We enter Ramadan this year as the world trembles under the weight of wars, political violence and widening human suffering and pain. In an age marked by militarized politics and diplomacy, ideological extremism and the normalization of mass violence, the sacred month of Ramadan arrives not in serenity but amid global moral exhaustion and chaos. That Ramadan returns again under such conditions deepens its urgency and our need for it.

Heart of fasting

Ramadan is not merely a month in the Islamic lunar calendar; it is a divinely opened horizon. It is a time altered by prophetic revelation, hunger is then transformed into light and discipline is ripened into spiritual intimacy. Ramadan is the month in which Islamic law, humility and love converge: where the outward fast (ṣawm/oruç) becomes an inward unveiling and a blessing of the heart.

Allah says in the Quran: "O you who believe, fasting has been prescribed for you as it was prescribed for those before you, that you may attain taqwa." The aim is taqwa: an existential consciousness and awareness of God, a consciousness that permeates breath, thought and action. In Islamic theology, fasting is obedience. It is a submission enacted through restraint. The Muslim believer refrains from what is lawful (food, drink, marital intimacy) not because these are evil, but because discipline frees the human soul from enslavement to materialistic and corporeal appetites.

Spiritual depths of Ramadan

Moreover, Ramadan is also the month of revelation: "The month of Ramadan in which the Quran was revealed as guidance for humanity,” the Quran says. Hence, the spirit of Ramadan is inseparable from the Quran. It is not accidental that many Muslims complete its recitation in this month, standing in night prayer, listening to its cadences in Mosques. For the theological scholars, this is revival of Sunnah; for the Sufis, it is reentering the moment of revelations: the trembling of Mount Hira, the breaking open of silence.

The Prophet Muhammad (May peace and blessings be upon him) said, as recorded in Sahih al-Bukhari and Sahih Muslim: "When Ramadan begins, the gates of paradise are opened, the gates of hell are closed, and the devils are chained.” This hadith speaks cosmologically and psychologically. The environment of mercy and bliss overwhelms the environment of heedlessness and egoism.

The great theologian and mystic Abu Hamid al-Ghazali wrote that fasting has degrees: the fast of the common person is abstention from food and desire; the fast of the elect is guarding the limbs from sin; the fast of the elect of the elect is the fasting of the heart from all but Allah. Hunger becomes a mirror in which the self sees its own dependence. When the body weakens, illusion weakens, irascible ego diminishes.

This interiorization of Ramadan reaches a luminous articulation in the poetry of Rumi. He writes: "There is a hidden sweetness in the stomach’s emptiness. We are lutes: no more, no less. If the soundbox is stuffed full of anything, no music.” For Rumi, hunger is not deprivation but hollowing. The reed flute only sings because it is empty. Ramadan empties the human instrument so that divine breath may pass through it. To fast is to become resonant with humanity, nature, the cosmos and Allah.

Similarly, Ibn Arabi, the great Islamic metaphysician of unity, sees fasting as a unique act of divine intimacy. In a sacred hadith, Allah says: "Fasting is for Me, and I alone reward it.” Ibn Arabi reflects that fasting is attributed directly to God because it is a form of negation, and God, in His incomparability, transcends all attributes. The fasting person embodies a kind of divine quality: refraining, needing nothing for a time. Hunger becomes a participation in transcendence. The servant imitates, in fragile human measure, the Divine Self-Sufficiency.

But Ramadan is not merely negation. It is presence intensified. The nights of Ramadan carry a stillness and bliss unlike other nights. In them falls Laylat al-Qadr. For Muslims, it is a night of multiplied reward. For the spiritual Sufi, it is a symbol of interior revelation. Sadr al-Din al-Qunawi, the foremost disciple of Ibn Arabi, emphasized that the human being is a locus of manifestation ("maẓhar") for divine names. Ramadan polishes that locus. Through hunger, prayer, charity and remembrance, the mirror of the heart is cleared of dust and sins. The Divine Names (the Merciful, the Forgiving, the Patient) find clearer reflection. One does not become divine, but one becomes a clearer sign.

Ramadan as "mujahadah": struggle. Not violent struggle, but inward striving. Junayd al-Baghdadi is reported to have said that hunger narrows the pathways of Satan. The ego thrives on excess; it softens under restraint. Anger surfaces, impatience surfaces, pride surfaces, because food no longer numbs them. Thus, Ramadan reveals the illnesses of the heart so they may be treated. Rumi would add that the breaking of the fast (iftar) is not merely the eating of dates, but the tasting of gratitude. After hours of abstention, a sip of water feels like a gift. The ordinary becomes miraculous. Awareness sharpens. The world regains freshness.

When Ramadan ends, the question remains: what was transformed? If hunger produced only fatigue, its spirit was missed. But if hunger produced tenderness, patience, wakefulness, conscious reflection, then Ramadan succeeded. The spirit of Ramadan is therefore paradoxical. It is emptiness that fills. Weakness that strengthens.

Thinking about it, Ramadan is the month in which the Muslim rehearses death (abstaining from worldly attachments) and rehearses resurrection (rising at night in hope). It is the month in which the Quran is not merely recited but encountered. It is the month in which the ego is narrowed so that the heart may widen. Ramadan is an invitation to return: to the Quran, to the Sunnah, to the heart’s original clarity and state. It is the opening of gates long closed. It is the whisper that says: become less, so that you may receive more.

From self to society

In a world fractured by war, displacement and moral exhaustion – from the destruction of the Gaza Strip to the prolonged conflict in Ukraine, to civil wars in Sudan, Ethiopia, Yemen and Somalia – the spirit of Ramadan calls not only for individual piety but for collective ethical awakening. Fasting disciplines appetite, but it must also discipline power, restrain injustice and unsettle indifference to suffering. If hunger teaches us dependence and vulnerability, it should also cultivate solidarity with those whose hunger is not chosen but imposed by political violence. The true continuity of Ramadan, therefore, lies in transforming spiritual self-restraint into communal and global mercy: becoming agents of justice, reconciliation, peace and moral courage in a world that desperately needs them today.