Farewell to the month of Ramadan

“This month stood among us in a standing  place of praise, accompanied us with the  companionship of one approved, and profited us with  the most excellent profit of the world’s creatures”.
(From  a supplication of Imam Zainul Abedeen(a))

This month which was with us for twenty-nine or thirty days,  is now about to leave us. It is time for us to go back and see  how this guest treated us. Imagine you have guests for a  month. Soon after they are gone you go home and go to the  room where your guest was staying in, and you feel their  absence, their empty space. You remember the wonderful  time you had with them during their stay. You remember the  good times, their kindness. There are people, who we never  get bored with no matter how long they stay with us as they  are gentle and good company. Imam Sajjad(a) says:

“… the month of Ramadan was staying with us in a very  great way, and it was a very good companion for us, a very  good friend.”

This is the example of the month of Ramadan.  This month enables us to benefit more than any other time.  But how much we have earned in this month?

“Then it parted from us at the completion of its time,  the end of its term, and the fulfilment of its number”.

When the time finishes, the guest leaves us, because they  have a limited time – they cannot stay forever. The same  goes for Ramadan. We soon realise how quickly the month  of Ramadan has finished.

“So we bid farewell to it with the farewell of one  whose parting pains us, whose leaving fills us with  gloom and loneliness, and to whom we have come to  owe a safeguarded claim, an observed inviolability,  and a discharged right”.

We are saying goodbye to the month of Ramadan – the one  whose departure is very heart-breaking., and this is bothering  us. It puts us in deep grief, makes us lonely, we will miss the  month of Ramadan. But of course we will always remain in  debt to the month of Ramadan, and we feel protective  towards the honour and dignity of the month.

“We say: Peace be upon thee, O greatest month of God!  O festival of His friends”.

With only a few days left, we are saying goodbye to this  month:

“Peace be upon you, oh greatest month of God”.

You  are the greatest month of God; you are the feast and the  banquet of the friends of God.  There are people who are weak in their faith; they count the  days to see when the month of Ramadan finishes. This  should not be the mentality of God’s friends. In contrast,  from the middle of the month they get worried and anxious  that soon Ramadan is going to leave them.

“Peace be upon thee, just as thou hast entered upon us  with blessings and cleansed us of the defilement of  offences”!

Another day passes. We say, Peace be with you. You came  and brought us lots of gifts of barakah. Let’s remind  ourselves the hadith of the Prophet:

“the month of Ramadan  has approached you with blessing, mercy and forgiveness.”

When a guest comes, he brings gifts and souvenirs.  Ramadan also brought with itself lots of blessings, and when  Ramadan passes, it removed and washed away all the dirt –  as if a good friend comes around and stays with us but also  helps us in our daily chores. When they leave our house is in  a better position. This is the example of the month of  Ramadan.

“Peace be upon thee – Thou art not bid farewell in  annoyance, nor is thy fasting left in weariness”!

We say goodbye to Ramadan, but not because we have  become tired of it. This farewell is only because we know  that it cannot stay for longer.

“O God, bless Muhammad and his Household, redress  our calamity at [the loss of] our month…”!

At the end of Ramadan we send salutations to the Prophet  and his progeny, and ask God to compensate us for our  musibah (calamity) because we have lost the month of  Ramadan. This is a musibah. When we lose a relative, or a  friend, we have majalis, or mourning; we dress in black. For  the month of Ramadan it should be the same, if not more.  The Imam says,

  “O God, this is a musibah that month of Ramadan has  left us”.

“Bless us in this day of our festival and our fastbreaking”.

We are compensated for the loss of Ramadan with the  festivity of Eid. We are granted a way to fill the cavity which is  created by the departure of the month of Ramadan in our  lives. When our dear guest wants to leave, we escort them  but with eyes filled with tears we see them go and disappear.  This guest however has left us a letter and some gifts, so we  read the letter and examine the gifts with pleasure and  happiness. We enjoy the gifts as it helps us to forget just for a  while that our guest is not with us anymore but our guest  knows about our pain after his departure.  This is the example of the month of Ramadan. The joy and  the gift that the month of Ramadan has bestowed upon us to  compensate for its leaving is Eid ul-Fitr.

Eid Mubarak

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