The First Revelation at Cave Hira

Around the year 610 CE, while Muhammad ﷺ was in seclusion in the Cave of Hira outside Mecca, the angel Jibril appeared to him and commanded, 'Read.' Muhammad ﷺ, who was unlettered, replied that he could not read. The angel embraced him tightly and repeated the command two more times, before reciting the first verses of what would become Surah Al-'Alaq: 'Read in the name of your Lord who created — created man from a clinging substance. Read, and your Lord is the most Generous.' Shaken by the experience, Muhammad ﷺ returned home trembling and asked his wife Khadijah to cover him. She comforted him and, seeking further reassurance, took him to her cousin Waraqah ibn Nawfal, an elderly man familiar with earlier scripture, who recognized the description of what had happened as the same kind of revelation given to earlier prophets, and told Muhammad ﷺ that he would likely be opposed by his own people, as prophets before him had been. This event marks the beginning of Muhammad's ﷺ prophethood and the start of the Quran's revelation. A pause in revelation followed before it resumed and continued steadily over the next twenty-three years, but this first night — commemorated by many Muslims as connected to Laylat al-Qadr, the Night of Decree — is regarded as the pivotal moment Islam began.