The advent of Ramadan

THE advent of Ramadan symbolises for the Muslim community a time of soul-searching and a fresh new invocation of faith. With the month of fasting getting underway today, it becomes the responsibility of every Muslim to call forth within himself the spirit of the belief which Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) inaugurated through Islam more than fourteen hundred years ago. At the core of that belief lies a readiness on the part of the Muslim to abjure pleasures of a worldly nature and instead focus on a reflection on the munificence of the Creator, the abundance of which can only serve to further buttress individual faith. In Ramadan, it is faith that is sorely tested, through Muslims sacrificing their temporal desires in favour of spiritual enlightenment.
The nature of such enlightenment necessarily comes through prayer and fasting for every Muslim. It is religious duty ordained by faith and has no room for compromise. More importantly, fasting entails a temperament that brings total commitment to the observance of the principles of Islam. Fasting is reduced to pointlessness when the individual engaged in it only appears to be going without food and drink for a whole day, until the call to prayer at Maghrib. In other words, fasting, being one of the pillars of the Islamic faith that its adherents must strenuously uphold, is at once an emotion and an act that begins somewhere deep within the soul and reaches out toward a higher plane of spiritual belief. Indeed, self-abnegation is at the core of fasting. Absolute abstinence from all those pleasures that undermine religiosity is the underlying thought during the holy month of Ramadan. At the same time, it is fellow feeling, a concern for those who are deprived and therefore suffer through their lives, that is the priority in Ramadan. The poor need to be helped, the ailing require sympathy and assistance from those more fortunate. Let that lesson be renewed in Ramadan.
Let Ramadan this year therefore be a renewed opportunity for Muslims to rediscover their innermost qualities through a clear pursuit of their faith. That Islam is a religion of peace, that it abhors extremism and terrorism in the name of faith is a truth that must be reasserted in Ramadan. Honesty, sincerity, courage of conviction and an upholding of the truth are the attributes Muslims are expected to maintain and promote in this holy month. Let that be done, through a demonstration of unflinching obeisance to the wishes of Allah.