Fasting

The kids fasted today, all half day. S insisted that she fast the whole day but gave in when O served her cinnamon buns and some other snacks. We had a homeschool group session today. The kids learned about what Ramadhan was all about and constructed a date palm tree triorama.

One thing to note:

When O brought up Ramadhan, she presented it in a very enlightening way, at least for me. Never in my life had I been taught in such a way. Well, maybe I had but even if i was it didn't stick in my head.

"Why do we fast in Ramadhan?" she asked.

Then,

"How do we know we have to fast? Do we just guess? Where does it tell us to fast?"
she continued.

"The Quran," someone answered.

"Yes, the Quran. Allah told us to fast in the Quran."

It drilled in me a very important aspect of teaching our children. Born Muslims grow up in Islam. Everything about Islam they are raised with, with no question. In the end it produced in us a lack of insistence in knowing the evidences for any ibadah that we are taught while we are growing up.

Yet, isn't it important to know why we do things? Isn't it important to know the reason why we do something? Isn't it important to know where the evidences come from? Often times we follow what our ustadh says without questionig his evidences. We treat the ustadh with extreme respect which is commendable yet in our reverence of his knowledge, we tend to forget that he's not infallible. Bad mistake.

Surah al-Baqarah ayat 185. the command to fast. I never paid attention before as to where exactly in the Quran we are told to fast, though I know it's in surah Al-Baqarah. it never dawned on me that I should teach the children where the command came from and pinpoint it in the Quran. I am doing exactly what shouldn't be done i a family of born Muslims.

So I would call today a very enlightening day. We finished school at around 11 am today because we started right after suhoor.