ISLAM Ramadan World 2010 - Photo Gallery

Ramadan 2010

Muslim men and women across the world are currently observing Ramadan, a month long celebration of self-purification and restraint. During Ramadan, the Muslim community fast, abstaining from food, drink, smoking and sex between sunrise and sunset. Muslims break their fast after sunset with an evening meal called Iftar, where a date is the first thing eaten followed by a traditional meal. During this time, Muslims are also encouraged to read the entire Quran, to give freely to those in need, and strengthen their ties to God through prayer. The goal of the fast is to teach humility, patience and sacrifice, and to ask forgiveness, practice self-restraint, and pray for guidance in the future.

With the Dome of the Rock Mosque seen in the background, a Palestinian Muslim worshiper prays during the third Friday prayers of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, in the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in Jerusalem's Old City on Friday, Aug. 27, 2010. (AP Photo/Muhammed Muheisen)

A Bahraini man points skyward at dusk Tuesday, Aug. 10, 2010, in Hamad Town, Bahrain, towards where a slim crescent moon should be visible to indicate the start of the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, a time of prayer, fasting and charitable giving. Clouds hampered skywatchers in the Persian Gulf island nation. (AP Photo/Hasan Jamali)

A Musaharati, dawn awakener, strikes his drum to wake observant Muslims for their overnight 'sahur', last meal, before the day's fast in Sidon's Old City in southern Lebanon just before dawn August 11, 2010. (REUTERS/Ali Hashisho)

Kashmiri Muslims pray on a street on the third Friday of Ramadan, in Srinagar, India, Friday, Aug. 27, 2010. (AP Photo/Altaf Qadri)

An Indian Muslim vendor prepares food at a roadside stall in preparation for Muslims breaking their fast at sundown in Mumbai, India on August 19, 2010. (SAJJAD HUSSAIN/AFP/Getty Images)

A Palestinian Muslim man decorates an alley of Jerusalem's old city with festive lights in preparation for Ramadan on Tuesday, Aug. 10 2010. (AP Photo/Muhammed Muheisen)

The crescent moon is seen near mosques in old Cairo on the fifth day of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan on August 15, 2010. (REUTERS/Asmaa Waguih)

A young Palestinian Muslim girl walks in an alley of Jerusalem's old city holding a traditional Ramadan lantern while celebrating with other children the announcing of the holy month of Ramadan on Tuesday, Aug. 10 2010. (AP Photo/Muhammed Muheisen)

A Pakistani volunteer pours milk into glasses for devotees to break their fast during Muslims' holy fasting month of Ramadan in Lahore, Pakistan on Friday, Aug. 20, 2010. (AP Photo/K.M.Chaudary)

Muslim girls offer prayers before having their Iftar (fast-breaking) meal during the holy month of Ramadan at a madrasa on the outskirts of Jammu on August 21, 2010. (REUTERS/Mukesh Gupta)

Egyptians buy fruits at a shop in downtown Cairo on August 20, 2010 during Islam's holy fasting month of Ramadan. Egyptians have been complaining from shortages of basic services during Ramadan, which began the first week of August amid sweltering summer temperatures. (KHALED
DESOUKI/AFP/Getty Images)

A member of Fairfax County Fire and Rescue, lower left, participates in an Iftar, the evening meal when Muslim break their fast during Ramadan, August 17, 2010 at Dar Al-Hijrah Islamic Center in Falls Church, Virginia. The Islamic center invited frontline responders for Ramadan dinner to show appreciation and foster increased understanding. (Alex Wong/Getty Images)

A Muslim man performs ablution before prayer during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan at the London Muslim Centre on August 18, 2010 in London, England. (Dan Kitwood/Getty Images)

A man prays during Ramadan Jummah prayer at the Islamic Center in Washington, D.C. on August 13, 2010. (JIM WATSON/AFP/Getty Images)

Indonesian chefs make miniature chocolate mosques for sale during the fasting month of Ramadan, at a chocolate shop in Jakarta, Indonesia, Friday, Aug. 20, 2010. (AP Photo/Tatan Syuflana)

Muslim pilgrims pray inside the Grand Mosque, with the Mecca Clock in the background, on the second day of the fasting month of Ramadan in Mecca August 12, 2010. The giant clock on a skyscraper in Islam's holiest city Mecca began ticking on Wednesday at the start of the fasting month of Ramadan, amid hopes by Saudi Arabia that it will become the Muslim world's official timekeeper. (REUTERS/Hassan Ali)

Thousands of Muslims gather in the Grand Mosque, in Islam's holiest city of Mecca and home to the Kaaba (center), as they take part in dawn (fajir) prayers on August 29, 2010, to start their day-long fast during the holy month or Ramadan. (AMER HILABI/AFP/Getty Images)

Thousands of Muslims circle the Kaaba inside the Grand Mosque in Islam's holiest city of Mecca, taking part in dawn (fajir) prayers on August 29, 2010. (AMER HILABI/AFP/Getty Images)

A Palestinian vendor displays traditional pastries in his shop in the West Bank city of Nablus on the second day of the holy month of Ramadan  August 12, 2010. (REUTERS/Abed Omar Qusini)

Jim Otun of Fairfield, New Jersey uses his iPad to read a dua in the Quran at Zinnur Books in Paterson, New Jersey. (AP Photo/Rich Schultz)

A Palestinian boy plays with a homemade sparkler after breaking his fast during Ramadan, in the West Bank city of Ramallah, Monday, Aug. 16, 2010. (AP Photo/Muhammed Muheisen)

Flood-affected people break their fast on the first day of the Muslim holy fasting month of Ramadan in a camp in Nowshera, Pakistan on Thursday, Aug. 12, 2010. Pakistani flood survivors, already short on food and water, began the fasting month of Ramadan on Thursday, a normally festive, social
time marked this year by misery and fears of an uncertain future. (AP Photo/Mohammad Sajjad)

A Muslim man places a chart which marks the times to pray on a wall during the first day of Ramadan at a mosque in the southern Spanish town of Estepona, near Malaga August 11, 2010. (REUTERS/Jon Nazca)

A Sudanese man reads the Koran on the first Friday of Ramadan in a mosque at Umdowan Ban village outside Khartoum, Sudan on August 13, 2010. (REUTERS/Mohamed Nureldin Abdallah)

Indian Muslims take a break as birds fly around Firoz Shah Kotla Masjid after prayers on the first Friday of Ramadan in New Delhi on August 13, 2010. (PEDRO UGARTE/AFP/Getty Images)

A mahya reading "Hold the fast. find good health" hangs between the minarets of the Ottoman-era Eminonu New Mosque in Istanbul August 12, 2010. Mahya, where dangling lights suspended between minarets spell out devotional messages in huge letters, are intended to reward and inspire
the faithful who have spent the daylight hours fasting. Today just a handful of Istanbul's mosques use Mahya, the phrases dictated by Turkey's directorate of religious affairs. (REUTERS/Murad Sezer)

Some 200 Muslims, inmates of the Quezon city jail in suburban Manila, are seen through a fence praying at the prison courtyard on August 13, 2010. The large Muslim minority in the Philippines - a country home to 75 million Catholics - is observing Ramadan, the holy fasting month of Islam. (JAY DIRECTO/AFP/Getty Images)

An Indian worker dries Seviiyan - thin vermicelli - which is used for the preparation of "sheerkhorma", a traditional sweet dish prepared by the Muslim community during the holy month of Ramadan at a food factory in Hyderabad on August 16, 2010. (NOAH SEELAM/AFP/Getty Images)

An Indian Muslim vendor separates the seeds of a pomegranate at a roadside stall in preparation for Muslims breaking their fast at sundown in Mumbai, India on August 19, 2010. (SAJJAD HUSSAIN/AFP/Getty Images)

A Palestinian woman's shadow is seen on a wall as she waits while attempting to cross the Kalandia checkpoint in order to go pray at the Al Aqsa Mosque on the third Friday of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, between Jerusalem and the West Bank city of Ramallah on Friday, Aug. 27, 2010. Israel loosened some restrictions on Palestinian movement between the West Bank and Israel during the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan. (AP Photo/Tara Todras-Whitehill)

Palestinian women walk past a barrier at an Israeli-controlled checkpoint on their way to pray at the Al Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem, on the third Friday of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, in the West Bank town of Bethlehem, Friday, Aug. 27, 2010. (AP Photo/Nasser Shiyoukhi)

An Afghan confectioner holds a traditional sweet for Iftar, the evening meal during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan on August 16, 2010 in Kabul, Afghanistan. (Majid Saeedi/Getty Images)

Muslim men pray before Iftar, the evening meal in the Muslim holy month of Ramadan at the London Muslim Centre on August 18, 2010 in London, England. (Dan Kitwood/Getty Images)

The shadow of a Palestinian Muslim praying at "fajr" or early morning prayer is cast on a pole, during the month of Ramadan at a mosque in the West Bank city of Ramallah on Tuesday, Aug. 17, 2010. (AP Photo/Muhammed Muheisen)

Palestinians struggle at an access point as food rations are given out by an Islamic charity on the second day of the month of Ramadan, in the West Bank city of Hebron on Thursday, Aug. 12, 2010. (AP Photo/Bernat Armangue)

A child sits with a plate of food that was distributed as part of the holy month of Ramadan, at a refugee camp in Kabul, Afghanistan, on Saturday, Aug. 14, 2010. (AP Photo/Mustafa Quraishi)

Indonesian women pray during the first night of Ramadan in Jakarta on August 10, 2010. (ADEK BERRY/AFP/Getty Images)

A Palestinian Muslim man reads from the Quran, Islam's holy book, on "fajr" or early morning prayer, during Ramadan at a mosque in the West Bank city of Ramallah on Tuesday, Aug. 17, 2010. (AP Photo/Muhammed Muheisen)

An Indian Muslim perfumer selects a bottle of ather (non-alcoholic perfume) for customers at his shop in Hyderabad on August 17, 2010. Muslims apply ather to their clothes as a traditional custom before
going for daily prayers during the Holy month of Ramadan. Hyderabad is a well known place for selling Ather some 157 varieties of perfume available on the market. (NOAH SEELAM/AFP/Getty Images)

Children run around inside the premises of Jama mosque after Friday afternoon prayers in New Delhi, India, Friday, Aug. 20, 2010. (AP Photo/Saurabh Das)

A Palestinian Muslim worshiper walks in an alley of Jerusalem's Old City, on her way to pray at the Al Aqsa Mosque on the third Friday of Ramadan on Aug. 27, 2010. (AP Photo/Bernat Armangue)

A rainbow is seen as a Palestinian sprays water on Muslim worshipers leaving the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound to cool them off as the temperature rises, following the second Friday prayers of Ramadan, in Jerusalem's Old City, Friday, Aug. 20, 2010. (AP Photo/Muhammed Muheisen)

Her hands decorated with henna, an Afghan Muslim woman takes part in evening prayers during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan on August 13, 2010 in Kabul, Afghanistan. (Majid Saeedi/Getty Images)

Shop owner Boualem Bensalem (left) prays in his flat with family and friends before for Iftar meal in Geneva, Switzerland on August 23, 2010. Switzerland is home to some 311,000 Muslims (4.3% of the population). (REUTERS/Denis Balibouse)

A Syrian Muslim girl stands at the top of Mount Qassioun, which overlooks Damascus city, during sunset and prays before eating her Iftar meal on August 22, 2010. (REUTERS/Khaled al-Hariri)

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Thanks!
Yasir

--
PLEASE FORWARD THIS MAIL TO AS MANY AS YOU CAN.
 
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ISLAM Wake up 4 Fajr Salaah

(ISLAM) Wake up 4 Fajr Salaah

A man woke up early in order to Pray the Fajr Prayer in the masjid.

He got dressed, made his ablution and was on his way to the masjid..

On his way to the masjid, the man fell and his clothes got dirty.

He got up, brushed himself off, and headed home. At home,

He changed His Clothes, made his ablution, and was, again,

on his way to the masjid.


On his way to the masjid, He Fell again and at the Same Spot!

He, again, got up, brushed himself off and headed home..

At home he, once again, Changed His Clothes,

made his ablution and was on his way to the masjid.


On his way to the masjid, He Met a Man Holding a Lamp.

He asked the man of his identity and the man replied 'I Saw You Fall Twice

on your way to the masjid,

So I Brought a Lamp so I can Light Your Way.'

The first man thanked him profusively and the

two where on their way to the masjid.


Once at the masjid, the first man asked the man with

the lamp to come in and pray Fajr with him.

The second man refused.

The first man asked him a couple more times and,

again, the answer was the same.

The first man asked him why he did not wish to come in and pray.

He man replied



I am Shaitaan(devil/ evil)

The man was shocked at this reply.

Shaitan went on to explain,

'I saw you on your way to the masjid

and it was I who made you fall. When you went home,

cleaned yourself and went back on your way to the masjid,

Allah forgave all of your sins.

I made you fall a second time, and even that

did not encourage you to stay home,

but rather, you went back on your way to the masjid..

Because of that, Allah forgave all the sins

of the people of your household .


I was AFRAID if i made you fall one more time,

then Allah will forgive the sins of the people of your village,

so I made sure that you reached the masjid safely..'


So do not let Shaitan benefit from his actions.

Do not put off a good that you intended to do as

you never know how much reward

you might receive from the hardships you encounter

while trying to achieve that good.

If forwarding this message will bother you, or take

too much time from you, then don't do it, but you will not

get the reward of it, which is great. Imagine,

that when you forward this, if some one start praying fajar then I would be beneficial for me and you also and the one who started sending this.

So will I for sending it to you! Wouldn't it be easy just to

Press Forward ' and receive this Reward?

May Allah (Subhana Ho Wataallah) grant us a perfect Muslim Heart n we

all do Prayers with our Heart and Soul... Ameen

--

"Oh Allah, I seek refuge in You lest I misguide others, or I am misguided by others, lest I cause others to err or I am caused to err, lest I abuse others or be abused, and lest I behave foolishly or meet with the foolishness of others".

(Abu-Dawud, Ibn Majah, Nasa'i, At-Termithi see also Al-Albani, Sahih At-Tirmithi 3/152 and Sahih Ibn Majah 2/336)

(ISLAM) Western research about value of chastity.

WESTERN RESEARCH ABOUT VALU OF CHASTITY

 

Quran considers chastity as a permanent value and lays a great emphasis on restricting the sexual activities within the bounds of marriage. The question is why this is so much important. This article reviews briefly the western independent research in this regards.

 

Richard Wilkins is a professor of law at Brigham Young University. He writes in his book "Marriage on the brink" that viewed from any historical, anthropological or sociological perspective, marriage is not just an emotional and sexual attachment but it is much more than an intimate association between two people. It civilizes men. It protects children. It generates social energy. It fosters individual and collective growth. It teaches norms. It creates culture.

According to Giambattista Vico, marriage is the "seedbed" of society. In 1725, after completing an exhaustive study of ancient history, he concluded that marriage between a man and a woman is an essential characteristic of civilization. Without strong social norms that encourage a man to direct his sexual attentions to a single woman and thereafter care for his offspring, Vico concluded that chaos ensued. John Locke referred to marriage as mankind's 'first society'. The married family is profoundly important for a stable society.

British anthropologist J. D. Unwin reached the same conclusion. In his 1934 book, Sex and Culture, Unwin chronicled the historical decline of 86 different cultures. His exhaustive survey revealed that "strict marital monogamy" was central to social energy and growth. Indeed, no society flourished for more than three generations without it. Unwin stated it this way, "In human records there is no instance of a society retaining its energy after a complete new generation has inherited a tradition which does not insist on prenuptial and postnuptial continence."

Unwin confessed that he began his investigation "with carefree open-mindedness" and "in all innocence". With no axe to grind, and no idea where his researches might lead him, he wanted to test the conjecture that civilization and sexual self-control were related to each other. He studied eighty primitive and sixteen civilized societies, and found that a society's cultural energy (art, science, technology, etc.) increases as its sexual energy is controlled.

Professor V.A.Demant's writes in his book "An Exposition of Christian Sex Ethic" about the Unwin's research as follows:

"His [Unwin's] conclusion, reached after a review of many societies and civilizations, is that when social regulations forbid indiscriminate satisfaction of the sexual impulses, the emotional conflict is expressed in another way; and that what we call civilization has been built up by sacrifices in the gratification of innate desires. "A greater or lesser mental development has accompanied a limitation or extension of sexual opportunity." Unwin correlates three types of religion with three kinds of society described by their sexual regulations. "Societies that permitted pre-nuptial freedom were in the zoistic condition and produced little culture beyond tribal survival. Societies that imposed an irregular or occasional continence were in the manistic condition: these have a more elaborate social system. Societies that enforced complete pre-nuptial continence were in the deistic condition, and these have the maximum of intellectual and creative energy. He deduces that the greatest social energy and impulse for civilization-building is a correlate of the strictest of sexual patterns, namely that of absolute monogamy and extra-marital continence".

David Holloway writes in his article "when private become public" as follows:

"The basic claim that sexual restraint is correlated with cultural health stands and seems to be self-evidently true. A society where marriage norms have been destroyed and where pure sexual gratification is a primary value is not a society that can motivate communal effort. Nor will many of its members want to make sacrifices for such a society."

E. J. Mishan once wrote:
"Can anyone care very much what happens to a society whose members are continually and visibly obsessed with sexual carousal - to a society where, in effect, the human animal has been reduced to a life-style that consists in the main activity of alternatively inflaming itself and relieving itself?"

Tony Blair when interviewed soon after he became British Prime Minister, said:
"Of all the behaviour which in my personal experience has caused the greatest misery to other human beings, I would put adultery pretty high on the list. I don't actually think you can expect a man with the strains of public life to perform adequately unless he has got a good home life to go back to."

Rev. Louis p. Sheldon, Chairman, Traditional Values Coalition says "destruction of marriage precedes death of a culture, history shows".

In his 1979 book, "Our Dance Has Turned To Death," Christian sociologist Carl W. Wilson noted that history reveals that nations decline and eventually die when sexual immorality becomes rampant and the traditional family is discarded in favor of group sex, homosexuality, infidelity, and unrestrained sexual hedonism. Carl Wilson notes that decadent cultures display seven typical characteristics: Men reject spiritual and moral development as the leaders of families; men begin to neglect their families in search of material gain; men begin to engage in adulterous relationships or homosexual sex; women begin to devalue the role of motherhood and homemaker; husbands and wives begin to compete with each other and families disintegrate; selfish individualism fragments society into warring factions; and men and women lose faith in God and reject all authority over their lives. Soon, moral anarchy reigns. When the family collapses, the society soon follows.

Sociologist Pitirim Sorokin, in "The American Sex Revolution," found essentially the same thing when he examined sexual immorality as it relates to cultural decline. Sorokin noted in the late 60's that America was committing "voluntary suicide" through unrestrained sexual indulgence. He observed that as individuals began engaging in pre-marital sex unrelated to marriage, the birth rate would decline and our nation would be slowly depopulated. He predicted an increase in divorce, desertion, and an epidemic of sexual promiscuity resulting in a rise in illegitimate children. His predictions, unfortunately, have come true. Sorokin's study of decadent cultures convinced him that a healthy society can only survive if strong families exist and sexual activities are restricted to within marriage. Sexual promiscuity leads inevitably to cultural decline and eventual collapse.