05-21-2003, 07:58 PM
Praise be to Allah, a praise which is adequate to Your graces and favors, Praise be to Allah abundant and special gratitude, we send prayer and peace on the best Messenger to the worlds our Prophet Mohamed, his family members, companions and whoever followed them until the day after. I seek refuge of Allah’s Complete knowledge from my ignorance, “O my Lord! expand me my breast;* Ease my task for me* And remove the impediment from my speech* So they may understand what I say"
We shall move to another Surat (chapter 70: 19- 34): “Truly man was created very impatient;* Fretful when evil touches him;* And niggardly when good reaches him* Not so those devoted to Prayer;* Those who remain steadfast (here I would use regular ) to their prayer;* And those in whose wealth is a recognized right* For the (needy) who asks and him who is prevented (for some reason from asking);* And those who hold to the truth of the Day of Judgment;* And those who fear the displeasure of their Lord,* For their Lord's displeasure is the opposite of Peace and Tranquillity;* And those who guard their chastity,* Except with their wives and the (captives) whom their right hands possess, for (then) they are not to be blamed,* But those who trespass beyond this are transgressors; * And those who respect their trusts and covenants; * And those who stand firm in their testimonies;* And those who guard (the sacredness) of their worship;” The noble Ayahs start by describing how mankind in general is impatient. Yet it made an exception of a special category of people. Those people have a number of characteristics as follows:
1. With all due respect to the scholar who shouldered this very hard task of translating the meanings of Quran may Allah grant him an incomparable reward. I would rather use the word regular to express the Arabic meaning of (da-emoon). For da-emoon is derived from modawama which means being regular on something. So the first characteristic is to be regular on prayer. In other word, not to peform prayer for some time and fail to do so on another. This makes prayer a fundamental means to stand in trials and tests in order to avoid being impatient.
2. The Ayahs include other features, taking in consideration that the order is set on purpose for us to observe the proirities of such features, going through giving money to the needy which comes second after prayer for money is one of the dearest items to mankind so whoever is capable of not letting the heart be owned by his wealth shall certainly stand trials, followed by believing in the Day of Judegement, fear Allah’s punishment, gaurd their chastity, observe trusts and coventants, give their testimony when asked for it.
3. The final point after all this again involves prayer but this time the word in Arabic is (yahfezoun: best translated as guard or keep or strictly observe). Well I don’t claim myself to be a scholar of course no way. I just share with you what I see. The word to me is a referrence to performing salat on time. Being punctual. No matter what you are doing just leave it and immediately respond to the call for prayer. Actully it is the call for a meeting with Allah. So what could stand the comparison. What is more important. Of course the word may be extended to also include observing proper ablution, proper performance, taking proper time while praying and the rest of the essential items which makes a perfect prayer.
Praise be to Allah Who guided us to this and if it was not for Him we wouldn't have been guided.
Praise be to Allah and prayer and peace be upon His Messenger Mohamed, his family members and companions