Question About Fasting

[The Bright Beast]

OK, I have a small question about fasting. I know hardly anything about islam, so sorry if this seems a little ignorant.

Why do you have to fast during Ramadan. Surely Allah doesn't actually stand to gain anything by you not eating during daylight hours? Is it for his entertainment? Is it another way of worshipping him (that I don't understand) or is there another reason?

 

[truseeker]

And I am curious about the Catholic idea of fasting. At least Moslims understand that fasting means no food or drink. Catholics say they are fasting while eating 2 small meals and 1 large meal per day. That hardly sounds like much sacrifice to me.

 

[The Bright Beast]

really? where have you experienced that?

 

[Sahar]

Hello Bright Beast and welcome to Islam forum. If you tried fasting, you would know that it has nothing to do with entertainment. It needs much struggle and patience but brings much peace and happiness to the soul. Fasting is an act of worship. It's one of the five pillars of Islam.

The Qur'an says: (O you who believe, fasting is prescribed for you as it was prescribed for those who were before you, in order that you may learn taqwa. ) (Al-Baqarah 2: 183)

Taqwa is a very important spiritual and ethical term of the Qur'an. It is the sum total of all Islamic spirituality and ethics. It is a quality in a believer's life that keeps him/her aware of Allah all the time. A person who has taqwa loves to do good and to avoid evil for the sake of Allah. Taqwa is piety, righteousness and consciousness of Allah. Taqwa requires patience and perseverance. Fasting teaches patience, and with patience one can rise to the high position of taqwa.

The Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said that fasting is a shield. It protects a person from sin and lustful desires. When the disciples of Jesus asked him how to cast the evil spirits away, he is reported to have said, "But this kind never comes out except by prayer and fasting.” (Matthew 17:21).

According Imam al-Ghazali, fasting produces a semblance of divine quality of samadiyyah (freedom from want) in a human being. Imam Ibn al-Qayyim, viewed fasting as a means of releasing the human spirit from the clutches of desire, thus allowing moderation to prevail in the carnal self. Imam Shah Waliullah Dahlawi viewed fasting as a means of weakening the bestial and reinforcing the angelic elements in human beings. Maulana Mawdudi emphasized that fasting for a full month every year trains a person individually and the Muslim community as a whole, in piety and self restraint.

Lessons and Moralities of Fasting:

1. Discipline

We learn in this month how to discipline ourselves for the sake of Allah. In our morning and evening, we follow a strict schedule of eating and drinking. We are constantly aware that even in our such mundane activities as eating and drinking, we must remain under divine injunctions. We change our habits in our daily routines because we learn that we are not the servants and slaves to our habits, but always the servants of Allah. Then after Ramadan, we have to keep this spirit of discipline in other modes of our life and must continue with our submission to the commands of Allah.
​

2. Renewal of Devotional Life

Ramadan renews our enthusiasm for worship and devotion to Allah. In this month we are more careful of our daily prayers and have special prayers at night.

3. Renewal of Contact with the Qur’an

Ramadan and the Qur’an are linked together from the beginning. It was in this month that this divine message was revealed to Prophet Muhammad (peace and blessings be upon him). We are told that the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) was fasting when he received the first revelation. Fasting prepares the believers' hearts to learn the Word of Allah. It is the most suitable condition for our spiritual and mental communication with the Qur’an.

4. Renewal of Identity with the Ummah

Ramadan is not an individual experience only, but it is an experience in community. The whole Muslim Ummah fasts together in one and the same month. We identify with one another in our obedience to Allah. This gives us a new sense of togetherness and association.

5. A Fresh Sense of Care and Sympathy

Fasting in the month of Ramadan helps us to understand the suffering and the pains of the poor and needy. By our voluntary hunger and thirst we realize what it means to be deprived of basic necessities of life. Ramadan is called the month of charity and sympathy. We learn how to be more kind and generous in this month. Many Muslims also pay their Zakah in the month of Ramadan.

6. Jihad or Struggle

Fasting in Ramadan and Jihad both of them were prescribed in the same year, that is, the second year of Hijrah in Madinah. Fasting prepares for hardships and sacrifice. These are two important things without which Jihad is not possible. Muslims learn in Ramadan how to struggle against the forces of evil in their own selves, in the society around them, and in the world at large.

7. Taqwa

To summarize all the moral and spiritual gifts of Ramadan, we can say that Ramadan gives us the great gift of taqwa (piety). Taqwa is the sum total of Islamic life. It is the highest of all virtues in the Islamic scheme of things. It means, God-consciousness, piety, fear and awe of Allah and it signifies submission to Allah and total commitment to all that is good and rejection of all that is evil and bad.

Very beautiful!!
​

​

​

​

​

​

 

[Sahar]

Who must fast?
Fasting in the month of Ramadan is obligatory upon every Muslim, male or female, who is adult (i.e. has reached puberty) and sane and who is not sick or on a journey...

[FONT=Verdana, Helvetica]Things that invalidate the fast:

[/FONT]

1) Eating, drinking or smoking deliberately, including taking any non-nourishing items by mouth, nose or anus.

2) Deliberately causing oneself to vomit.

3) The beginning of menstrual or post-childbirth bleeding even in the last moment before sunset.

4) Ejaculation out of sexual excitement from kissing, hugging, etc.

5) Eating, drinking, smoking or having sexual intercourse after Fajr (dawn) on mistaken assumption that it is not Fajr time yet. Similarly, engaging in these acts before sunset on the mistaken assumption that it is already sunset time.

Sexual intercourse during fasting is forbidden and is a great sin. Those who engage in it must make both qada' (make up the fasts) and kaffarah (expiation by fasting for 60 days after Ramadan or to feed 60 poor people for each day of fast broken in this way). According to Imam Abu Hanifah, eating and/or drinking deliberately during fast also entail the same qada' and kaffarah.

Sources:
Fasting: Meaning & Rules
Lessons and Moralities of Fasting - IslamonLine.net

I hope this helps.
​

​

 

[The Bright Beast]

thanks that's helped me understand more about it. But what is the reason behind fasting, why does Allah want you to?

 

[islam means peace]

thanks that's helped me understand more about it. But what is the reason behind fasting, why does Allah want you to?

The main reason is that by doing fasting men/women can learn 'TAQWA'

The Qur'an says: (O you who believe, fasting is prescribed for you as it was prescribed for those who were before you, in order that you may learn taqwa. ) (Al-Baqarah 2: 183)

Now what is 'TAQWA' , I donot know the exacet meaiing in english , but in simple word of my own it mean to stop from bad thing and do good things.

The basis person of life is to follow the commandments of Allah, and to do good and stop from bad ,

Now , when you leave all the halal (allowed) thing like food , water etc for certain period of time , obviously when you are stoping from food etc you also stop from bad things too that the main purpose of fasting stoping from bad habbits, then this execercise in one month teaches us that we have to try to follow the same stooping from bad all the year.

 

[ruhnafsoul]

thanks that's helped me understand more about it. But what is the reason behind fasting, why does Allah want you to?

hmm.. Fasting is physically to deny eating and drinking for a certain period of time, therefore disrupting one's normal routine that he / she use to follow regularly. In doing that, it make ones realize how good He / She is as a worshipper to ALLAH , and whether can one tolerate to face the new dicipline during the fasting month. It does changes one's regular perception towards his life, his faith and made him realize the greatness of GOD

The same way it goes spiritually. Fasting in the spiritual perception is to deny the eating and drinking of his NAFS. The normal food and drink of his NAFS is all the things that is other than remembering and realizing ALLAH, the one and only GOD. By fasting, it disrupts the normal regular way of his Nafs in doing and seeing things in life and make him struggling to follow the dicipline of denying the NAFS. In a way, it elevates man from animal state to anglelic state.. means to make man realize the act of his NAFS.. so that one doesnt follow the bad intentions and orders from his the NAFS but to be obedient and godly man instead..

forgive me

 

[sindbad5]

nothing to add after Sahar post
i just want to say that i hate when Ramadan ends and wish that the whole year become fasting like Ramadan.