Fast facts
- What it is
- The ninth month of the lunar calendar, and the month of obligatory fasting
- The obligation
- Sūrah al-Baqarah 2:183
- Hours
- From the true dawn until sunset, each day of the month
- Why this month
- The Qur’an (القرآن) was sent down in it, Sūrah al-Baqarah 2:185
- The stated aim
- Taqwa (تقوى), watchfulness before Allah
On this page
The obligation and its reason
The command is given with its purpose attached, which is not always the case in Qur’anic legislation and is worth noticing when it happens.
يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا كُتِبَ عَلَيْكُمُ الصِّيَامُ كَمَا كُتِبَ عَلَى الَّذِينَ مِن قَبْلِكُمْ لَعَلَّكُمْ تَتَّقُونَ"O you who believe, fasting is prescribed for you as it was prescribed for those before you, so that you may attain taqwa." (Sūrah al-Baqarah 2:183)
Two things are established in one sentence. Fasting is not an innovation of this community, since it was prescribed for those before. And the objective is taqwa (تقوى), a watchfulness before Allah, rather than hunger, health, or solidarity with the poor. Those may follow; they are not the stated aim.
What the fast actually requires
From the true dawn until sunset: no food, no drink, no marital relations. The boundaries are given in Sūrah al-Baqarah 2:187, which also permits eating through the night and describes spouses as garments for one another in the same passage.
The intention must be present, and the abstention is from what is otherwise entirely lawful. This is the feature that distinguishes fasting from every other act of worship: nothing forbidden is being avoided. Water is permitted in every other month and is refused anyway, which is what makes the act legible only as obedience.
The classical texts are equally clear that the fast is not only of the stomach. A person who abstains from food while continuing to lie, abuse and cheat has, in the reported words of the Prophet ﷺ (محمد), given Allah no need of their leaving food and drink (Sahih al-Bukhari 1903).
Who is excused
The exemptions arrive in the same passage as the obligation, two verses later, which is the pattern throughout Islamic law: the relief is legislated, not conceded.
- The ill and the traveller do not fast those days and make them up later: Sūrah al-Baqarah 2:184.
- Those who cannot bear it, in the classical readings the very elderly and the chronically ill, feed a poor person for each day instead.
- Menstruating and post-natal women do not fast and make up the days afterwards.
- Pregnant and nursing women who fear harm to themselves or the child are treated under one of the two categories above, with the schools differing on which.
The passage closes by stating the principle behind all of them: Allah intends ease for you and does not intend hardship (Sūrah al-Baqarah 2:185). A person in one of these categories is not failing at Ramadan; the obligation has not attached to them in that form.
The night worth more than a thousand months
Ramadan carries Laylat al-Qadr (ليلة القدر), the night on which the Qur’an began to descend. Sūrah al-Qadr 97:3 values it at better than a thousand months, which is more than eighty years: a single night set against a long lifetime.
Its exact date is not disclosed. It is sought in the last ten nights, and the odd ones especially, which has the effect of turning the search into ten nights of effort rather than one. The concealment is doing work that an announcement would not.
What the month is training
The gap between capacity and appetite. Everything needed is within reach, permitted at every other time, and left alone from dawn until sunset because Allah said so and for no other reason that an observer could detect.
That is why the month is repeated annually rather than performed once. A capacity that is not exercised does not persist, and the fast is the exercise: thirty consecutive days of doing something difficult with no audience, which is precisely the definition of taqwa (تقوى) the opening verse gave.
Frequently asked questions
Why does Ramadan move through the year?
Because the Islamic calendar is lunar, so the year is about eleven days shorter than the solar one and Ramadan drifts backwards through the seasons. Over a lifetime every Muslim fasts it in long summer days and short winter ones, which distributes the difficulty evenly across latitudes and generations.
Does swallowing saliva, or an injection, break the fast?
Saliva does not. Injections are discussed by contemporary jurists according to whether they are nutritional: those that provide nourishment are generally treated as breaking it, and non-nutritional medication is widely held not to. The underlying question in every such case is whether something has been taken in as food or drink.
What if someone deliberately breaks a fast?
Breaking a fast of Ramadan without excuse is a serious matter, and the classical rulings attach an expiation to it in addition to making up the day. The contrast with the exemptions is deliberate: genuine incapacity is provided for generously, and disregard is not.