ern terms as deity, majesty, highness, state, government,
direction, counsel; in these expressions the abstract quality or act is
incarnated in certain persons, and so we may imagine that at a certain
stage of society any quality or act might be isolated and regarded as a
personal thing. A series of victories, for example, might suggest the
conception of 'victory' as a thing present in these events, and the
tendency to personalize would then create the divine figure Victory.
Historically a personalization may have arisen, in some cases, through
the isolation of an epithet of a deity (so, for example, Fides may have
come from Dius Fidius),[1188] but in such cases the psychological basis
of the personalization is the same as that just stated. From these, as
is remarked above, must be distinguished poetical and philosophical
abstractions.

+697+. Whatever be the explanation of the process, we find in fact a
large number of cases in which such abstractions appear as deities and
receive worship.

+698+. _Semitic._ The material for the Semitic religions on this point
is scanty.[1189] The Arabic divine names supposed by Noeldeke to
represent abstractions are Man[=a]t (fate), Sa'd (fortune), Ru[d.][=a]
(favor), Wadd (love), Man[=a]f (height), 'Au[d.] (time). Whether these
are all abstract terms is doubtful. _Wadd_ means also 'lover,' divine
friend or patron. _Sa'd_ occurs as adjective 'fortunate,' is the
appellation of certain stars, and the god Sa'd is identified by an Arab
poet with a certain rock[1190]--the rock is doubtless an old local
divinity. _Ru[d.][=a]_ is found apparently only as a divine name (in
Palmyrene and Safa inscriptions and as a god of an Arabian tribe)--the
form may be concrete, in the sense of 'favoring,' divine patron. As
"time" (_dahr_, _zaman_) often occurs in Arabic poetry in the sense of
'fate,' the god 'Au[d.] may be an embodiment of this conception.[1191]
_Man[=a]f_, if understood, as is possible, in the sense 'high place,' is
not abstract but concrete, though in that case the original reference of
the term is not clear.

+699+. Man[=a]t is one of the three great goddesses of Mecca, the others
being Al-Lat ('the goddess') and Al-Uzza ('the mighty one'); as these
two names are concrete, there is a certain presumption that _Man[=a]t_
likewise is concrete. The original meaning of the word is obscure. It
does not occur as a common noun, but from the same stem come terms
meaning 'doom, death,'[1192] a