قربانی کا وقت

It is narrated from Bara ibn Azib (may Allah be pleased with him) that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) delivered a sermon on the day of Eid al-Adha and said: "The first of our special tasks on this day is that we offer the Eid prayer before Allah; then we return and offer the sacrifice. Whoever does so has acted correctly according to our way (and his sacrifice is valid); but whoever slaughters before the prayer, his sacrifice is not a sacrifice at all — he has merely slaughtered a goat for meat for his household (it has no more standing than that)."

The aim of sacrifice is not to fill the belly, nor show, nor extravagance, but to create in the believer a striving spirit and character and taqwa — the fear of Allah. As Allah says: "Neither their flesh nor their blood reaches Allah, but what reaches Him is your piety." (Al-Hajj 22:37) In truth, not only sacrifice but all acts of worship — prayer, fasting, zakat, Hajj and the rest — were made obligatory to create and awaken the quality of taqwa and God-fearing in the believers, so that in private and public, everywhere and at all times, they fear Allah alone and spend their lives seeking His pleasure.

The clear commands of the Qur'an and hadith show that sacrifice in Allah's name and in His path is a most important act; to refuse to offer it or to mock it is to reject the Qur'an and Sunnah, and whoever does so should take account of his own faith and Islam. As the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings be upon him) said: "Whoever has the means and yet does not sacrifice, let him not even come near our place of Eid prayer." (Musnad Ahmad and Ibn Majah)

That is, when the whole Muslim community is observing an important symbol of the Sacred Law and a memorial of Ibrahim, the Friend of Allah — how can one to whom Allah has given everything, who can so easily take part in this important act, yet is negligent of it, have the face to celebrate Eid together with all the Muslims?

Although it is permissible to have someone else slaughter the sacrificial animal, the recommended and more meritorious act is for the one offering the sacrifice to slaughter it with his own hand; but one who for some reason cannot do so should at least be present at the time of slaughter, and while slaughtering, or while it is being slaughtered, consciously call to mind the feelings expressed in the words of the sacrificial prayer — namely, that everything we have is for Allah alone and should be offered in His path; taking this as a sign, today we sacrifice an animal in His path, and tomorrow, if the sign comes, we would with these same feelings sacrifice even our own dear lives in His path and thank Him for granting us, by enabling us to shed blood in His way, the honour of martyrdom.

The meaning of this hadith is that offering the sacrifice before the prayer earns no reward of sacrifice; it merely counts as the ordinary meat cooked at home. The proper time of sacrifice begins after the Eid prayer, and one who sacrifices before offering the Eid prayer is not correct, as is clear from the Prophet's words: "Whoever slaughters (the sacrificial animal) before the Eid prayer must slaughter another in its place (for the sacrifice), because his sacrifice, being before its time, was not valid." (Bukhari and Muslim)