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The Muslim NewsJuly 

2014

Issue 24 

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NEWSRamadanStart: 29 June 2014

Communal Iftars

Dates: 5 July 2014

12 July 2014

19 July 2014

‘Id: 28 July 2014

Zakat  is compulsory .

Please send the Jama‘at

a cheque or use CAF.

If you use CAF please let the

Treasurer know your reference. We

suggest it is best to pay Zakat  to the

 Jama‘at in the UK. 

Fitrana: £5.00 per person.

Fasting in Summerand Winter:

a Spiritual Approach

The month of Ramadan is approach-

ing, and especially in areas with veryearly sunrise and late sunset, thefasting hours may be very long.Hence, some Muslims will be un-willing or physical unable to fastsuch long hours. In this Note wewill try to express an alternativeview on fasting in summer, whichmay enable these brothers and sis-ters to fast in Ramadan as well.

First we would like to quote a

Ahmadiyya Anjuman Isha‘at Islam Lahore (UK) 15 Stanley Avenue, Wembley, UK, HA0 4JQ

aaiiLahore@gmail.com 

The next meetingwill be held in August.

There will be no monthly meeting in Julyon account of Ramadan. 

Broadcasts

www.virtualmosque.co.uk

Friday service: 13:00Dars: 13:45

Monthly meetings: first

Sunday of each month

at 15:00 

(the physical part) that is most im-portant, but observance of duty. Andseveral ahadith  (traditions from theProphet Muhammad) on fasting showus that our fast is not complete if wefind ourselves in false talk and illicitconduct during fasting (Bukhari,Muslim). So, it is not the outer actsof fasting that are more important,

 but the inner part.The second point is that fasting

and prayer keep us away from inde-cency and evil. Indecency and evil towhom? Most likely not to ourselves, but to others. Therefore, if we shoulddesist from doing evil to others, ourfasting should cover at least that pe-riod in which we are in contact withother people.

There is a hadith  which tells us

part of Maulana Muhammad Ali's commenton verse 2:187 of the Quran:

“An important question arises hereregarding countries in which the days aresometimes very long, where it would be beyond the power of ordinary men to ab-stain from food from the breaking of thedawn to sunset. There is a report according

to which the companions of the Prophetare related to have asked him abouttheir prayers in a day which extended

to a year or a month, and the Prophetis related to have answered that they

should measure according to the measureof their days (AD 36:13). From this itwould follow that in countries where thedays are too long the time of fasting may be measured in accordance with thelength of an ordinary day, or where practi-cable postpone the fasts to shorter days ofabout normal length.” 

Based on this view of the Maulana, wewould like to provide the reader with somemore arguments to fast shorter hours in thecase of very long days.

The first point is the spiritual meaning behind the rituals we perform.

Quran 2:183 tells us that fasting shouldlead us to greater taqwa  (to guard ourselvesagainst evil). The goal of prayer, as well, isto strengthen our taqwa. Quran 29:45states: “Prayer keeps one away from inde-cency and evil.” Also, in the case of sacrifice,as 22:37 states, it is not the flesh or blood

Some of the Lahore-Ahmadiyya mosques in Suriname

SkypeWeekly Urdu lecture/dars 

Skype: Lahori-Ahmadi  

Day: Sunday

Time: 10:00 am (BST)

‘Id Salaat

11:00 sharp 

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that the Prophet disliked havingconversations after Isha  prayer (latenight prayer) (Maulana MuhammadAli,  A Manual of Hadith, chapter 9,hadith 10). This is probably becausethe Prophet wanted Isha  to be thelast action of the day. The advice tohis followers is not to have conver-sations (after Isha) to avoid the riskof getting involved in unnecessarytalk. Isha enables us to make up forthe mistakes of the day just beforegoing to sleep. So it is our last ac-tion after having social contact withothers, and Fajr   is our first action before our social interacting. Be-tween Fajr   and Isha  are our socialactivities, with emphasis on thetime just after Fajr   and just beforeMaghrib  at ‘normal’ sunrise andsunset times (the working hours).

Thus, if fasting should keep us

away from committing evil againstothers, then there will be no needto start fasting at 3:00 am (for ex-ample), as we will have little or nosocial contacts until a few hourslater.

In winter, the situation can bereversed. Some are not willing tofast the long hours of summer, buttake the opportunity to fast the veryshort hours in winter. We are of theopinion that in winter the fast

should also cover at least the periodin which we are involved in socialactivities, which is most likely be-tween 6:00 am and 7:00 pm (atleast). For example, in December inHolland one would fast less than 10hours if calculated from dawn tillsunset, and iftaar   (breaking of fast)would be around 4:30 pm, whilethe time for social activities will notyet have passed (in Europe, socialactivities, even work, go on till 6:00pm in many cases). Therefore, inthis case fasting should be extendedtill at least after 6:00 pm.

Furthermore, 2:187 of the

 but to stay away from indecency andevil (Quran 29:45).

These are our opinions, in caseof non-standard times of sunrise andsunset: to keep fast at least duringthe period covering our social activi-ties, with a maximum of 15 hoursand a minimum of 13 hours approxi-mately (15 hours is about the longest

fasting time in Makkah), and to keepthe prayer times around these timesas well. Of course this is only ouropinion, based on Quran and Hadith,and if one chooses to match his orher fasting or prayer times accordingto sunrise and sunset, one may do soaccording to the literal interpretationof the verses. This note is meant forthose in the first place, who plannednot to fast due to the long hours insummer, to get them an opportunityto fulfil their duties in an easier way.

[Source: the IVISEP website at the

following link:

http://ivisep.org/index.php?

option=com_content&view=

article&id=687:summer-

winter&catid=25:spiritual-

note&Itemid=35]

A Message from Shahid

The month of Ramadan is upon us.There is in this month a lesson for allthose who love Allah and that is to

give up for His sake the things of thisworld that we not only enjoy but onwhich our very survival depends.

We fast because the Holy Qurancommands us, but there are in theHoly Quran many other injunctionswhich we need to act upon. ThePromised Messiah encapsulated theseinto one sentence: I shall give prefer-ence to my religion over my worldly af-

  fairs.  Ramadan is a time to reflectupon that, and remember that it isnot enough to do acts of personalgoodness. Islam requires us to carry

out acts of communal good as well,even when it means that we have tosuffer a personal loss.

Quran gives permission to go toone’s wife in the nights of Ramadan.This permission will not be valid ifwe keep fast in the mid of summer between dawn and sunset. Allah de-sires ease and not hardship for us. Ifwe take fasting between dusk anddawn literally in summer, we puthardship on ourselves against Allah's

will (Quran 2:185).For salaat times as well, it would

 be an option to fix these around theperiod in which we are involved insocial activities (in case of non-standard times of sunrise and sunset).There is, for example, no need toperform Fajr   at 3:00 am and go tosleep again. Even if sunrise is at 3:00am, people may consider performingFajr   between 5:00 and 6:00, just before starting their social activities.

The same goes for Isha. It can beperformed before going to bed, evenif the sky is not yet dark.

For example, in June, sunset will be after 10:00 pm in Holland and theend of twilight will be after mid-night. According to a hadith, theProphet disliked sleeping before Isha ( A Manual of Hadith, chapter 9, 10).In our opinion, there is no point instaying awake till after midnight toperform Isha  and then get up onlyfour hours later for Fajr . Further-

more, this short period of time doesnot leave much space for those whowould like to perform the voluntarynight prayers, tahajjud salaat (in par-ticular these people might not findspiritual fulfillment in the short sum-mer nights when seeking for theLailat al-Qadr , the blessed night inwhich the revelation of the Quranstarted). In fact, going to sleep afterMaghrib and getting up for Isha  aftermidnight will give the Isha salaat the

characteristics of tahajjud   prayer.Remember that the main goal ofpraying is not to keep certain hours,

The new mosque in Rotterdam

Celebrating 25 years of the Stichting (The Netherlands) Jama‘at:  

Azhar ud Din Ahmad (speaker); Dr Z. and Mrs F. Aziz (front left table);Mustaq Ali, Secretary UK Jama‘at (front right table at far end) with his  daughter, Adeeba, and wife, Nazra.

Celebrating the centenary

of the Centre of the LahoreAhmadiyya Movement