Muslim Woman

A simple conventional answer may be that we pray because our forefathers have been praying and told us to pray, this is exactly as we tell our children to pray. Traditionaly we pray because God has asked us to pray. But for many people who are sincerely searching for a more meaningful answer this may not be satisfactory. First of all God has given us freedom of choice for everything including prayers, so we do not have to pray if we do not want to. Usually we donot pray when we are enjoying the good times, but majority do this when some tragedy strikes or when we reach old age that many of us start praying regularly. For example an airplane full of people is going to crash and in this situation every one will be praying for life and survival.This instinct of self-survival is inherent in every living being including humans. But humans find themselves helpless and defenseless against many living beings and natural catastrophes. Therefore prmitive human prayed to various natural objects that threatened or benefited his survival. When human beings developed tools for self-defense and gradually advanced in science they tended to drift away from religion.They found security in science rather than prayer because science gave them control over the forces of nature. Priesthood considered this attitude as an attack on religion itself. This led to a continuous battle of religion with science. History bears ample testimony to this continuous struggle. Thus we see that there seems to be no single reason as to why people pray. Everyone can come up with his or her own answer and feel satisfied. In fact this is what we normally do. But as we mentioned before, the right answer that transcends space, time circumatance and human emotions can only come from God through his book..The Quran.

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Most of the people thinks that we pray because our forefathers have been praying and told us to pray. We pray because God has asked us to pray and therefore we tell our children to pray in a same way. But for many people who are sincerely searching for a more meaningful answer this may not be satisfactory. First of all, God has given us freedom of choice for everything including prayers. So we do not have to pray if we do not want to. In fact in propesperity most of us don't. Only when some personal tragedy strikes or when we reach old age that many of us start praying regularly. To understand this with example; consider a plane full of people about to crash and in this helpless situation where everyone realize that they are going to loose their lives they all start praying for God's mercy, forgiveness, His pleasure and personal salvation in the hereafter. But nevertheless, everyone will be trying his/her best to survive until the very end. This instinct of self-survival is inherent in every living being, including us. The traditional concept of praying has started long ago when humans find themselves helpless and defenseless against  natural catastrophes. They supplicate to various natural objects that threatened or benefited their survival. But once human beings developed tools for self-defense and gradually advanced in science they tended to drift away from religion. They found security in science rather than prayer because science gave them control over the forces of nature. Priesthood considered this attitude as an attack on religion itself. This led to a continuous battle of religion with science. History bears ample testimony to this continuous struggle.

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Praying five times a day is only one part of Salaat. When we finish our prayers in the Masjid, we are not done with Salaat. It is not something to do and finish. It involves every aspect of life, keeping it within the guidelines of the Divine Code twenty four hours a day. And this has to be done within a system under a central authority according to the Quran. This system was originally established by Messenger Muhammad peace be upon him and the Sahaba. Five times a day our prayers are meant to renew and reinforce our commitment to steadfastly enforce the system of Salaat ordered by
Allah Almighty and practically shown to the humankind by the Messenger Muhammad peace be upon him. This renewal boosts our psychological energy to come together and support each other towards the goals of the Quran. Salaat is the mechanism by which the Quran is implemented in mankind. This is how Allah's laws can be engrained within us; this is how the Messenger Muhammad peace be upon him and the Sahaba found it so natural to follow the Quran, and the results they produced within 30 years speak for themselves. Needless to say, our prayers are not producing the same results although we have been praying for more than a thousand years in ever increasing numbers.