MUHAMMAD’S  VISION

  

Islam’s origin is ascribed to a vision in which the angel Gabriel appeared to the still pagan Muhammad. Many explanations have been proposed as the source of the vision(s), ranging from divine inspiration, demonic possession, psychiatric disorders, dreams, trances, seizures, or just plain lies and deceptions. 

There is another explanation for Muhammad’s vision, if its description is revisited in the light of what is known now, in the 21^st century. 

The description of Muhammad’s vision appears in several sources; one is his most authoritative biographer, Ibn Ishaq, who was ordered by the Caliph in Baghdad one hundred thirty years after his death, to write down everything known about him. Ishaq’s primary resources were the ahadith, or “traditions,” which were collections of the words and actions of Muhammad. The original sources from which these collections were taken had been written down on down on leaves, bits of animal skin, and other somewhat fragile bits of material subject to deterioration, and put away in a box. Another resource was the strong oral tradition that existed among the Arabs, as it did in many societies where literacy was not common. In this case, much material had been memorized and handed down from one generation to the next.  

It appears that Ishaq was very inclusive; he wrote down everything he could find, even though much of the material appeared contradictory, and according to Western standards, much of it was unsavory. 

Muhammad's Relevant Life History

Muhammad was born in Mecca in 570 A.D., shortly after the death of his father. As was customary, he was given to a Bedouin wet nurse to be cared for as an infant. Early in life, at around four years of age, Muhammad was said to have had some form of seizure. 

The seizure alarmed Muhammad’s nurse, since seizures were thought to result from demonic possession. Shortly afterwards, when he was five, he was returned to the care of his mother. About a year later, when Muhammad was six, his mother died. He was cared for then first by his grandfather, and after his grandfather’s death, by his uncle.

In his uncle’s household, religious rites were strictly observed, and Muhammad grew up well steeped in the pagan traditions of the day. These included praying three times a day while prostrating oneself in the direction of the Kaaba, and observing several important fasts, especially Ramadan, the longest one, which lasted thirty days. 

Muhammad’s uncle was a merchant, and at the age of twelve, he began accompanying him on trade missions to Syria. While there, he had opportunities to observe the religious practices of the Jews and Christians, and found himself attracted to the spiritual quality of these religions. He began to feel a longing to find some way to experience that kind of spirituality himself.  

As a young man, he was employed by a relative, a wealthy widow named Khadija, who hired him to go on a trade mission for her. She herself was interested in a new religion, Hanifism, which had been established shortly before Muhammad’s birth. The Hanifs, who were few in number, rejected polytheism; they worshiped only Allah, one of the gods of the pagan pantheon, and was represented by the moon.  

Muhammad was very successful as a merchant, and he was described as handsome and personable by his contemporaries. Khadija soon let it be known that she wished to marry him, which was an arrangement that benefited them both. She was forty and he twenty at the time of their marriage. 

Due to: 1) his early years in the religious household of his uncle, 2) his observations of the spiritual nature of the monotheistic Jews and Christians during his trade missions, 3) the influence of his wife Khadija, with her interest in monotheistic Hanifism, and 4) his acquaintance with Khadija’s Christian relatives, especially her cousin Waraqa bin Naufal, who was learned in both the Torah and the Gospels, Muhammad was inclined to engage in religious thought and meditation. He often retired to his favorite cave at the foot of Mount Hira, about three miles outside of Mecca, to be alone and think. He did this especially during the month of Ramadan, when he prayed, fasted, and practiced Tahannuth, a set of pagan rituals that was the custom of his tribe. After praying, he would walk around the Kaaba seven times. 

During his solitary time in the cave, he thought about how to “replant” the true religion of Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, Jesus and the other prophets, and how to go about replacing the multiple gods of the various Arab tribes with his one, true religion. While he admired many aspects of Judaism and Christianity at this time in his life, he came to the conclusion that even they had introduced corruptions and superstitions that he wished to weed out of his new religion. He often discussed his thoughts with his family and close friends, and acquired among them a reputation as a very pious man.  

It was during one of these times of meditation in the cave that Muhammad had his vision. The following is a description of it, taken from Ishaq and the authors of the Ahadith, or “Traditions,” Tabari, Muslim, and Bukhari. 

The "Vision" and "Night Voyage" As Described by Early Muslim Sources

The Vision:

Bhukari said: “The commencement of divine inspiration to Allah’s Messenger was in the form of dreams that came true like a bright light. The Prophet loved the seclusion of a cave in Hira.”

Tabari states: “Aisha (his second wife, who had not yet been born by the time the vision occurred) later reported: ‘Solitude became dear to Muhammad and he used to seclude himself in the cave of Hira.’”  further description,’s description, also per Aisha, went on: “The first form of revelation was a true vision in sleep. He did not see any vision but it came like the break of dawn.” 

Here is Ishaq’s description of the initial vision, also as described by  Aisha:  “Aisha said that when Allah desired to honor Muhammad [by making him Allah’s Messenger], the first sign of prophethood was a vision in brightness of day shown to him in his sleep.” 

The actual content of the vision was described by Ishaq like this: “[The angel Gabriel] came to me,” the Apostle said, “while I was asleep, with a coverlet of brocade whereon was some writing, and said ‘Read.’ I said, ‘What shall I read?’ [Muhammad was illiterate].  He [the angel Gabriel] pressed me so tightly that I was near death.” [This happens two more times.] “When I thought I was nearly dead  I said, ‘What shall I read; only to deliver myself from him, lest he should do the same thing to me again...So I read it, and he [the angel Gabriel] departed from me. I awoke from my sleep.” 

Muhammad was terrified.  Bhukari writes, “The Apostle returned from that experience; the muscles between his neck and shoulders were trembling, and his heart beating severely. 

In Tabari,  Muhammad says “... I fell to my knees and crawled away,  my shoulders trembling.”  

Muhammad thought that he had been possessed by the devil, and was so upset that he decided to commit suicide just to escape his fear.

Ishaq reported, “None of Allah’s creatures was more hateful to me than an ecstatic poet [Muhammad hated poets] or a man possessed. I thought, ‘Woe is me, I’m a possessed poet.’...I will go to the top of the mountain and throw myself down that I may kill myself and be at rest.” 

He didn’t go through with the plan, however. He reported that while he was standing on the mountain, preparing to kill himself, he heard a voice: “Muhammad, you are Allah’s Apostle.” He raised his head to see who was speaking, and  “...lo, I saw Gabriel in the form of a  man with feet astride the horizon... I stood gazing at him and that distracted me from committing suicide. I couldn’t move.” 

His wife, Khadija, apparently concerned over his prolonged absence, sent a search party after him to bring him home. 

Still feeling terrified, and believing that he had been molested by a jinn and possessed by a demonic spirit, he said: “I came to her and sat by her thigh [and] said: “Woe is me. I am possessed.” He begged her, “Cover me,” and described his fear, saying, according to Ishaq, “I do not know what has happened to me. I fear for myself...I’m afraid I’m going out of my mind and being possessed by an evil spirit.”  

Tabari said of the event, “He [Muhammad] went to Khadija and said, ‘I think I have gone mad.'”  

The account by Muslim also reported Muhammad’s feeling of fear: “I was terror-stricken by [Gabriel]."  

Later, in the same report, Muhammad said, “Then I came to Khadija, and they threw water on me...”

Khadija tried to reassure her husband, saying: “Rejoice, cousin, and be of good cheer. You will be the Prophet. Allah will not bring you to shame...” (Remember, the Hanifs already worshiped Allah as their sole god, which is why she referred to him several years before the founding of Islam.)  

Apparently, her reassurance wasn’t quite enough for Muhammad, so according to Bukhari, Khadija took Muhammad to consult with her Christian cousin, Waraqa bin Naufal. Bin Naufal, the son of Khadija’s uncle, who agreed with Khadija somewhat tentatively, saying to her, “If what you have said is true, your husband is a prophet...”

It brought great relief to Muhammad to hear on such good authority that he had not been molested by a jinn or possessed by the devil. He was so pleased with the news that he had been appointed the messenger of Allah that when he didn’t experience his vision again for about three years, he became quite depressed. He began going to the mountains again, and again contemplated suicide. Gabriel appeared to him and, as before, told him, “You are Allah’s Prophet.” Muhammad’s spirits were lifted, despite the fact that the sight of the angel once again caused him to feel terror. Tabari described it like this:  “I was walking one day when I saw the angel who used to come to me at Hira. I was terror-stricken by him.” 

The Night Voyage:

About twelve years after he began preaching his new religion, Muhammad described another unusual experience. He had begun to make some real headway in converting his countrymen to his new religion by this time. While spending the night in his late uncle’s house, he left his body in his niece’s home, and traveled with Gabriel on a white steed to Jerusalem. There, he met with the prophets who had preceded him, visited all seven levels of heaven, met Allah, got the number of prayers Muhammad’s followers had to perform reduced from fifty a day to five a day, and then returned home to Mecca. Here is how salient features of the story, as told by his uncle’s daughter Umm, are presented: 

Bukhari said of this event, “The Prophet said, ‘While I was at the House or standing place in a state midway between sleep and wakefulness, an angel recognized me...my body was cut open from the throat to the lower part of my pubic area...he (the angel) took out my heart and filled it with belief and wisdom before returning it to its place. Then Al-Buraq, a white animal, smaller than a mule and bigger than a donkey, was brought to me and I set out with Gabriel.’ The Prophet said, ‘The animal’s step was so wide it reached the farthest point within reach of the animal’s sight.’”

And from Ishaq: “While I was in the Hijr, Gabriel came and stirred me with his foot. He took me to the door of the mosque, and there was a white animal, half mule, half donkey, with wings on its sides yet it was propelled by its feet. He mounted me on it...“When we arrived at the Temple in Jerusalem, we found Abraham, Moses, and Jesus, along with a company of prophets...” 

And from Muslim:  “The Messenger said: ‘I was brought on al-Buraq, an animal white and long. I mounted it and came to the Temple in Jerusalem...Gabriel...took me to heaven.’” 

Heaven consists of seven levels; the first that Muhammad asked to see was Hell, the “nearest” heaven. It was Adam who greeted Muhammad here; Hell is also the abode of the infidels. After that, they went to the second heaven, where Jesus and John lived. Then on to the third, where Joseph was seen, and to the fourth, where Enoch greeted him, and then on to the fifth, where Aaron lived. In the sixth heaven, they saw Moses. Gabriel and Muhammad finally ascended to the seventh and highest heaven, where they saw Abraham. 

Bukhari and Muslim: “We ascended to the seventh heaven...There I greeted Abraham. He (Gabriel) ascended with me till I was taken to such a height...I was shown Al-Bait-al-Ma’mur (Allah’s house)...”  

There, Allah told Muhammad that the faithful were to offer prayers fifty times a day. Muhammad descended back to the sixth heaven, where Moses wasn’t at all pleased. “What have you done?...Your followers cannot bear fifty prostrations...” Moses explained to Muhammad that he had tried to induce the tribe of Israel to pray fifty times a day, but that they had found it impossibly difficult to comply. Muhammad  returned to the Seventh Heaven, and was eventually able to bargain with Allah to bring the burden of prayers down from fifty times a day to five times a day. 

Upon returning to his niece’s home after his trip, Muhammad tells her about it: “Umm Hani, during the night I prayed in the Temple of Jerusalem.” (As an aside, the Temple of Jerusalem had been destroyed by the Romans in 70 AD and had not been rebuilt). 

Ishaq said: “Umm, Abu Talib’s daughter (Abu Talib was Muhammad’s late uncle), said: ‘The Apostle went on no journey except while he was in my house. He slept in my home that night after he prayed the final night prayer. A little before dawn he awoke us, saying, ‘O Umm, I went to Jerusalem.’  

In Ishaq,  Aisha reports “The Prophet’s body remained where it was. Allah removed his spirit at night.”  

Both women found the account incredible.  

In Bukhari, Aisha said of the story, “Once the Prophet was bewitched so that he began to imagine that he had done a thing which in fact he had not done.”  

In Ishaq, Umm says, “I pleaded, ‘O Muhammad, don’t tell the people about this for they will know you are lying and will mock you.’ "

But Muhammad would not listen: He said, "By Allah, I will tell them.” 

Muhammad was not to be dissuaded; he did exactly what he said he would do–he went out and told his small group of followers about his night trip to Jerusalem. The crowd responded exactly as Umm had predicted; they laughed at him, shouted angrily at having been deceived by him, and then they began to leave. If it hadn’t been for the intervention of his friend Abu Bakr, whom they respected and who convinced them that the story was true, Islam would then and there quite possibly have been consigned to the trash heap of history.  

It is of substantial interest to note here that Muhammad’s nighttime visit to Jerusalem forms the basis for the Muslim claim to the ownership of  Jerusalem and Palestine. 

Why would Muhammad, who was just beginning to succeed in his goal of spreading Islam, ignore the pleas of his niece and place his whole effort in jeopardy? If even Umm, who was one of his followers, thought he was lying about the trip to Jerusalem, why didn’t he even consider that his other followers might also think he was trying to deceive them? Did he himself truly believe he had made a quick trip to Jerusalem that night?

The Source of Muhammad's "Vision" and "Night Voyage" 

Given all the information above, what was the source of Muhammad’s vision and his night travel?  Was it divine, demonic, a dream, a psychiatric disorder, a trance, a seizure, or just a big con job?

I think the best answer is “None of the above.”

Both Muhammad’s vision and his night flight correspond very well with descriptions of a neurological condition called "sleep paralysis." It has begun to be understood only in recent years, in the last half of the 20^th century, but although its etiology is only now becoming understood, it has been described for almost as long as mankind has been able to record events, and in many cultures around the world.

Sleep paralysis is a neurological phenomenon characterized by the inability to perform voluntary movements either at the moment of falling asleep or upon awakening. During that time, however, the “sleeper” does not experience full loss of awareness of his surroundings. The experience may occur only once in a lifetime, or it can be recurrent. It also vary in intensity, being hardly noticeable, or it can make a lasting impression. It has been called one of the last of the “closet” conditions, since few people, with some justification, volunteer that they have it for fear of being considered mentally unsound. However, when directly asked about it, between 25% and 40% of the population will admit to having had at least one episode. 

While the condition is called “sleep paralysis,”  it commonly involves more symptoms than just the inability to move. It may include auditory, visual,  tactile and kinesthetic hallucinations, as well as complex sensations involving floating or flight. If these phenomena occur while falling asleep, they are called  “hypnogogic” sleep paralysis, or if while awakening, “hypnopompic” sleep paralysis. 

While sleep paralysis can occur at any age, most often the first episode occurs in adolescence. The first episodes usually begin to occur starting around ten, then the incidence increases rapidly until seventeen, when it peaks. After age seventeen, there is a rapid decline in the incidence of initial episodes through the mid-twenties. While it is uncommon for someone to experience the first episode after thirty, about two percent of newly experienced cases do occur at forty, which is the age at which Muhammad described  his vision. Initial episodes of sleep paralysis have been reported to occur as late as the seventies. 

In the past, sleep paralysis was thought to occur more often in people with narcolepsy or daytime panic attacks, with which it shares some characteristics, but that hasn’t been shown to be the case. While these conditions are no protection against sleep paralysis, neither do they appear to predispose people to it. However, there are some predisposing factors: Sleep paralysis appears to occur more frequently when the sleeper is 1) alone, 2) sleeping on his back, 3) sleep deprived, 4) a teen, 5) related to people with the disorder. 

Sleep deprivation may explain why it happens more often among night shift workers and teens. Teens have an inordinate physiologic demand for sleep, which they often seem to do their best to ignore. It is entirely possible that during his stays in the cave at Hira, Muhammad’s intense focus on the development of his new religion caused him to lose sleep, and, of course, he might have been sleeping on his back.

Despite the concerns of some people who suffer from the condition, there has not been found to be any association with mental health disorders, and while sleep paralysis is usually an unpleasant experience, it is not harmful to the person suffering from it.

Some suggestions have been made that Muhammad’s seizures had some connection with his visions. While he did have what may have been at least one febrile seizure as a four-year-old, that would not have predisposed him either to the vision he had at forty in the cave, or to the night voyage to Jerusalem.

Muhammad's seizure may have resulted from a fever accompanying a childhood illness, since that is the most common reason for infants and young children to experience seizures. About 4% of all children between the ages of three months and five years experience febrile seizures; they rarely occur after that age. 

Febrile seizures are of two kinds, simple and complex. The simple ones are usually brief, solitary, and are the kind most people think of when “seizure” is mentioned; the patient loses consciousness, and the arms and legs alternately contract and relax in a pattern associated with grand mal seizures. The complex ones are characterized by focal signs and symptoms, such as chewing movements, purposeless automatic behaviors, numbness, tingling, and so on. Children who experience febrile seizures have a 2% chance of developing epilepsy after they grow older; most of these are associated with the complex type of seizure. Muhammad may have had the simple type, since he did not appear to have had seizures while growing up.

It has also been said that Muhammad suffered from headaches, and attempts have been made to link these headaches with his “visions.” Although pain, including head pain, can occur with sleep paralysis, it is an uncommon component of it. 

Headaches do, however, frequently occur due to a multitude of other causes, including poor posture, grinding one’s teeth during sleep, muscle tension, sinus problems, dehydration,  migraines,  tumors, and so on. Sometimes headaches occur as part of the “postictal,” or recovery, phase of a seizure, most often after a grand mal seizure; however, if he had had grand mal seizures frequently, much would have been made of them, given the significance attributed to them at the time; such was not the case. In addition, had he suffered from a seizure disorder as an adolescent or adult, any headache present as part of the recovery from it would not have been the focus of much attention.

Given that Muhammad’s descriptions fit so well with sleep paralysis, as described below in detail, and that there is so little evidence for a seizure disorder, I suspect that any headaches he might have had were due to one of the more common causes.

After he began proselytizing, he began having what were described as some sort of “falling spells,” which have been interpreted as possible seizures. He would appear anxious, fall to the ground, and sweat would form in beads on his forehead. It was not stated whether he experienced any alteration of consciousness or involuntary behaviors or utterances on these occasions. He is said to have asserted that during these episodes, he was receiving revelations from Allah.

Symptoms and signs such as these do not fit the description of seizures, although they are seen in panic attacks, as effects of emotionally overwhelming situations, in certain cardiac disorders, and in some metabolic states such as hypoglycemia; he may have suffered from one of these conditions. On at least some occasions, he could simply have been pretending to have a "spell" in order to impress his followers, or when he deemed it convenient or necessary to have a “revelation.”

Today, when someone who suffers from sleep paralysis is sophisticated about the condition, he knows that what  happened was not real. On the other hand, people with sleep paralysis who don’t understand the condition, are virtually impossible to persuade that what they experienced did not really happen; for them, the sense that the experience really, actually, truly happened, is extremely compelling, unlike ordinary dreaming. While an ordinary dream can seem extremely real while it is going on, it is quickly recognized upon awakening to be “not real,” and "just a dream." Sleep paralysis experiences are not as easily consigned to the realm of brain-generated creations. A typical assessment by someone who suffers from sleep paralysis, and who is well educated about it, is “...the experience is one hundred percent REALISM.” Only his knowledge about the nature of the phenomenon enabled him to identify it upon awakening as not really having happened. 

That being the case, it can be granted to Muhammad that he wasn't making it up; his absolute conviction that he was experiencing something that was completely real was par for the course. He wasn't lying; he genuinely thought the vision and the voyage had really happened. 

Characteristics of Sleep Paralysis

Here is a list of the most common kinds of experiences described by people with sleep paralysis:

1) Paralysis:

The inability to move, speak, or cry out occurs either just as someone is falling asleep or waking up, and can last a matter of seconds to several moments or longer. The person has an awareness of his surroundings, but he has no control over what he is experiencing.

Muhammad said that when he saw Gabriel, he couldn't move. 

2) The “Sensed Presence”

This is one of the most commonly experienced phenomena of sleep paralysis, although it does not occur in every instance.  The sense or awareness that someone or something is nearby has been described as ranging from a vague suspicion to an absolute certainty. The level of interest held by the “presence” for the sleeper can range from none, to merely watching, to closely monitoring or studying  him. 

Sleepers may identify the “presence” as anything from something very mundane to something quite exotic, and the description may be vague or very specific. Some identifications of the “presence” include animals, such as dogs or wolves; burglars; rapists; terrified children; baby-like figures; demons; the devil; aliens; giant spiders and dead friends. Hooded entities are also seen; the classical hooded figure representing death is one such figure, and at least one sleeper was reported by Professor J. Allan Cheyne, of the University of Waterloo in Canada, to have identified the figure as Darth Vader.  Another sleeper, also described by Professor Cheyne, reported seeing something not unlike Muhammad’s brocaded cloth. It was  “...a cloth-like triangle hanging or balanced in mid air...” 

Muhammad identified the "presence" as the angel Gabriel. 

The presence can simply “be there,” with the sleeper simply feeling an awareness, or it can be forceful and active, sometimes even attacking the sleeper. The most frequently “attacked” part of the body is the chest, and may be felt as sensations of pressure, pushing down on the body, crushing, and difficulty with breathing, which sometimes progresses to a sensation of suffocation and impending death.

Muhammad felt the angel Gabriel pressing on his chest, had difficulty breathing, and feared that he might die.

Depending on the position of the sleeper, other parts of the body that are affected can include the back, the side of the torso, or the limbs. Sometimes there is a sensation that one’s entire body is being restrained, pushed into the bed, sinking, or being dragged down. The sleeper may feel as though he is being prodded or probed; in females, there can be a sense of being raped. One regular sufferer of sleep paralysis felt as though aliens were inserting a metal probe into his head.

Muhammad felt as though he was being cut open, and that his heart was removed and replaced in his chest.

3) Fear 

The “presence” is nearly always experienced as dominating and/or threatening, and awareness of it is often accompanied by anxiety, fear, or just plain terror. Reports of the incidence of fear vary, ranging between 66%-98%.  Another of Professor Cheyne’s subjects said of the fear, “How about ‘overwhelming terror'? These attacks leave me shuddering and crying. Sometimes I’m so scared I get sick to my stomach.” Upon awakening,  the sense of fear or anxiety lingers on.

Muhammad's fear upon awakening was extreme, and continued long after he had returned home.

4) Hallucinations 

    Auditory: Auditory hallucinations are the most common ones associated with sleep paralysis, and when they occur, they are always associated with the sensed presence. The most common are very simple sounds, such as whirring, ringing, humming, screeching, grinding, breaking glass, sirens, pure tones, rushing wind, “white noise,” or buzzing.  

The least common are the sounds of distinct speech made by human voices. The human voices often don’t produce speech per se; more often, the sounds resemble laughter, a crowd of people talking, whispering, gibberish, moaning, or screaming. When they do produce speech, they can be understood, but  the words are invariably limited to short phrases. Another of Professor Cheyne’s subjects reported hearing “I’ve got work for you to do!” At another time, the presence stated that the sleeper was playing the game wrong, and either it had to be  played right, or the sleeper had to quit.

Muhammad reported hearing similarly short phrases, such as the command to “read,” and “Muhammad, you are Allah’s Apostle.” 

Sometimes, communication with the presence is accomplished not with speech, but with telepathy.

       Visual: Visual hallucinations are produced less frequently than auditory hallucinations, but like them, they are associated with the sensed presence. The appearance of light can sometimes signal the onset of an episode of sleep paralysis, or light can appear sometime during it.

Muhammad was aware of light at the beginning of his vision.

The sleeper is usually unable to see the presence; often, though, when there is something more distinct than a mere sense of awareness of a presence, it appears in the periphery of the visual field. Sometimes people describe it as a distinct form, but it’s usually black or shadowy, with no features inside the silhouette. There is a well known nighttime radio talk show where people often call in with stories of fleeting visions of “shadow people” who lurk just outside their ability to see them directly; many of these callers are surely experiencing common visual hallucinations of sleep paralysis, but don’t know it.

Sometimes, people with sleep paralysis describe the shadowy form evolving into a more distinct, recognizable form. Occasionally, there are well-defined images which assume a form known to the sleeper via his culture; in the past, these have included witches, hags, demons, and the devil. Today, aliens are often identified.  

Muhammad's image, of course, was of the angel Gabriel.

       Tactile: Tactile sensations range from simple vibrations to shaking, numbness, electrocution, or pain; the pain can occur with attempts to move a paralyzed limb, and has also been part of an auditory hallucination, with intense vibrations causing headache. One of Professor Cheyne’s sleepers reported that the sounds were like high-pitched power tools  “. . .close to my ears and gained in volume and intensity until I felt like my head was going to explode.” Still another said “I felt as if a satellite had been connected to my head. The vibration increased. . .it affected my left ear and I felt pain, as if my ear would blow up. The pain lasted for two days.” A person whose experiences were of alien abductions said that he had “Painful examinations with syringes, devices, exposure of the brain...I am like a robot being repaired...”  

This experience is similar to the one Muhammad experienced when he was cut open.

        Kinesthetic: This is the sensation of motion, weight, or position of a body part as it is moved around a joint by muscle activity. Although the person is paralyzed, he can experience this sort of sensation during his hallucinations.

5) Infrequent Experiences 

       Floating: The most common experience is that of having something–usually the “presence”–pushing down on the body; one woman described being pushed so hard she went through the bed, the floor beneath it, down into the room below! But the opposite sensation, the feeling of floating, weightlessness, or flying, can also occur. These journeys are usually peaceful, even blissful experiences, but not invariably so;  they can also be quite uncomfortable, giving the impression of falling, acceleration, hurtling through a tunnel, or rising at high speed. One sleeper said his experience made him want to throw up. More often, though, it is a mild sensation, like being lifted up.

Occasionally the “presence” may accompany the sleeper on his floating trip. This can be unpleasant, and may create images of being abducted by aliens, witches, or demons, etc. One person reported, “I felt like I was with the devil–I always think it is the devil. He is usually behind me, and I feel like we are flying through the air at warp speed and I actually see the view of the room as I am moving and passing by everything.”

Muhammad’s companion was the angel Gabriel.

        Out-of-Body Experiences: Sometimes the floating sensation is “autoscopic,” meaning it occurs where the sleeper has the sensation that he has separated from his body, and views his body and his surroundings from above. One description of the experience was “I’ve actually been floating above myself, and seeing myself in the bed.” Another was, “...I felt like I left my body. I was hovering right above my sleeping form.”

         Flying: Another kind of experience is not “autoscopic,” in that the floating is accomplished without the sensation of leaving the body.  One sleeper described a somewhat out-of-control “flight pattern” while flying, bumping against the ceiling and walls, and even the bottom of the bunk bed above him while flying! When he looked back at the bed, where his body should have been, it was empty.  Another of Professor Cheyne’s sleep paralysis subjects, who lived in a house by the ocean,  reported  “I felt myself floating out the window and across the sea at a tremendous speed.

Muhammad traveled to Jerusalem at a very high speed, thanks to the extremely long stride of his mount.

Much of the time, these floating/flying experiences are  pleasant. Many floaters say they experience their paralysis at the moment they re-enter their bodies, and some try to wake up before that happens, hoping to avoid it.

Virtually all persons with sleep paralysis have an awareness of being unable to move, and that, all by itself, is scary; often, but not always, they sense some sort of “presence” accompanied by fear.  In addition to the paralysis, the sensed presence, and the fear, about 60% have associated hallucinations, which may be auditory (the most common), visual, tactile, or kinesthetic. Fewer than 5% experience all these components simultaneously.

Review of Muhammad's "Vision" and "Night Flight"

Muhammad was about 40 when he first spoke of his vision; according to the descriptions, it may have included either some awareness of his situation at sunrise, with first light, or its onset may have been signaled with a hallucinatory burst of light; either of these could have been the case. 

Muhammad was utterly and totally convinced that both his vision in the cave and his night flight were real, that the events in them had actually taken place, and that they had occurred as the result of the will of Allah; as was so often the case among both Jews and Christians, the bearer of the news in this instance was the angel Gabriel.  

Muhammad sensed a formed presence which he identified as the angel Gabriel, a figure known to him from his association with Christians and Jews. The presence had a piece of fabric with writing on it, and Muhammad felt that the figure was dominant, even threatening. It commanded Muhammad: “Read,” even though he was illiterate (for this reason, some believe that the command was “Recite,” not “Read”).  

When he did not comply right away, the presence–Gabriel–pressed on him so hard that he couldn’t breath, and Muhammad felt himself near death. This happened three times. Finally, Muhammad complied with the command, and the presence disappeared. Muhammad was terrified and trembling, and the fear didn’t leave him after he awoke. He contemplated suicide just to get some relief from it. However, although he was emotionally prepared to die, he was unable to carry out the act; he saw Gabriel again, who told him he was the prophet, and he was unable to move.

Muhammad had at least one episode of sleep paralysis while seeking solitude in the cave, but since he was there for more than one night, he may easily have had more than one episode. It's possible that Gabriel didn't press on his chest three times during one episode, but rather, he may have pressed on it one time during each of three separate episodes. Similarly, Muhammad's desire for relief from his intense fear via suicide may have occurred either as the final part of the first vision, as he was awakening and was still paralyzed, or as part of a separate vision altogether, also while paralyzed. Either way, the vision involving his desire to commit suicide also appears to have occurred at sunrise, with Gabriel, still a fearful presence, seen by Muhammad while he was still paralyzed.

The difficulty in establishing the chronological order of events described in the Muhammad's vision was due to the record-keeping habits of the scribes, as noted earlier. The notes were kept in a box, in no particular order, so it was up to later authors to try to sort them out and put them in something resembling the correct order. For this reason, it's often difficult to sort out details such as whether Gabriel appeared one time in each of three episodes, or three times in a single episode, and just where, in Muhammad's experience, Gabriel told him of his appointment and persuaded him not to commit suicide. 

Muhammad was still terrified by the time Khadija’s search party found him. He told her that he was possessed, and he feared he had gone mad; he may have been quite agitated, since according to one report, someone threw water on him, possibly in an attempt to calm him down.  

He sought comfort and reassurance from Khadija, who told him he was neither insane nor possessed, but that on the contrary, that he was a “prophet.”  Her reassurances were only partially successful, however, so she made arrangements for him to meet with one of her Christian cousins, who was well versed in both the Christian and Jewish holy books. This consultation with Khadija’s cousin, who agreed somewhat tentatively that if what Muhammad had said was true, then he might be a prophet, finally seemed to calm him down.

Apparently, Muhammad didn’t have these experiences very often at first. Nevertheless, the one(s) he did have were experienced as completely, undeniably, totally “real.” Once he had been convinced that the experience meant he had been selected to be the Messenger of Allah, he looked forward to having more of them, despite the terror he felt when seeing Gabriel. He was actually alarmed when they didn’t recur until three years later, fearing that he had been abandoned by Allah or rejected as his messenger. 

Their "reality" was so compelling, so sincerely felt, that his conviction of their genuine nature was communicated to his followers with a power that couldn't be ignored, and it lent great credibility to whatever he said. 

While Muhammad was genuinely and completely convinced that the events in his first vision(s) had really occurred, he had been quite cautious about revealing them to anyone outside his family for fear of being considered mentally unsound. By the time he had his night voyage to Jerusalem though, his followers believed as strongly as he did that his initial vision was really a visit from Gabriel, and he regarded both as undeniable evidence of a special relationship with Allah.

There can be no doubt that, as was the case with his visions, he absolutely believed he had taken a trip to Jerusalem. His description of the trip was quite a bit more elaborate than many, but not all, "flights" of sleepers are; some of the stories of alien abductions, for example, are sometimes quite elaborate. It is not beyond the realm of possibility that some abductees fill in parts of their stories with additional details. Such could have been the case with Muhammad.

By that time, he had surely become accustomed to being a little creative from time to time; every once in a while, he would make up “revelations” for the sake of expediency. This being the case, it would not have bothered him to introduce a few details to "flesh out" the story of the voyage to make it more interesting for his followers, provided it did not violate the basic elements of his experience, and provided his elaboration remained consistent with his beliefs and his close relationship with Allah.

By this time, then, twelve years after his first "vision," he was confident that just as his followers had believed that account, they would also believe the story of his trip to Jerusalem. He, Muhammad, believed the voyage had really happened, so why wouldn't they, just as they had believed the visit from Gabriel?

Thus, despite Umm's advice, Muhammad did exactly what he said he would do–he went out and told his small group of followers about his night voyage to Jerusalem. By now, he had a real sense of urgency about sharing his experience with his followers; he was convinced that it would serve to strengthen their belief, not threaten it.

But the crowd responded exactly as Umm had predicted; they laughed at him, shouted angrily at having been deceived by him, and began to leave. If it hadn’t been for the intervention of his friend Abu Bakr, whom they respected and who convinced them that the story was true, Islam would then and there quite possibly have been consigned to the trash heap of history.

However, many of Muhammad's later “revelations” did not fit the description of sleep paralysis, or even of ordinary dreams. They were often a trifle too “situation-specific” and expedient for comfort. These were without a doubt created to fulfill some desire he had. It would have been easy for him to insert a fictional revelation here and there designed to justify getting something he wanted. 

Quite possibly, another person who experienced “floating” or “flying” as part of a sleep paralysis experience was the storyteller who originally spoke of flying carpets!

Early Descriptions of Sleep Paralysis

Muhammad may have been the first person in history to offer such a complete, clinically accurate description of sleep paralysis, but he wasn’t the only one to do it. According to Professor Cheyne, accounts consistent with sleep paralysis go back at least two thousand years. Lilitu, an ancient Sumerian “hag,” used to fly, especially at night, and often attacked men while they were sleeping. She may be the same personnage as Lilith, the Jewish spirit-demon who was usually found in remote desert regions, and who enjoyed the same sort of nocturnal activity. Lilitu may also have been related to the Romans’ “Lamia,” who also engaged in nighttime attacks. There are other Middle Eastern spirits, too, who were associated with leaping on and crushing people while they are asleep.  Europe has its own versions; the Greeks had ephialtes (“one who leaps upon”), pnigalion (“the choker”), and Pan, the half-human, half goat entity who was seen as an instigator of dreams and visions, especially those that produced sudden, violent terror. In addition to Lamia, the Romans had the incubus (“one who presses or crushes”). The Germans had “Hexendrucken” (“witch pressing”), and the old English “hagge” (“evil spirit”), etc. Many of these entities were also shape-shifters who could assume different forms during their attacks. Some paintings of people with the sensed presence sitting on their chests while the sleeper is in the supine position bear a remarkable resemblance to gargoyles.  

The very word “nightmare” has its origins in words for some of these unpleasant entities; Old English “maere,” Norse “mara,” and ancient German “maron” are all associated with them. The French word for “bad dreams” is “cauchemar,” which comes from the word  for a “crushing spirit.” 

Stories of  nighttime attacks on individuals who are just falling asleep or just waking up occur all around the world; The West Indies, North America, Ireland, Thailand, Japan and Laos all have descriptions of them.  While the details, such as who or what the “presence” might be  differ according to the culture, the basic experiences–the sensation of a presence, a feeling of fear, the feeling of pressure, etc.--maintain a remarkable consistency across cultures and through history. 

Normal Sleep

An understanding of normal sleep helps to understand sleep paralysis:  

Normal sleep occurs in cycles, beginning with Stage I;  the person’s eyes are closed, and he appears to an observer to be asleep. When roused, however, he denies having been asleep. Sleep in this stage is so light that it qualifies as a deep drowsiness.  

If nothing wakes the sleeper up, Stage II replaces Stage I; the muscles, which were initially tense in Stage I,  are now alternately tense and relaxed. The eyes roll up in the head, the heart rate begins to slow, and the temperature begins to drop. This slowing of body functions occurs as the brain prepares to leave light sleep and enter the deeper, restorative phase of sleep. 

Stage III is the beginning of deep sleep, and  it slowly merges into Stage IV. The two are generally lumped together. The muscles become very relaxed, and there is little movement.  

Stage IV is much like State III, except that it is so deep that in many respects, it resembles a coma, except that the sleeper can be aroused. Anyone who has a pet cat has witnessed this arousal going from “zero to sixty” in an instant. 

Suddenly, at the end of Stage IV, the brain suddenly reverses itself, going back from Stage IV to III, and to II. Then suddenly, the activity of the brain increases markedly, the heart rate increases,  respirations become shallow and rapid, and the muscles that we use to maintain posture and move our arms and legs become paralyzed because the neurotransmitters, the chemicals that signal the muscles to move, are blocked. Even our reflexes, the ones that cause us to “kick” when our knee is tapped at the doctor’s office, are inactive. In essence, there has been a programmed “disconnect” between brain and body. The eye muscles aren’t paralyzed, though; the eyes return to the position they normally have when we are awake, and they begin to move rapidly, tracking the movements that occur in the dreams that are now beginning.  

This period of “dream sleep” is named for the activity seen in the eye movements–Rapid Eye Movement (REM) sleep. There is a good reason for the brain-body disconnect at this time, with muscle paralysis; if the body could move the way the eyes do, we would get up and act out what’s happening in the dream, leading to possible injury or even death. 

Stage V sleep is the “dream sleep,” or REM period, and resembles the initial “drowsy” sleep of Stage I, except for the presence of the dreaming. It lasts about ten minutes, while each of the “non-REM” periods lasts from about five to thirty minutes, changing as the night progresses. 

The five stages of sleep, ending with the completion of the REM stage, constitute a single sleep cycle, and lasts from about ninety to one hundred minutes. There are about five of these cycles a night; with each successive stage, deep sleep decreases in length, and REM sleep increases in length. The dreams we have during the last REM period of the night have been organized and made sense of as well as possible by the brain, and they are the most vivid of the night; we wake up at the end of the last REM period, and simultaneously, we recover our ability to move.  

These cycles of brain activity don’t stop, however, just because we are awake; they continue twenty-four hours a day, with periods of greater alertness alternating with periods of decreased alertness. In fact, some people even call the long period of wakefulness we experience during the day as “Stage VI” of sleep.  

It’s no accident that we stop to eat three times a day, with a coffee or tea break between meals, and may even have a bedtime snack. These breaks are not mere social conventions; most of the time, they are taken around the times of the daytime “sleep cycles” that would be represented by the Stage IV of the nighttime sleep cycles. During these periods, we  feel less alert, and so we pause to engage in some activity that doesn’t involve much mental crispness. Eating a meal or having a cup of coffee fills the bill. Often, the sleepiness we experience after a meal has little or nothing to do with the effect of putting food in our stomachs; it’s just that at about the time we felt the onset of decreased alertness and began our meal, we eat, and continue our descent into a daytime “Stage IV;” by the time the meal is over, our “sleep cycle” has hit rock bottom, and we have to wait a while for it to rev up again.  Similarly, the alertness we get soon after drinking a cup of coffee often isn’t due just to the caffeine, but is also the effect of our sleep cycle rising from the depths of its daytime “Stage IV equivalent” to a lighter stage. 

A lot of very productive work is being done to determine just what is happening in the brain that causes the sleep paralysis complex of symptoms. Dr. Cheyne describes it as an anomalous REM state. He describes work done with neuroimaging studies during REM sleep demonstrates that the primitive “emotional” part of our brain, the limbic system and the amygdala, are very active during REM sleep. Activation begins in a network of cells in the brainstem, the slightly swollen top of the spinal cord, and then goes on to stimulate the thalamus, the larger, uppermost part of the brainstem. The thalamus has connections to many other parts of the brain, including the limbic system and amygdala. This "emotional" brain is where raw emotions, such as terror, are produced. Other connections go to the cortex, where judgment, sensory discrimination, vision, and identification take place. It’s here, in the cortex, that the brain tries to “make sense” out of what’s happening.  

The value of the ability to become alert from sleep is to enable the sleeper to rouse so he can escape danger. Even during sleep, the brain is able to pick up subtle cues from the surroundings that a threat to the sleeper’s well-being may exist “out there.” It’s as if a part of the brain is on “sentry duty” while we are asleep, ready to rouse us to action. Our cats’ “sentries” are particularly good at this, and in them, we can see this mechanism operating at its very best. It is in this respect that Stages III and IV differ from coma, where the sentry is not “on duty,” and arousal does not occur.  

Normally, we go through the sleep cycles without incident. We dream the last dream of the night, complete with paralysis. Then we begin simultaneously to wake up and recover our ability to move. Our brain becomes aware of its surroundings, we know we are awake, we can move, and as our awareness kicks into high gear, we begin to remember things. We may remember the dreams themselves, and the things that happened yesterday before we went to sleep. We get out of bed, and shuffle into the kitchen for a cup of coffee. 

Now, imagine, on the other hand, that you are actively dreaming the last dream of the night, and your brain is preparing to wake up. You are just beginning to be aware of your surroundings. Your brain still has one foot, so to speak, in the dream, and the other in reality. But the dream, along with its protective paralysis, is lingering beyond the time it normally does. Even though you are aware of your surroundings, you are also aware of the dream content. The brain is very confused by the combination of its awareness of both dreams and surroundings, and it won’t let you move yet, since you are still dreaming. In the meantime, it is trying its best to integrate all the sensations from the dream and from the environment. You are very aware of the strange dual nature of your experience, as well as of the fact that you can’t move.  

That, essentially, is a simple example of sleep paralysis.  

I believe that sleep paralysis is the source of both Muhammad’s “vision” and his “night voyage” to Jerusalem.