Encyclopedia of Islam

Further reading: Annemarie Schimmel, And Muham-

mad Is His Messenger: The Veneration of the Prophet in 

Islamic Piety (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina 

Press, 1985); Michael Sells, Early Islamic Mysticism: 

Sufi, Quran, Miraj, Poetic, and Theological Writings

(Mahwah, N.J.: Paulist Press, 1996); Abu Abd al-Rah-

man Sulami, Subtleties of Ascension: Early Mystical Say-

ings on the Prophet Muhammad’s Night Journey, the Isra 

wa Miraj. Translated by Frederick Colby (Louisville, 

Ky.: Fons Vitae, 2007).

Night of Destiny

 

(Arabic: Laylat al-Qadr; 

Persian: Shab-i Qadr/ Shab-e Qadr; 

alternate meaning: Night of Power)

If r

amadan

 is the most sacred Islamic month, Lay-

lat al-Qadr is the most sacred night in that month. 

The Arabic word qadr can mean both destiny and 

power; Muslim commentators have differed over 

which is the correct meaning. The phrase occurs in 

Sura 97 of the q

Uran

, which is called al-Qadr. The 

first verse in this chapter states, “Indeed we have 

revealed it on the Night of al-Qadr  . . . the Night 

of al-Qadr is better than a thousand months” (Q 

97: 1, 3). Some commentators have identified this 

passage with the event of Muhammad’s receiving 

the Quran in its entirety via angels who brought 

it down to him from heaven. This belief seems to 

contradict earlier accounts, which hold that the 

Quran was revealed gradually during the last 23 

years of Muhammad’s life. To reconcile the two 

views Muslim commentators have proposed that 

the 

angels

 first brought it down on one night 

from the Preserved Tablet (God’s heavenly book) 

to the lowest level of heaven and that from there 

g

abriel

 revealed it gradually to m

Uhammad

 in 

m

ecca

 and m

edina

. Still others say that the event 

refers only to Muhammad’s first 

revelation

 at the 

Mountain of Light Hira outside of Mecca. Euro-

American Islamic studies scholars have pointed 

out that the celebration of a single moment of 

revelation may have been inspired by pre-Islamic 

Jewish and Christian traditions of revelation, such 

as the revelation of the t

orah

 at Mount Sinai and 

the birth of J

esUs

. Shiis have added yet another 

level of meaning to this night, for they believe it 

is also when F

atima

 (ca. 605–633), Muhammad’s 

daughter and mother of the imams, was born, and 

when a

li

 

ibn

 a

bi

 t

alib

 (d. 661) was martyred.

The holiday falls on one of the last odd-num-

bered nights in Ramadan; Sunnis usually observe 

it on the 27th and Shiis on the 23rd. Devout 

Muslims customarily go to mosques to celebrate 

it, spending the entire night there in 

prayer

 and 

listening to Quran recitations. Some even go on 

retreat for up to 10 days at the end of Ramadan.