English Translation

Yahya told us: Muhammad ibn 'Amr told us, who said: Abu Salamah ibn 'Abd al-Rahman narrated to me, who said: We discussed the Night of Decree, and some of the people said it moves around within the year. So we went to Abu Sa'id al-Khudri. I said: "O Abu Sa'id, did you hear the Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) mention the Night of Decree?" He said: "Yes. The Messenger of God (peace and blessings be upon him) secluded himself for devotion during the middle ten days of Ramadan, and we secluded ourselves with him. When we reached the morning of the twentieth, he returned and we returned with him. He had been shown the Night of Decree, then he was made to forget it, and he said: 'I saw the Night of Decree, then I was made to forget it. I was shown myself prostrating in water and mud. So whoever secluded himself with me, let him return to his place of seclusion. Seek it in the last ten nights, in the odd ones among them.'" The sky poured down upon us at the end of that evening, and half of the mosque was a shelter of palm branches, and it leaked. By the One who has honored him and sent down the Book upon him, I indeed saw him lead us in the sunset prayer on the night of the twenty-first, with his forehead and the tip of his nose in the water and mud.