As for our short story, I'm still waiting for more of your plot development contributions and will write it up next week.

In the meantime, it's the month of Ramadan, which for the more than one billion Muslim inhabitants of the earth is a holy month.

Exactly 1400 years ago the Koran was revealed to Muhammad during Ramadan, the ninth month in the Islamic calendar. Hear more about how the Koran was revealed and what it means to people.

In many world religions a revelation is seen as the only source of divine communication with mankind.

The Old and New Testament - which are considered by Muslims to be Holy Books - tell many stories of revelation, be it the encounter by the Prophet Moses with a flaming bush, or the annunciation to Mary by a dove, or indeed the Apocalypses of St John.

But the revelation which came to the Prophet Muhammad is the most recent and maybe therefore the description of it keeps a lot of very human details.

What personally strikes me as a writer, when I'm reading manuscripts from that epoch, is a powerful mixture of astonishment, fear, doubt, honesty, devotion, loyalty and wisdom.

But most of all, this recounted revelation stands out to me as showcasing the bearing of the unbearable which fell upon a human being with such an intensity.

Just imagine for yourself: an illiterate man of 40 years' old. His nickname is 'Truthful' because he never lies to anyone. He goes to a cave for some seclusion and there, in solitude, he meditates night and day.

And in a moment, like a bolt from the blue, the rocks of the cave are lit with a blinding light, and an utterly alien gigantic creature appears in front of the man and starts to fight with him.

The angel caught me forcibly and pressed me so hard that I could not bear it any more. He then released me and again asked me to read. I replied, 'I do not know how to read'. Thereupon he caught me again and pressed me a second time till I could not bear it any more. He then released me and again asked me to read, but again I replied, 'I do not know how to read' (or what shall I read?). Thereupon he caught me for the third time and pressed me, and then released me and said: 'Read, in the name of Your Lord, who created, created man from a clot. Read!'

- Al-Bukhari, Book of Hadith As-Sahih

Tabari, one of the first biographers of the Prophet Muhammad (who, of course, was that man in the cave - the cave, incidentally, still exists), writes:

That evening, leaving the mountain, Muhammad went to Khadija - his wife - and said: 'O Khadija, I believe I am going mad.' Why, she asked? Because, he said, I see in myself the signs of the possessed: when I walk along the road, I hear voices from each stone and each hill; and, in the night, I dream of an immense being in front of me, a being whose head touches the sky and whose feet touch the earth; I do not know it and it approaches me in order to take me'... One day, finding himself with Khadija in his house, Muhammad said: 'O Khadija, this being appears to me, I see it. Khadija approached Muhammad, sat down, took him on her breast and said: Do you still see it? "Yes", he said. Then Khadija uncovered her head and her hair and said: "Do you see it now?" No, said Muhammad. Khadija said: Rejoice. It is not a demon but an angel.

This story was first told to me by my Granny, when I was a child. In her version there was another stage after the part about the dishevelled hair. She used to go on: 'Then Our Lady Kadija stretched her legs and the Angel ashamedly disappeared. Shaytan (Satan) would be shameless. That was the difference!'

The documents of the epoch tell us that even then, both of them consulted Waraqah ibn Nawfal, Khadijah's relative and a learned Christian, about it. Waraqah told Muhammad that he had encountered the very one whom God had sent to Moses, and that he would be driven out by his people.

And so began that middle-aged illiterate man's prophethood, which has changed the world so much.



