Man was sent to this world to cultivate and trade for the hereafter. The month of Ramadan is the most appropriate time period for this trade because the reward for actions in the month of Ramadan is a thousand fold. Each word of the Quran has ten rewards when it is read and will yield ten fruits in Paradise.[Tirmizdhi, Fadailu’l-Quran, 16; Majmau’z-Zawaid, 7/163.] In Ramadan, each word bears not ten fruits but a thousand, and verses like Ayat al-Kursi thousands for each word, and on Fridays in Ramadan, it is even more.[Daylami, Musnadu’l-Firdaws, 3/130.] And on the Night of Power, each word is counted as thirty thousand rewards.[see al-Qadr, 97/3.]
Indeed, the Quran, each of whose words yields thirty thousand eternal fruits, is like a luminous Tree of Tuba that gains for believers in Ramadan millions of those eternal fruits. So, come and look at this sacred, eternal profitable trade, then consider it and understand the infinite loss of those who do not appreciate the value reading the Quran.
The month of Ramadan is an extremely profitable display and market for the trade of the hereafter. It is an extremely fertile piece of land for the crops of the hereafter. For the growth and flourishing of actions, it is like April showers in the spring. This meritorious period of time is like a brilliant holy festival for the parade of the believers’ worship to the other creatures in the universe and their Creator.
Therefore, man was ordered to fast so as not to heedlessly indulge the animal needs of the soul like eating and drinking and not to indulge the appetites lustfully and in trivialities. Thus, it becomes possible for man to be freed from bestial needs and assume the angelic state.
The month of Ramadan comprises and gains a permanent and eternal life in this fleeting world and brief transient life. Certainly, when it is spent truly, a single Ramadan can produce fruits equal to that of a lifetime of eighty years of worshipping since it contains the Night of Power.
For example, a monarch may declare certain days to be festivals during his reign, and on those days, he favors his subjects. Similarly, the All-Glorious Monarch of eighteen thousand worlds, who is the Sovereign of Pre-Eternity and Post-Eternity, revealed in Ramadan the illustrious decree of the Quran, which looks to the eighteen thousand worlds. It is a requirement of wisdom, then, that Ramadan should be like a special Divine festival, a dominical display, and a spiritual gathering.
Since Ramadan is a divine festival, man was commanded to fast so that he would be disengaged, to a degree, from base and animal activities. The most excellent fasting is to make the human senses and organs, like the eyes, ears, heart, and thoughts, fast together with the stomach. That is, to withdraw them from all unlawful things and from trivia, and to urge each of them to their particular worship.
For example, to ban the tongue from lying, backbiting, and obscene language and to make it fast and to busy it with activities like reciting the Quran, praying, glorifying Allah’s Names, asking for Allah’s blessings on the Prophet, and seeking forgiveness for sins make the tongue perform a perfect fast. And for example, to prevent the eyes from looking at members of the opposite sex outside the stipulated degrees of kinship, and the ears from hearing harmful things, and to use the eyes to take lessons and the ears to listen to the truth and to the Quran, is to make other organs fast too.
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