The pause of revelation (Fatra)

Revelation ceased for a time after its first descent at Hira. The Sealed Nectar prefers, on the basis of Ibn Sa'd's report from Ibn Abbas, that the pause lasted days, and holds that the well-known claim of three years or two and a half years is not sound. ^{1 2 3}. Then Gabriel came to him a second time with the opening verses of the revelation of al-Muddaththir. ^{1 4 5}.

Ibn Sa'd relates from Ibn Abbas what indicates that the pause lasted days. This is the view the author prefers, and indeed it is settled for him after considering all aspects. The widely reported view that it lasted three years or two and a half years is, for him, not sound in any way. ^{1 2 3}

He remained during the days of the pause dejected and grieved, seized by bewilderment and amazement. ¹ The author cites what al-Bukhari relates in the Book of Interpretation: he grieved so much that he repeatedly went out intending to hurl himself from the peaks of high mountains. Whenever he reached the summit of a mountain, Gabriel appeared to him and told him that he was truly the Messenger of God ﷺ, and his heart would be calmed and he would return. When the pause lengthened for him, he would go out to do the same. ^{1 6} The author notes in a footnote that the word "ʿadā" is spelled with an unpointed ʿayn (from the root meaning to run), and in some copies with a dotted ghayn. ¹

The author cites Ibn Hajar that the cessation of revelation for days was meant to remove the terror he had felt and to create in him a longing for its return. When the certainty that he was a prophet was firmly established, and his watchful expectation of the coming of revelation became a cause of his steadiness, Gabriel came to him a second time. ^{1 2}

• The preference for "days" is the author's own, as he declares. The common view in the sira books is otherwise, and the event card carries the status "disputed."