Muslims fast during the month of Ramadan from dawn to sunset. Fasting involves abstaining from food, drink, and intercourse, and encourages resisting temptations. It aims to redirect the heart from worldly activities and cleanse the soul. Muslims who have reached puberty and are physically and mentally fit are expected to fast, unless exempt due to health issues, old age, pregnancy, menstruation, or travel. The month involves increased worship, prayer, charity, and Quran recitation, as well as sharing meals and gifts with family and friends.

2. Fasting in Islam
Muslim’s fast in the month of
Ramadan. Ramadan is a time of
spiritual reflection and worship.
Muslims are expected to put more
effort into following the teachings of
Islam and to avoid obscene and
irreligious sights and sounds. During
fasting, intercourse is prohibited as
well as eating and drinking, and

3.  During fasting, intercourse is
prohibited as well as eating and
drinking, and resistance of all
temptations is encouraged.
 The act of fasting is said to redirect
the heart away from worldly
activities, and its purpose being to
cleanse the inner soul and free it
from harm.

4. WHO MUST FAST ?
Fasting Ramadan is compulsory upon every
Muslim, male or female, who has these
qualifications:
 To be mentally and physically fit, ( sane and able
).
 To be of full age, (the age of puberty - normally
about fourteen).
 To be present at one's permanent settlement, your
home town, one's farm, and one's business
premises, etc. This means not to be on a journey
of about fifty miles or more.

5. EXCEMPTION FROM FASTING
 Children under the age of puberty.
 Insane people who are unaccountable for their
deeds.
 Men and women who are too old to fast and
bear its hardships. Such people are exempted
from this duty, but they must offer, at least,
one needy poor Muslim an average full meal
or its value per person per day.
 Sick people whose health is likely to be
severely affected fasting. They may postpone

6.  Travelers may break the fast temporarily
during their travel only and make up for it in
later days, a day for a day.
 Pregnant women and women breast-feeding
their children may also break the fast, if its
observance is likely to endanger their own
health or that of their infants. But they must
make up for the fast at a delayed time, a day
for a day.
 Women in the -period of menstruation. They
must postpone the fast till recovery and then

7. GENERAL RECOMMENDATIONS
 This practices are strongly recommended by Prophet
Muhammad SAW especially during Ramadan:
 To have a light meal before the break of the dawn,
known as Sahur.
 To eat a few dates or start breaking the fast by plain
water right after sunset.
 To make your meals as light as possible.
 To perform the prayer known as Tarawih after
breaking fast.
 To increase the study and recitation of the Qur'an.
 Practice patience and humbleness.

9. Prayer and the reading of
Qur’an to fasting, Muslims are encouraged to read the
 In addition
entire Qur'an. Some Muslims perform the recitation of the
entire Qur'an by means of special prayers, called Tarawih,
which are held in the mosques every night of the month,
during which a whole section of the Qur'an (Juz', which is
1/30 of the Qur'an) is recited. Therefore the entire Qur'an
would be completed at the end of the month.
 Ramadan is also a time when Muslims are to slow down from
worldly affairs and focus on spiritual cleansing and this is to
establish a link between themselves and God through prayer,
supplication, charity, good deeds, kindness and helping others.
Since it is a festival of giving and sharing, Muslims prepare
special foods and buy gifts for their family and friends and for

11. Iftar
 Muslims all around the world will abstain from
food and drink, through fasting, from dawn to
sunset.
 At sunset, the family will gather the fast-
breaking meal known as Iftar. The meal starts
with the eating of three dates — just as
Muhammad used to do. Then it's time for the
Maghrib prayer, which is the fourth of the five
daily prayers, after which the main meal is
served.
 Over time, Iftar has grown into banquet festivals.

13. Reasons behind fasting
 Fasting is a means that makes us appreciate and
give thanks for pleasures.
 Fasting is a means of giving up haraam things, so
fasting is a means of avoiding the things that Allah
has forbidden.
 Fasting enables us to control our desires, because
when a person is full his desires grow, but if he is
hungry then his desire becomes weak.
 Fasting makes us feel compassion and empathy
towards the poor, because when the fasting person
tastes the pain of hunger for a while.
 Fasting humiliates and weakens the Satan; it
weakens the effects of his whispers (waswaas) on a
person and reduces his sins.