George Sale, The Koran, commonly called the Alcoran of Mohammed, translated into English immediately from the original Arabic; with Explanatory Notes, taken from the most approved Commentators. To which is prefixed A Preliminary Discource (1734)
God than that of musk; and al Ghazâli reckons fasting one fourth part of the faith. According to the Mohammedan divines, there are three degrees of fasting: 1. The restraining the belly and other parts of the body from satisfying their lusts; 2. The restraining the ears, eyes, tongue, hands, feet, and other members from sin; and 3. The fasting of the heart from worldly cares, and refraining the thoughts from every thing besides God 1.
The Mohammedans are obliged, by the express command of the Korân, to fast the whole month of Ramadân, from the time the new moon first appears, till the appearance of the next new moon; during which time they must abstain from eating, drinking, and women, from day-break till night 2, or sun-set. And this injunction they observe so strictly, that while they fast they suffer nothing to enter their mouths, or other parts of their body, esteeming the fast broken and null if they smell perfumes, take a clyster or injection, bathe, or even purposely swallow their spittle; some being so cautious that they will not open their mouths to speak, lest they should breath the air too freely 3; the fast is also deemed void if a man kiss or touch a woman, or if he vomit designedly. But after sun-set they are allowed to refresh themselves, and to eat and drink, and enjoy the company of their wives till day-break 4; tho’ che more rigid begin the fast again at midnight 5. This fast is extreamly rigorous and mortifying when the month of Ramadân happens to fall in summer, (for the Arabian year being lunar 6, each month runs through all the different seasons in the course of thirty three years) the length and heat of the days making the observance of it much more difficult and uneasy then than in winter.
1 Al Ghazâli, Al Mostatraf.
3 Hence we read that the Virgin Mary, to avoid answering the reflections cast on her for bringing home a child, was advised by the angel Gabriel to seign she had vowed a fast, and therefore ought not to speak. See Korân, chap. 19. p. 251.
4 The words of the Korân (chap. 2. p. 22.) are, Until ye can distinguish a white thread from a black thread by the day-break; a form of speaking borrowed by Mohammed from the Jews, who determine the time when they are to begin their morning lesson, to be so soon as a man can discern blue from white, i.e. the blue threads from the white threads in the fringes of their garments. But this explication the commentators do not approve; pretending that by the white thread and the black thread are to be understood the light and dark streaks of the day-break: and they say the passage was at first revealed without the words of the day-break; but Mohammed’s followers taking the expression in the first sense, regulated their practice accordingly, and continued eating and drinking till they could distinguish a white thread from a black thread, as they lay before them; to prevent which for the future, the words of the day-break were added as explanatory of the former. Al Beidawi. V. Pocock. Not. in Carmen Tograi, p. 89, &c. Chardin, Voy. de Perse, t. II. p. 423.
5 V. Chardin, ib. p. 421, &c. Reland. de Relig. Moh. p. 109, &c.
6 See hereafter, §. VI.
