The Night of Destiny in Islam (aka Laylat Alqadr).

[Sam_777]

The Night of Destiny which is mentioned in (Quran 97:1) is better than one thousand months (around 83 years), its one of the last ten nights of Ramadan, where the Spirit and the Angels descend to earth.

My question is, was there any special night like that in the Torah or any other Jewish reference?

 

[Sister_Amy]

Night of Power.

 

[ralphinal]

There is the time when God would enter the Tent of meeting when they wandered the dessert. (Ex 40:35)

He was present in the Holiest of Holies, but that was constant and only once a year could a man enter.

 

[Contarini]

The Night of Destiny which is mentioned in (Quran 97:1) is better than one thousand months (around 83 years), its one of the last ten nights of Ramadan, where the Spirit and the Angels descend to earth.

My question is, was there any special night like that in the Torah or any other Jewish reference?

Passover. In the traditional Jewish Passover liturgy a child asks: “Why is this night different from all other nights of the year?” And the answer is that on this night God delivered our fathers from slavery in Egypt. The Christian Passover (called “Easter” in English) celebrates Jesus’ resurrection–the delivery of the whole human race from slavery to sin and death.

At the Easter Vigil (a night-time service), we (Anglicans and Catholics, and some other Christians as well) sing an ancient Christian hymn called the “Exultet,” which says among other things:

This is the night
when first you saved our fathers:
you freed the people of Israel from their slavery
and led them dry-shod through the sea.

This is the night
when the pillar of fire
destroyed the darkness of sin!

This is the night
when Christians everywhere,
washed clean of sin
and freed from all defilement,
are restored to grace
and grow together in holiness.

This is the night
when Jesus Christ broke the chains of death
and rose triumphant from the grave.

What good would life have been to us,
had Christ not come as our Redeemer?

Father, how wonderful your care for us!
How boundless your merciful love!
To ransom a slave you gave away your Son.

O happy fault, O necessary sin of Adam,
which gained for us so great a Redeemer!

Most blessed of all nights,
chosen by God to see Christ rising from the dead!
Of this night scripture says:
“The night will be clear as day:
it will become my light, my joy.”

The power of this holy night
dispels all evil, washes guilt away,
restores lost innocence, brings mourners joy;
it casts out hatred, brings us peace,
and humbles earthly pride.

Night truly blessed
when heaven is wedded to earth
and man is reconciled with God!

I’m quoting from this Catholic website. I like the translation in our Episcopal Book of Common Prayer better, but it is abridged and doesn’t include some of the relevant material.

The Eastern Christian churches don’t use this specific prayer, but they put even more emphasis on the “Easter Vigil.” I would guess that Muhammad may well have adapted Jewish and Christian concepts to give Muslims an equivalent celebration–he seems to me to have done that kind of thing a lot, though I know that the question is controversial!

Edwin

 

[Sam_777]

Thank you ralphinal & Contarini for your explanations.

For Amy,

The Arabic word “القدر” doesn’t reflect at all the word “Power” in English, its more toward “Destiny”, when we say in Arabic that this our destiny, we say “هذا قدرنا”, that is the problem when reading Quran in a language other than Arabic, its hard to understand the accurate meaning of its words.