Assalamu alaikum,
Peace be with you,
And Eid Mubarak.
Welcome to the University of Sufism's reading of Rosina Fawzia al-Rawi's book,
The Call of Allah,
A companion to the holy month of Ramadan.
Today,
I am sharing the epilogue,
Epilogue,
Bismillah ar-Rahman ar-Rahim,
In the name of the one,
The most merciful,
The singularly compassionate.
Ramadan draws to an end,
And the three celebration days approach.
The festival of breaking the fast,
Eid al-Fitr,
Or the sugar festival.
People gather for the festive community prayer,
And then the celebrations start.
These are the days of joy and festivities.
We congratulate one another for the joyful,
Blessed,
And challenging time we have experienced,
And the wonderful gift we have been given.
Surprisingly,
The fact that this demanding month is over also makes us sad,
As if our body is happy,
But something in us is mourning and longing,
A little like the happiness mixed with sadness which accompany us when we emigrate.
Yet our work is not over when Ramadan comes to an end.
During one month,
For the sake of Allah,
We have abstained from food and other things usually permitted.
May we now have the willpower and the love to abstain from those things which Allah has asked us to give up.
May Al-Hadi,
The loving guide,
Guide us through the year,
And may we carry Allah's blessing and forgiveness in our hearts.
Every Ramadan,
The Muslims are instructed anew to reflect more intensely on the meaning of life and of the hereafter.
There are no absolutely good or bad times in the Muslim perception of time.
Whether the times are good or bad depends upon us human beings.
It is our inner attitude which makes the times good or bad.
Quran 64,
Ayat 11 Whoever believes in God guides his own heart towards this truth.
Our beloved Prophet Muhammad,
Peace and blessings be upon him,
Said,
Piety is here,
Pointing at his heart.
This he repeated three times.
May Allah always hold our hearts in his remembrance.
May we always feel and experience his love,
His mercy,
And his guidance.
May we always follow his path from darkness into light.
Every inhale takes us back to unity,
To him,
And every exhale expresses gratefulness in the world of multiplicity and change.
In this way,
We breathe with our heart,
Our chest expands,
And we let heaven enter our heart.
Quran 94,
Ayat 1 Have we not opened up thy heart?
Born in the world,
Let your deeds open the gates of paradise.
The Divine is like the ocean,
Which shows itself in millions of waves.
Nurun ala nur,
Light above light.
Thank you for joining us for this reading of The Call of Allah,
A Companion to the Holy Month of Ramadan.
With the permission of Rosina Fawzia al-Rawi,
Eid Mubarak,
Light above light.
