to the Almighty, and the waters of the sea become sweet in a moment of time! This night is frequently confounded[1] with the Shab-i-Barát; but even the Qurán itself does not appear to be quite clear on the subject, for in the Surat-i-Dukhán we read, "By this clear book. See, on a blessed night have we sent it down, for we would warn mankind, on the night wherein all things are disposed in wisdom." In which it appears that the blessed night, or the Laylut-ul-Mubarak, is both the night of record and the night upon which the Qurán came down from heaven, although the one is supposed to be the twenty-seventh day of Ramazán, and the other the fifteenth of Shabán.
M. Geiger identifies the Ramazán with the fast of the tenth (Leviticus xxiii. 27); it is, however, far more likely that the fast of the Tenth is identical with the ʾId-i-Ashura, not only because the Hebrew ʾAsúr, ten, is retained in the title of that Muhammadan fast; but also because there is a Jewish tradition (vide Adam Clark), that creation began upon the
- ↑ By Lane, in his "Egyptians," and by other writers.
