(dawn and night) are the two limits of the day (beginning and end). Between this view, however, and this verse of the Coran there is not the slightest connection whatsoever. For if the beginning of fasting was identical with the beginning of the day, his (God's) definition of something that is quite evident and well known to everybody, in such terms, would be like a pains-taking attempt to explain something void of sense. Likewise he has not defined the end of day and the beginning of night in similar terms, because this is generally known among all mankind. God orders that fasting should commence at the rise of dawn; but the end of fasting he does not describe in a similar way, but simply says that it should end at "night," because everybody knows that this means the time when the globe of the sun disappears. Hence it is evident that God, by the words of the first sentence (i.e. eat and drink till you can distinguish a white thread from a black thread at the light of dawn), does not mean the beginning of day.
A further proof of the correctness of our interpretation is the word of God (Sûra ii. 183): " It has been declared as lawful to you during the night of fasting to have intercourse (lit. to speak obscene things) with your wives," &c., to the passage, "Thereupon fast the entire day till the night." Thereby he extends the right of having intercourse with one's wife, and of eating and drinking, over a certain limited time, not over the entire night. Likewise it had been forbidden to Muslims, before this verse had been revealed, to eat and drink after night-prayer (the time when the darkness of night commences). And still people did not reckon their fasting by days and parts of the night, but simply by days (although the time of fasting was much longer than the day).
Now, if people say that God, in this verse (Sûra ii. 183), wanted to teach mankind the beginning of the day, it would necessarily follow that before that moment they were ignorant of the beginning of day and night, which is simply absurd.
Now, if people say the legal day is different from the natural day, this is nothing but a difference in words, and the calling something by a name, which, according to the usage of the language, means something else. And, besides, it must be considered that there is not the slightest mention in the verse of the day and of its beginning. We keep, however, aloof from pertinacious disputation on this subject, and we are willing to agree with our opponents as to the expressions if they will agree with us regarding the subject-matter.
And how could we believe a thing the contrary of which is evident to our senses? For evening-twilight in the west corresponds to morning-dawn in the east; both arise from the same cause, and are of the same nature. If, therefore, the rise of morning-dawn were the beginning of the day, the disappearance of evening-twilight would be its end. And actually some Shiites have been compelled to adopt such a doctrine.
Let us take it for granted that those who do not agree with us
