Pre-Islamic-Arabs worshiped a number of spirits, and they were generally nature-oriented spirits, sometimes associated with natural features like trees or rocks or strength. And the Kaaba in Mecca was one of a number of these sanctuaries, centered around a particular cluster of deities.

 

It was said the Hebrew patriarch Abraham himself built the Kaaba centuries before, and that a sacred black stone it held within had fallen from the sky. In these turbulent times, the Kaaba provided a rare place of peace. Only here would the Bedouin submit to a temporary truce before returning to their conflicts of the open sands.

 

There was this one place in the middle around the Kaaba, which was from even Pre-Islamic times, was a place of a sacred enclosure, where all people had to put down their arms and this of course facilitated trading, because it meant that you couldn't carry on your feuds when you were doing your buying and selling.

 

The spiritual and economic importances of the Kaaba in Mecca are pretty hard to separate as far as Pre-Islamic-Arabs are concerned.

 

The Kaaba made Mecca a vibrant center for trade. Here were found Arabian incense, exotic perfumes and Indian spices, Chinese silks and Egyptian linens. But perhaps the greatest treasure to be found in Mecca was the rich mixture of cultures.

 

There were people who came through town, who had all kinds of interesting experiences to relate to faraway places. The local religion was mixed---there were Christians, there were Jews, and there were also the Arabs of the desert who followed an animist type of religion.

 

Muhammad's world was a center of trade, connecting the Mediterranean Sea to the Indian Ocean, linking the aging empires of Byzantium and Persia to the great bazaars of India and China. Muhammad became a merchant. In fact, he had a great flair for trade. At the age of 25, while leading a caravan northward to Syria, his talents caught the eye of the shipment's owner, a wealthy widow named Khadija.