Re: Who’s fasting tomorrow?
Peace Little Princess
After coming to the ME … I can now see the moon for myself. So can you … being in Saudi. The calculated visibility curves are generated, yet not being followed - the people are still declaring the start of the Islamic months in general 1 day too early. Sometimes it is right. They are doing it on the basis of moonset after sunset in Makkah and conjunction occurring before the sunset of that day in Makkah. These conditions are never going to be visible even in Makkah. Conjunction needs to occur several hours before sunset in order for the hilal to be seen and the elongation angle to create the hilal requires at least a difference of about 10 minutes between sunset and moonset.
If either of these don’t occur then it should be extended for the 30 days. These days they are not even basing the sighting on the naked eye - but with estimations of what areas will see the hilal with optical aid or not at all which skews the observations against shari’ rules … which require occular sighting.
The general traditional tendency is to delay, if sighting is not possible … Which means that if we are right on the button the preference should be to maximise the 30 days where possible. Instead the calendar system being used is doing the opposite it is stressing early sighting or early announcement - causing an error.
It’s not interpretation either … it is clear cut … As a human observer these are scientifically empirically testable and I can give you an easy way to determine whether it is being done correctly or not.
At the beginning of the month the moon and sun are usually quite close and usually near the horizon, but during the middle the moon is full and is usually higher up in the sky. Astronomical New Moon is NOT the Hilal … Astronomical New Moon or ANM is when conjunction occurs - which is when the whole moon blacks out. It takes several hours up to 17 or so for the hilal to be seen by the naked eye and this depends on the angle the sun make with the moon in the sky as well. That is called elongation. Anyway … you know traditionally everyone knows about the 14th night is the full moon. This is absolutely correct … The largest the moon should ever be is on the 14th night. Reason being that the hilal should offset the centre of the month. The true phase cycle takes about 29.7 days so this splits over sometimes being a 29 day month and other times being a 30 day month.
Half of 29.7 is 14.35 - which is when the moon is at the fullest.
If it’s a 29 day month then each day will be accounting for 29.7/29 = 1.024 days of the phase cycle
If it’s a 30 day month then each day will be accounting for 29.7/30 = 0.99 days of the phase cycle
To find out which day will be the night that accounts for the fullest moon in a 29 day month or in a 30 day month we just divide the above numbers in to 14.35.
14.35/1.024 = 14.01
14.35/0.99 = 14.495
These are both showing that fullest moon will be closer to the night of the 14th.
So just look outside at the night sky and note which night has the fullest moon and that should be the 14th night. This also shows that the night of the 15th must have a moon which is now beginning to wane … So the same size as a hilal but subtracted from the full moon on the opposite side the hilal was seen will result in the shape expected for the night of the 15th.
Going back to the visibility curves - Most of the Muslim world was not in line of sight on the night of 29th of Rajab. But because Rajab itself was started too early it meant in order to correct the calendar they would have to put 31 days in to Rajab. So they called Sha’ban early and hence Mid-Sha’ban was 1 day too early as well.
Remember simple rule - No moon is bigger than on the 14th night.
So whatever night you see the full moon you can check against the calendar and see if it coincides.