What Is An Eid UL Adha?

Eid ul-Fitr al-Rasoul are not the same holiday. While the latter features special pre-occasions activities, the Eid ul-Fitr normally deals with charitable donations. In fact, this holy festival is widely celebrated all over Pakistan with special feasts and charity fundraising events. Throughout the country, people give charities proceeds from their special eid sales and sale activities.

Eid ul-Fitr is the second of two Islamic holidays, Muslim calendar, celebrated during the month of Ramadan. This holy day honouring the willingness of Abraham to sacrifice His son Isaac as an act of worship to God was made possible by God's intervention. Prior to Abraham's offering, God promised Abraham that His son would be sacrificed in lieu of Isaac. When Isaac was born, God sent the dove Noah to save him. Noah flew to the Jewish land and told Abraham that if he did not sacrifice Isaac to God, the son would die because of a disease.

Thus, Abraham offered Isaac his son as a sacrifice so that Ishmael would live. When the Jews went to worship God, they honoured Abraham by offering Him a ram as a sacrifice. The meaning of this act was that God is greater than Isaac since he had offered him as a sacrifice earlier. Every Muslim is taught to honour and praise God whenever they perform eid.

What is important about Eid ul-Fitr is that it is a religious obligation, not only to Muslims but to all other believers. The scholars of Islam, the mubarakfis, always regard it as a blessed day. The followers of Judaism, the Arabs and the Christians also regard it as a blessed day. This is why it is considered as one of the most important feasts in their religion. They believe that it is a time of triumph, celebration and happiness.

Eid ul-Fitr is celebrated differently in different parts of Pakistan. Some of them break the fast for a day while others celebrate it for several days. The amount of food eaten during the festival depends entirely on the locality. In some places, the Muslims offer 'meals' (tickets) to the idolaters so that they can feed for the whole day. In some other places, they throw rice and dates to the idols of deities but in the urban areas, the Muslims sell 'meals' at regular intervals of the day and charge reasonable prices.

Muslims believe that eid adha marks the end of Ramadan and when they go to pray, they offer 'Dhams' or prayers to their gods. They believe that by sacrificing these meals, they will be rewarded by their god. On Eid, all the homes in Pakistan are decorated with flowers and carpets and Muslims make sure they are very clean before going to worship the god. However, for the 'Oriental Muslims', eid adha marks the beginning of fasting and they consume nothing except water and tea for seven days.

The main feature of eid prayer is performing the entire ceremony with utmost sincerity. Muslim men and women wash their hands before putting on the tilak (special prayer clothes). After washing, they tie a turban (a tight head scarf) and proceed to walk towards the place where they will spend the night. Muslim men wear a special 'Bukhri' made of silk and they use eid prayer beads to decorate their hands. In order to perform the bukhari, the leader (usually the mufti) visits each home and offers special eid prayer, in the presence of his imam.

After saying du'a at each home, the leader leads the Muslims to the place where they will spend the night. Then they perform a khumra, a ceremony in which they burn some incense or light a lantern (that is used to keep away the evil). Next, they go to the place where the lord (God) is worshiped and perform the bukhari. When the prayers are over, the people return home and enjoy the festival. This is why, on it, Muslims have been seen participating in local festivals such as shopping, eating, poetry recitation and camel trading. This is what eid ul adha means: the festival of sacrifice.