XX.—RAMAZA′N, OR THE MONTH OF
FASTING.
The Ramazán[1] is the ninth month of the Muhammadan year, which is observed as a strict fast from the dawn of day to sunset of each day in the month. The excellence of this month was much extolled by Muhammad, who said that during Ramazán "the gates of Paradise are open, and the gates of hell are shut, and the devils are chained by the leg"; and that "only those who observe it will be permitted to enter by the gate of heaven called Rayyán." Those who keep the fast ‘"will be pardoned all their past venial sins."[2] In the month of Ramazán, Muhammad said, the Qurán began to be revealed from heaven.[3]
The fast does not commence until some Musalman is able to state that he has seen the new moon. If the sky be over-clouded and the moon cannot be seen, the fast begins upon the completion of thirty days from the beginning of the previous month.
The Ramazán must be kept by every Musalman, except the sick, the infirm, and pregnant women, or women who are nursing their children. Young children, who have not reached the age of puberty, are exempt, and also travellers on a journey. In the case of a sick person or a traveller, the month's fast must be kept as soon as they are able to perform it. This is called Qazá, or expiation.
The fast is extremely rigorous and mortifying, and when the Ramazán happens to fall in the summer and the days are long, the prohibition even to drink a drop of water to slake the thirst is a very great hardship. Muhammad speaks of this religious exercise as "easy,"[4] as most probably it was when compared with the ascetic spirit of the times. Sir Wilham Muir[5] thinks Muhammad did not foresee that, when he changed the Jewish intercalary year for the lunar year, that the fast would become a grievous burden instead of an easy one; but Muhammadan lexicographers say, the fast was established when the month occurred in the hot season (see note, p. 119).
During the month of Ramazán twenty additional rakʾats, or forms of prayer, are repeated after the night prayer. These are called Taráwíh.
Devout Muslims seclude themselves for some time in the Mosque curing this month, and abstain from all worldly conversation and engage themselves in the reading of the Qurán. This seclusion is called ʾItiqáf. Muhammad is said to have usually observed this custom for the last ten days of Ramazán.
The Laylut-ul-Qadr, or the "night of power," is said by Muhammad to be either on the twenty-first, twenty-third, or twenty-fifth, or twenty-seventh, or twenty-ninth. The exact date of this solemn night has not been discovered by any but the Prophet himself, and some of the Companions, although the learned doctors believe it to be on the twenty-seventh. Of this night Muhammad says in the Qurán (Surat-ul-Qadr):—
"Verily we have caused it (the Qurán) to descend on the night of power.
"And who shall teach thee what the night of power is?
"The night of power excelleth a thousand months;
"Therein descend the angels and the spirit by permission
"Of their Lord in every matter;
"And all is peace till the breaking of the morn."
By these verses commentators[6] understand that on this night the Qurán came down entire in one volume to the lowest heaven, from whence it was revealed by Gabriel in portions as the occasion required. The excellences of this night are said to be innumerable, and it is believed that during it the whole animal and vegetable kingdom bow in humble adoration to the Almighty, and the waters of the sea become sweet in a moment of time! This night is frequently confounded[7] with the Shab-i-Barát; but even the Qurán itself does not appear to be quite clear on the subject, for in the Surat-i-Dukhán we read, "By this clear book. See, on a blessed night have we sent it down, for we would warn mankind, on the night wherein all things are disposed in wisdom." In which it appears that the blessed night, or the Laylut-ul-Mubarak, is both the night of record and the night upon which the Qurán came down from heaven, although the one is supposed to be the twenty-seventh day of Ramazán, and the other the fifteenth of Shabán.
M. Geiger identifies the Ramazán with the fast of the tenth (Leviticus xxiii. 27); it is, however, far more likely that the fast of the Tenth is identical with the ʾId-i-Ashura, not only because the Hebrew ʾAsúr, ten, is retained in the title of that Muhammadan fast; but also because there is a Jewish tradition (vide Adam Clark), that creation began upon the Jewish fast of the Tenth, which coincides with the Muhammadan day ʾAshura, being regarded as the day of creation. Moreover, the Jewish ʾAsur and the Muslim ʾAshura are both fasts and days of affliction. It is far more probable that Muhammad got his idea of a thirty days' fast from the Christian Lent. The observance of Lent in the Eastern Church was exceedingly strict both with regard to the nights as well as the days of that season of abstinence; but Muhammad entirely relaxed the rules with regard to the night, and from sunset till the dawn of day the Muslim is permitted to indulge in any lawful pleasures and to feast with his friends; consequently large evening dinner-parties are usual in the nights of the Ramazán amongst the better classes. This would be what Muhammad meant when he said, "God would make the fast an ease and not a difficulty," for notwithstanding its rigour in the day-time, it must be an easier observance than the strict fast observed during Lent by the Eastern Christians of Muhammad's day.
- ↑ The word Ramazán is derived from Ramz, to burn. The month is said to have been so called either because it used (before the change of the calendar) to occur in the hot season, or because the month's fast is supposed to burn away the sins of men. (See Ghyás-ul-Loghát.)
- ↑ Mishkát-ul-Musábih, bk. vii. chap. i. sect. 1.
- ↑ Qurán, Surat-i-Baqr, verse 181.
- ↑ Ibid.
- ↑ Life of Mahomet, iii. p. 49.
- ↑ Tafsír-i-Hoseini.
- ↑ By Lane, in his "Egyptians," and by other writers.