MONTH OF GOD’S DISCOVERY

MAN’s true good and happiness lies within him. Indeed, his true greatness lies in how far he attains mastery over the little universe within him, how far he curbs and controls the currents and crosscurrents of passions in the depths of his own ego, illumines that inner world of his with higher visions and purposes and thereby fulfils his destiny as God’s vicegerent on earth. The really great men of history were Abraham, Moses, Jesus, Buddha and Muhammad ﷺ – the spiritual scientists who by their inner light, illumined the darkness of this earthly existence of man, and brought a cure for man’s sorrows and sufferings. The institution of Fasting has been prescribed with this express purpose to foster and awaken this kingdom of God within man.

This has been made clear in so many words in the Quran. ”Fasting has been enjoined on you”, it says, “as it was enjoined on those before you, so that you may become Muttaqis”. This word Muttaqi carries a most comprehensive significance – abstaining from everything sordid, low and baneful, and absorbing and assimilating all that is good and noble, till one is steeped in Divine virtues, which, according to the Quran, is the sole purpose of man’s creation. Every Islamic commandment has that end in view. But of all the commandments, Fasting is specially designed and directed towards forging a living, personal link between man and his Creator.

Fasting, like multiple-vitamin tablets, confers many benefits on man. It tones up his physical frame. It gives him moral fibre, inculcating self-restraint and self-discipline. It brings him the joy that is born of a victory scored against one’s creature cravings. But the highest purpose, the Quran tells us, is to awaken in man a quest for discovering the Source of his life and forging a live contact with that Source. It is this personal relationship between man and God which has been underlined as the main purpose of Fasting in the verse:

وَإِذَا سَأَلَكَ عِبَادِى عَنِّى فَإِنِّى قَرِيبٌ أُجِيبُ دَعْوَةَ ٱلدَّاعِ إِذَا دَعَانِ فَلْيَسْتَجِيبُوا۟ لِى وَلْيُؤْمِنُوا۟ بِى لَعَلَّهُمْ يَرْشُدُونَ

Al-Baqara (The Cow) 2:186

“And when My servants ask thee concerning Me, surely I am nigh. I answer the prayer of the suppliant when he calls on Me. So they should hear My call and believe in Me that they may walk in the right way.”

Mark the seven-time repeated personal pronoun for God in this verse, underlining the existence of God as a Supreme Personality, and the fact that it is possible for man to discover that Personality for himself, and forge a personal link with Him.

Modern man with all his achievements in the domain of science, technology and philosophic thinking has made a mess of things just because of cutting adrift of this root of life. God is the ground, the root of human life, as indeed of all existence. A man who loses contact with God is like a rootless tree which possesses neither security nor fertility.

Religion comes to supply this vital basis for human life. The Quran, therefore, describes a man of faith as one who lays hold on a firm handle which knows no breaking. Whereas under the strains and stresses of life’s vicissitudes, the greatest worldly props and supports prove of no avail, the prop that never and under no circumstances fails man is a firm contact with God, the Source and Ground of life.

In our last we noted the misconceptions of a distinguished Manchester Professor as to the destiny of man in Islam. This message of Ramadan as a link-forger between man and God should give some idea of the high destiny Islam assigns to man. It is the destiny which made Jesus exclaim that he and the Father were one. What Jesus claimed for himself, the Quranic revelation vouchsafes to every true Muslim. In the Muslim Ummah, there have been thousands who have attained to that close merger with and in God as implied in Jesus’ words. It is this fact which the Founder of the Ahmadiyya Movement in one of his eulogies in praise of the Holy Prophet Muhammad ﷺ and the spiritual blessings that rained on mankind through him, proclaimed in his line:

واں مسیح ناصری شد از دم او صد ھزار

“His breath gave birth to thousands of Nazarene Jesuses.”

We must rediscover this root of life, if we are to recapture the vitality and dynamism that Islam connoted. A religion without God, without personal contact with God, without revelation, to put it in religious parlance, is like a rootless tree which can not but be a withered tree, lacking the sap of life, divested of foliage and flower, and bearing no fruit.

This is the significance of this most blessed month of Ramadan. It was the fruit of this, the Quran tells us, that a great gift like the Quran was given to mankind. Fasting is indeed one of the greatest blessings of God to man, bringing as it does, the happy tidings of an opportunity to attain nearness to God. What is needed is that we should understand this inwardness of the institution, the restoration of contact with God, abstaining from everything that is base and low, and emerge cleaner, purer and spiritually more fresh and serene out of this month-long self-dedication to God.

M.Y.Khan

(The Light – Friday January 24, 1964)