problem with salah(contact prayer) please help me:(

FreedomStands

Salam agphys.

Just in case you do not understand Arabic... my suggestion would be for you to learn the meanings of the words that you say during salat - if possible with word-by-word meanings. Then when you try to stand in salat next time, do focus on the meaning of what you are saying and actually mean them from your heart.

Also know that salat does not need to be as rigid and inflexible as traditionalists imply them to be.
Here are a few tips that can make the ritual ever fresh and interesting

Try learning new verses of Qur'an (of course with meaning) and use them in salaat.
Feel free to have your own say in the ruku / sizdah positions - even if it is in your own words - own language.
Use the sitting position to have your own prayers (dua&#039 - even if it is in your own words - own language. Some of the best prayers can actually be found in Qur'an. But if you use them make sure you understand them and mean them.

I try to practice the above myself and my experience of salat has transformed from an obligation which I wanted to get over with - to - a personal break from the chaotic world that I actually look forward to!

Hope these tips will help you.

May Allah guide us all to the straight route.

Regards,
Arman

I do the same, great suggestions.

JavaLatte

Thank you sister JavaLatte.

handshake

Salam.

Salam. sun

Nice to see you again, brother.

hafeez_kazi

Peace

Follow that which is sent down toward you from your Lord, and follow not any patrons beside Him; yet little ye are admonished 73

A crystal clear command to THE PROPHET to follow only what is revealed UNTO HIM and not to follow any patrons.

Were the details of Salat revealed to the Prophet? Were the details of Zakat revealed to the Prophet? Those who follow that which is not revealed are following conjectures.

And if you obey most of those in the earth, they will lead you astray from Allah's way; they follow but conjecture and they only lie. (Al-An'aam 116)

And they have no knowledge of it (SALAT and ZAKAT); they do not follow anything but conjecture, and surely conjecture does not avail against the truth at all. (An-Najm 2

And there is no animal that walks upon the earth nor a bird that flies with its two wings but (they are) genera like yourselves; We have not neglected anything in the Book, then to their Lord shall they be gathered. (Al-An'aam 3

But still the details of SALAT and ZAKAT are missing in the Quran. SURPRISING?

Armanaziz

Salam brother Hafeez.

My intention is not to debate with you. I would just like to highlight some counterarguments ? which you and the readers can consider.
Then everyone can use their own understanding to follow what is appropriate.

Qur?an is fully detailed does not mean Qur?an is meant to serve the purpose of an encyclopedia. It means Qur?an is fully detailed as guidance. If one follows the teaching of the Qur?an wholly and wholeheartedly, one will not deviate. But there is always room for deriving practical suggestions from outside Qur?an. For example, Qur?an tells us to eat from the delicious things. But Qur?an does not provide the recipe for how to prepare foods. We learn that from our community / family / environment.

It is sufficiently clear form Qur?an that Qur?an encourages to pray to Allah and to remember Allah continuously as well as repeatedly (day and night). Given that is the expectation, if one follows the ?recipe? of prayer based on how his community practices ? takes the best of it and improvises to one?s personal needs - and practices it with due sincerity without emphasizing form over substance, how does one violate Qur?an? It only becomes problematic when someone gets over fanatic about the form, format and frequency of the ritual ? which is of course not elaborated in Qur?an as these are left to community and individual to decide.

Similarly, Qur?an encourages to perform charity. If a community follows a historical recommendation of a certain standard ratio of excess wealth as the minimum expected level of charity ? and if someone complies with that standard and tries to do more with due sincerity then where is the problem? It only becomes problematic when someone gets over fanatic about the percentage and gets convinced that somehow meeting the ratio would absolve him from his full responsibility of charity and kindness and guarantee purity of his livelihood in spite of other forms of wrongdoing.

The specific verse you quote (73) tells us not to take a patron beside him. One would be taking a traditionalist as patron if one believes following the traditionalist?s form of rituals guarantees one?s salvation. As long as one?s faith and submission are to Allah ? being consistent with community in terms of practice does not harm. Rather it makes complete sense.

May Allah guide us all to the straight route.

Regards,
Arman

Man_of_Faith

Hafez kazi,

It is not so strange since the scripture itself is the salat to follow/maintain/uphold.

Be well

FreedomStands

Maybe forget about praying until you understand more about Allah and prayer, or not.

agphys

will my fasting be accepted if i dont pray salah?

Can you pray fajr,maghrib and isha with 2 rakats? (instead of prayig isha with 4, you do 2 etc.)

difference btw reading the quran and praying?

hafeez_kazi

Peace Brother Mof

Hafez kazi,

It is not so strange since the scripture itself is the salat to follow/maintain/uphold.

Be well

This is what I discovered after 14 years of research. My article on salat is yet not complete.

Thanks

Armanaziz

will my fasting be accepted if i dont pray salah?

Can you pray fajr,maghrib and isha with 2 rakats? (instead of prayig isha with 4, you do 2 etc.)

difference btw reading the quran and praying?

Salam agphys.

The way I view this is - salaat means "respectful obedience" to Allah. The ritual salat is the expression of your "respectful obedience" to Allah. While the form of expression is not hardcoded in Qur'an - there is absolutely no doubt that establishing respectful obedience for Allah (akimus salaat) in one's lifestyle is an indispensable part of consciousness (taqwa). How does one establish respectful obedience for Allah in one's lifestyle? - By consciously guarding against shameless and deplorable behavior (2945) and continuously striving to do good (1071-7).

If this above understanding is acceptable to you, you can consider below responses to your queries

will my fasting be accepted if i dont pray salah?
As long as you are respectfully obedient to Allah you are establishing salaat. The ritual salaat is a means to that end, not the end in itself.
As such failure to perform ritual salaat should not prevent from taking benefit of any other act of goodness (e.g. siam) in any way.
However, practicing the ritual salaat is the prescribed method of expression of our "respectful obedience" for our community (Ummah). So deliberate ignorance or avoidance of the ritual is by definition disrespectful and will make you vulnerable to departing from "respectful obedience". So, the recommended action would be to guard the rituals with sincerity as well.

The similarity is, performing the assigned homework prepares a student for the exam. But not doing the homework does not stop one from preparing for exam in other approaches. But of course, doing the minimum prescribed homework before any other optional excercise is the recommended method.

Can you pray fajr, maghrib and isha with 2 rakats? (instead of praying isha with 4, you do 2 etc.)
If that is what is convenient to you as a starter, why not? There should be no blame for you to shorten the prayer while you are in the transitional state. But once you are secured and assured do give an effort to be grateful to Allah for how He taught us what we did not happen to know (i.e. adhere to the minimum standard taught to us through our communities).
difference btw reading the quran and praying?
Reading Qur?an (without understanding meaning) has very little value, if any. Reading Qur?an with understanding is valuable and can serve the purpose of salaat ritual during the transitional state.
Complete salaat ritual traditionally comprises of reciting (from memory) and contemplating over selected verses of Qur?an in standing position, performing ruku and sizdah to express our obedience and submission to Allah and then praying to Allah (in flexible format) in sitting position. Prayer of course should have a balance between praying for goodness in life of the world and hereafter (2200-202).

May Allah guide us all to the straight route.

Regards,
Arman

Man_of_Faith

Hafez kazi,

I am glad that you came to this conclusion after this long because you are absolutely right on spot now. The word means literally "The Following" but that sounds a bit awkward in English whereas "Guidance" springs to mind.

Fit that several times and you have a more intelligible scripture. Moses has GOD with him as long as he upholds the guidance (following). Shu'aybs guidance makes him determined. Patience and following are good ways. The birds follow in formation (salaTEH is not used there). GOD and the angels/Malekateh give the prophet guidance (following). Etc.

Be well

hawk99

will my fasting be accepted if i dont pray salah?

Can you pray fajr,maghrib and isha with 2 rakats? (instead of prayig isha with 4, you do 2 etc.)

difference btw reading the quran and praying?

Peace agphys

will my fasting be accepted if i dont pray salah?

There is no "accepting" of salat. Salat is "spiritual food" for your soul.

Can you pray fajr,maghrib and isha with 2 rakats? (instead of prayig isha with 4, you do 2 etc.)

There are no set number of rakats, the Quran only mentions one sequence "one rakat"
(I cannot find the word rakat in the Quran.)

difference btw reading the quran and praying?

The Quran is a text that has many attributes, while prayer is for the self.

God bless

FreedomStands

Peace agphys

will my fasting be accepted if i dont pray salah?

There is no "accepting" of salat. Salat is "spiritual food" for your soul.

Can you pray fajr,maghrib and isha with 2 rakats? (instead of prayig isha with 4, you do 2 etc.)

There are no set number of rakats, the Quran only mentions one sequence "one rakat"
(I cannot find the word rakat in the Quran.)

difference btw reading the quran and praying?

The Quran is a text that has many attributes, while prayer is for the self.

God bless

I agree with all that. I can not guarantee anyone's efforts might garner any good results or bad results, or if anyone's efforts will be rewarded in the ways they might expect, thus like it has been said, one should do these things for oneself and their immediate benefits rather than a view that they are meaningless and to please Allah.

JavaLatte

I think salat is for Allah*, but salat is also something good for us.

Say, truly, my salat, my service of sacrifice (?), my life and my death are for Allah, the Lord of the 'Alamin

*and it doesn't mean that Allah need us to do that, but He commands the believers to do that

amin

Salat is giving your time for God, listening to Him, talking to Him, Silently sitting can also be a form of Salat.
lets not assume our ancestors had a well developed language, they used different methods to communicate, symbols and signs too were part of their communication, so ritual Salat is also good in a way we are giving our respect symbolically, it conditions ourselves.

I believe the primary purpose of Salat is to take us out from excess, think of us working nonstop through out the day, our mind is occupied totally on our selves/desires, too much stress is the result. we need balance and so we stop and spend some time remembering Him(the common goodness provider) and continue.
To me Salat is no different from the worship of dieties in temples. The objective in both is all the same, only the symbols are different.

agphys

Thanks to God, i have now started to pray again and i feel much better)

But i still have a long road to go (spiritually) because after knowing the truth and the laws of God, i made several mistakes that wasnt so good and i slipped, but now im going to start and begin with fast and pray, then Gods knows best.

Basically, i was on the str8 path and i slipped and fell. Now i need to clean the dust from my shoulders and if God wills, i have learned from my mistakes and i will not repeat them.

Being clean/pure from sins = Euphoria and happiness. <=

"therefore, be patient, for God's promise is true, and ask forgiveness for your sin, and glorify and praise your Lord night and day."
Quran 4055

"For them, joy and happiness in this world, as well as in the Hereafter. This is God's unchangeable law. Such is the greatest triumph." Q 1064

"We granted him happiness in this life, and in the Hereafter he will be with the righteous." Q. 16122

"You have no idea how much joy and happiness are waiting for you as a reward for your (righteous) works." Q.3217

"These have deserved happiness." Q.9018

Armanaziz

To me Salat is no different from the worship of dieties in temples. The objective in both is all the same, only the symbols are different.

Salam Amin.

While I agree to most of what you said, the last comment quoted above caught me surprised. I believe rather there is a clear distinction between ritual salaat (as expected to be practiced by a follower of millat-i-ibrahim) and the worship of dieties in temples.

The objective of worship of deity in a temple, be it some ancestors or imaginary heavenly beings or angels or even a singular deity ? is to offer respect / blessings and seek help from one or more entities that exist (or supposed to exist) separately from us. The underlying idea is, if the deity can be pleased, the deity can do good to us. Channeling one?s reverence to a deity turns one into an idolater ? fanatic and hateful towards others outside the group.

On the other hand salaat (as expected to be practiced by a follower of millat-i-ibrahim), is not offered to any entity that exist, rather it is directed to the One source of all existence. The underlying idea is, focusing all our reverence and prayer to the ?Source? of all existence ? the source of our ?soul? and our sense of right and wrong - is our natural obligation. The salat symbolizes our ritual submission to that Master ? our unconditional acceptance of our obligation of acting righteously ? and our spontaneous acceptance that whatever is the God-gifted outcome of acting righteously is indeed the best for us. The goal should not be to please Allah (for Allah does not need our worship) ? the goal should be to reaffirm ourselves that we submit to Allah. Channeling one?s reverence to the Master of all that exists turns one into muttaqui (conscious) ? peaceful from within and fair and merciful to all others.

2256 There is no compulsion in the resolution (&#1616. Verily, right has become clearly distinct from the error ? then whoever represses (faith) in deity (&#1616 and has faith in Allah has grasped the most firm handhold with no break in it. And Allah is Listener, Knowledgeable.

2257 Allah is the patron of those who have put faith; He brings them out from darkness into light. And those who repress (faith) ? their patrons are the deities ( they bring them out from light into darkness; they are the ones ? the society of the fire; they will be in there permanently.

(My personal translation, cross checking is recommended.)

The irony is, many faith repressors among the broader family of Abrahamic religion have resorted to worshipping an artificial deity defined by the books with the authority of their religious clergy. Even though they call the deity by the name Elohim / God / Allah, even though they may seem to be the strictest monotheist, they none-the-less worship a deity (&#1615.

On the contrary, some purer sects within Hinduism do focus reverence on one Brahman, and many enlightened Budhdhas do focus reverence on the singular spirit sustaining this universe seeking unity with the same. Perhaps their worship can be comparable to Abrahamic salaat, with different symbolism.

May Allah guide us all to the straight route.