THE OBLIGATION OF FASTING
Allah says in the Quran:
"O uou who have faith! Fasting is prescribed for you as it was prescribed for those before you - so that hopefully you will have taqwa." - Al Baqarah(2):183
Meaning that hopefuly you can safeguard yourselves from the Fire through Fasting; fasting is a means to the forgiveness of sins, and sins lead one to the fire.
The two sahihs record the hadith in which the prophet (pbuh) said:
"Islam is built upon five: that you worship Allah and reject the worship of anything else, to establish the prayer, the giving of Zakat, performing pilgrimage to the house and Fasting the month of Ramadan." [This is the wording of Muslim, Bukhari has the first sentence as 'that you testify none has the right to be worshipped save Allah'].
THE VIRTUES OF FASTING
Fasting carries with it a number of benefits, amongst which are: the elevation to ones rank, the expiation of sins, the breaking of ones desire and lusts, the increase of charity, the multiplication of actions of obedience to Allah, giving thanks to the one who knows the hidden matters, and preventing oneself from even contemplating the commiting of sin.
THE ELEVATION OF RANK
With regards to the elevation of rank, the Messenger of Allah (pbuh) said:
"When Ramadan comes, the gates of Paardise are opened, the gates of Hellfire are locked and devils are chained." [Bukhari]
He (pbuh) also said, relating from his lord Mighty and Magnificient,
"All of the actions of the son of Adam are for him except the fast for that is for me and I will reward it. Fasting is protecting sheild, so when it is the day when one of you are fasting, let him not behave or speak indecently; if someone tries to abuse him or fight him, let him say, 'I am fasting'. By the one in whose hand is the soul of Muhammad, the smell emanating from the mouth of the one fasting is better with Allah then the smell of musk. The one fasting has tewo time of joy, when he breaks his fast he is happy and when he meets his lord he will rejoice at his fasting." [Bukhari and Muslim]
The prophet (pbuh) also said:
"Every action that the son of Adam does, [its reward] will be multiplied, a good deed will be increased tenfold. Allah Mighty and Magnificient says, 'except for the fast, for that is for Me and I will reward it for he left his desires and food for My sake'" [Muslim]
The prophet (pbuh) also said:
"In paradise there is a gate which is called ar-Rayyan through which the people who fasted will enter on the day of Judgement, and no one else shall enter along-side them. It will be asked, 'where are those who fasted?' and they will walk through it, and upon the entry of the last of them, it will be locked, and no one else will walk through it." [Bukhari and Muslim]
With regards the 'opening of the gates of paradise', this is a phrase that points to the increase of actions of obedience that in turn lead to the opening of the gates of Paradise. 'Locking the gates of Fire' is a phrase that points to the decrease, and lack of therewith, of sins which in turn leads to the locking of the gates of the Fire. 'The chaining of the devils' is a phrase that points to the termination of their whisperings, and temptations, to those who are fasting because they give up hope of receiving a favorable response.
His saying, "All of the actions of the son of Adam are for him except the fast for that is for me, and I will reward it," fasting has been specifically adjoined to him in the order of Honour it because the hidden nature of fasting prevents ostentation entering it, and moreover, hunger and thirst are not used as means to draew closer to any king of this world nor any idol.
QURAN
HADITH
RAMADAN
CHARITY
ZAKAT-A-FITR
ZAKAT-AL-MAL
THE MONTH OF RAMADHAAN IN WHICH WAS REVEALED THE QUR'AAN, A GUIDANCE FOR MANKIND AND CLEAR PROOFS FOR THE GUIDANCE AND CRITERION (BETWEEN RIGHT AND WRONG).
SO WHOEVER OF YOU IS PRESENT DURING THIS MONTH SHOULD OBSERVE ITS FAST. AL QUR'AAN
After Imaan, Salaah and Zakaah, the most important pillar of Islaam is Sawm (Fasting) during the month of Ramadhaan (the 9th month of the Islaamic calendar). Fasting in the month of Ramadhaan is amongst the fundamentals of Islaam; one who denies its obligation goes out of the fold of Islaam. One who does not fast during this month is a faasiq (an immoral and flagrant transgressor)of the highest degree. Such a faasiq completely destroys his spirituality and morality.
Sawm literally means 'to abstain’. But in the terminology of the Sharee'ah, it means 'to refrain from eating, drinking and cohabitation from sub'h saadiq to sunset, with the intention of fasting’.
Fasting during the month of Ramadhaan, was ordained on the Ummah of Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wasallam after the revelation of the above mentioned verse in the 2nd year of our Prophet's sallallahu alayhi wasallam migration to Madeenah.
Before fasting in the month of Ramadhaan was made compulsory, our Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam would fast on the 10th of Muharram, instructing the Sahaabah radhiyallahu anhum to follow suit. But once the fasting of Ramadhaan became obligatory, fasting on the 10th of Muharram was made optional. It is reported in Bukhaari Shareef, on the authority of ‘Aa’ishah and Abdullah Ibne Umar radhiyallahu anhumaa that when the Messenger of Allah sallallahu alayhi wasallam came to Madeenah, he commanded the people to fast on the 10th of Muharram, but when fasting during the month of Ramadhaan was made compulsory, our Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam said, "Now fasting on the 10th of Muharram is optional."
There are numerous spiritual benefits of fasting. Fasting is extremely efficient for the acquisition of taqwaa (piety), without which a Muslim cannot gain closeness to Allah. The prime benefit in the pursuit of taqwaa is the suppression of the erratic desires and demands of nafs (based carnal desire), which is always working in collusion with Shaytaan, to spiritually and morally ruin the believer. If the nafs is allowed freedom, then it will succeed in making man a slave of lust, passion and base emotions, due to which his Imaan will suffer. Therefore, it is essential that the nafs be restrained. Fasting greatly aids towards pursuing this objective. By fasting, a Muslim learns to suppress his lowly desires. Thus the ability of inculcating taqwaa is created. Further, fasting purifies the soul, and creates gratification in worship, making the heart conducive for worship. The bond with Allah is also strengthened. Once our beloved Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam supplicated, "O Lord of the universe! When does the servant become closest to you?" The Divine Reply came, "When the servant is hungry and when he is in sajdah (prostration)."
Another outstanding feature of fasting is that it lifts man above the level of beasts and animals - who eat, drink and copulate at will, whenever the urge comes - and takes him to the parallel of the angels. Since the latter do not eat or drink, they are devoid and free of evil inclinations and all things base. Man, by reducing his worldly relations and emotional desires, moves himself to the realms of the angels.
As well as the many spiritual benefits of fasting, there are physical benefits and advantages of fasting too. Notably, feeling for the poor and hungry is engendered. Man becomes more aware and conscious of his less fortunate brethren and their deprivation, which in turn teaches him to sacrifice his wealth and assist others in need. Thus feeling for humanity is generated and inculcated in man.
There are innumerable Ahaadeeth of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam which illustrate great virtue and blessing for the fasting person.
- Sahl Ibne Sa'd radhiyallahu anhu narrates from our Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam that he said, "Verily! In Jannah, there is a door called ‘Ar Rayyaan’, through which will enter the fasting people on the Day of Judgement. No one will enter through this door besides them. It will be announced, 'Where are the fasting people?' They will stand (and enter). No one will enter besides them. Once they will enter, the door will be locked so no one can enter through it (after them)."
- Aboo Hurayrah radhiyallahu anhu reports from our beloved Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam, that he said, 'Allah says, 'Every deed of Ibne Aadam (son of Aadam) is for him, except for fast. Verily, fasting is for me, and I shall (personally) apportion out the reward for it."' It is further said, "For a fasting person, there are two pleasures, which please him. When he eats upon completing the fast, he becomes happy, and when he will meet his Lord he will be pleased due to his fast."
- Aboo Hurayrah radhiyallahu anhu narrates from our beloved Prophet sallallahu alayhi wasallam that he said, "One who keeps the fast of Ramadhaan with Imaan (faith) and longing for reward, all his previous sins are forgiven."
For the acquisition of the numerous virtues and benefits of fasting, there is however, one essential condition: a person takes extra precaution in making sure he abstains from sin and futility. A person should spend much of his time in the recitation of the Qur'aan and also engage himself in the constant Remembrance of Allah. If one does not abstain from sin and futility then his fasting will merely be staying hungry and thirsty, without any reward or spiritual upliftment.
A few common evils, which are regarded lightly, but are very detrimental to a fasting person, should be taken into consideration and avoided totally:
- Telling lies.
- Backbiting.
- Quarrelling.
- Eating haraam items.
- Earning through unlawful means.
- Any act which may harm or cause grief to a person.
In short, a person should try to refrain from all kinds of sins - protecting his ears, eyes, tongue and all other organs from indulging in unlawful activities. When a Muslim spends his Ramadhaan in this manner then he will notice great changes in his life. Spiritual strength will be gained, which will facilitate him to conduct his life according to Islaam, together with Allah's Pleasure.
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Schacht asserts that hadiths, particularly from Muhammad, did not form, together with the Qur'an, the original bases of Islamic law and jurisprudence as is traditionally assumed. Rather, hadiths were an innovation begun after some of the legal foundation had already been built. "The ancient schools of law shared the old concept of sunna or ‘living tradition’ as the ideal practice of the community, expressed in the accepted doctrine of the school." And this ideal practice was embodied in various forms, but certainly not exclusively in the hadiths from the Prophet. Schacht argues that it was not until al-Shafi`i that ‘sunna’ was exclusively identified with the contents of hadiths from the Prophet to which he gave, not for the first time, but for the first time consistently, overriding authority. Al-Shafi`i argued that even a single, isolated hadith going back to Muhammad, assuming its isnad is not suspect, takes precedence over the opinions and arguments of any and all Companions, Successors, and later authorities. Schacht notes that:
Two generations before Shafi`i reference to traditions from Companions and Successors was the rule, to traditions from the Prophet himself the exception, and it was left to Shafi`i to make the exception the principle. We shall have to conclude that, generally and broadly speaking, traditions from Companions and Successors are earlier than those from the Prophet.
Based on these conclusions, Schacht offers the following schema of the growth of legal hadiths. The ancient schools of law had a ‘living tradition’ (sunna) which was largely based on individual reasoning (ra'y). Later this sunna came to be associated with and attributed to the earlier generations of the Successors and Companions. Later still, hadiths with isnads extending back to Muhammad came into circulation by traditionists towards the middle of the second century. Finally, the efforts of al-Shafi`i and other traditionists secured for these hadiths from the Prophet supreme authority.
Goldziher maintains that, while reliance on the sunna to regulate the empire was favoured, there was still in these early years of Islam insufficient material going back to Muhammad himself. Scholars sought to fill the gaps left by the Qur'an and the sunna with material from other sources. Some borrowed from Roman law. Others attempted to fill these lacunae with their own opinions (ra'y). This latter option came under a concerted attack by those who believed that all legal and ethical questions (not addressed by the Qur'an) must be referred back to the Prophet himself, that is, must be rooted in hadiths.These supporters of hadiths (ahl al-hadith) were extremely successful in establishing hadiths as a primary source of law and in discrediting ra'y. But in many ways it was a Pyrrhic victory. The various legal madhhabs were loath to sacrifice their doctrines and so they found it more expedient to fabricate hadiths or adapt existing hadiths in their support. Even the advocates of ra'y were eventually persuaded or cajoled into accepting the authority of hadiths and so they too "found" hadiths which substantiated their doctrines that had hitherto been based upon the opinions of their schools’ founders and teachers. The insistence of the advocates of hadiths that the only opinions of any value were those which could appeal to the authority of the Prophet resulted in the situation that "where no traditional matter was to be had, men speedily began to fabricate it. The greater the demand, the busier was invention with the manufacture of apocryphal traditions in support of the respective theses."
In summary, Goldziher sees in hadiths "a battlefield of the political and dynastic conflicts of the first few centuries of Islam; it is a mirror of the aspirations of various parties, each of which wants to make the Prophet himself their witness and authority." Likewise,
Every stream and counter-stream of thought in Islam has found its expression in the form of a hadith, and there is no difference in this respect between the various contrasting opinions in whatever field. What we learnt about political parties holds true too for differences regarding religious law, dogmatic points of difference etc. Every ra'y or hawa, every sunna and bid`a has sought and found expression in the form of hadith.
And even though Muslim traditionalists developed elaborate means to scrutinize the mass of traditions that were then extant in the Muslim lands, they were "able to exclude only part of the most obvious falsifications from the hadith material." Goldziher, for all his scepticism, accepted that the practice of preserving hadiths was authentic and that some hadiths were likely to be authentic. However, having said that, Goldziher is adamant in maintaining that:
In the absence of authentic evidence it would indeed be rash to attempt to express the most tentative opinions as to which parts of the hadith are the oldest material, or even as to which of them date back to the generation immediately following the Prophet’s death. Closer acquaintance with the vast stock of hadiths induces sceptical caution rather than optimistic trust regarding the material brought together in the carefully compiled collections.
From Daniel Brown Muslim Scholar from America
The relevance of the past: classical conceptions of Prophetic authority
The word sunna predates the rise of Islam and is well attested in pre-Islamic sources. The word sunna was likely to be applied to Muhammad even during his lifetime (p8).
The Quran never mentions sunna-al-nabi (sunna of the Prophet). The application of the term sunna is likely to be post-Quranic, especially when applied exclusively to Muhammad.
Early muslims did not give precedence of Muhammad's sunna over other sunnas, such as the sunna of the early caliphs or early companions. The sunna term was not exclusive to Muhammad. There were no rigid distinctions about sources of religious law, i.e. it wasn't concrete that Muhammad's sunna could be used as a source of law.
Shafi was born in 204 AH (193 years after Prophet Muhammad's death). He was the first to argue the Prophet's sunna as a source of law, identified to authentic prophetic hadith, and give it an equal footing to The Quran. Different attitudes to sunna existed during Shafi, al-kalam (a particular group or school of thought) rejected hadith altogether in favour of The Quran alone. Shafi's view was also oppossed early by schools of jurisprudence in Hijaz, Iraq and Syria, who applied the term sunna to Muhammad, his companions and the early caliphs as well.
After Shafi, it is rare to find the term sunna applied to other than Muhammad. Al-kalam argued the sunna of Muhammad should never be allowed to rule on The Quran and described the science of hadith (as in the methods used to collect hadith) as arbitrary. Evidence of this was the hadith was filled with contradictory, blasphemous and absurd traditions. [top]
Challenges to the view of the organic relationship between The Quran and sunna are not completely unprecedented in the history of Islamic thought. Some of the opponents of Shafi argued that The Quran explains everything (e.g. 16:89) and needs no supplement, this was because one of Shafi's central arguments was the need to clarify The Quran. This opposing viewpoint was snuffed out after the triumph of the traditionist view. However and it was not until the 19th and 20th centuries that the argument was seriously revived. One of the reasons Daniel Brown gives for the defeat of the opponents of Shafi was that they could not deny the authority of the Prophet. If for example, you found a hadith that was truly authentic then there is no way you can deny it because as it states in The Quran the Prophet was a very good example. Also, Shafi emphasised that to obey the Prophet was to obey God. Under this pressure, the opponents of Shafi were defeated. Rarely does the author address how specific arguments were defeated unfortunately, which was the most disappointing aspect of this book.
The question arose: how is it possible to determine which hadith were authentic and which were not?
In the 19th and 20th centuries, increased criticism and scrutiny by Western scholars of Islam showed Muslims that the hadith could not stand up to the criticism, whilst The Quran could. It made Muslims look back on the hadith and reflect more and examine their basis and origin in Islam.
The authenticity of hadith
The great compilations of the hadith took place in the 3rd century AH (i.e. beginning about 189 years after Prophet Muhammad's death, with the 6 books being complete about 280 years after his death), p83. In the eyes of most Muslim scholars sahih (reliable/authentic) hadith could with a high degree of confidence be considered to represent the actual words and deeds of the Prophet. On the other hand, few scholars would have argued the system was full proof. Any information in the hadiths was no absolute truth, it had to be classified as conjecture. The opponents of the hadith at the start were a minority. It was not seriously questioned.
Goldziher was unquestionably the most important 19th century critic of hadith. He became the first scholar to subject the hadith to a systematic historical and critical method. His study was published in 1896. Joseph Schacht "origins of Muhammadan jurisprudence" in 1950 was published. Like Goldziher, he concluded that few, if any traditions originated with the Prophet.
Even the Prophet recognised that there were people among his companions or those living during his lifetime were spreading lies about him. This is testified to in a hadith in Bukhari (p85). There is documented evidence that the companions disagreed with each other and criticsed each other, for example Aisha and Ibn Abbas were reported to have criticised Abu Hurayra. A number of companions demanded evidence for the truth of reports passed onto them. Umar alledgedly questioned a report from Fatima bint Qays. Umar is also reported to have confined three companions to Medina to keep them from spreading traditions. Abu Huyrara was only with the Prophet for 3 years, yet he is alledged to have been the most prolific in transmitting hadith. Biographical literature provides ample material for criticism for Abu Huyrara's character, Umar called Abu Huyrara a liar for example. Aisha criticised Anas for transmitting traditions as he was only a child during the life of the Prophet. And Hassan called both Umar and Zubair liars.
The process of hadith transmission was primarily oral, at least through the first century. Even after written collections of hadith were compiled, oral transmission remained the ideal (p88). Abu Rayya argues that the late date when traditions began to be registered in written form more than 100 years after the Prophet's death became a major obstacle to the fidelity of hadith (p89). Emerged in final form only in the 3rd and 4th centuries
Those who argue that Muhammad's companions began to record hadith in writing during his lifetime must explain the Prophetic prohibition on writing of hadith. Contradictions within the hadith exist regarding this subject. (p91)
Under orders from Caliph Hisham, Shihab al-Zuhri was first assigned to collect hadith. This tradition has commonly been taken to mean that al-Zuhri, under duress, became the first traditionist to violate the Prophet's prohibition on recording hadith in writing. Al-Zuhri is reported to have said: "We disapproved of recording knowledge until these rulers forced us to do so. After that reason we saw no reason to forbid the Muslims to do so." In other words, before al-Zuhri writing was the rare exception; after him writing of traditions became commonplace. This argument is bolstered by numerous accounts that early generations of pious Muslims, including not only al-Zuhri and traditionists like him but also the first four Caliphs, strongly disapproved of writing hadith.
The evidence strongly suggests that early generations of Muslims did record traditions in writing, however having reports about written records is rather different than having the records themselves. Thus, the apparent aversion of pious Muslims to the recording of hadith should be interpreted as reluctance to record an official, public collection of hadith. (p92)
Scholars agree that forgery of hadith took place on a massive scale. The science of hadith developed gradually as a response to this problem. The early written compilations called suhuf were little more than random transcriptions or personal collections. Muslim sources identify the first systematic collection in recording of the hadith with the Ummad Caliph Umar and with the scholars Abu Bakr. No such collection has survived. The earliest systematic collection is the muttawata of Mailk bin Anas, 179 AH (168 years after Prophet Muhammad's death), p94. Isnad (checking of transmissions) was not applied until after the early 2nd century AH according to Schacht. The book studies in early hadith literature stated it was earlier than this. For middle ground see Juynboll: "Muslim tradition". Major works of hadith (p161 footnote 70).
According to some, forgers of hadith became active even during the lifetime of the Prophet. In the Caliphate of Umar, the problem became so serious that he prohibited transmission of hadith altogether. The degree of the problem that resulted can be seen from the testimony of the muhahadithin (those who collect hadith) themselves. Bukhari selected 9000 traditions out of 700 000 (p96). When Bukhari reports that he selected from over 700 000 traditions, he is counting every different transmission chain, even when the substance of the tradition are the same (p99). The point is that hadith criticism did not begin during the 3rd century but was practiced continually from the time of the companions onwards (p99).
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