The word Asr also refers to the name used for one of the five mandatory daily salat (prayers). It is the third prayer performed after Fajr, the morning prayer and Zhur, the noon prayer.

Muslims are encouraged to value this prayer for many reasons; one being that it shows total devotion as it’s time is usually the busiest part of the day, where people are usually in the midst of their day but stop what we are doing to perform Asr salat shows immense devotion and discipline.

Asr literally means “time”. What is time? The dictionary defines the noun time as “the indefinite continued progress of existence and events in the past, present, and future regarded as a whole”. Time indeed is hard to measure or even perceive. It is a complicated matter.

In Islam however, the simple translation for the word Asr is “time”, but the deeper Koranic meaning of Asr is time that is limited or time that will come to an end. Therefore we must use our time wisely. Just as the time of Asr salat comes when the day is declining or is soon to come to an end, we must be quick in giving devotion to God as well as reminding ourselves that time is short.

We should first and foremost give worship to God, and then focus on performing good deeds. It is also to remind and encourage others to do good and to practise patience, as we all know that patience is a virtue. Allah has promised that these actions will allow us to gain His pleasure thereby assisting us to attain success in this world and success too in the hereafter.

In sura Asr, Allah is also asking us to reflect on the passage of time. Allah is telling us that our time is short and limited and if we do not make the most of it we are surely the losers, verily, Allah says, we are in loss.

I don’t think anyone of us wants to end up as losers; just ask the Cup Match teams.

Bermuda, please use time wisely. It is an invaluable commodity. Heed to sura Asr and do what God instructs us to do for timeless and eternal success.

As salaam alaikum (peace be unto you)

• Linda Walia Ming is a member of the Bermuda Hijab Dawah Team, a group of Muslim women who reside in Bermuda and have a goal of educating the community about the religion of Islam