life's self has given unto him."

But what if Yahia is not an Arab word this would then place a different role on the dating of the Mandaic Book of John. Although there still was a redaction after Islamic conquest of the area due to the phrases that indicate Islamic activity—the term Yahyia may be exempt from proof.

In the Qu’ran the we read that John the Baptist is born to the aged Zechariah and his old and barren wife. The name given to John the Baptist is Yahya.

“Also the Book of John (Drasia d-Iahia) was probably redacted after the Muslim conquest, probably in the 8th century AD. It mentions Muhammad and gives the name of John the Baptist as iahia iuhana. A number of scholars agree that the form of the name iahia (Ar. Yahya) is an Arabian influence in Mandaean literature which also shows the collection was made during the Islamic period.” Knowledge of Life by Sinasi Gunduz page 56

The first item that a Christian reader will notice is the phrase “on none by that name have We conferred distinction before”. The Bible refers to the name John or Jonathan many times. In the Old Testament there are more than twenty-five references to the name Jonathan. Since Mohammed was the author of the Qu’ran was he ignorant of the Jewish and Christian books and did not clearly understand that the name John or Jonathan are common name?

Abraham Geiger wrote:

“He [Mohammed] actually asserts that before John the Baptist no one had borne the name of John. Had he known anything of Jewish history he would have been aware that, apart from some historically unimportant people of the name mentioned in Chronicles, the father and the son of the celebrated Maccabean priest, Mattathias, were both called John. This mistake must have been obvious to the Arabic commentators, for they try to give another meaning to the clear and unmistakable words.”
Abraham Geiger, Judaism And Islam 1970, Ktav Publishing HouseInc.: New York, pp. 19.

"I saw the prophet when I was a pagan. He was saying to the people, ‘if you want to save yourselves, accept that there is no God but Allah’ At this moment I noticed a man behind him saying ‘he is a sabi.’ When I asked somebody who he was he told me he was ‘Abu Lahab, his uncle'

Of the relationship between the Sabians who lived in Sawad (in Iraq ) and Mohammed it is mention that the polytheists of Mecca were heard to say of Mohammed "he has become a Sabian." by ‘Ibn Jurayi (d. 767) and ‘Ata ‘ibn Abi Rabah (d.732) in The Knowledge of Life by Sinasi Gunduz (Journal of Semitic Studies pg. 18)

" He (Mohammed) is a Sabian" by ‘Ibn Jurayi (who lived in the 8th century) The Knowledge of Life by Sinasi Gunduz (Journal of Semitic Studies pg. 25)

“The prophet and his companions are referred to as "these are the Sabians" comparing Mohammed to the Sabians” by ‘Abd al-Rahman ‘ibn Zayd (d798 AD) in The Knowledge of Life by Sinasi Gunduz (Journal of Semitic Studies pg. 18)

Is the name Yahya indicate an Arab word? Was this term used both in the Qu’ran and in Pre-Islamic literature? If Yahya was not a common Arab term then where did Mohammed get the word Yahya? Could it not be that Mohammed was ignorant of traditional Christian and Jewish theology but knew of information that the other two religions had rejected or forgot about? If Mohammed had been a Sabian and knew that John the Baptist proper name was Yahya then would he not pass on that information in the creation of the Qu’ran?

The Quran uses two words to indicate the word John—one being Yuhanna and the other Yahya specifically only for John the Baptist.

The Bible translated into Arabic uses the word Yuhanna not only in the title of the gospel the Book of John, but also, for example, in Maccabees and the New Testament.

The Qur'ān, also written in Arabic, uses the word Yuhanna for all instances of the word John including the gospel “Book of John” but for John the Baptist the word Yahya is used.

Is the name Yahya really an Arabic word or could it have come from a foreign source into Arabic. Could Yahya really been a Mandaic word brought into the Arabic instead of vice versa? The word Sabian, which the Mandaeans are known by, is an example of how the Arabic used a Mandaic word.

The Qur’an simply gives the description of what the Mandaeans are noted for: Subbai- baptizers. It is generally assumed that the Mandaeans were not known as Sabians until Mohammed gave them that title. But in reality we have “Sabian” terminology used way before the time of Mohammed.

The word Masbuthaeans comes from the same root as the word Sabian. In Mandaic the word Masbuta is the term used for the baptismal rite. The Mandaic word Masbuta also comes from the root SBA that means to immerse, dip in, or baptize.

Eusebius recounts the works of Hegesippus who named the sects that once existed among the Jews.

In fact the Arabs might not have taken the term directly from Syriac but from the Mandaic verb sb’. The ‘ayn of Syriac words disappears in Mandaic and sometimes turns to alaf. We find sb’ means “to baptize, immerse, dip ion” in Mandaic, a changed form of Syriac sb’.
The Knowledge of Life by Sinasi Gunduz (Journal of Semitic Studies pg.20)

The word “Sobiai” again appears to be a variation of the word Sabian (Sabaean). The Sabians as we already know are the Mandaeans who would have been in the general area where Elchasai is said to come from. We also know that by the date of 220 AD the Mandaeans literature did exist due to the incorporation of that material in the work of Mani. Hippolytus says that Elchasai gave the book to the “Sobiai” but it is more probable that the “Sobiai” (Mandaeans) gave the book idea to Elchasai. If the Mandaeans had not received their theology until after 100 AD, courtesy of Elchasai, it would be very difficult to create a whole new religion with numerous books, a large following, and a new language in barely 100 years. It is only logical to assume that Elchasai used some of the Mandaean material in much the same way as Mani did a century later.

Since we know that the word Sabian (Sabaean) can be traced from the Mandaic into the Arabic and the word was used to describe religious sects from at least 100 AD—could not the Yahya also be looked at in a different light. Do we have to assume that because the Arabs use the word Yahyia it came from Arabic to Mandaic or can the vice versa be in order as in the word Sabian.

Al-Suyūtī states in his Al-Itqān fī cUlūm al-Qur'ān

"Only a few rare Nazoraeans are still to be found, and these in Upper Egypt and beyond Arabia, but the remainder of the Ossaeans (Essenes), who used to dwell where their Ancestors did, above the Dead Sea and on the other side with the Sampsaeans (that is the Sabaeans), no longer practice Jewish customs. They have become associated with the Ebionites.”

We also know of the Sobiai from an account of Hippolytus (c. 150 to 235 AD) who wrote about a man who came to Rome in possession of a book. The man was, Alcibiades from Apamea (a city in Syria), who came to Rome in about 217 to 222 during the reign of Callistus. The book is said to be revealed to “Elchasai” in about 100 AD by a male angel. “Elchasai” is said to have received this book from Serae (a city in Parthia) and that he had given the book to “Sobiai”.

“The doctrine of this Callistus having been noised abroad throughout the entire world, a cunning man, and full of desperation, one called Alcibiades, dwelling in Apamea, a city of Syria, examined carefully into this business. And considering himself a more formidable character, and more ingenious in such tricks, than Callistus, he repaired to Rome; and he brought some book, alleging that a certain just man, Elchasai had received this from Serae, a town of Parthia, and that he gave it to one called Sobiai”

The Mandaeans seem to have originated in Mesopotamia about the 5th century A.D. The sect has drawn heavily on biblical, Syriac Christian and Manichean sources for its teachings, though also incorporating some more ancient Mesopotamian ideas and practices. Their technical religious vocabulary cannot be explained apart from the Peshitta (a Syriac Bible used by Nestorian and Jacobite Christians), and their scriptures show clear evidence of having been written down in Islamic times

Unfortunately he is not a Mandaean scholar and many of his facts are wrong. Whereas he correctly indicates that the word Yahya does not appear in Pre-Islamic literature he fails to take note of the Mandaean use of the word Yahya. Instead using old data he declares the Mandaeans to date to the 5th century AD and based on Manichaeism which is completely false since it is Manichaeiam that incorporates. He also completely fails to take notice of the overwhelming Jewish connection in favor of a strong Christian origin.

If Yahyia is not Aramic in origin then is it just a coincidence that Arabic word haya, has its counterpart in Aramaic and Hebrew, and are certainly cognates, identical in origin?

In Arabic, the present form Yahyia is the third person of the Arabic root haya. The Arabic root haya can be written either with a lean alīf or an upright alīf as shown in e present and past forms. This root has two distinct meanings. ( Lexicon Syriacum by C. Brockelmann, Halix Saxonum, Sumptibus: Max Niemeyer 1928, pp. 228-229 and A Compendious Syriac Dictionary by J. Payne Smith (ed.), 1967, Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 138-139.)

Those two meanings are describe as:

C'est la correction Youhanna pour Yahyā Youhanna au lieu de Yahyā, nom de saint Jean-Baptiste. Je n'osais pas la publier, d'abord pour la raison générale énoncée plus haut, ensuite parce qu'elle entraīne une curieuse conséquence. En effet, les Mandaļtes ou pseudo-Chrétiens de saint Jean, qu'on identifie aux Sābiens du Coran, ont un livre oł leur principal prophčte est appelé Yahio. Si ce nom est dū ą une erreur de lecture des rédacteurs du Coran, le livre est nécessairement postérieur ą la diffusion du Coran canonique et toutes les théories édifiées sur cette identification s'écroulent.

It is the correction Youhanna for Yahyā, Youhanna instead of Yahyā, the name of Saint John the Baptist. I did not dare to publish it, firstly for the general reason stated earlier, because it leads to an odd coincidence. Indeed, the Mandaeans or pseudo-Christians of Saint John, identified with the Sabians of the Qur'ān, have a book where their principal Prophet is called Yahio. If that name was due to a misreading of the writers of the Qur'ān, the book would necessarily be older than the diffusion of the canonical Qur'ān and all the theories built on that identification would fall apart.

The first is derived from al-hayah, i.e., life which is the opposite of death like when it is said: lan ansa laka hadha as-sanīca ma hayīt,

The second meaning of the Arabic root haya is derived from al-haya' ending with a hamzah meaning shyness/chastity.

“And No One Had The Name Yahyā ( John?) Before: A Linguistic & Exegetical Enquiry Into Qur'ān 19:7” by M S M Saifullah, Muhammad Ghoniem & Elias Karīm 18th August 2000
http://www.islamic-awareness.org/Quran/Contrad/External/yahya.html

Now we come to the Mandaean use of the term Yahia-Yohanna. Many Western scholars have suggested various explanations for this term with the prevalent being that the name Yahia being inserted into the scriptures at a later date due to Islamic influence. There are two ways that we can look at this term.

The first is that the Yahia part is the malwasha and that the Yohana part is the common name or that the name Yahia Yohana was the original name of John the Baptist

The Mandaeans and the Quran is not the only place where you see the nameYahia used for John the Baptist. The Encyclopaedia Judaica (Encyclopaedia Judaica (CD-ROM Edition), 1997, Judaica Multimedia (Israel) Limited.) uses the term Yahya Ibn Zakariyya only and no mention of the word Yohana. So now we have 3sources for the word Yahia.

We know in Josepheus that