By Sheikh ABDURAHMAN SULEIMAN ADANGBA
His full name is Fadeelat Sheikh Abdulrahman Sulaiman Adangba. But many simply call him Sheikh Adangba.
He is one of the leading Islamic scholars in Nigeria today. He gets invited from time to time to talk about Islam during Ramadan and beyond.
He is the Chief Imam, Adangba Central Mosque, in Lagos.
Sheikh Adangba, as he is fondly called, was born in Lagos to an Ilorin family, in February ’60. He is a great scholar of Arabic and Islamic studies, having completed his primary and secondary education at Ansarudeen School and College in Kano and Offa respectively. He proceeded to Markaz Agege and graduated with flying colors in 1985. He participated in the Fadeelatu Sheikh (revered scholarship) courses in Al-Azhar University in Cairo in 1990. He also graduated from the same university from the Printing Tech Department same year, while he returned home to serve Markaz Agege, as a Teacher and Director of the Printing Department of Markaz till 1999, before engaging in Interior merchandising with a prominent interior merchant in Lagos. He attended so many capacity development courses at the University of Massachusetts in Boston, USA and at Harvard University in the US 2013 and 2014 respectively. He is an Ambassador of Publicity to HWPL (Heavenly World Propagation of Light) in Seoul South Korea, since 2016. He was the National Missioner of Al-Fatihul Quareeb Islamic Society of Nigeria from 2004 to 2017. He was also the P. A to Sheikh Adam, the Founder and Proprietor of Markaz from 1978 till his death. He is a Marriage Counselor, a preacher of standard, a leader of substance in the Islamic arena and so many more….
A few days back, City People Publisher SEYE KEHINDE spent some quality time with Sheikh Adangba in his house in Lagos during which he spoke about how Muslims should spend the last days of Ramadan.
Below are excerpts of the interview.
We are in the Holy month of Ramadan.
What are your observations about this year’s Ramadan?
It has been a good start, all the way. It has been smooth running, all the way. It is not different from what we are used to, only that in the month of Ramadan when the price of things go skyrocketing they don’t come down. They don’t go crashing.
In this Ramadan, prices are crashing, when it comes to the financial aspect of life, like food stuffs and fuel. The price of fuel has come down and you begin to wonder, what is wrong with our people. They are not bringing down the prices of commodities.
I was shocked when my wife came to tell me that the money I gave her at the beginning of the month of Ramadan is sufficient to take us through the month.
She told me that the money I do give for about 15 days financing is sufficient to take us through 22 day financing. Why? Because the prices of commodies have come down. The rate at which commodies is coming in from rural areas has increased. The price of basket of Tomatoes has come down.
In that wise, you can see that the Ramadan has been good, so far. Except for a lot of deaths that have occured. Maybe because they are closer to us. A lot of ill health has affected a lot of people. What is causing the incessant death of younger people? Yes, it is a trend for death to come, but why is it coming the way it is. That Why is what we don’t know. It is left for the Almighty. So far so good.
Muslims are now in the last 10 days of the Holy mon th of Ramadan. What is expected of them? What are we to look at?
Like we all know, Ramadan is a special month. Ramadan itself is an exercise that gives the body some achievable level of health. Fasting is a lasting solution for many ailments. If you have Cholesterol, it will go down. If you have other ailments, it will go down, because those diseases don’t have what to feed on regularly as they used to feed on and expand in your body. Aside that, Ramadan, spiritually will uplift your sense of humour. When you have a sense of humour, the welfarism of humanity increases. When I give you Peace, the result of giving you your own Peace, to me, is my own security, because I am virtually giving myself the security. You want to protect me. So when I give you your Peace, the result of giving you your Peace, to me, is my own security because you care for me. You want to save me. So, if you do same to me, I want to do same to you. So, in spirituality, our level of welfarism is increasing and as such, we are having good neigbourliness amongst ourselves, no matter what we preach, no matter the religion, no matter the Tribe, no matter whoever, everybody is wining and dining the same way. And there will be ultimate Peace. And that is what we are praying for. When we have Peace, in our society we will have a good society, a formidable society, a working society, that will last longer.
Now, Muslims are clamouring for the last 10 days of the month of Ramadan. In the last 10 days the Holy Prophet Mohammed (SAW) told us that there is a day in the odd days of the last 10 days, that is 21st, 23rd, 25th, 27th and 29th. In those days, we would have a night that we call The Night Of Majesty. We call it Laylatul Quadr. You will be somewhere, where all you do is to Pray, where when you pray you don’t have to stress yourself too much. You don’t need to shout, all you need to do is to recite, pray to him and he will hear it.
In this Night of Majesty, Almighty Allah will descend in his mightiness. All you need to do is to recite the hymn and he will hear you. That night is a night that every Muslim is expected to come and meet their Lord and look out for, either on the 21st, 23rd, 25th, 27th or the 29th.
We calculated the month, the Lunar Way, not the Solar Way. Some think the night that we counted is the accurate night. The night can be on any of these days. It may not be the accurate night with Allah. It may be on any of these days.
It may be on any of the 10 days. It could fall on any of the 10 days. So what all these means is that in the last 10 days, be ready to meet your God.
And in the same last days you are supposed to go into Public Seclusion. We call it Itkaf. It is a state where you go into the Mosque, and do everything acceptable in the Mosque.
There you don’t have to visit your family. You will be alone, calling on the name of God, having prayers, during the day and in the night, for those 10 days, exclusively to seek the favour of God for yourself, friends and family, observing the nawafil.
Today is the 17th so we have only 3 days to go. So on the 20th night to the 29th you should have moved to the Mosque, if you are spending the whole 10 days or you want to take 1 of the days or 3 of the days or 5 of the days or 7 of the days or the whole 10 days. So you will seclude yourself, in the Mosque on 20th night, which leads to the 21st morning. We count Ramadan differently from the way we count other days. We count Ramadan from the night preceding it. If you enter the Mosque from the night of the 20th to start on the 21st you will be there for the total 10 days, extensively calling on God, reciting the Quran, listening to the exigencies of the Quran, listen to sermons. But it has to be in a Central Mosque, where you will not need to go out to observe Jumat prayers. You will observe Jumat prayers in the same Mosque.
You are to do all these hoping that Allah will accept your fasting and prayers as you have requested.
