Bismillaah il-Rahmaan il-Raheem

In the Name of Allaah, Most Gracious Most Merciful.Praise be to Allaah, Lord of

the Worlds and peace and blessings be upon the leader of the pious, Muhammad
the Messenger of Allaah, and on all his family and companions.

Salah , It is one of the most important pillars of Islam.It is such an important pillar
of islam that one of the hadiths in saheeh Muslim says that the diff between a
muslim and kafir is negligence of salaah(vol1,ch36,h146).The first thing a person
will be asked to account among all his actions will be salah (abu dawood vol1,
ch300, h863) It is compulsory for every muslim to offer salaah.There is no
excuse for not offering salaah (even for those who are sick).It is mentioned in
saheeh bukhari (vol2,ch19,h218) that a person approached Prophet Muhammed
(pbuh) and said that he was suffering from piles and how he should offer
salah.the prophet said” pray while standing.if u cant do it pray while sitting. if u
cant do it pray while lying by ur sides”.So there is no excuse for not offering
salaah .Even if u r sick,you have to offer salaah.

Many of us offer salaah regularly, but do we really offer salaah in the manner
allah wants us to offer salaah.We offer salaah as though we are doing some
favour upon allah by offering salaah. Whether we offer salaah five times a day or
fifty times a day Allah will neither benefit from it nor will He lose anything if we
don’t offer salaah.It is we who will benefit from it. salaah is not just some sort of
physical exercise (though it has many medical benefits) that we perform five
times a day.It is through salaah that we communicate with Allah, It is through
salaah that we thank Allah, It is through salaah that we ask for Allah’s help and
his guidance.As most of us (non arabs) don’t know Arabic as a language,our
mind keeps on wandering while offering salaah. For e.g. if a student after
attending an examination is offering salaah then durng salaah he starts reviewing
his paper,whether he has written all the questions correctly,whether he has
attempted all the questions etc.The reason for the wandering of our mind is that
our mind is empty and our mind cannot remain empty.therefore it wanders.

So the best way of preventing our mind from wandering is to learn the Arabic
language. So that we are able to understand and ponder upon what is being
recited during the salaah and hence prevent our mind from wandering. But many
people think that it is not possible to learn Arabic . Moreover the Qur’anic Arabic
is far superior than the spoken Arabic. So the best solution is to learn the
translation of those chapters of the Qur’an that we recite during the salaah in the
language that we know best and recall the translation when the verse is being
recited. Most of the muslims know the surah Fatiha. We can recite it at 100 mph.
but have you really pondered upon the way we recite surah fatiha in our salaah.

Just try to read the translation of surah Fatiha in the manner we recite it in the
salaah and u’ll come to know in what a hopeless manner we offer salaah. In
surah Fatiha we r praising Allah and asking his guidance and help, but is it the
way of praising someone or asking for help from anyone.!!!

To gain maximum benefits from the salaah(also cultivate interest in offering

salaah) we should even understand the meaning of what is being recited and
also try to imagine it. For eg when we recite Aauzo billahi minashaitan
nirrajeem(I take refuge in Allah from the shaitan the outcast) we try to feel the
enemity of shaitan and imagine that Allah is giving us protection from it.