THE PRIMACY OF PRAYER

Never Lose Sight of the Hereafter

ISLAM enjoins believers to perform salat five times daily. Salat is an Islamic form of worship and it has a specific ritual. Performing this ritualistic practice requires the availability of water to perform ablutions, a comfortable space where one can perform all parts of salat while facing the direction of Kabah in Makkah. It may happen that a person is travelling and the time to perform salat approaches. It is also possible that a person is engaged in spreading the word of God and striving his utmost for the cause of God, even in these instances, when the time for prayer approaches, Islam asks one to leave every other thing aside and perform salat.

However, in cases of emergency, believers are permitted to shorten their prayers. They can perform salat while sitting, lying down or travelling. It is not necessary to keep facing Kabah throughout salat if that is not possible. But believers must perform salat. There is no exemption from this obligation.

Why is this so? This great emphasis is to remind the believers what is of true importance in this ephemeral world. What is of real value is realizing and remembering God. All acts of religion, whether in the nature of prayer (salat) and alms-giving (zakat) or the propagation of God’s word or the struggle for God’s cause, have the ultimate purpose of remembering God. Their aim is to create a man who lives with the thought of God at every moment and under all situations; who fears God in moments of apprehension and longs for Him in moments of hope; who relies solely on God; whose attention is focussed on God. If he achieves something, he believes it to be from God and if he suffers deprivation, he takes it as being God’s command. The whole of his inner existence should be lost in the majesty and grace of God. This orientation is such an important matter that, even in most critical times one is directed to say one’s prayer in some form or the other. This is to be reminded of what is of real value in any situation, which will be carried along with one to the Hereafter.