The 10th day of Muharram

Praise be to Allah. We are thankful for His graciousness, we pray for His help, guidance and forgiveness. We thank Him and repent to Him. We also ask Him for protection from the corruption within ourselves and from our bad deeds.  No one can misguide the one whom Allah guides. And no one can guide the one whom Allah misguides.  I declare, I believe and I know that no one is God except Allah. He is Al-Wahid — the One who has no partner in His God-hood and Al-Ahad – the One clear of the imperfection of being divided into parts. Hence, Allah is not a body and must not be attributed with bodily attributes. He is Allah, Al-‘Awwal – the One Whose existence does not have a beginning. He is Al-Khaliq the Creator Who brings everything from the state of non-existence into the state of existence. He is Allah, the One Who created all creation, including time and place, and is clear of being attributed with time and place. I also declare, believe and know that our master, our beloved and our great leader Muhammad, is the slave and Messenger of Allah, His chosen and most beloved. Muhammad is the treatment for ill-hearts, remedy for ill-bodies and vision for blinded eyes. May Allah raise the rank of Prophet Muhammad and protect his nation from that which he fears for it.

Brothers in Islam, first I advise myself then I advise you all to obey Allah the Lord of the worlds, by performing the obligatory and avoiding the unlawful, and to follow the path of His honorable prophet. ^Ashoura’ day lies on the 10th day of Muharram. Fasting the day of ^ashoura’ has been unanimously agreed upon by scholars of Islam to be a Sunnah deed.

Many great events in the history of Islam happened on the day of ^ashoura’. Some of which were as follows: On this day, Allah saved Prophet Moses from the evil pharaoh who drowned also on that day. Allah accepted the repentance of Adam after he committed the small sin when he ate from the forbidden tree in paradise. This was a small sin without meanness. Also on the day of ^ashoura’, the arc of prophet Noah landed safely on the mount of Al-Joudiyy in Iraq after the flood. Al Hussein son of Imam Ali was martyred on that day and the battle of “that-ur-reqaa” took place on the tenth of Muharram as well the validity of fasting  ^ashoura’ started when prophet Muhammad arrived at Al-Madina. He saw Jews fasting ^ashoura’. When he inquired about the reason behind their fasting, they explained to him that this day is special to them because on that day Allah gave Moses victory over Pharaoh. Prophet Muhammad then said what means: We are more deserving of Moses than you are. The Prophet said this because Moses was Muslim as all the prophets, and we are more worthies of rejoicing his victory. Then the Prophet continued by urging Muslims to fast the day of ^ashoura’ and the day before by saying what means: If I remain alive until Muharram of next year I will fast the ninth and tenth of it. Prophet Muhammad specified two days of fasting rather than the single day the Jews were fasting for two reasons: First to differ from the Jews and the second is to assure that they did not miss fasting the tenth of Muharram, due to the possibility of an error in confirming the beginning of Muharram.

In the end, we ask Allah to enable us to adhere to the methodology of our prophet by fulfilling his Sunnah and to keep us steadfast on the path of knowledge and obedience Ameen.