Chapter 2: Surat Al-Baqarah (The Cow), verse 183-185
Translation:
Believers, fasting is decreed for you as it was decreed for those before you; perchance you will guard yourselves against evil. Fast a certain number of days, but if any one among you is ill or on a journey, let him fast a similar number of days later; and for those that cannot endure it there is a penance ordained: the feeding of a poor man. He that does good of his own accord shall be well rewarded; but to fast is better for you, if you but knew it. In the month of Ramadan the Koran was revealed, a book of guidance for mankind with proofs of guidance distinguishing right from wrong. Therefore whoever of you is present in that month let him fast. But he who is ill or on a journey shall fast a similar number of days later on. God desires your well-being, not your discomfort. He desires you to fast the whole month so that you can magnify God and render thanks to Him for giving you His guidance. (183-185)
Commentary:
Fasting serves as a training for
two things at the same time—thanksgiving and inculcating the fear of God in
the heart fo the believer. Food and water are great blessings of God, yet man is
incapable of attaching due importance to them. While fasting, he goes hungry and
thirsty the whole day, then at sunset, in a state of extreme hunger and thirst,
he eats and drinks to his fill. He then realizes through his own experience how
great are the blessings of God present in the form of food and water. This
experience produces boundless feelings of gratitude towards his Lord. On the
other hand, fasting also serves as a form of training for a God-fearing life,
which entails abstaining from all kinds of sins and evil deeds, which God has
forbidden. A total abstention from food and drink from dawn until sunset is an
exercise in making God one’s guardian. The entire life of the believer is a
life of fasting. During the month of Ramadan he receives his training by
abstaining from certain things, temporarily, so that for the rest of his life he
may renounce all those things of which God disapproves. The Quran is a great
blessing of God to man. It is through fasting that man enables himself to be
truly thankful to God, and to lead a godly life in accordance with the teachings
enshrined in the Quran.