In the prophetic style, which uses the present or past for the future, Mahomet had said,
Appropinquavit hora, et scissa est luna (Koran, c. 54, v. 1; in Maracci, tom. ii. p. 688.) .
This figure of rhetoric has been converted into a fact, which is said to be attested by the most respectable eye-witnesses(Maracci, tom. ii. p. 690.). The festival is still celebrated by the Persians (Chardin, tom. iv. p. 201); and the legend is tediously spun out by Gagnier (Vie de Mahomet, tom. i. p. 183 - 234), on the faith, as it should seem, of the credulous Al Jannabi. Yet a Mahometan doctor has arraigned the credit of the principal witness (apud Pocock, Specimen, p. 187); the best interpreters are content with the simple sense of the Koran (Al Beidawi, apud Hottinger, Hist. Orient. l. ii. p. 302); and the silence of Abulfeda is worthy of a prince and a philosopher.