Cave of Hira and Mountain of Nur

[Zeynab]

By Dr. Louay Fatoohi

The following are excerpts and photos from Dr. Fatoohi's article "One Night in a Cave that Changed History Forever."  Dr. Louay Fatoohi's writes about seeing the Cave of Hira and the Mountain of Nur when he and his wife visited Mekkah for Hajj and later for Umrah.

Amazingly, the cave faces the direction of the Ka‘ba, so when you pray in the cave you face the Ka‘ba. Remember that Muhammad worshipped and meditated here many years before Allah commanded Muslims to face the Ka’ba during prayer — some 14 years after the revelation of the Qur’an.

Muslims over the centuries continued to climb to the top of the 600-meter high Mountain of Hira’ to visit the cave where the Qur’an was first revealed and to seek blessings. The name Hira’ has become used almost exclusively for that cave, whereas the mountain has become known as the “Mountain of Nur (Light)”, in reference to the revelation of the light of the Qur’an. 

I first visited the cave in 2001, when I went for pilgrimage ... I visited it again when we went for ‘umra in 2006, which is when I took the photos in this article. Mecca is in a valley surrounded by desolate hills and mountains, so even when we were getting very close to the mountain we needed our taxi driver to point it out for us.

But that could not answer the question that started to occupy my mind as we were approaching the site: why and how did that seclusion seeking Meccan man choose this particular mountain? It looks just like any other mountain, but it probably looked different to him. Today there is a village at the bottom of the mountain, but in the early sixth century the mountain must have stood in an uninhabited area. This makes it even more mysterious as to how the Prophet chose this mountain. 

Climbing the mountain today is much easier than it used to be. Many pilgrims over the years have volunteered to pave the way for visitors. A relatively easy path has been made for a considerable part of the journey, and the friendliest route has been well marked. Some parts of the path have even been turned into relatively easy-to-climb steps.

Once you have squeezed yourself through the 3-meter long narrow path to the other side of the rocks you first come to a little open courtyard that is roughly 3x2 meters. At the end of this court is the cone-shaped cave. It is surrounded from the top, right, and left with the same building blocks of that place: large, heavy rocks. It is over 2 meters deep, and about 1.5 meters wide at the beginning, but less than a meter at the front end. It is too small for more than one person to stand comfortably to pray.

The top of the Mountain of Nur in that mountainous desert is surely one of the loneliest places. But the cave, and even the courtyard, is even more isolated. If you stand in the courtyard, you can only look over the surrounding rocks at the desert or, these days, building that are hundreds of meters down and hundreds of meters to many kilometers away. If you sit down, the surrounding rocks are just too high to see anything other than the sky. Inside the cave you are completely surrounded by those rocky walls. It is total isolation and complete emptiness. There is nothing of this world there to see or get distracted by — the ideal place for someone who wanted to forget the world and focus on what lies beyond the present, visible, and material.

No one can stay there even for a minute or two without feeling lonely. In my second visit, which took place when we went for 'umra, the pilgrims who were there before me left at some point and I found myself on my own for about 5 minutes before new visitors started to arrive. It was so lonely. You do not see or hear anyone, and you feel so apart from the rest of the world. It can be scary in the morning, but it must be utterly terrifying in the night. This is the place that Muhammad frequented and lived in for days and probably weeks, day and night. He wanted to be alone, away from all people, because he was seeking a different company. This is where Muhammad sought and worshipped Allah, the only God, who was going to inspire him, make him His last Prophet, and reveal the Qur’an to him. 

Visiting the Cave of Hira’ was one of the most moving and memorable experiences of my pilgrimage and later ‘umra. Having seen how well hidden the cave is, even to someone at its path, there is no way Muhammad, looking up from the bottom of that mountain, could have guessed that somewhere near the summit of that mountain there was a totally isolated cave. We do not know whether he climbed up the mountain looking for the cave he felt existed and needed to find, or whether he was made to find it having been led to explore that summit. But what is certain is that Muhammad must have been drawn to the cave. Allah wanted him to find the cave and make it the private abode that he would frequent to be on his own with Him and think of the spiritual matters that preoccupied him. 

My first visit to the cave left me with an overwhelming sense of amazement, reverence, and awe. The belief that it was Allah who led Muhammad to the cave was so intense. But the impact of what I saw and learned about that breathtaking cave and the Prophet’s miraculous journey to its discovery was too strong to easily neutralize by my knowledge that this miracle, like anything else, is easy for Allah to do.


A view of the surrounding terrain from the Mountain of Nur


Summit fo the Mountain of Nur


Steps made by pilgrims for reaching the Cave of Hira


You need to climb to the summit of the Mountain of Nur to descend to The Cave of Hira’


The steps leading to the narrow path to the Cave of Hira’


A view of the courtyard taken from the front end of the cave


Source: One Night in a Cave that Changed History Forever  by Dr. Louay Fatoohi