This year, Ramadan will begin the evening of April 2nd and end the evening of May 2nd, God willing. Ramadan is a month of retrospection, worship, and remembrance of God. Ramadan is the 9th month of the Islamic Lunar calendar. The lunar calendar is a bit shorter than the Gregorian calendar, which means that Islamic holidays fall about 2 weeks earlier on the Gregorian calendar each year. Ramadan is the month during which the Prophet Muhammad received his first revelation from God through the angel Gabriel. These words from God and the subsequent revelations over the next 23 years became the Qur'an, the Holy Book of Muslims which is considered to be the direct word of God rather than retellings by mankind.