ures from the Byzantine authorities, Meccan society was "not entirely unfamiliar with monotheistic doctrines" (Fisher 23). Bedouin society was based on ties of kinship through clans and tribes. The Bedouin valued individual prowess, especially in battle, tenacity and endurance. He had little attachment to the common good "beyond that which pertains to his tribe" (Hitti 10). The traditional values of Bedouin society were threatened by the emergence of a mercantile culture in Mecca. According to Fisher, "kinship of money was supplanting that of blood" (31). Lacking any sense of nationhood, Arabia was then in a state of quasi-anarchy. Lapidus says that "violent conflicts between clans and tribes became more frequent" (17). He says that "commercial activities brought in their wake social stratification on the basis of wealth and morally inassimilable discrepancies between individual situations and the imperatives of clan loyalty. Everything was in question; nothing was decided" (30). Hitti say
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