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It
is only natural that fasting should be decreed to the nation that is duty bound
to launch a campaign to establish the Islamic way of life that Allah has laid
down for mankind, to call people to accept it, and to testify against them in
respect of their attitudes to it. Fasting is a manifestation of man’s
determined will and his relationship with his Lord, which is based on total
obedience and submission to Him. Fasting is also a demonstration of man’s
deliberate disregard of all his physical needs. He willingly forgoes these needs
in order to achieve his aim of winning the pleasure of Allah and earning His
reward. These are necessary elements in the training of the believers so that
they are able to bear the pressures and hardships of the way they have chosen.
It is the thorny way, full of obstacles. On both sides of it there are all sorts
of pleasures and temptations that beckon the travelers, trying to force them off
their course.
We
may add also that fasting has numerous advantages for health that continue to be
discovered as time passes. I am personally not inclined to relate religious
duties and directives, especially in matters of worship, to their apparent
physical advantages. The underlying purpose of all such duties and directives is
to equip man adequately to fulfill his role in his life and to prepare him for
the achievement of the standard of perfection designed for him in the hereafter.
Nevertheless,
I do not deny any benefit that we may observe or that scientists may discover to
result from the fulfillment of such religious duties and directives. It goes
without saying that Allah takes into consideration the physical constitution of
man before He lays down his duties for him. We must not, however, relate our
religious duties solely to what our human knowledge discovers. Our knowledge is,
after all, limited and cannot comprehend fully the divine wisdom behind
everything that relates to man and his education and training, let alone
comprehend everything that relates to the universe.
Allah
realizes that man requires help and motivation in order to respond to duty and
fulfill it regardless of its benefits. It takes time for man to get used to a
certain duty and to be convinced of its wisdom. Hence, the decree of fasting
starts with the address made to the believers, which reminds them of their
essential quality, that is, their belief in Allah. They are then told that
fasting has always been a duty required of the believers in all religions. Its
principal aim is their education and training so that their hearts acquire a
high standard of sensitivity and purity and that the fear of Allah is well
established in them:
(Believers,
fasting is decreed for you as it was decreed for those before you, so that you
may be God-fearing.)
To
fear Allah, then, is the great aim of fasting that looms large before our eyes.
As the believers fulfill this duty, in total obedience to Allah and in pursuit
of His pleasure, they feel the quality of fearing Allah to be a life within
them. This is, indeed, the quality that guards their hearts against spoiling
their fasting by indulging in sin. Those who are addressed by the Qur’an are
fully aware of the value Allah attaches to this quality of fearing Allah and
being conscious of Him. Its acquirement is something for which they yearn.
Fasting is a tool with which it is achieved, or we may say, a way that leads to
it. Hence, the Qur’an raises it before them as a noble objective that they try
to achieve through fasting.
They
are then told that fasting is prescribed only for a certain number of days. It
is not to be practiced every day in their lives. Exempted from it, however, are
the ill until they have recovered, and the travelers until they have settled:
((Fast)
a certain number of days. But whoever of you is ill, or on a journey, shall
fast instead the same number of days later on.)
Taken
at its face value, the statement concerning the exemption of the ill and the
travelers is general, unrestricted. Hence any illness or journey is a good
reason for exemption from fasting, provided that compensation is made when the
case that justifies the exemption no longer obtains. This is my understanding of
this general, unqualified Qur’anic statement. Moreover, it is more in line
with the Islamic concept of relieving the strain and causing no hardship. The
exemption is not related to the severity of the illness or the hardship of the
journey; it is related to sickness and traveling generally. The purpose of the
exemption is that it is Allah’s wish to make things easy, not hard, for man.
We cannot claim to have full knowledge of the divine wisdom behind relating this
exemption to sickness and traveling generally. There may be some considerations
known to Allah and unknown to man in these two cases. There may be some
hardships that may not immediately appear to us or we may tend to overlook.
Since Allah has not attached this exemption to any particular reason, we refrain
from making any judgment concerning it. We obey any statement Allah has made,
even if its wisdom does not appear immediately to us. What is certain is that
there is a wisdom behind it, although we may not necessarily recognize it.
Some
people may fear that such an opinion may cause people to be lax or to neglect
their worship duties for any reason. Indeed, this is what has prompted Islamic
scholars to adopt a more strict attitude and to lay down conditions. This
argument, however, does not justify, in my opinion, attaching any restrictions
to an unqualified statement made by Allah. Islam does not compel people to be
obedient. Its method is to implant in them the fear of Allah so that they obey
Him. The acquirement of the quality of fearing Allah is the particular aim of
this type of worship. He who tries to make use of a certain concession made by
Allah in order to evade fulfilling a duty is, in the first place, devoid of
goodness. With such an attitude, the aim behind the religious duty cannot be
fulfilled. We must not forget that Islam is a religion laid down by Allah, not
man-made. Allah knows best that this religion achieves a perfect balance between
the relaxation of certain duties and strict adherence to duty. A certain
exemption or concession may serve a certain interest that cannot be served
otherwise. Indeed, this must be the case. Hence, the Prophet (peace and
blessings be upon him) has ordered Muslims to make use of the concessions and
exemptions Allah has allowed them.
If
it so happens that people in a particular generation have become corrupt, their
reform cannot be achieved through an extra-strict application of Allah’s
rules, but through their education and motivation to acquire the quality of
fearing Allah. If a strict application of the rules that govern human
transactions may be used as a deterrent or as a means to prevent evil when
corruption spreads, the same cannot be applied to matters of worship. Worship is
a relationship between man and His Lord that has no direct effect on the
interests of human beings, in the same way as the rules governing human
transactions have. Appearances in matters of worship are irrelevant, unless
worship is based on fearing Allah. If this quality is present, no one would try
to evade a duty or utilize a concession except when he is fully satisfied that
making use of it is preferable, in obedience to Allah, in the particular case in
which he finds himself.
A
strict application of the rules that govern acts of worship generally or a
tendency to restrict the exemptions that have not been qualified originally may
cause some people to refrain from using them when they need them. Moreover, it
has little effect in checking those who want to be evasive. It is far better to
handle matters in whatever way Allah has made clear to us. He has far more
wisdom than us and He knows best the interests, immediate and not so immediate,
served by all His rules that lay down duties or relax them.
As
for the exemption from fasting in cases of illness, it appears to me that the
exemption applies to every case that may be reasonably described as illness,
regardless of its nature or intensity. It is compulsory for anyone who makes use
of this exemption to compensate for the days of Ramadan that he does not fast
because of illness or traveling. Each day is compensated for by fasting one day
at any time during the year [except for those days in which fasting is
originally prohibited such as the two `eids]. The weightier opinion is that
there is no need to fast on consecutive days when one fasts in compensation for
the days he did not in Ramadan.
* This
article based on the English translation of the author’s work
Fi Zilal Al-Qur’an (In the Shade of the Qur’an), Volume I, Trans. and ed.
by Adil Salahi, published by The Islamic Foundation and IslamOnline.net.
**
Sayed Qutb
(1906-1966) was a prominent and influential Muslim intellectual and writer. He
wrote many books about Islam and its distinctive features as a comprehensive way
of life. Among his most important works is his exegesis of the Qur’an In
the Shade of the Qur’an, which found outstanding popularity and welcome
among Muslims.
*** Adil
Salahi is the Religious Page
Editor of the Jeddah-based Arab News.
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