Ramadan . . . when light permeates the soul

Ramadan is all about values. And fasting is a reminder not merely of what the Almighty expects His creation to do in remembrance of His munificence but also a reassertion of the belief that there are the multitudes out there in need of the means of survival. In very broad terms, therefore, from Ramadan flows the annual message that life is all about principles, that these principles form the core of morality upon which men and women are expected to conduct their lives.

We are once more on the path of the supreme religiosity which the month of Ramadan symbolizes. Once again, Muslims around the world must answer the call of faith, respond to questions of how they have carried themselves in the year that has gone by since the last fasting season. Ramadan is therefore a  moment in time for a reassertion of faith, a replenishing of the soul with vitality. In a remembrance of the munificence emanating from the Creator, Ramadan enjoins upon all Muslims the sacred need to look into their souls, to ask themselves the question of whether they are fulfilling the responsibilities ordained for them by the Islamic faith.

Such fulfillment comes, not through a display of opulence or a demonstration of the hedonistic or a falling back on the sybaritic, but through a recalling of the original principles upon which the Holy Prophet of Islam informed us of the links between Allah and His Creation. It is through a recapitulation of the humility and simplicity which underlined the life of Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) that we understand the significance of belief.

Belief is what we demonstrate through prayers, at home and in the mosque. But belief thrives in the heart too, for no faith can assert itself until it throbs in the innermost being of a person. In the heart, therefore, it is that grandeur of God, that undying lesson that it is from Him that we came and that to Him we will return, which shines in the month of Ramadan. And beyond Ramadan.

And belief is, again, to remember what humanity is all about, what the essence of living is all about. In fasting, therefore, it is the meaning of endurance coupled with our faith in Allah that matters. Ramadan is not a promise of heaven. Nor should it be a temptation, of expectation of a beautiful niche in paradise. In Ramadan it is the strength of faith, the ability to live a spartan existence, to do away with the ostentatious which powers our thoughts. Ramadan is not a pledge of heavenly delights that impels us into abstinence from dawn to dusk.

Ramadan is more a moral affair, an ethical question if you will. It abjures everything which reeks of opulence, of an ugly demonstration of it. It embraces everything which speaks to us of the man seeking alms outside our door, of the neighbor whose children are in need of succour, of the poverty-stricken relative in the family and clan for whom iftar is a threadbare affair. Ramadan is that opportunity for all of us to open the doors wide for all Muslims, indeed for all humanity to come in. Ramadan welcomes all. It gives.

And thus we return to that necessary matter of morality. And morality is of course the thought that the spirit of Ramadan is not to be lost in waste, in gormandizing as it were. The break of fast is that special moment in time when our infinitesimal presence in this wide universe becomes for us a new reason to discover ourselves. All glory flows from the Creator. Iftar, from that absolutely proper perspective, is therefore an occasion for an unobtrusive demonstration of piety. The power of faith, the essence of belief is not to be had in celebrations of life through such occasions as iftar parties.

Iftar is not a time for politics to be indulged in, for grand displays of affluence. In similar fashion, Ramadan is no excuse for exhibitions of temporal pleasure. Crass commercialism and rude consumerism are precisely the reasons why Ramadan happens to be, indeed why religion happens to be -- to lead men and women back to belief, to the light of Allah. Ramadan is that break in the year when the truth is revealed anew, that faith is an idea we need to hold dear, that the month of fasting is but a re-engineering of that cardinal principle.

In this season of renewed faith in the Creator, of reassertive devotion to the Prophet of Islam, it becomes the task of the faithful to abjure that which militates against the purity of the soul and the largeness of spirit embedded in the heart. It is that time of year when we care especially well for those who have little or nothing, for those whose lives could be made a trifle better than they were last year. In that nocturnal hour when the family gathers for sehri, the sparkling stars hanging low over the universe speak to us of the evanescence of life.

When the day ends, when from the mosque flows to us in the voice of the muezzin that melody we know as the azaan, that call to prayer, that ringing of the heavenly bell informing us it is time to break the fast, to bow in devotion to the Lord of the Universe, we are made aware yet again of who we are, whence we came and where our destiny will lead us. In the glow of the primeval sunset, in the brilliance of the stars, we shine in the light of Creation.

Ramadan, in the end, connects us to the Almighty. When that happens, we remember mortality. All beauty is fleeting. Every path leads to the grave. When it pours in our hamlets, when the skies burst above our humble abodes, when thunder sounds through the clouds and lightning dances across the heavens, the soul beats in rhythm to the music which plays --- and has played since the beginning of Creation --- in the realm beyond this mundane planet we inhabit. Ramadan takes us back to the Almighty, to the message shining through the pages of the Holy Quran.

Ramadan is that moment in time when introspection takes hold of our corporeal being, lifts us to the state of the spiritual, for there is the Other World, beyond ours. We will answer for our deeds there. Ramadan prepares us for that test of religiosity, for that adherence to faith expected of us.

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