Our First Steps Toward Ramadan: Preparing from Shaʿbān

Occasion: a transcript of a lecture delivered at MCNET on January 31, 2025.Source: transcript of a recorded lecture by Dr. Ahmed Abouseif — watch the original video on YouTube

How can we prepare ourselves for Ramadan? What do we need for Ramadan, and what do we need from it? The lecturer asked these questions at the outset and invited the room to refresh its minds together and talk it through. What is the first goal for you in Ramadan? What do you want to reach by the end of it, what is the result, what is the gain?

What do you need from Ramadan?

Someone in the audience answered: to reach taqwā. Good, he said. That is one of the main goals, and Allah Himself says so: it means arriving at that level.^[1] Another answer came: forgiveness. Why do we need forgiveness? Everybody needs it, he said, because we are human beings, and that is exactly what the Prophet ﷺ taught: every single person has made mistakes.^[2] Even if I do not realise my mistakes, I still have them, intentionally or unintentionally; it makes no difference, I still have my problems. If you want to know my mistakes, he said, ask my wife; she will tell you a lot. He gave that example on purpose. The people close to you watch you in different states, in different situations, in different moods, even in the tone of voice you use with the people around you. The closer they are, the better they can tell you what your mistakes are.

So there is guidance, and there is forgiveness. What else do we need from the Qurʾān itself, given that Ramadan is the season of the Qurʾān? The Qurʾān explains to us how to reach our destination and our goals when we stand before Allah on the Day of Judgment. That makes three things so far: guidance, forgiveness, and a third that the transcript leaves unclear (apparently the taqwā mentioned earlier).

Which comes first, the fasting or the Qurʾān?

Then he put a question of order to the audience: which came first in the order of the Qurʾān? (The question is garbled in the transcript.) He suggested that Allah answers it when He speaks of the month of Ramadan, the month in which the Qurʾān was sent down.^[3] Everything that happens in the month is a kind of celebration of that revelation: we are celebrating the revelation that came to us. How do we celebrate it with the things we already do in Ramadan? What is the first? We fast. And the second? The word is lost in the transcript; from what follows, it is the night prayer.

So there are two things, and he asked which of them contains the Qurʾān. Fasting does not. We can read the Qurʾān while fasting, but reading it is not a pillar of the fast. One of the pillars of the prayer, on the other hand, is reciting the Qurʾān. If Ramadan is a celebration of the revelation of the Qurʾān, the most important thing is the act that carries the recitation itself. I hope I am clear, he said, and moved to a second question. Which one is closer to the Qurʾān? Which of them is obligatory and which is voluntary? The act that does not contain the Qurʾān is the one that came as an obligatory command, and the act that does contain it, the one that is the source and the reason for the whole celebration, came as voluntary. Does that make sense? The things related to the Qurʾān should come before anything else.

Here he drew his conclusion. Allah commands us to fast the whole day as a preparation for standing, at the end of the day, to listen to or recite the Qurʾān. So the preparation is mandatory in itself, and the thing it prepares for is voluntary. You may ask: if that is so, why did Allah not make the night prayer mandatory too? Because this is the position of the elite among the people, and we cannot force people to come close to us. If you want to be close to Allah, subḥānahu wa-taʿālā, it is your choice. What is being done now is that we are forced to prepare ourselves. If you take advantage of that and prepare yourself to be among the elite who stand at the end of the day to listen to the Qurʾān or recite it, you have got it. This is also why Satan comes to whisper, and puts this mentality in our minds: it is not mandatory, it is not important, it is just the (word lost) of the Prophet ﷺ.

A friend who wants to be alone with his Lord

The lecturer told of a friend of his, one of the most righteous people he had seen in his whole life, and said that he had never seen him in a certain place (the word is missing in the transcript). He asked him once: brother, give me an honest answer, please. Do you not like my recitation? The friend's reply is only partly clear: he said that a long time ago it had been different, and that the lecturer was doing well. The lecturer then asked why he did not come to the (word lost). And the friend said: I want to be with my Lord alone. Nobody else with us. The lecturer thanked him, because a new meaning came to his mind and a new understanding of the matter. This is why the Prophet ﷺ prayed with the people for a few nights and after that completed it at home.

He was careful to add that he was not telling people to stay away from the mosque. This is the sunnah of the Prophet ﷺ, and the Companions came afterwards and did the same. But he wanted to ask himself and everyone else: when we enter the prayer, especially at that time, we need to be at a different level of tranquillity, closer to Allah.

What do you take home from the prayer?

He then said that he asks the people who come to pray at the mosque what their benefit is. He mentioned that the Prophet ﷺ promised rewards for praying in congregation at the mosque, and the narrations give different numbers.^[4] Why would the Prophet ﷺ promise rewards like that for coming to pray with the congregation? Because you are supposed to get a benefit.

Think of a student who came to class and was busy with Snapchat, showing pictures to the others while the teacher was explaining the lesson. At the end of the time he went home with nothing. Compare him with the other student, who concentrated with the teacher, took notes, thought about what he was saying and tried to grasp something. One came back with a benefit, the other with nothing. If you come into the mosque only to stand there, and you understand nothing from the reciter and catch nothing from his recitation, and go home, what is the value? You did not need to come. You need to come for the value. Why? Because we are receiving lessons there, and the lesson is given to us by the one who recites the Qurʾān. Come on, guys, he said. Why does Allah ask us to come at fajr time? To start our day with a message we have received from the imam. My imam stands there to teach me something before I go to work. When I get to work I reflect on what the imam taught me at the beginning of the morning and try to apply it to myself, and at the end of the day, perhaps I have changed something because of it, and I come back to stand behind him and receive another message. If I do not get my message from my imam, I am a bad student. I am not a good person; I came to class to benefit from the teacher.

So when the imam recites something, he is giving a message on purpose. Sometimes, he said, one of the people of the community comes and I know he has a problem with his wife, for example: they have a conflict and treat each other badly. When I see those people coming in, I give a message that matches their situation and their state of mind at that precise time. I am a leader of the community. I am teaching the people standing behind me. Even if I only recite the Qurʾān in the prayer, even if I do not say a single word after it, I have done my part, if I chose the āyāt for my community to fix a problem here, to help that person or support this woman. Did you get the point?

And coming back to the prayer itself: it is a goal in itself, and the goal is to pray accurately. That is why the Prophet ﷺ made the reward equal between fasting the whole day, refraining from food and water and everything you enjoy for all that time, and just one hour of (the word is cut off in the transcript; evidently standing in prayer). Imagine comparing one hour with twelve or thirteen or fourteen. Is that fair? As my son would say, it is not fair. It is not fair to compare one hour with fourteen. But it comes from the importance of listening to, reading or reviewing the āyah. Just one āyah of the Qurʾān, he said, is equal to a year of work, not just a day.^[5]

What is the aim of Ramadan?

Why do we need to prepare for Ramadan, and what must we achieve in it? First of all, to free my neck from any kind of punishment. Once I am freed from that, I will be safe. Then I will get my forgiveness from Allah, subḥānahu wa-taʿālā, and with that I get my guidance, and I read my Qurʾān, and so on.

The first step: repentance

What is forgiveness, and why do we need to repent to Allah? The first step in preparing for Ramadan starts from now. When people begin to talk about this topic they say that the first thing we must do is repent to Allah. But what does that mean? When you say "I am sorry," what does it mean? It means I realise that I am a human being, and, as we said, I have my mistakes. I cannot control myself one hundred percent. Sometimes I do something even without being conscious of it. So I have my shortcomings, and once I admit that, once I recognise that I am a human being who cannot control himself completely, it means I need somebody to watch me.

The lecturer gave an example from his own life. The doctor gave me a sensor, he said, and once in a while my phone beeps: the sugar is high. Okay, stop, please, we are in a lecture. What does the sensor do? I know that I am diabetic. I recognise it, al-ḥamdu li-llāh, and so I watch my sensor. Where is the sensor? It is here, in the heart. How can I control my heart? The only way to control my heart is to look up and watch Allah, subḥānahu wa-taʿālā, as Allah is watching me. Repentance to Allah means watching Allah.

And imagine what it is like to watch the one who watches you. Suppose you drive your car in an area where the police officers are really strict and tough people. Somebody warns you: do not drive through that road, the speed limit is fifty-five, and on the way to Chicago that road is very strict. The police stopped me there once, he said, the Texas plate: Where are you going? It is not your business. Okay, I need to know. And he searched the car. (The transcript does not make clear who says which line.) Why are they so strict there? Because of that area and that period of time. I am watching the watcher. What does that mean? I am watching his reactions and his actions, what he is going to do, so I will be as strict with my lane as he is strict with his word. I will not move from this lane to the other one without making sure nobody is behind me. I will not jump back and forth, I will not go over the speed limit, and so on. When we watch Allah, subḥānahu wa-taʿālā, in the same way, we control our actions, including the words I give to my wife at home, the anger I sometimes have at home, the words I use with the people around me, the money, where it comes from and how I spend it. Everything in my life I am going to watch, because I am watching the One who watches me, Allah, subḥānahu wa-taʿālā.

Seeing that others have rights over me

Let us conclude on the same path, he said. What do we need to get in Ramadan? Forgiveness. To get it, we need to repent to Allah. And what does it mean to recognise our mistakes? It means I look at the people around me and see that they have rights over me. I am always watching the people, trying to give them their rights. I do not see myself in a position above the other people. At that time I am killing my ego, I am putting myself on the same level as a human being who has mistakes and needs watching. I look at the people as a giver, not as a recipient. What is the difference? As a giver, I owe them something; I have duties toward them. As a recipient, I think I deserve your respect when you deal with me. In the first case I am putting myself down, and in the second I am putting myself up.

He said that if I put myself down with my brother, and he puts himself down with me too, then we are on the same level, each of us trying to raise the other above himself. I am not sure which is right, he said, but you understand what I mean. Someone might say: I have my right, because I worship Allah and they ignore that point. He answered that even then, and in a difficult situation, not a normal one, you should not go to your work and say: I am putting you down because you are not worshipping Allah. No, no, no. We have a different concept here: the concept of daʿwah. We deliver the message for them. We show them our īmān, not our position. We show them our ethics and our morals. So repenting to Allah means recognising our mistakes and feeling that humbleness, in order to stay with other people in a good situation and at a good level of morals.

The second step: what the Prophet did in Shaʿbān

The second thing is what the Prophet ﷺ used to do in Shaʿbān, before Ramadan. In short, he used to fast. ʿĀʾishah said: I never saw the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ complete a month with fasting except Ramadan, and I never saw him fast in any month more than Shaʿbān.^[6] He fasted a great deal in Shaʿbān, because he was preparing himself to catch Ramadan at the level that Ramadan deserves.

The lecturer gave the example of a race. If I am going to compete with others, will I start preparing once the race has begun, or do I need to prepare before? When he has a group travelling with him, he said, he asks the people: please walk two or three miles every day for days before travelling here. Then, once you are going around and walking from place to place, you are in good shape. But if you are tired because you did not prepare, you cannot even concentrate on the duʿāʾ you are making, because you are exhausted. Your only goal at that time is to finish the walking. You get bored and cannot continue. And once in a while somebody cannot go on, and we ask the rest of the group to sit for a few minutes until our brother or sister takes a break, and then we resume. The main thing there is the duʿāʾ; we should not have to think about anything else. In Ramadan likewise: we do not want to be thinking about our hunger, about our stomachs, about our thirst. We should be thinking about duʿāʾ, the Qurʾān, good actions, helping people, and the reality of the fast.

So the Prophet ﷺ fasted in Shaʿbān because he would not start his race without that preparation. He began preparing himself from the beginning of Shaʿbān. What is the secret of Shaʿbān? The transcript is unclear here; he described it as one of the months to which Allah has assigned a position. What does that mean? It has a position by itself, even if it does not have anything else. Think of a congressman: he is not doing anything for me, but he is still a congressman. I asked him for this and that and he did not do it, and he is still a congressman. Shaʿbān is like one of the months that Allah has assigned a position. Even if I am not doing anything good or better in this month, it still has its position.

In Ramadan everything is running to get a benefit from the month. But Shaʿbān: the translation I found was that people neglect it. I do not know a good translation, he said, and in my humble opinion they are not giving that month the full attention they give to Ramadan. They are not exactly neglecting it, but they are busy with a lot of things. So I need to switch my attention, from my business, my money, my family, my stores, my everything, to my heart, my mindset, my feelings, my Lord, and the angels around me.^[7] Once I have a good route, I can reach my goal, because I am going on the straight path. Think of the GPS, he said. What does it do? It gives me a direction. Do we set the destination when we arrive, or before we start? Before I even start the car, before my trip begins, I say: take me home.

Heart, mind and body

Shortly, then: what do we need to prepare for Ramadan, our hearts, our minds or our bodies? He apologised and answered: all of them, all together. Sometimes when I talk about this point, he said, somebody reacts (the word is unclear in the transcript), because preparing our bodies means eating less. I am sorry for that, but we need to do it. We need to lower the amount of food we take each day, and after a while we will feel fine. And do you know the secret? Stop your coffee, please. Coffee is one of the crazy things that make people crazy in the first days of Ramadan. Please do not talk to me. What is wrong with you, man? I did not get my coffee today. A man like that has forgotten everything in Ramadan and is thinking only about the coffee. So we need to stop our habits with these things, just to prepare ourselves physically for Ramadan: food, and coffee in particular. And why not walk a lot during the day, half an hour, an hour, it does not matter how much? We need to prepare our bodies for the hard time. Once we are standing behind the imam, in a few minutes somebody gets tired, because he did not do that during the whole year, and up to the first night of Ramadan he has been standing there thinking: when is the imam going to finish? And he has a bomb in his stomach that wants to explode.

Then the mind. It means I need to understand, not just accept the words. We need to understand the methodology of the Qurʾān. The transcript is broken at this point: he says that knowing this is more important than a "value" (the word is lost), and the sentence cannot be rendered with confidence. He then gave the reason: without the Qurʾān I cannot fast, without the Qurʾān I cannot pray, without the Qurʾān I have no source of my Islamic education. The Qurʾān is the main thing in our Islam in general. From the Qurʾān I get the pillars of Islam; from it I know everything about (word lost); and from it I know how I deal with the people around me. From the Qurʾān I know how to marry and how to divorce, how to give, everything. And yet Allah made standing with it voluntary, because it is for the elite, for the people who already want, sincerely, to be closer to Him, subḥānahu wa-taʿālā.

He ended there. I think I have passed my time, he said, and invited the audience to put their questions to him.

--- ^[1]: Editor's documentation: the speaker alludes to the aim given in the verse on fasting, ﴿يَا أَيُّهَا الَّذِينَ آمَنُوا كُتِبَ عَلَيْكُمُ الصِّيَامُ كَمَا كُتِبَ عَلَى الَّذِينَ مِن قَبْلِكُمْ لَعَلَّكُمْ تَتَّقُونَ﴾ [البقرة: 183] (O you who believe, fasting is prescribed for you as it was prescribed for those before you, so that you may attain taqwā). The transcript does not contain the recitation of the verse. ^[2]: Editor's documentation: the speaker gives the meaning of a saying of the Prophet ﷺ without its wording or source. The saying commonly cited for this meaning is «كُلُّ ابْنِ آدَمَ خَطَّاءٌ، وَخَيْرُ الْخَطَّائِينَ التَّوَّابُونَ» (Every son of Adam errs, and the best of those who err are those who repent), reported by al-Tirmidhī and Ibn Mājah; it is not certain that this is what he had in mind. ^[3]: Editor's documentation: ﴿شَهْرُ رَمَضَانَ الَّذِي أُنزِلَ فِيهِ الْقُرْآنُ هُدًى لِّلنَّاسِ وَبَيِّنَاتٍ مِّنَ الْهُدَىٰ وَالْفُرْقَانِ﴾ [البقرة: 185] (The month of Ramadan, in which the Qurʾān was sent down as guidance for the people and as clear proofs of guidance and the criterion). The transcript has only the speaker's reference to it, not the recitation. ^[4]: Editor's documentation: in the transcript the numbers he cited (27, 24, 18, 25) are garbled, so none is stated here. ^[5]: Editor's documentation: the wording of this sentence is unclear in the transcript and no source is cited; it is reproduced as the speaker's statement only. ^[6]: Editor's documentation: reported by al-Bukhārī and Muslim from ʿĀʾishah. The speaker gives the meaning of the report, not its exact wording. ^[7]: Editor's documentation: one word in this list is dropped in the transcript (it begins with "J") and is omitted here.