NIGHTLIGHT

There will be no dark in the sky tonight, yet it could be Laylat al Qadir. It still feels strange to be back in Scotland, spending my Ramadan so close to the Northern Lights. Down at the mosque there is general agreement on reasonable times for fasting, and no-one seems too concerned about making 'isha and tarwih in the bright light of a dusk that will slowly move across the sky to form the dawn. But can there be a night of power if there is no night?

Even my calendar from Islam Central puts a bare four hours between maghrib and fajr, which makes for rather a flurry of food drink sex and prayer at nights, an experience of Ramadan far removed from that of latitudes nearer the Tropic of Capricorn. Yet in the bright light of midnight anyone who looks to the sun and the sky to give order to his spiritual day can see that at the ends of the earth the rules break down.

Here at World's End, the constancy of the light is exaggerated by being filtered through a thick veil of moisture. The watery afternoon light gives few shadows, and the instant of sunset is one moment indistinguishable from others in the slow darkening of the grey skies. Indeed there are those here who think it impossible to be a good muslim without the help of Seiko and Citizen, but I for one would still rather rely on the clockwork of the heavens.

Surely there must have been a smile on the Face of God when the creation of the world involved a slight tilt, blurring the edges of laws that many would prefer to believe can be defined with absolute precision, yet which most muslims understandably accept as willingly as a straight-jacket. A twist that gives us not only the seasons, but a virtuoso demonstration of the voluntary nature of prayer and fasting. For if you don't like the rules just travel far enough in the right direction and they vanish of their own accord.

Yet if I accept that the five pillars are the ideal structure on which to shape my life, what justification can there be for traveling to these places where they are difficult if not impossible to fulfill. If Islam is for all mankind, perhaps in such places one seeks for knowledge - even as far away as China.