Ramadan 2009

In the name of God, the compassionate, the merciful. May you guide me in this blogging journey.

Here we are again...another year has passed and us Muslims all over the world are embarking on our 1 month quest to get closer to our heart, closer to our souls to find God. It is RAMADAN again!!! We are fasting. Fasting means abstaining from food and drink, foul language, bad thoughts/actions and sexual intercourse from dawn to sunset for 30 days. Since last Ramadan I have gotten quite savvy in the wonderful world of technology and so I have decided to blog about my personal experience this Ramadan. My blog will contain both personal thoughts/feelings/experiences as well as Qu'ran quotations and perhaps a bit of Islamic history. Here we go....

(all references to the Qu'ran have been taken from Penguin Classics "The Koran", which is the best English translation of the Qu'ran that I have found.)

Ramadan is mentioned in The Holy Qu'ran like this:

"Believers, fasting is decreed for you as it was decreed for those before you; perchance you will guard yourselves against evil. Fast a certain number of days but if any one among you is ill or on a journey, let him fast a similar number of days later' and for those that cannot endure it there is a penance ordained: the feeding of a poor man. He that does good of his own accord shall be well rewarded; but to fast is better for you, if you but knew it.

In the month of Ramadan the Koran was revealed, a book of guidance for mankind with proofs of guidance distinguishing right from wrong. Therefore whoever of you is present in that month let him fast. But he who is ill or on a journey shall fast a similar number of days later on.

God desires your well-being, not your discomfort. He desires you to fast the whole month so that you may magnify God and render thanks to Him for giving you His guidance.

It is now lawful for you to lie with your wives on the night of the fast; they are a comfort to you as you are to them. Eat and drink until you can tell a white thread from a black one in the light of the coming dawn. Then resume the fast till nightfall."

Typically when someone hears that I am fasting, the food element is what comes to mind. NO FOOD OR DRINK is allowed. No gum. Nothing by mouth. This is difficult, absolutely. And I'll have more words on this aspect later. Right now, however, I want to look at the other aspects of fasting. During fasting hours the fasting person strives to be as God has intended him to be-kind, patient, fair, loving and compassionate. Oddly enough, this is difficult! For example, to argue with someone or to yell at a driver on the road for cutting you off would be a violation of your fast. Ramadan teaches me to think of the other person. Perhaps that person driving so violently on the road is rushing to see his child being born or perhaps a family member in the hospital. At any rate, it doesn't matter what their reasons are-it has nothing to do with me.

Fasting from our own inner demons (our thoughts) is in many ways more difficult then the superficial fasting of food. When I approach Ramadan with the mindset that I am going to use this time as it was intended-to cleanse myself of myself and to be as close as possible to the beautiful soul that God made me, it opens worlds for me that I could never have imagined. When I approach Ramadan grudgingly and focused on the hunger in my stomach and the dryness of my mouth, it ends up being torcher and pushes me further away from God and leaves me feeling like a failure. So, you can see....Ramadan is more about re-establishing oneself and re-connecting with God and in the end is so much more rewarding then putting a piece of food into my mouth. God feeds my soul.