 Welcome back, it's the breakfast in Plosivia, Africa. We just look at our second conversation right here and the conversation is around Eid al-Fatri. Now Ramadan has been described as the most important and Holy As-Mount in the Islamic calendar and clerics have urged the Muslim faithfuls to make charity a duty in order to gain multiple rewards from Allah. We'll be looking at the significance of the entire celebration, what it means for the Muslim community right here. We have in the studio an Islamic cleric, Ashim Ibrahim Bologi. It's good to have you join us. Thank you very much for having me. All right, so let's get straight to it. I wasn't sure what I was going to say, maybe happy Eid al-Fatri? Yeah, you can say yeah, happy Eid al-Fatri. Thank you very much. So let's get to it. What is Eid al-Fatri and what is the significance of, you know, this celebration? Yeah, okay, so Bismillah wa s-salatu wa s-salam ala rasulillah wa ala ahli wa sahabi wa manwala. As Muslims, Allah swt always has this way of rewarding us after we have come through some sort of spiritual upliftment or spiritual joining. So it gives us like a reward saying, like a thank you for going through this process. And then after we are done with that process, it gives us a day to celebrate, a day to share within ourselves the lessons that we have learned over the month and then explain to others how it is for us Muslims to share goodness between each other and then explain to people around those that are non-Muslims also that this is actually the message of Islam and this is the message of we Muslims. So Eid al-Fatri is a day of sober reflection of whatever has happened over the month of Ramadan, and also a day of celebration, like a day of receiving gifts of sharing gifts all over ourselves and then saying that, yes, we have come through this journey. There we look at what we have been able to achieve over the course of the month. You know that as we all know when Ramadan comes, every Muslim comes with this new self that is different from the way they've been coming over the years. So that month creates a time for you to connect truly with Allah, creates a time for you to keep your five daily prayers, then fasting, then wake up with the midnight to pray, and all that which we might not have done in normal days that are different from the month of Ramadan. So after that month, we now access ourselves. You know yourself, if you have gone through some form of spiritual upliftment, you know yourself that you have changed. Maybe there are some particular acts that you do before Ramadan that you have dropped after Ramadan. So that is how you know that these my 30 months have actually been accepted. You know, you have some particular sins that this is a particular sin that I do, and I'm going to in this month with this sin. By the time I exit this month, I do not want to go back to this sin. If you're able to do that, then you know that your Ramadan has been accepted. Let's talk about all of that now because during the 30 day fast for the Muslims, they go through a whole lot. We talked about cyber reflection and they do think in moderation. They try to you know study and get closer to Allah and they put away most of the sins. So what happens after that? Because most times I've had to interact with most of them. They tend to be very, very close to Allah during the period of Ramadan. Shouldn't it be spread across the other you know seasons of the year or the month of the year? Should it stop on just the Ramadan fast? Yes, so as Muslims once again, there's a key point for us that we're supposed to look at all the time and we reiterate it to a lot of Muslims that Ramadan is not just a month on it. So it's a reformation. It's not just about the fast. It's not about staying away from eating and all that. It's a month for you to reform yourself. So whatever lessons you have learned in that month you're supposed to take it through your whole life. A lot of people got a way to recreate themselves during the month of Ramadan and then they spread it afterwards. So whatever is haram that is whatever is unlawful in Ramadan remains unlawful. If you stay away from say you stay away from taking alcohol in Ramadan, it doesn't mean that after Ramadan you get back to taking alcohol. You're supposed to still stay away from taking alcohol because normally you know that taking alcohol is unlawful for you as a Muslim. So this is it's just like that. But people tend to think that just that month I want to be pure and clean and then after every other month I can. Yes, we know that Allah gave us that month as a month of forgiveness. So whatever sins you've committed over the over the last 11 months you have that month to come and clean up yourself because Allah says the Prophet mentioned that if you fast that month completely and after the end of that month you are like the day you were born. Sinless. So if you're sinless after a whole month you know people feel that but the problem is you're not assured of meeting that month again alive. So if you fast this year complete Ramadan this year and you're sinless afterwards and then you start sinning immediately again what gives you the assurance that you're going to meet another Ramadan alive nobody gives you the assurance. So why don't you just maintain whatever you have been able to learn through the month and then take it over all over the other months of the year. So like a reminder now this period very significant what would be the message out there? Okay so the message out there is that as Muslims today is a day of sober reflection not just a day to marry it's not just a day of married men's we've just heaped excessively that oh we've been we've not been eating good for 30 days there we have today let's just eat as much as possible here you can eat celebrate share gifts visit people visit the poor visit the needy visit people in the sick homes and all that and after you have done all that sit down and reflect that what what have I been able to gain over the course of this month what have I been able to do differently then that particular thing you know put pressure on it apply pressure so if it's you see that it's your five daily prayers that you've been able to be complete over the next 30 days they start doing that you know every time starts praying the five times per year daily and then keep that closeness you have with Allah so that's that's the main point of Ramadan that closeness you have with the Creator people will tell you I pray during Ramadan and the prayer got accepted it's the same God it means if you prayed in other days he would have accepted it but you did not see yourself as someone that could pray unconscious yeah you're feeling like oh I'm not I'm not clean enough I'm not pure enough I cannot talk to God I God said come I would answer you just ask me I'm closer to you than your jugular being so you don't even need to shout for me to listen to you just ask me speak to me the way you want to any way you can speak to me in fact the prophet advised us that when we want to pray as Muslims talk to God like you're talking to your friend okay so fine you know Ramadan is one of the pillars of Islam and I know during Ramadan today also talks of zakat al-Fitr and the sadakata does this actually still play out even after Ramadan okay so we have we have two forms of zakat we have the zakat al-Fitr which is the one that is supposed to have been done this morning so that is giving our harms to people that are fasting Muslims that might necessarily not have something to do their own festivist festival so you know this morning people want to eat and all that and they may not have food so you give them the raw food if you have money you can add money to eat for them to go and cook and all that so you look for the downtrodden that actually need it that is zakat al-Fitr which is far different from zakat itself so zakat itself is another embodiment of Islamic principle like we have the tithes so yeah so zakat it's 2.5% on the annual earnings and that is for it's at a particular threshold as that today I think is about 2.1 million so if you have that over the course of a year then you're liable to pay zakat on it that is different from the zakat al-Fitr so that is just like giving it's like every day giving general giving you can give at any time so Muslims are enjoying to always learn the back part of the lessons of Ramadan is for you to see how the pangs of hunger for people that do not have like you have so you know how to treat them when you meet them so people that that are suffering like you you know avagely it's not like every Nigerian is happy with this economic situation so if you have someone that you know that's just it just so so invariably a soda car should be done like um like on a daily practice in fact it's like a and highly if you can do it highly like a lifestyle like a lifestyle adopt it as a Muslim and give as much as possible in fact giving preifies you yourself the person a lot of your salam was told in the Quran where Allah says that who's mean I'm while him so that put on collect from them you know so from of soda car then after that pray for them that's the thing you're collecting from them is to purify them so you two are collecting it don't keep it as you're collecting it share it out to people too so that they can pray for the person that gave it to you and from that you're going to create people alive all right oh once a very big thank you to you for the enlightenment you have given to rose concern in the ramadan what people should do even afterwards he also talked about zakat at all zakat al-fitri and them soda car I actually needed to be reminded about it because I used to understand all of that thank you so much we were joined by Hashim Ibrahim Boloji and Islamic cleric and we have been looking at the essence of um it all fit again of course the lessons from ramadan just reflecting on all of that many things once again for sharing your thoughts with us we thank you very much for having thank you that's the size of the show for today we must say a very big thank you to all of you who have sat back to watch and of course to our muslim brothers and sisters that will say happy id al-fit to you my name is justin akadunia return again tomorrow all right that's the size of the conversation it's all right to follow us on facebook twitter and instagram and do subscribe to a youtube channel where plus tv africa and plus tv africa lifestyle many thanks for watching i am mesi i bubol have a great day