Editorial

A Month Overflowing With His Mercy

Ramadan, jewel of the crown and holiest of times, is upon us. It is a time of purification, reflection, and repentance. It is the month of fasting, sharing, asking for forgiveness, and reciting the Qur’an. What makes this month so precious, aside from the abundance of glad tidings associated with it, is that it’s the month in which the Qur’an was revealed.

That was an incredibly significant turning point in humanity’s history because the divine message was brought down in all its perfection and for all of creation. It then began to be imparted to the final messenger as the first verses of the last message. For this monumental occasion, Allah (subhanahu wa ta’ala) endowed the month when His divine words were revealed to His beloved messenger (sallallahu alayhi wa sallam) and the night on which the first revelation occurred, with immense blessings that no other ummah had received. The Messenger of Allah (sallallahu alayhi wa sallam) gave wonderful news about this month, whose blessings seemingly know no bounds:

“It is a month, the beginning of which is mercy, the middle is forgiveness, and the ending is salvation from the fire.”

We can’t be thankful enough for such a remarkable month that graces us each year and bestows us with the mercy, forgiveness, salvation, and the means to draw closer to Allah than we could in other times. We can, however, strive to purify our motives and intentions in what we do to worship Allah and how we worship Him because our reasons determine the worth of all we do and even who we are. Fasting, then, is a singular gift for us to help us achieve this noble goal. Abstaining from sustenance, vices, and pleasures for Allah is such a worthy cause that Allah has deemed it an act only for Himself and no other. Thus, it is our safe haven from hypocrisy and a key to ikhlas. With fasting, we can achieve the purity of worshiping Allah that may be overwhelmingly more difficult through other acts due to external factors that enable us to succumb to the poisonous allure of showing off.

Ramadan is a time uniquely fashioned by Allah’s grace for us to shake off our attachment to this world and the ties that bind our hearts to the bidding of our nafs. Knowing that those who devote themselves to their own desires abandon their duty to Allah and that those who devote themselves to pleasing Allah valiantly turn away from the beckoning hand of worldly pleasures, we should do our best to avail ourselves of the purifying nature of Ramadan and realign our hearts and minds with what pleases Allah rather than what leads us astray in search of an illusion of happiness.

I pray for a blessed Ramadan for all Muslims and hope to see you in the May issue inshallah.

M. Galip Dönmez