Festival of Fast-Breaking (Eid-al-Fitr)

During the month of Ramadan, Muslims observe a strict fast and participate in pious activities in all domains of life, as it is a great occasion granted by God for them to take advantage of, and these will be richly rewarded. At the end of this blessed month there is a day called “Eid-al-Fir” (Festival of Fast-Breaking). That is the first day of the month of Shawal, the lunar month following Ramadan.

And in this day of relaxation after a “hard” month of training, two things are ordained:

First: all Muslims should feel the joy and the relaxation. For this purpose, a preparation is necessary one or a few days before, by means of “Zakat-al-fitr” (substance giving) to those who have no means.

Secondly: Precaution is to be taken, so that this relaxation does not lead to the pursue of one’s unlimited desires and excess of joy, or the abandonment of one’s duties.

God says: “O children of Adam! Don your adornment at every place of worship, and eat and drink, but do not be excessive; He (= God) truly does not love those who are excessive. Say: Who has forbidden the adornment of God, which He has brought forth for His servants, and the good things of (God’s) sustenance? Say: These are (lawful) in the life of this world to all who have attained to faith, and to be exclusively theirs (alone) on Resurrection Day. Thus clearly do We spell out these signs to people of (innate) knowledge” (7:31-32).

That is why, this day starts with certain observations: after Fajr prayer one takes a light breakfast (as a proof that it is no more a fasting day), then after the sun rises, all families will observe the Eid-Prayer together, preferably in an open yard. This can be followed by visits to families and relatives. Gatherings of harmless entertainment and amusement are desirable.

“When Abu-Bakr (a close companion of the Prophet) entered the house of the Prophet (God’s blessings upon him) on the day of Eid, he found two young girls playing music and singing. Abu-Bakr asked them: You are doing this in the house of the Prophet, how come? But the Prophet immediately told Abu-Bakr to leave them be, for Eid is a day of merriment and joy”.

In this day, it is recommended to praise God by pronouncing “Allahu Akbar, Allahu Akbar, La ilaha illa Allah” (= God is the most great, God is the most great, there is no divinity except God alone), as many times as possible, as the Qur’an says:

 “.. God intends (to provide) ease for you and does not intend (to create) hardship for you. All this is so that you may complete the number (of fast-days as prescribed) and that you extol God for His having guided you aright, and that you render your thanks (to Him)” (2:185).

The Night of Sublimity !

         Abu Hurairah related the saying of the Prophet

         (God’s blessings upon him): “Anyone who stays

         awake for the Night of Sublimity (Lailat-ul-Qadr) 

         with faith and for the sake of God, will have all 

         his previous sins forgiven” (Al-Bukhari & Muslim).

“Lailat-ul-Qadr” (The Night of Sublimity) was the night therein God revealed the Qur’an for the first time to Muhammad (God’s blessings upon him), whom He chose as the last and the Seal of Prophets.

What is that Night of Sublimity? God says in the Qur’an:

“We have indeed revealed this (message) in the Night of Sublimity. And what will explain to you what the Night of Sublimity is? The Night of Sublimity is better than a thousand months. Therein come down the angels and the Spirit by God’s permission, on every errand: Peace it is until the rise of Morn” (97.1-5).

The sublimity of this night lies in the great favor endowed by the Almighty to humanity with the blessed revelation of the Qur’an. Furthermore, it has other gracious gifts: “By the Book that clarifies. Indeed We revealed it on a blessed night. Indeed We are ever warning. In that night every definitive matter is distinguished. As an ordinance from Our side. Indeed We are ever sending (Our messages of guidance). (And that is) as a grace from your Lord. Surely He is all-Hearing, all-Knowing” (44:2-6).

According to Sayidah ‘Aishah, the wife of the Prophet (God’s blessings upon him), “during the last ten days of Ramadan, Prophet Mohammad would pray a lot, wake his family for a night prayer and perform many good deeds” (Al-Bukhari).

Then it is expected that Muslims everywhere, until now, and always will celebrate this occasion earnestly, by multiplying their prayers and good deeds, appreciating this blessed night, the Night of Sublimity!

The excellent reward promised to those who celebrate this event, is of course valid only for those who are taking this act seriously with the pure intention that they will continue to be faithful to God and obey His ordinances.

The reward is not for those who just take this event as a mere exhilaration, for as the blessed Prophet said: “The value of an action depends on the intention behind it” (Muslim & Nasaie).

And it is an occasion for Muslims everywhere to pray to God to help the oppressed people in Palestine, in Syria, Iraq, Egypt, Burma, Central Africa and wherever they are.

Al-Fatiha: A Reflection!

Here I will show some points of the reflections on Surah Al-Fatiha done by Abul Kalam Azad, an Indian scholar and a senior political leader of Indian independence movement, well known in the first half of twenty century.

Abul Kalam Azad (1888-1958) was born in Makkah. His father Maulana Khairuddin was a Bengali Muslim of Afghan origin who went to Makkah and settled there for some years. Khairuddin married an Arab woman, the daughter of Sheikh Mohammad Zaher Watri. In 1890 Khairuddin took his wife and son back to Calcutta.

The young Abul Kalam studied Qur’an, Arabic, Urdu, Persian, English, Philosophy, Geometry and Mathematics. Then he visited Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Egypt and Turkey, where he met many personalities, among them Muhammad Abduh in Egypt.

The aims of the Qur’an

Since the early time of his constant studies, he was eager to work on the interpretation of the Qur’an, so he published his periodical “Tarjuman Al-Qur’an” and started to do the work in Urdu. The most famous of his achievement was  “The Opening Chapter of the Qur’an”, which he published in 1930, but he continued renewing it and published its last version in 1945 and let it be translated into English by Professor Dr. Syed Abdul Latif of Osmania University in 1960.

According to Abul Kalam Azad, the function of revelation has been simply to interpret, on the basis of knowledge and conviction, the inherent urges of man.

Surat-ul-Fatiha expresses the instinctive urges of man so artfully and with such ease that he is impelled to affirm that every line of this Surah (= chapter), nay every word of it, is but the compulsive voice of his own heart and mind. It reveals one or other of the great purposes which underlie the “Deen” (= the way of life sponsored by the Qur’an).

For Abul Kalam, this Surah, Al-Fatiha, summarizes the content of the Qur’an. And the aims of the Qur’an are as follows:

(1)         To present the attributes of God in proper perspective, for, it is in his approach to them that man has often blundered.

(2)         It lays emphasis on the principle of causation in life so as to suggest that, even as in nature, every cause has its effect in the domain of human life, both individual and collective, so much so, that a good action produces a good result and an evil action an evil result.

(3)         To inculcate in man a faith in the life of the Hereafter, by pointing out that man’s earthly existence will become manifest, as a matter of course.

(4)         It points the way to righteous or good life: “Surely, This Qur’an guides to all that is most upright, and gives the believers who do good deeds the glad tiding that theirs will be a great reward” (17:9).

Contents of Al-Fatiha

This Surah draws attention to the All-encompassing providence of God, His Mercy and His Justice. And this gives a comprehensive picture of divine attributes which operate to provide man with all that he needs to sustain and develop the humanity in him and prevent him from going down in scale of life.

Anyone who has attained to faith and performs prayers in which he says “All praise is due to God, the Sustainer of all the worlds, the Most Gracious, the Dispenser of Grace”, then reflects over the life of the universe will see that the most pointed reality that strikes in the order that subsists therein is the system of God’s sustainment and benevolence. It is through this order that we are introduced to Nature. And when we get to know it a little closer, we realize that a greater reality than this order is at work everywhere and on which this very order depends. This is the sustainment and benevolence of God to Whom we say in our prayers “All praise is due to God, the Sustainer of all the worlds”. And if we reflect further, it is not sustenance alone the whole objective, something greater than this is in view. Sustenance is but a means to the development of beauty and perfectness in everything. We notice that there is a design in the life of the universe, and that there is beauty in this design. There is in its disposition the sense of balance.

This Surah desires man to acknowledge the universal character of divine concern for every individual, group, community, country and every form of existence.

This Surah emphasizes that requital is but the natural reaction to one’s own action and its inevitable result. It is not fair therefore to assert that God deals out punishment to any one out of revenge or in anger. This signifies that alongside the attributes of grace and beauty, those of “power” and “pressure” are also at work in the universe, and this is because His wisdom has assigned to each object a particular quality productive of a particular result. Justice, according to the Qur’an, is not a negation of mercy. It is mercy itself.

Moreover, the form of prayer suggested in the Surah is not only “we serve You”, but is specifically worded “You alone do we serve, and from You alone do we ask for help”. This manner of expression fulfills the primary condition of faith in the unity of God and disallows room for every form of “Shirk” (= associating with God anything beside Him).

Lastly, the path of goodness is styled “as-sirat-al-mustaqeem” (= the Straight Path). There could be no better or more appropriate term than this to designate it, for no one will fail to distinguish between a straight road and a road which is not straight, or disdain to choose the first. And then to enable him to know what a straight road for himself, and this, not in the form of any abstract idea, but in the form of a concrete reality, namely, the road followed by those on whom God has, as a result of their actions, bestowed favors.

For, whatever the country or nation one may belong to, man has always found two ways lying clear before him. One is that of those who have lived successful lives, the other failures.

This was the reason why the prayer form was adopted to stress the point. The prayer form helps to voice the inward condition of one who thought intent on seeking a spontaneous expression.

How to attain to Faith . . .

To be a Muslim only believing in God and in the Hereafter is not enough. A Muslim should attain to faith in God, in His Angels, in His Scriptures, in His Messengers, in the Hereafter and in the Qadar (= ordained measure, which is considered good and bad).

I am surprised that most translators of the Qur’an into English used the word belief in translating the word iman. “Iman” is equal to “attaining to faith”.

According to English dictionaries, “faith” is the allegiance and loyalty to a duty or a person. It means fidelity to one’s promises, or sincerity of intentions. It means belief and trust in and loyalty to God, etc. English dictionaries also indicate that “belief” is a feeling of being sure that someone or something exists or that something is true.

Among the translators I know, only Muhammad Asad translated “iman” with “attaining to faith”. In translating “ya ayuhal-lazeena amanu”, Muhammad Asad used to translate it as:

“O you who have attained to faith” and not “O believers”.

To be sure about this issue, let us ponder upon verses 14 and 15 of Surah Al-Hujurat in the Qur’an: “The Beduin say: We have attained to faith; say (to them o Muhammad): You have not yet attained to faith; you should (rather) say: We have (outwardly) surrendered, for (true) faith has not yet entered your hearts. But if you (truly) pay heed to God and His Messenger, He will not let the least of your deeds go to waste: for, behold, God is Much-Forgiving, a Dispenser of Grace. (Know that) true believers are only those who have attained to faith in God and His Messenger and have left all doubts behind, and who strive hard in God’s cause with their possessions and their lives: it is they, they who are true to their word!” (49:14-15).

Let us now go ahead with our reflection on “how to attain to faith”.

First of all, we have to be sincere with ourselves, each of us has an inner feeling about the concept: there must be a One Who created us and everything around us. Because with only One Creator (Who continuously sustains), all creation can go on constantly in harmony! Surely, all those harmonious beings could not be so, except with the Guidance of the Sustainer.

Secondly, the teachings of God’s Messengers’ told us that only human beings have the choice to follow God’s Guidance or to disobey. This being has a certain freedom of will and of desires. Only those who have a strong will to strive against certain destructive desires and who have a strong will to obey God’s guidance can be considered having attained to faith.

Thirdly, to help faithful human beings undertake their duties correctly in this hard life, God traced for them certain obligatory trainings to be performed, such as salaat (= prayers), siyaam (= fasting), zakaat (= purifying alms), hajj (= pilgrimage to Makkah) and discipline in behaviour.

These are obligations, which should be fulfilled while accomplishing all life activities as excellently as possible and in the most useful way for society.

It is important to emphasise that prosperity can only be obtained by undertaking the following four points:

1.   To be patient in adversity: We have to increase our capacity to calmly endure pain and trying situations, to bear provocation, annoyance or misfortune without complaint or losing our temper. We have to show steady persistence in the course of any action we do.

2.   To vie in patience with one another.

3.   To strengthen each other and bind our mutual relations closer for our common service to God.

4.   To strengthen our consciousness of God by always remembering Him in all our activities.

We find all these elements in the Qur’an as follows: “O you who have attained to faith! Be patient in adversity, and vie in patience with one another, and be ever ready (to do what is right), and remain conscious of God, so that you might attain to a happy state!” (3:200).

People with faith in God will always face others who mock and ridicule them, but the real servants of God should endure and have patience with them. God says: “Endure them with patience (all that they who deny the truth may say), and (remember) that it is none but God who gives you the strength to endure adversity, and do not grieve over them, and neither be distressed by the false arguments which they devise” (16:127).

Faithful Muslims should behave in a good way with other communities in any context, even if the others behave badly: we should endure their behaviour with patience: “And endure with patience whatever people may say (against you), and avoid them with a comely avoidance” (73:10).

In fact, whatever situation a person who has attained to faith is facing, good or bad, that person will always be content, as explained by the Messenger of God:

Suhaib bin Sinan reported that the Prophet (God’s blessings upon him) said: “How wonderful is the case of the faithful believer. Indeed all his case is good for him; and this could apply only to a faithful believer, because if prosperity attends him, he expresses gratitude to God and that is good for him. And if adversity befalls him, he endures it patiently and that is better for him”  (Recorded by Muslim in his Collection of Hadith).

Those who attain to faith in today’s life, will be welcomed (in the hereafter) in gardens of perpetual bliss which they shall enter: “Those who are true to their bond with God and never break their covenant, and who keep together what God has bidden to be joined, and stand in awe of their Lord and fear the most evil reckoning (which awaits such as do not respond to Him); and who are patient in adversity and of a longing for their Lord’s countenance, and are constant in prayer, and spend on other, secretly and openly, out of what We provide for them as sustenance, and (who) repel evil with good. It is these that shall find their fulfilment in the hereafter: gardens of perpetual bliss, which they shall enter together with the righteous from among their parents, their spouses, and their offspring; and the angels will come to them from every gate (and will say): Peace be upon you, because you have persevered. How excellent, then, this fulfilment in the hereafter!” (13:20-24).