9 questions on Ramadan you have been too embarrassed to ask

Ramadan is the Muslim holy month, and a lot of the world’s estimated 1.8 billion Muslims will observe it in some type.

Which implies there is a good likelihood you — or a good friend, a coworker, a neighbor, your kid’s trainer — might be celebrating, fasting, and doing all kinds of different actions which might be distinctive to the holy month.

However what’s Ramadan, precisely? What’s the take care of fasting? And is there something particular you need to do or say whenever you’re round Muslim pals and acquaintances throughout Ramadan?

Don’t fear, we have you lined: Listed here are probably the most primary solutions to probably the most primary questions on Ramadan.

1) What’s Ramadan truly about?

Ramadan is probably the most sacred month of the 12 months for Muslims — the Prophet Mohammed reportedly stated, “When the month of Ramadan begins, the gates of heaven are opened and the gates of hell are closed and the devils are chained.”

Muslims consider it was throughout this month that God revealed the primary verses of the Quran, Islam’s sacred textual content, to Mohammed, on an evening often known as “The Evening of Energy” (or Laylat al-Qadr in Arabic).

Throughout the complete month of Ramadan, Muslims quick on daily basis from daybreak to sundown. It’s meant to be a time of religious self-discipline — of deep contemplation of 1’s relationship with God, additional prayer, elevated charity and generosity, and intense research of the Quran.

But when that makes it sound tremendous critical and boring, it is actually not. It is a time of celebration and pleasure, to be spent with family members. On the finish of Ramadan, there’s a giant three-day celebration known as Eid al-Fitr, or the Competition of the Breaking of the Quick.

It is type of just like the Muslim model of Christmas, within the sense that it is a spiritual vacation the place everybody comes collectively for giant meals with household and pals, exchanges presents, and usually has a beautiful time.

2) How does fasting work?

Fasting throughout Ramadan is without doubt one of the 5 pillars — or duties — of Islam, together with the testimony of religion, prayer, charitable giving, and making a pilgrimage to Mecca. All Muslims are required to participate yearly, although there are particular dispensations for many who are sick, pregnant or nursing, menstruating, or touring, and for younger kids and the aged.

The follow of fasting serves a number of religious and social functions: to remind you of your human frailty and your dependence on God for sustenance, to indicate you what it feels prefer to be hungry and thirsty so you’re feeling compassion for (and an obligation to assist) the poor and needy, and to scale back the distractions in life so you’ll be able to extra clearly focus in your relationship with God.

Throughout Ramadan, Muslims abstain from consuming any meals, ingesting any liquids, smoking cigarettes, and fascinating in any sexual exercise, from daybreak to sundown. That features taking remedy (even in case you swallow a capsule dry, with out ingesting any water). Chewing gum can also be prohibited (although I did not discover that one out till about midway by means of my first Ramadan after changing — oops).

Doing any of these issues “invalidates” your quick for the day, and also you simply begin over the following day. To make up for days you did not quick, you’ll be able to both quick later within the 12 months (both abruptly or a day right here and there) or present a meal to an individual in want for every day you missed.

Muslims are additionally imagined to attempt to curb unfavourable ideas and feelings like jealousy and anger, and even lesser issues like swearing, complaining, and gossiping, in the course of the month. Some folks can also select to surrender or restrict actions like listening to music and watching tv, usually in favor of listening to recitations of the Quran.

3) What’s a typical day like throughout Ramadan?

Throughout Ramadan, Muslims get up nicely earlier than daybreak to eat the primary meal of the day, which has to final till sundown. This implies consuming numerous high-protein meals and ingesting as a lot water as potential proper up till daybreak, after which you’ll’t eat or drink something.

At daybreak, we carry out the morning prayer. Because it’s often nonetheless fairly early, many return to sleep for a bit earlier than waking up once more to prepare for the day (I actually do).

Muslims are usually not imagined to keep away from work or college or another regular duties in the course of the day simply because we’re fasting. In lots of Muslim international locations, nonetheless, companies and colleges could scale back their hours in the course of the day or shut solely. For probably the most half, although, Muslims go about their every day enterprise as we usually would, regardless of not with the ability to eat or drink something the entire day.

When the night name to prayer is lastly made (or when the alarm in your cellphone’s Muslim prayer app goes off), we break the day’s quick with a lightweight meal — actually extra of a snack — known as an iftar (actually “breakfast”), earlier than performing the night prayer. Many individuals additionally go to the mosque for the night prayer, adopted by a particular prayer that’s solely recited throughout Ramadan.

Benson Ibeabuchi/AFP by way of Getty Photos

Amir Makar/AFP by way of Getty Photos

That is often adopted by a bigger meal a bit later within the night, which is usually shared with household and pals in each other’s properties all through the month. Then it is off to mattress for a number of hours of sleep earlier than it is time to get up and begin over again.

(Observe: There are good causes for less than having a small snack to interrupt your quick earlier than performing the night prayer after which consuming a much bigger meal later. Muslim prayers contain plenty of motion — bending over, prostrating on the bottom, standing up, and many others. Doing all that bodily exercise on a full abdomen after not having eaten for 15 hours is a recipe for catastrophe. Simply belief me on this one.)

Regardless of the hardship of fasting for a complete month, most Muslims (myself included) truly stay up for Ramadan and are slightly unhappy when it’s over. There’s simply one thing actually particular about understanding that tens of hundreds of thousands of your fellow Muslims around the globe are experiencing the identical starvation pangs, dry mouth, and dizzy spells that you’re, and that we’re all in it collectively.

4) So do you drop some weight throughout Ramadan?

A few of you could be pondering, “Wow, that seems like a good way to drop some weight! I will attempt it!” However in reality, Ramadan is definitely infamous for occasionally inflicting weight acquire. That is as a result of consuming massive meals tremendous early within the morning and late at evening with a protracted interval of low exercise bordering on lethargy in between can wreak havoc in your metabolism.

One meta-analysis of scientific research on the consequences of Ramadan fasting on physique weight discovered that “[w]eight modifications throughout Ramadan have been comparatively small and largely reversed after Ramadan, progressively returning to pre-Ramadan standing. Ramadan offers a possibility to drop some weight, however structured and constant way of life modifications are crucial to attain lasting weight reduction.” [Italics mine.]

So similar to with another excessive weight-reduction plan plan, you could lose a number of kilos, however except you truly make “structured and constant way of life modifications,” you are most likely not going to see main, lasting outcomes.

5) Why do the dates of Ramadan change yearly?

For spiritual issues, Muslims observe a lunar calendar — that’s, one primarily based on the phases of the moon — whose 12 months add as much as roughly 354 days. That is 11 days shorter than the one year of the usual Gregorian calendar. Subsequently, the Islamic lunar calendar strikes backward roughly 11 days annually in relation to the common Gregorian calendar.

In order that implies that the primary day of the month of Ramadan, which is the ninth month of the Islamic lunar calendar, strikes backward by about 11 days annually.

This has a big affect on how folks expertise Ramadan from 12 months to 12 months. When Ramadan falls within the winter, it is a lot simpler to quick: the times are shorter, which suggests you do not have to quick as lengthy, and it is colder out, so not with the ability to drink water all day is not as massive of a deal since you’re not sweating as a lot.

Conversely, when Ramadan falls in the summertime, fasting will be brutal. In lots of Muslim international locations within the Center East and Africa, summer season temperatures can attain ranges often reserved for the deepest bowels of hell.

And in some Northern European international locations corresponding to Iceland, Norway, and Sweden (the place, sure, there are Muslims), fasting can final a mean of 20 hours or extra in the summertime. (And in a number of locations above the Arctic Circle, the solar by no means truly units in the summertime. In these circumstances, Muslim spiritual authorities have decreed that Muslims can both quick together with the closest Muslim nation or quick together with Mecca, Saudi Arabia.)

6) Okay, however why is there all the time confusion yearly about precisely what day Ramadan begins on?

There is a purpose “Ramadan begin date” is without doubt one of the most-searched phrases each single 12 months. That is as a result of Muslims around the globe have no idea when precisely Ramadan is definitely supposed to start out.

That additionally has to do with the moon — in addition to disagreements about science, historical past, and custom, plus a little bit of geopolitical rivalry.

The start of every new month within the Islamic calendar begins on the brand new moon. Which implies the month of Ramadan begins on the brand new moon. Easy sufficient, proper?

Unsuitable.

If it has been some time since your highschool astronomy class, this is a reminder of what the phases of the moon appear like:

Getty Photos/iStockphoto

Again in Mohammed’s day, in sixth-century Arabia, astronomical calculations weren’t as exact as they’re in the present day, so folks glided by what they might see with the bare eye.

Because the new moon is not truly tremendous seen within the evening sky (as you’ll be able to see above), Muslims historically waited to start out fasting till the small sliver of crescent moon turned seen. There’s even a saying attributed to the Prophet Mohammed about ready to start out the quick till you see the crescent. (Some folks assume for this reason the star and crescent is the image of Islam, however the crescent was used as an emblem lengthy earlier than Islam.)

This methodology was a bit messy, although, since issues like clouds or simply the issue of recognizing the moon in some places usually led to totally different teams beginning their quick on separate days, even inside the similar nation. Every neighborhood, village, and even mosque inside the village would possibly ship its personal man out to search for the crescent, with rival teams arguing over whether or not the opposite man actually noticed it.

At present, nonetheless, we’ve got exact scientific calculations that inform us precisely when the brand new moon begins, and we need not wait till somebody spots a tiny crescent within the sky. (In truth, in response to the Oxford Dictionary of Islam, “The necessity to decide the exact look of the hilal [crescent moon] was one of many inducements for Muslim students to review astronomy.”)

So downside solved! Besides that some Muslim students consider we must always nonetheless wait till the slight crescent moon is seen within the evening sky as a result of that is what Mohammed stated to do and that is the way in which we have all the time completed it.

Others argue that Islam has a robust custom of purpose, information, and science, and that if Mohammed have been round in the present day, he’d select the extra exact scientific calculations over sending the man on the mosque with one of the best eyesight outdoors to squint on the evening sky.

To make issues much more enjoyable, some argue that the entire world ought to simply observe the official moon-sighting decrees of Saudi Arabia, the birthplace of Islam and the placement of its holiest websites.

However not everybody thinks that is such a swell thought — particularly rival international locations like Pakistan and Iran, which balk on the thought of treating Saudi Arabia as the last word authority on something having to do with Islam.

7) Are there variations between how Sunni Muslims and Shia Muslims observe Ramadan?

For probably the most half, no. Each Sunni and Shia Muslims quick throughout Ramadan. However there are some minor variations — as an illustration, Sunnis break their every day quick at sundown, when the solar is not seen on the horizon (however there’s nonetheless gentle within the sky), whereas Shia wait till the redness of the setting solar has fully vanished and the sky is completely darkish.

Shia additionally rejoice a further vacation inside the month of Ramadan that Sunnis don’t. For 3 days — the nineteenth, twentieth, and twenty first days of Ramadan — Shia commemorate the martyrdom of Ali ibn Abi Talib, the cousin and son-in-law of the Prophet Mohammed who was each the revered fourth caliph of Sunni Islam and the primary “official” imam (chief) of Shia Islam.

Ali was assassinated within the fierce civil wars that erupted following the loss of life of Mohammed over who ought to lead the Muslim neighborhood in his stead. On the nineteenth day of the month of Ramadan, whereas Ali was worshipping at a mosque in Kufa, Iraq, an murderer from a bunch of rebels who opposed his management fatally struck him with a poisoned sword. Ali died two days later.

Ali is a massively necessary determine in Shia Islam. His tomb in close by Najaf, Iraq, is the third-holiest web site in Shia Islam, and hundreds of thousands of Shia make a pilgrimage there yearly. Though Sunnis revere Ali as one of many 4 “rightly guided” caliphs who dominated after Mohammed’s loss of life, they don’t commemorate his loss of life or make a pilgrimage to his tomb.

Antonio Sempere/Europa Press by way of Getty Photos

8) What can I do to be respectful of my Muslim pals throughout Ramadan?

In some Muslim international locations, it’s a crime to eat and drink in public in the course of the day within the month of Ramadan, even in case you’re not Muslim.

After all, this isn’t the case in the US, the place we get pleasure from freedom of (and freedom from) faith. And most American Muslims, myself included, do not anticipate the non-Muslims round us to transform their habits to accommodate our spiritual quick throughout Ramadan.

I’ve had pals and coworkers who’ve chosen to quick together with me out of solidarity (or simply as a result of it appears “enjoyable”), and that was candy of them, nevertheless it’s not one thing I ever anticipate folks to do. (Plus, they often final about three days earlier than they resolve solidarity is overrated and being thirsty for 15 hours isn’t remotely “enjoyable.”)

All that stated, there are issues you are able to do, and never do, to make issues slightly simpler for pals or colleagues who occur to be fasting for Ramadan. When you share an workplace with somebody fasting, possibly eat your scrumptious, juicy cheeseburger within the workplace break room slightly than at your desk, the place your poor, struggling Muslim coworkers must odor it and salivate (in the event that they even have sufficient moisture left of their our bodies to salivate at that time).

Attempt to keep in mind to not supply them a chew or a sip of what you are consuming, as a result of it is generally laborious for us to do not forget that we’re fasting and straightforward to absentmindedly settle for and eat that Lay’s potato chip you simply provided us. However in case you do, it is okay. We’re not going to get mad or be offended (except you are doing it on objective, wherein case, what’s improper with you?).

When you’re having a cocktail party and also you need to invite your Muslim pals, attempt to schedule it after sundown to allow them to eat. Muslims do not drink alcohol or eat pork, however we often do not thoughts being round it. (Opposite to in style perception, we aren’t frightened of or allergic to pork; we simply do not eat it. It is not like we’re vampires and pork is garlic.) However do tell us if there’s alcohol or pork in one thing so we do not unintentionally eat it.

If you wish to want your Muslim pals or acquaintances a cheerful Ramadan or blissful Eid al-Fitr, you are welcome to simply say, “Blissful Ramadan!” or “Blissful Eid!” That is not offensive or something. However if you wish to present them you made an effort to be taught extra about their faith, the usual greetings are “Ramadan/Eid kareem” (which suggests “have a beneficiant Ramadan/Eid”) or “Ramadan/Eid mubarak” (which suggests “have a blessed Ramadan/Eid”).

Even one thing so simple as studying a kind of expressions and saying it with a smile to your Muslim pals will go a great distance towards making them really feel snug and welcome.

9) So in case you’re not imagined to get indignant or complain or gossip throughout Ramadan, how come terror assaults by teams like ISIS and al-Qaeda generally spike throughout Ramadan?

As a result of terrorists are assholes.

Replace, March 7, 2024, 3 pm ET: This story was initially revealed in 2017, and has been up to date with new dates and to take away outdated references.