Ramadan AlMubarak

Sunday September 21, 2008
Selamat Berpuasa and get ready to celebrate Selamat Hari Raya.

Well, what have you aquired or experienced after abstaining form food and beverages in duration of you fast? Allah has promised to His servants that thosewho fast will experience two golden moments in their quest to submit to Him i.e. the moment you want to end your fast and the moment of meeting Him in the YaumilAkirah.

As His humbleand suservient servants, we are to change our lifestyle and our submission to Him. Firstly, as promised, Ramadan is the Holy Month whereby all the negative forces, the satans, are being locked away theroughout the month from carrying out their terms of references - to distract humans from obeying the commands of their Creator.

Fasting, not only be deprived of food and beverages, means to abstain from doing the act ofmunkar. Munkar can derive from you eyes, ears, mind and body. Hence, Muslims are offered tremendous rewards for guarding their acts of munkar. The month of Ramadan ensures Muslims that good deeds will be rewarded from 70 to 700 times.

Hadis, has it said that by having a late sahur, supper, Muslims will be accorded with rewards from Allah. Upon waking up, he would then perform his Tahhujud prsyer; had is last supper and headed to mosques or suraus to perform his ubuh prayer. Having answered Allah's call to perform Subuh prayer, he would then read a few verses of the Holy Quran.

The day begins with his normal jobs in whatever that he is involved in. Then during Lunch Break he would be congregating with the other Muslims in the performing of Zuhr prayer in a mosque or surau. While waiting for the afternoon session to start, he is advised to read the Quran and Hadis. By 5 his day would be over and he heads ome to be with his family. On reachng home he must perform his obligatory Asr prayer, either alone or with his family.

The Asr prayer is the mid-prayer of the day i.e. the middle prayer between Subuh and Zuhur and between Maghrib and Isy' prayers.his is the testing time during the fasting. It is only about 2 hours before the beaking of the fast but it will be the most challening minutes of the 12 hours fast. You would feel the the second-arm of your watch or clock, moves slowly than the normal movement. Even second of the 24 hour system is meaningful. Some people would use this challeging time to help his wife prepare food for the breakfast, while some would be reading the verses of he Quran and some would be languishing in front of TV.

Usually the last 300 seconds to the breakfast time would be really the most difficult test of your spiritual endurance. Hold your desire because as Prophet Muhmmad (pbuh) once stated that The most difficult thing to do is to fight against desire. Humans differ from the other creation of Allah is their ability to control and master thier emotional and spiritual quotients. Both quotients would be uncontrollable or unmanagable without the intelligent quoutient. islam is a religion the evolved around Intelligent Quotient, Spritual Quotient and the Application of both.

Finally, the breakfast time is here. Azan would signal the end of one's fast. This signals he success of one's spiritual effort to gain Allah's blessing. Children and adults too would instanly gargle and swallow whatever food and beverages on the dinner table. No ne woud be able to describe the thrill and excitement of tasting the first drop of liquid after 12 hours of thirst and hunger.

Hold and behold. Islam has it made that once Azan Maghrib is filling the air, we must pronounced our thanks to Allah for having successfully performed our fast. Then before sipping our first drop of liquid through our mouth, we must offer ourdoa to Allah for providing the food for our consumption. Quench your thist and tasted the delicaries that Allah has provided for you and at the same time we must also bear in mind that Muslims all over the world are not so lucky to have lavish food o quench their thirst and to fulfill their hunger.

That's the rationale of having to fast is to understand the difficulties and hardships of other fellow humans who are starving to live in this planet earth. As Muslims we are to pay Zakat and Fitrah so that the fund could be used to help the sufferings of others.

Does our fasting process end hee? No. Don't eat as if that is the last meal of your life. Our Beloved Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) once said Stop eating before your are satiated because someone with full stomach would be hesistant or worse would be unable to perform his obligatory solat. That would be the worse thing to happen to someone who has managed to perform his fast but fail to perform his utmost obligation, to pray. of course Maghrib prayer. Fortunately most Muslims who have fasted during the day would not fail to perform his oher Maghrib prayers.

Is that the end of our routine in he month of Ramadan? Not yet, though. Take a break after Mahrib prayer beafor preparing yoself to attend Isya' and Tarawikh prayer at home or at the surau. A day in Ramadan would only end once you have performed your Witr prayer which is usually performed at around 10 pm.

Time to sleep and ready to roll he same routine throughout Ramadan.

Selamat Meneruskan Puasa and Selamat Hari Raya Ailfitri.

Maaf ahir Bathin.

Dr Bano