Do six days of fasting after Ramadan count like a whole year?

This is not a sum to be taken literally. It means that God rewards these extra fasts far more generously than one would expect. They are kept in the month of Shawwal, the month after Ramadan.

This hadith is often explained like a sum. Thirty days of Ramadan and six more days make thirty-six, and if God rewards every good deed tenfold, as the verse above says, one arrives at roughly the days of a year.

Yet God is not bound by such a calculation. He does not have to multiply by exactly ten. The meaning is a different one. Whoever keeps on fasting voluntarily after Ramadan receives a far greater reward than they themselves would think fitting.

Elsewhere too the Holy Qur’an speaks of God multiplying the reward of a good deed many times over, as richly as He wills. How much He rewards is His decision alone. The numbers are not meant to make us calculate but to show how generous God is.

These six fasts are kept in the month of Shawwal, which follows Ramadan. The festival day itself, with which Ramadan ends, is not a day of fasting. Whoever does not stop at once after Ramadan but fasts voluntarily for a few more days shows that fasting was not just a duty for them, but a nearness to God that they wish to keep.