Ramadan is giving our body a break and igniting our soul’s desires to commune and congregate with the Divine— Jaihoon’s Ramadan journal 1442
Last Updated May 8, 2021
Reflect 01
Once again, here is another Ramadan. Once again, here is another month of abstinence for the body and indulgence for our soul. Once again, we imprison our desires and liberate our spiritual longing. Our souls are, so to speak, on parole because usually it is our bodily pleasures which get a free ride in our priorities. Ramadan is giving our body a break and igniting our soul’s desires to commune and congregate with the Divine, its original Power Source.
Reflect 02
In the world of constant changing relationships, we often aspire for the ultimate source of help and hope that we can rely on. Individuals and institutions keep failing us every time we count on them. No lover or friend can accompany the other to all places. No parent can guarantee to take care of their beloved child forever. Thus, we need a Universal Source of Help and Hope that we can rely on, whether we are diving in the rivers of East or soaring the skies of the West.
“And to Allah belong the east and the west, so wherever you turn, there is the Face of Allah… (Sura Baqara : 115)
Reflect 03
Faith is no kids play. It is a vast ocean we must anxiously hold on the tiny palm of human Reason. Faith in the Divine is indeed the greatest treasure one can cherish in their heart. But this priceless treasure once attained should not be taken lightly thereafter. Faith is a gift from the Divine for which we should be incredibly thankful and fearful of losing it. Faith is a 24/7 state of vigilance and awareness. It is not, as some mistake, a lifetime membership without disqualification.
(They say), “Our Lord! Do not let our hearts deviate after you have guided us (Sura Al Imran : 8)
Reflect 04
Many among our contemporaries misread that Poetry and Faith are mismatched to one another. They feel poetry is an excess baggage in the journey of the Faithful. Nothing can be further from the truth.
The life and times of the Holy Prophet was the celebration of the poetic era. On the bed and the battlefield, the Messenger and his companions used rhyming and riveting verse in their conversations.
For instance, even in the fiercely fought Battle of Hunain, while the Holy Prophet was attacked, he chose a rhyming slogan to proclaim his unflinching courage:
أنا ابن عبد المطلب
أنا النبي لا كذب
Reflect 05
Men and women have two unbreakable traits- firstly to hideously hoard tons of possessions and secondly to suppose he or she will own them forever, and ever. Even the mighty Pharaohs were no exception for this dual fallacy. The Egyptian tyrant, who denied the Divine, used to bury utensils and maids along with their corpses hoping to utilize them in the future.
Once during a men-only neighborhood party, one guest asked another to justify the reason for wasting incredible amount of money on his car modifications, ‘Do you plan to take it to your grave?’. The car owner replied in the same logic: Have you married an extremely beautiful woman to drag her along to your resting place as well’?
‘Your obsessive greed for surplus distracts you. Until you end up in graves.’ (Sura Takathur: 1, 2)
Reflect 06
The last lap of Ramadan is filed with festive exuberance— of the spiritual and profane as well. The Faithful tribe aggressively commune with the Divine to grab the mega fold rewards of the Holy Month. Admittedly, many among them also are in the pursuit of Eid shopping for themselves and others. Shopping for ‘essential’ 3Gs — Garments, Gifts, Gourmet— also form an essential part of the last rites of Ramadan in many households.
Devout Shoppers, however, must bear in mind that ‘essential’ denotes a completely meaning in the dictionary of those human beings affected by the pandemic. Thousands of people in world’s largest democracy are desperately shopping for the most unthinkable commodity: breath. Like in a futuristic science fiction film, breath-starved children of Adam and their dear ones are struggling to grab oxygen cylinders, just to remain alive. Their Constitution has guaranteed them freedom to vote, but the System could not assure them the freedom to breathe.
We may be able to live for a while food and water, dress and home— let alone cars and gadgets. Breath is indispensable for us at every moment. May the Most Merciful bring an end to our miseries, if not by rational medicine, then by an insane miracle.
