Gems Of Ramadan ✔

DAY 4 - FASTING IS FOR ME

The Prophet sallallahu 'alayhi wa sallam said that Allah said:

كُلُّ عَمَلِ ابْنِ آدَمَ لَهُ ، إِلاَّ الصَّوْمَ فَإِنَّهُ لِي ، وَأَنَا أَجْزِي بِهِ
Every good deed of the sons of Adam is for them except fasting, it is for Me and I shall reward the fasting person for it.

The Hadith is in Sahih al-Bukhari and the Hadith is a Hadith Qudsi. Ahaadith al-Qudsiyyah (أحاديث القدسية) are the ones that are revealed to the Prophet sallallahu 'alayhi wa sallam but they are the words of Allah.

The difference between them and the Qur'an is that you cannot recite them in Salah and they get a general reward, not the specific reward of the Qur'an where you get ten Hasanaat per letter. And also they get scrutinised like other Ahaadith, so some are accepted and some are rejected. You do not accept automatically a Hadith Qudsi just because it is a Hadith Qudsi, the 'Ulamaa of Hadith tell you which is authentic and which is not.

WHY DID ALLAH SAY FASTING IS FOR ME?

In this Hadith, Allah said every good deed of the son of Adam is for him except fasting, it is for Me and I shall reward the fasting person for it. All the deeds are for Allah, we know that. That is an established fact but why did He specify fasting here, fasting is for Me? That is the point of our talk today. Fasting is for Me, Allah said that. You may think it is a simple issue but Ahmad Ibn Isma'eel al-Qazweeni in his book Hadhaa'ir Al-Quds (حظائر القدس) mentioned fifty five scholarly opinions as to this matter, Ibn Hajr mentioned ten. In these few moments, we will discuss some of the popular opinions so we can achieve our goal of understanding the Hadith and understanding fasting better.

THERE IS NO RIYAA' IN FASTING

Every good deed of the sons of Adam is for him except fasting, it is for Me. That is our point, I reiterate that is our point. Al-Maaziri, al-Qurtubi, Ibn al-Jawzi and others said that fasting was specified in this Hadith and Allah attributed it to Himself because fasting has no Riyaa'. It has no eye service, no hypocrisy, no dissimulation, it has no showing off in it. Fasting is a special worship between you and Allah, there is no show off in it unless you speak about it, unlike other matters of worship. If you give charity, if you lecture, if you offer Salah, if you perform Hajj, if you are dutiful to your parents, if you are good to your neighbours, and other matters of worship, they are apparent and there may be a show off aspect in them because people see them. The act itself can be for show and one at times needs to struggle with himself to purify his intention, to eliminate the show off aspect of these worships.

In fasting, it is different. A man fasting to show off while his stomach is full, a fake, looks and appears to the public like one who is sincerely fasting for the sake of Allah, a genuine Muslim. Both appear to the public as not eating, they do not eat, no one knows the reality of the matter but Allah. One can be fasting a Nafil, a Sunnah, a non obligatory outside Ramadhaan and no one knows that but Allah, and one can break his obligatory fast in Ramadhaan and no one knows about it but Allah.

FASTING IN ITSELF IS A SILENT AND PRIVATE IBAADAH NO ONE KNOWS ABOUT UNLESS YOU SPEAK ABOUT IT.

Let me make it clear in an example, a story that I once read. There was a line at a meat market once and a man from back of the line told the butcher, he said hurry up, I have to get home and cook the meat before Maghrib because I am fasting today. So an unwise man behind him who was possibly worse than him told him, he said you want him to rush and you are only fasting one day, I have been fasting three days and I wait in line all day long and I have not asked him. The point of that is Allah covered the matter, no one would have known that. Had both of them not spoken, no one would have known about it. It is a matter only Allah knows, so that is one of the scholarly explanations of this Hadith, that fasting is for Me and I shall reward for it.