Who Is Excused From Fasting

It happens that some students at school during Ramadan, even though they may have been sick and should not have been going without food and drink, did not eat or drink; and most of the time one will generally find that people are pretty rigid about that. That has to do, sometimes, with not fully understanding the tradition. Because if one is diabetic, it is actually prohibited to fast. If a physician thinks that it is harmful, it is prohibited by the Sharīʿah, and one would actually be doing something ḥarām, in the teaching — one would be doing something prohibited — because preservation of the self is the second after preservation of religion. It is the second highest priority in the Sharīʿah. Old people, if it is difficult for them — if they are able to but it is hard — have a choice. People who are travelling have a choice, but if it is hard, they are encouraged to break it, and if it is extremely hard to do, then they have to break it. A pregnant woman, a nursing woman: she can either decide for herself or get a doctor's opinion, and the doctor's opinion would be binding on her. Anyone who has a physical illness like diabetes, or who has to take medicines regularly throughout the day, is excused. Now, some scholars have permitted things like asthma inhalers — inhalants — on the view that they do not break the fast. There is a difference of opinion about that, but one shaykh gave a religious opinion that it did not break the fast, because it went into the lungs, and that smoking broke the fast because it was unnecessary — which a smoker would definitely disagree with.

Soldiers are another case, and a good point: somebody who was fighting and needed his physical strength. Hakeem Olajuwon became something of national news because he was fasting during the playoffs; but it would really be prohibited for him to do that — to break his fast — because it is a sport. That is why, if it were a valid job — it is permissible, for instance, if there were a harvest that had to be done, and they could not do it fasting and would lose the crop or something like that because of it, some type of situation like that — then it would actually be permissible to break the fast.

Fasting goes from the fajr prayer, which is dawn, until the sunset prayer; and then one can eat, sleep — well, one does sleep in the daytime anyway — but one can eat and drink and have relations with one's husband or one's wife. That is during the night-time. Can one marry during Ramadan? Absolutely: the Prophet (peace be upon him) got married in Ramadan. Does the month predate Islam? The month does, not the fasting: the lunar months of Islam predated Islam, and what predates Islam is the rites around the Kaʿbah. But no — Ramadan does not predate Islam: fasting in Ramadan is from the second year of the hijrah, and before that the Arabs did not fast. And the Qurʾān says: fasting has been prescribed upon you, just as it was prescribed upon the people before you, in order that you might learn discipline.

So it is actually considered a spiritual practice, to discipline oneself. If one thinks about it, for people who abstain for a whole month from eating during the daylight hours, there is a very strong discipline that goes with that. And it is prohibited to backbite at any time, whether about a Muslim or a non-Muslim: one is not supposed to talk badly about people. It is prohibited to lie. It is discouraged to talk a lot — empty talk, in Islam, is just not something encouraged. There is a tradition in which the Prophet (peace be upon him) said that Allah dislikes empty gossip. Thoreau said that gossip was good in homoeopathic doses.

A question arises about governments. A lot of Muslims think there is none, but there are governments that claim to be Muslim governments; have any of the current governments that claim to be Muslim governments started to collect zakāt? Absolutely: in the Emirates, in Arabia, in different places, they do have zakāt, and people can pay it through the government. They do not have to, but they can do it that way. It is a good point.