Ramadan: what is it for?
There is, for the moment of breaking the fast, a famous du`a
that most Muslims learn as children. It is famous because the Prophet used to
say it, ﷺ. The du`a is short and to the point, and
uncomplicated; it has a clear rhythm, and it rhymes – all of which makes it (in
the Arabic) easy to memorise. Yet, the meaning of this du`a is quite
extraordinarily rich and profound. It is one of countless examples of the
Prophet’s skill as a teacher, and the strength of his grasp of what islam means
and what it is for – in this case, his grasp of what Ramadan means and what
Ramadan is for. It is God who set him the task of prophethood; and it is God
who enabled him to complete that task across the whole expanse and multitude of
demands that it imposed.
We have the best of reasons, therefore, for reflecting on
his du`a as a way into understanding what Ramadan is for. The whole of it is
just these few words:
- Allahumma la-ka sumtu: O God it is for You that I have fasted
- wa-bi-ka amantu: and in You that I have believed
- wa-`alay-ka tawakkaltu: and on You that I have relied
- wa-`ala rizqi-ka aftartu: and with Your provision that I have broken my fast
Some versions of this du`a shorten it to just the first and
fourth lines. So let us begin with the shortest version.
In the precious few seconds before surrendering to the need
to eat and drink, we say: “O God: it is for You that I have fasted, and (it is)
with Your provision that I have broken my fast.’ What is the need for saying
this? The fact of sunset has already been announced by the call to prayer. And,
self-evidently, God does not need to be informed about this – He already knows
that we fasted, how well we did so, and with what we are about to break our
fast. So why are we stating the obvious? What is this du`a really about?
Mindfulness in prayer and in fasting
When Muslims stand to pray, in company with others or alone,
it can happen that they do the prayer without being fully present in all of it,
their minds drifting away to other concerns. Though most undesirable to do so,
it is possible to say or hear the words and do the movements of the prayer,
without the attentiveness that is their due right. Thus it can happen that we
are absent in some part of the prayer though we are not absent from it. By
contrast, when we are fasting, we cannot be absent in it or absent from it. The
minimum outward form of fasting – abstaining from food and drink and sexual
activity from first light to sunset – continually requires us to be mindful.
Indeed, as the effects of hunger and thirst become stronger during the day, so
mindfulness in doing what we are doing becomes stronger. It is, no doubt, by
virtue of this increase in attentiveness that (according to the teaching of
God’s Messenger, ﷺ) seeking forgiveness, acts of
devotion and worship, and acts of kindness in Ramadan are rewarded more
generously than at other times. One of the many blessings of this month is that
when Muslims stand to pray they do so much more mindfully than before.
Why even lapsed Muslims keep the fast
Sadly, some Muslims absent themselves altogether from the
duty of prayer, and perhaps also neglect other of the rules and conditions of
Muslim life. Yet, even such Muslims observe the fasting in Ramadan. Why? Why do
they do so, and how are they able to do it? In Ramadan we become aware of what
we know but do not properly acknowledge, namely that God is real to us,
individually and personally, that His will is real to us, individually and
personally, and that He really does enable us to do what He commands us to do.
And we know what He commands from His Book, from the teachings of His
Messenger, ﷺ, and from the clear prompting of our
consciences to do what is unselfish and good and to not do what is selfish and
bad – in everyday life the decision about such matters is, if we are honest,
rarely difficult. Not knowing what to do is hardly ever the problem; the
problem is nearly always having the will to do it and see it through.
We are always ready to state in a formal way that “it is
inconceivable of God that He should command us to do either what it is
impossible for us to do or what it is not good for us to do”. But in Ramadan,
by personally coping with our own hunger and thirst day after day, we
demonstrate to ourselves the truth of this statement and, more importantly, we
demonstrate our belief in it along with our acting by it. The body’s relief in
the iftar meal is accompanied by the heart’s relief that we have a right of
entry to the dignity reserved for believers. It is for the sake of that dignity
that the most unobservant Muslims are nonetheless observant of the fasting
month.
Having said, “O God, it is for You that I have fasted”,
there is only a brief moment before the heart realises the truth of what we say
next: “and (it is) with Your provision that I have broken my fast”. Theoretical
dependence on God becomes concrete and real; a vague, abstract assent to the
idea of God becomes a lived experience of belief in Him.
In sum, the affirmations in the du`a are not redundant information-statements.
Rather, they express, in the first person singular, gratitude and wonder that
the task that was set has been done. The second and third lines, in the longer
version of the du`a, explain how it was doable: by believing in God and relying
on Him.
Reading the du‘a as a virtuous circle
The phrases of the du`a are linked by a simple “and’. It
would be possible to link them into a sort of virtuous circle with “because” –
I have been able to fast for You (i.e., at Your command) because I have
believed in You; because I have believed in You, I have relied on You
(entrusted myself to You); and having relied on You I have from You the
provision with which I have broken my fast; because I have broken my fast with
food and drink provided by You, it is for You (i.e., at Your command) that I
have fasted . . .
But that is a wrong way to understand the du`a. To make such
a reading possible we have to switch the emphasis of the Arabic on You (which
we have indicated by “It is for You that”, etc.) to an emphasis on I – “I did
this because, and this because, etc.” This reading makes the fasting appear to
be an initiative of human will, and a test of it, as if the purpose of fasting
were to make the human will stronger through denial and self- discipline. That
is, at best, a possible (and welcome) side-benefit; we always need
self-control, and we need it to complete the fast properly – it is only the
means to the end. And the end, the goal, of the fasting is not to strengthen
the will (even if that is a minor outcome of the effort) but to silence and
suspend it: we eat and drink when God wills, not as and when we will.
Silencing the will
Human will is a busy thing, forever tangled in plans and
preoccupations, our own and those of others, competing and co-operative. Its
objectives are not as clear and certain as we like to imagine, but they appear
to us important enough to distract us from awareness of ourselves as creatures
of God who need to be answerable to Him. That need is the basis of our dignity
as human beings. Though obscured by the human will, this need is stronger and
deeper than the body’s needs for water and sustenance and reproduction. That is
why in devotion and worship we find relief from our own plans and
preoccupations, and what we will can be viewed from the larger perspective of
what is pleasing to God. By means of hunger and thirst, endured in response to
God’s command to make Ramadan a month of fasting, the clamour of the will dies
down, its urgency is weakened. The silence that the will forever obscures and
displaces is defined for our attention, and we have the opportunity to be aware
of God, of our dependence on Him and of our need for Him. That is the wisdom of
the way the Prophet phrased his du`a.
Fasting is not about self-control
Unfortunately, the idea is widespread that the benefit of
fasting is self-control. This may be true, but it is not its purpose. If any
human power had, for its own private reason, imposed on us the same task of not
eating or drinking, we would have spent all the hours of daylight fuming
angrily about it. We would resent our weakness in relation to the power and its
arbitrary, unkind imposition and, naturally, we would disobey if we could get
away with disobeying. Then, when food and drink were allowed, the relief would
not suffice to convert our resentment into pleasure. Rather, it is most likely
that resentment would ruin the taste of the meal.
If the same conditions were imposed upon us by chance – for
example, if we got so lost on the way to a meeting for lunch that we missed not
only the lunch but the next meal also – the food, when at last it came, would
most likely taste well. This is because we accept, simply and fully, the
unfortunate circumstance that we got lost and were unable to reach food. Even
so, it is an experience that we would try hard to avoid in future. The same
applies to crash diets and severe physical training regimes that people impose
upon themselves for various reasons – done well and sustained, they can improve
health, self-control, etc., but the aim is to avoid them in future, as soon as
the desired object of human will has been attained.
Why we miss Ramadan when it ends
That is not at all the case with fasting in Ramadan. For
sure, it is a task imposed, but no Muslim ever plans to avoid it in future, and
no Muslim is seriously tempted to disobey its conditions. On the contrary, most
Muslims look forward to Ramadan and observe the fast conscientiously – as I
mentioned, even usually non-observant Muslims do so. As we enter the last third
of the month, we begin to get anxious that only a few days are left, and the
feeling takes hold that, when Ramadan has passed, we will miss it. Then, when
it is over, we do miss it in fact – for a while. We can understand the feeling
of anxiety when friends or relatives staying with us come to the end of their
stay, and the feeling of loss when they have gone and we miss them. But how do
we explain such feelings for a month of the year, and a month of fasting at
that?
The answer is in the du`a. O God: it is for You. A
well-known Prophetic hadith tells us that God has said the fast is for Him, and
He will reward it. So what is the reward that we are after, if not nearness to
Him? When, from behind the noise of our will enfeebled by thirst, we almost
hear the silence, we hope to catch within it an echo of God’s mercy. Perhaps
that is what perfect silence is. His mercy is ever present, but we are not
attentive. It has more weight and power than any and all human sins, crimes,
faults, lapses, slips and shortcomings put together, and it is accessible to
all except those who deny Him and deny their need of His forgiveness. It is not
bound by place or time but the Messenger of God, ﷺ, has informed us that the mercy of God, though it is always near, is
brought yet nearer in Ramadan. The coming of this special opportunity is what
we look forward to, and its passing is what makes us anxious.
In-sha|a Allah, there will be time in the talk to mention
the diverse other blessings of Ramadan that are explained in the hadiths, and
the many other du`as that the Prophet commended to us to help us benefit from
fasting and worship in this month, most especially its connection with the
mercy of the Qur|`an and its revelation.
