Title: When is Ramadan? -

SECTION-AThe holy month of Ramadan is just one of the four sacred months in the religion of Islam. Major Calendars in existence are of two kinds; Gregorian and Hijri. Muslims all over the world follow the Hijri Calendar, which is lunar. There has been an issue about how to calculate when the month of Ramadan begins from where an individual is located. We know that people live in different different places. In this book you will find out how to calculate Ramadan from where you are. Regardless of what kind of Muslim grouping you are in, this knowledge is essential for all to grasp. So, When is Ramadan? For years, since 1996, this issue has continuously reared the heads of people and it has finally reached a point where, one year there was not only issues so much with where the moon was seen, how it was seen or whether or not it was even seen. There was also an issue of timing. Now we are talking about when Ramadan is. Why is there so much difference? Part of the reason why there is so much difference about Ramadan is because of the mixed messages that the common Muslims are receiving; 1. The slaves of Allah are being told that it can’t be seen at certain locales. 2. The slaves of Allah are being told, ‘Listen, Islam was revealed in Mecca and Medina, follow Saudi.’ 3. They are being told to follow back home. 4. They are asking just to trust a worthy brother because they themselves are unsure. Now before we can even start to get down to the crux of the matter, we have to mention recording time. No matter where you go on earth, people record time, people write down seconds, minutes, hours, days, dates and important points in history, because they believe it should be preserved. That’s why people record time. Now you have a number of ways that people record time; one is through historical events. You will sometimes read in literature in the reign of King such and such; for example the Hebrew have in the reign of King Josiah, in the reign of King Hezekiah, during the age of king such and such. The Abbasids have it, during the reign of Al-Mustazhir, during the reign of Al-Musta’sim. It’s talking about historical events or the year of the elephant, when the prophet, Muhammad (SAW) was born, that is an actual physical historical event. So these are times where history is important and history connects us to time. The other aspect is the sundial. Sundials can be used for two things; measuring time and also measuring shadows. A sundial is pretty much an object, usually bronze, that is utilized by the person to find out when solar noon is and to measure the days and the months. Before the clocks that we know of now, people had sundials. People had sundials to measure Salah and people had sundials to measure the year. So you will see the Mayan calendar, the Hindu calendar, and you will see that usually they have on a poster or on a leather pouch or on the wall of some of the people who still follow the Aztec calendar, what looks like a wheel or a cylindrical object, that’s a sundial telling you how many years there are and what the leap year is. That’s why people are concerned about the Mayan calendar because the cutoff point of it is 2012, because they are looking at the sundial and how many notches are on it and the last notch is the year 2012. So there are a lot of people making predictions based on the sundial. Seasons: people will make historical events based upon seasons. When the prophet Jesus (Isa AS) was born, around that time it is said that the shepherds watched their flocks night and day.

The only time that this could happen would be in the spring before summer, because in the winter, sheep were brought indoors into stables. So the prophet Isa (AS), was definitely born around springtime which is roughly somewhere between March and June. So it’s about knowing events by seasons, and that is the root of the king that we already described before. People talk about ages before, during the reign of king Henry VII during the reign of king Nebuchadnezzar, during the reign of king David, during the reign of king Solomon, such and such happened, because some people didn’t have calendars during that time, they just simply didn’t have literature, they didn’t have documentations, they did not have calendars and so some people were forced to record things according to the rule of a king. Before this, some people would record things by using the moon, they would ask, ‘How many moons ago were you born’? The response could be, ‘I was born twenty moons ago’ or ‘I was born during this festival’ or ‘I was born in the reign of this king.’ So a young child would say, “Oh! Glory be to God! My father

was born in the reign of king Nebuchadnezzar and I was born in the reign of king Kourosh, that means there is forty to fifty years between myself and my father, if we took that as an example and if it was true. Calendric: Calendric dating is by far the most popular. Calendric dating is to organize a calendar, to actually create a calendar in which you will measure years, so you have a definite fixed time period. People that measure time according to a calendric system, are using a calendar. The Gregorian calendar, the Jewish calendar, the Muslim calendar and the Hindu calendar; these are ways in which people are measuring time and when people measure time in years they want to make dates. Dates are going to give you; the day of the week, the day in the month, the month itself and the year, because people want to fix definite points in time so that history can be passed on to other generations. Now, calendric dating, of all the different types of dating I’ve told you, is the most important. Someone might ask, “What is the big deal about calendric dating? I mean people can find out when kings ruled and things like that, but it doesn’t always give you the year.” So you will find some people that, because they don’t know what year they were born, they can only state that they were born under the reign of a king or the reign of a judge or during a particular season and die not knowing exactly what age they were. So you get different documentation, especially when you are dealing with calendars outside of a specific calendar. A solar calendar has its own issues. When people are conquered, is another way that people will measure time cylindrically because sometimes when a nation is conquered, a people will superimpose a calendar that’s their own, on that particular people. I will give you an example: When British forces came into India, in certain areas in India, they bowled over the Muslims and replaced the Muslim calendar with the Gregorian calendar which is based on Pope Gregory; they just bowled over the Muslims and forced the calendar. Where does the Gregorian calendar start? According to Pope Gregory, the Gregorian calendar is a revamping of the Julian calendar. The base of the Gregorian calendar is the belief that year one is the birth of the prophet Isa (AS) who they believe is a deity; both man and god, possessing two natures. So when you start off the date as Anno Domini (AD), ‘the year of our lord,’ that’s what they mean. Now some Muslims have said, “Ok, let’s put CE instead: Common Era.” That’s precisely what Pope Gregory had hoped and insisted that this is the calendar for everyone and will be. So it doesn’t matter if you put CE

instead of AD as AD could have some polytheistic connotations. Lets put CE.” It’s still that same wretched profligate intercalated kafir calendar, it doesn’t matter what you put. We look at the year. People see years as important. People find out: How old you are and when you were born. For example: I was born on the 24th of Dhul Qa’dah, 1394, that’s going to tell you exactly how old I am because I have given you information in which you can find out; the day of the week, the day of the month, the month, and the year. What date is it today? Once you find out the date for today, then you can accurately examine. So the year is also important because people produce yearly, annual books that are called Yearbooks, Diaries and Annuals for you to write in. So, then you utilize these books. For every year it is to record events that have happened in that year. In reality there are only two types of calendars in use among humans. There is the solar calendar and the lunar calendar. The lunar calendar is older than the solar calendar. The older the civilization you get as you go further back, you find that there are lunar calendars in all of the records. Solar calendars came after lunar calendars. Solar Calendars are measuring time basically by the length of time it takes the earth to make one revolution around the sun. There are three elements to the solar year. So 365 days per year and that’s the year it is generally based on unless there is a leap year, in which it’s 366 days, twelve months = 366 days but sometimes it might be 10 months, sometimes 7 months, sometimes 9 months, it depends; Why? Let’s look at the history. The present calendar that people are using is called the Gregorian calendar, as I said, based on Pope Gregory. Where did the Gregorian calendar come from? The Gregorian calendar is a renewal and a correction of the Julian calendar, the Julian calendar is a baseline calendar of the Roman calendar. Where did the Roman calendar come from because we have got to come up to speed? It came from the calendar of Romulus. Romulus was an old Roman calendric system that was pretty much lunar, but they decided to bring solar aspects in to it. Now originally it was only 7 months, then they began adding more months to it. Augustus was the first Roman Emperor or ruler. His name was added to it, hence August. Julius Caesar the dictator, was eventually added to it as a deity, but they began moving the months around as they gained more months, because previously before in the calendar of Romulus and the Roman calendar they had too many days and didn’t know what to do with them. So they used to have a period called inter-calends where people would not write down dates. So you would have a month and then between some months you would have what is called inter-calends where there were no dates and people could do what they wanted during inter-calends. So people would get murdered, people would commit sexual acts or whatever else, and would not be prosecuted during inter-calends because technically inter-calends don’t represent a date. Now, leap years worked in which Romans and other people noticed a problem and said, “We have got too many days and our calendars are going to come out as 370 days or 390 days, we have got to do something about this.” So they began to alter and work on their calendar which produced the Julian calendar’s refinements but finally Pope Gregory, by his taking over because he was the monarch of the Roman right of Catholicism or the head, he instituted a number of reforms and by instituting his reforms into a twelve month calendar that was 365 days and 366 days in a leap year, he also moved the Christian festivals. This created divisions between the western churches and the eastern churches. So when it’s Easter time here, in this country the United Kingdom, go down to the

Greek Orthodox Church and ask, “What are you guys doing for Easter? They will look at you very sternly and say, “It is not Easter yet.” This is because they are using either a refined Julian calendar or an older calendar. The Coptics use an older calendar. The Indian orthodox that were about a 1700 year old church, don’t use the Gregorian calendar. However, the Gregorian calendar is used and was popularized more importantly by the protestant nations that later fell away and became secular nations. Everywhere the United States go, they superimpose that calendar, and sometimes it will be alongside other calendars. So how you measure time is important because it is how you see the world and how you judge by things. For example: The Gregorian calendar, even though it was devised and eventually broken down and renewed and reformed by Pope Gregory, it still has its Roman roots where it is named after different gods. So it still has that idolatrous past to it. As for lunar calendars that came earlier, I will mention them secondly because the first and usually the best of something is left until last, like the prophet Muhammad (SAW) is the last prophet (AS) and such. How do Muslims relate to this? The lunar calendar is measuring the moon’s cycle around the earth. I have already said that the earth’s cycle around the sun is 365 days or 366 days, but the lunar cycle is 355 days or 354 days. Now, 355 fits a full year in which we have one more full moon and one more 30 day month instead of a 29 day, and a hollow, if you have one less, you have one more 29 day. For example: The date today is Friday (Yaumul-Jummah), 14th day of the month of rajab, in the year 1432 of the Hijri Calendar. Now why is this so, when the Gregorian calendar is so different? How did we arrive at this date? Here is where it all began; the Hijri calendar begins from the date that the prophet Muhammad (SAW) left from Mecca to Medina. The calendar was successfully moved back from being lunar-solar to lunar, during the governance of Umar-bin-Khattab (RA). The starting point of the calendar was supposed to be the 10th day of the first month, Mu arram, and the first year after the Hijrah (migration). Thisḥ being written and rendered into English as ‘A.H.’ (After Hijrah). This is where the Muslims began measuring time. So when you see 1432 that means: 1432 years since the prophet Muhammad (SAW) left from Mecca to Medina. Now, previously we have been lunar-solar, what does that mean? Lunar-solar is where people practice what is called intercalation or harmonizing. Sometimes people wanted the lunar calendar to match with the seasons of the year that were solar; spring, summer, winter and fall. So because the lunar calendar moves back 11 days every year, they decided to add extra days to the lunar calendar. The prophet (SAW) forbade this practice when The Quran was revealed, which we will be looking at shortly, but Umar (RA) completed the process by dropping the extra days and then finishing the refinement of the calendar which falls in line with the hadith, “You must follow my Sunnah and the Sunnah of the rightly guided successors after me.” (Sahih-Al-Muslim). So this hadith was fulfilled because we are following Umar RA’s example. What has Allah said about recording years? How are we supposed to record time? What Allah says about how we are to record time is the most important. Allah says, “They ask you about the crescent moons, say, they are to be points of measurement for the people and for Hajj.” (Surat Al-Baqarah, the 2nd Surah, ayat 189). So as Muslims we measure time as lunar. Allah says further, “He is the one who made the sun a shining torch and made the moon a light and gave it stages so that you might know the number of years and the counting of time, Allah only created all of this in truth so that He

might make His signs clear to the people that know. (Surah Yunus, ayat 5). So Allah tells us the purpose of why He put the moon there. You are to use the moon for what? Measuring time and years so you know the measurement and when it is Hajj. But what is the sun there for? The sun is a shining torch to light your day so you can move around and do the things that you are supposed to do in the day, but the moon was put there to go through the different stages and you would know the years by watching the moon going from a crescent as the light illuminates on to it. The illumination increases or decreases, then it increases, then it has no illumination on it, that’s the whole purpose why Allah put it there. There are but 12 months with Allah, no intercalation and nothing like it, only 12 months. “The number of months in the sight of Allah is 12 as ordained from the day He created the skies and the earth, and 4 of them are sacred, this is the upright religion.” (Surah-At-Tauba, the 9th Surah, Ayah 36). That’s the basis of everything. It’s not 13 months, not 19 months like the Baha'is say. It’s 12 months and 4 of them are sacred, namely; Muharram, Rajab, Dhul-Qa’dah and Dhul-Hijjah. The sanctity that has been attached to these four months is from two perspectives. Firstly, fighting and battles were prohibited in these months. Secondly, the rewards for worshiping Allah are increased. The first feature of war being prohibited has been abrogated according to the majority of the scholars, whilst the latter still remains. (Ibn Rajab al-Hanbali, Lata’if al-ma’arif fi ma limausim al-Am min al-watha’if and Ma’arif al-Qur’an, 4/372). The months of the Hijri Calendar Mu arram, afar, Rabi-al awwal, Rabi-at-Thani, Jumaadul-ḥ ṢUlaa, Jumaadul-Ukhra, Rajab, Sha‘ban, Rama an, Shawwal, Dhul-Qa’dah, Dhul-ḍ

ijjah, all of these are the 12 months. So when you are looking at a calendar and Ḥyou are trying to follow the date and you see for example, if you are in the month of Rajab right now, then on the 14th of Rajab, that means, you only have another 15 or 16 days before Sha‘ban, so really you are a month and another 15 or 16 days away from Ramadan. So before the Ramadan moon wars begin, you need to be clear where you are. Beginning the year right: how do we do this? Mahaq is very important. There is a difference between Mahaq and Hilal in the Arabic language. Mahaq is the 28th day of the month where there is no illumination at all on the moon. This is what is called new moon or the birth of the new moon. The Hilal is the crescent moon. We as Muslims are not interested in the Mahaq other than to find out when the 28th is, so we know when the 29th is, because we are looking for The Hilal. The Hilal is the appearance of the crescent moon, after illumination begins to appear on the moon and the Hilal occurs on the 29th day when the moon starts to regain illumination. Allah has already said, “They ask you about the crescent moons.” They are not asking about the Mahaq. Why? Because that’s when the illumination isn’t on the moon. Allah is telling you to look for what is happening to the moon not what it is doing but what is happening to the moon from the light that’s being cast on it. That is how you measure your days. Some Muslims may ask, “Do we need this calendar? Is it just a throwback? The Jews have it but they hardly use it, except for sacrificial or ceremonial reasons. Why do we need to use it? What is the big deal? Why can’t we just blend it? The Jews blended their calendar, it’s lunar-solar. They have made their calendar the same throughout the year. Why are the Muslims being so stubborn? There are 1.5 billion of them. Why don’t you just enter into the rest of the world with everyone else and just have a normal calendar?” There are some reasons why. The Hijri calendar is absolutely necessary in its use to

establish; 1.Divorce for women who have no monthly cycle. In The Quran, Allah says that when the women are divorced or they have had husbands that have died and they have no monthly cycles, then Allah says that you measure months. Now we have already found out the context of what Allah means by month, that it’s a lunar one. So that means we need to know what they are, for when an old woman comes and says, “My husband has pronounced divorce/I have decided to get divorced and he has granted it/the court granted it but I don’t have a monthly cycle.” And the reply to her would be, “Ok sister that’s going to be three lunar months.” After the third month, the woman is clean, pure, free and single. 2.Contracts that have an ending: For example if someone says, “Well, this contract last for 3 months, whose month, whose 3 months? Pope Gregory’s 3 months or Allah’s 3 months or Julian’s 3 months or Nebuchadnezzar’s 3 months or Gilgamesh’s 3 months, whose three months? or the Baha’i’s 3 months which is only 19 days x 3 because each Baha’i month is 19 days, whose 3 months? But sometimes we assume January, February, March, no, that’s not it, there’s a basis to all of this. 3.Marriage: Dates are establish for marriage. We are going to get married on this date and the marriage must take place on this date or ‘When did you get married?’ When we start looking at divorce, ‘Hold on, when did you get married?’ –“I got married on this day.” To establish sometimes the due date of children. “When did you get married?”- ‘I got married on this date.’ – “And when did you conceive?”-‘I believe it was on this date.’ That’s impossible because your monthly cycle is during this time and this happened on this time so it couldn’t possibly be and this is how Ali (RA) used to often establish adultery cases. One day he was given a rule in his court and an issue came up regarding the rights of the husband and the rights of the wife and it just happened to be that she, the wife, mentioned some point about her cycle and all of a sudden it became an adultery case. It became an adultery case because of him knowing the months and the break down of everything. 4. The Eids: Days of the week, months of the year and the very years themselves. How do we find out when Eid is? We need to know when Eid is. Oh we’ll find out when the Saudis are doing it but that’s not going to tell you when Eid is where you at because if you take that position then that means you have to pray Zohr when you see the Saudis making the Adhan for Zohr, in which case it’s Qaza here for you, because you haven’t prayed it as they are hours ahead. We know that we can’t do that.

SECTION-BHarmonizing the calendar: Some people have called for harmonizing the Muslim calendar and their position is that they’ve said, “Well the Jews have done it and the Americans have done it, it can’t be that hard, why don’t we just harmonize the calendar and just have a fixed Ramadan? So we always know that Ramadan is coming in December.” It’s during the easiest point of the year; gets light late, gets dark quick, can you imagine how easy that fast would be? Perpetual December Ramadans. The nation of Islam does December fasting, why not us? What is the history of harmonizing calendars? The first calendar harmonizing occurred when the children of Israel were captured by the Babylonians who were harmonizing their calendar and were made to harmonize their own. Since that time the children of Israel have made their calendar, now, if

memory serves me correct, they are counting the year 5758 because they start their calendar from where they believe the process of creation ended, it’s 5758 years since the creation was ended. So when Allah finished the whole creation it was 5758 years ago, but it’s a lunar-solar calendar. So Hanukkah always falls on the same day. In the United States, outside of the white house where the president lives, you’ll see the Christmas tree and you’ll see the Hanukkah bush and then increasingly now you’re seeing a Ramadan tree because there are some Muslims who are now harmonizing the calendar and saying, “Well, we have simply got to enter into the 21st century.” The call for Global Unity: we need a global calendar. A Muslim brother once mentioned to another that, “Well brother if we had a Khalifa then we would be sorted because then we would just have one Ramadan for everyone.” The other Muslim replied sarcastically, “You’re absolutely right, the world would be folded in half, there would be no more time zones, there would be no point would there? Because everyone would have the same day, it would be Tuesday four o’clock here, it would be Tuesday four o’clock in Karachi, Tuesday four o’clock in Cairo because time as we know it will end once the Khalifa comes.” But we need to establish this. How are some people trying to harmonize the calendar? 1. By lunar-solar combination, which we already discussed. 2. By Calculating: Now of those that have delved into this area of calculating, there were Brothers who were living in the west coast of the United States, where the brothers sited the moon and the Muslims used to have battles with the local leadership, because they said, “We're going to calculate it and look for it mathematically.” They had all the logarithms and there was a blackboard full of equations and everything, and then in 1996 the Hilal appeared over the Islamic Centre of North America headquarters and they said, “No that is an optical illusion, that's a distortion of the actual sun's rays and you're not seeing the Hilal.” But the brothers were seeing the Hilal! Think about what I've just mentioned. You need to know what the days are, you need to know when the Eids are, you need to know. Science has advanced so far and you can't see it anyway, you can't see the moon in this country, we're going to come to that point later. 3. Global sightings: Some people have said that no matter where the moon appears… it’s a ‘Global sighting.’ Muslim brothers on the 29th of Shaban, say “We are fasting tomorrow it's been seen in Java… “ - How would you know it's been seen in Java? You don't live in Java, it's a ‘global sighting.’ It was seen in Melbourne, the Muslim brothers at the beach saw it in Melbourne; it was seen in Okinawa in Japan. I know Japan has Muslims, but what does that have to do with us in the UK? This was the issue. Now, the lunar-solar combination tampers with the calendar. With regards to calculating, what do the scholars say? When the Muslims ruled Sicily for several hundred years. They built Florence and they built other areas in Sicily and Italy. Maliki’s in most parts. Imam Al-Maziri’s last name is As-siklli (the Sicilian). If you go in some of the old churches and you rub out the frescoes you can see the Ayat from The Quran because those were Masjids. Imam Al-Maziri said, "Now we must discuss the hadith, ‘Do not fast until you see the the Hilal. Do not break fast until you see the Hilal. And if the clouds should obscure it from you, then calculate.’ The vast majority of the scholars understand it, that you should complete 30 days, just as is specified in another hadith. They say it is not permissible to use the calculations of Astronomers as the people, if made responsible for that, it would not be easy for them as only a selected few have this knowledge; but the revealed law was only so that the vast

majority of people might know the affair.” (Sahih Muslim bi-sharhi-Nawawi, volume 7 page 188 – 189). Now, Imam Al-Maziri is saying something very important here. ‘…do not fast until you see the Hilal.” Muhammad (SAW), didn’t say that, ‘don't fast until you heard about the birth of the new moon,’ or ‘don't fast until we’ve calculated it for you,’ or ‘don't fast until you've heard the announcement.’ For example: A new arriver in the city attends a meeting, expecting to go out and sight the moon to establish what day Ramadan will be. At the meeting, a sighting is not even performed. A newcomer will become confused and end up sighting the moon alone. Sadly, some brothers have insisted on calculation and have quoted this, hadith and the last part; “And if the clouds should obscure it from you, then calculate.” The vast majority of the scholars of Fiqh understand it that you should complete the 30 days. That's what they understand, ‘calculate’ to mean. Ahmad ibn Hanbal understands that, If the sky is covered over with clouds because of massive smoke or strange weather conditions that are outside of the norm, then you on the 29th of Shaban, would intend to fast for Ramadan. If you get up and you find out that it's Ramadan, then Alhamdulillah! If it's not, then you've still protected yourself and safeguarded yourself. That is the understanding of Imam Ahmad, which was taken from Mu’awiyyah, A’isha and Ibn Umar. The vast majority would say that it means 30 and Imam Ahmad would say when there are strange weather conditions, then you fast that day because it’s a day of doubt (yaum-us-Shak), that's the only 2 positions there are. Then Imam Ahmad rightly said, “They say it's not permissible to use the calculations of Astronomers as the people, if made responsible for that, it would not be easy for them.” Why? He says, “Because the revealed law was only so that the vast majority of the people might know the affair.” That's you and I, the people on the street. We can't know what the observatories have all seen. We don't know about all of the information about Azimuth and that's drag from the moons white when it was hit with a certain Ray of the sun. Muslims, if you look in the hadith literature, in Sahih ul-Jami, when a Bedouin comes to the prophet (SAW) and says that he has seen the moon. They established that the Bedouin is a Muslim and they started fasting. That's the end of it. There wasn't a debate between Imams, “Ok, that's it! I'm sick of you guys.” What happened here? what happened in 2002? Originally everyone was supposed to have agreed. They had their 2nd imams meeting; a massive explosion of rage occured and they said, “That's it!” Some of the Masjids broke off and one said, “Ok, we're doing it on Wednesday.” The other said, “No! we're doing it on Thursday.” You even had a Saturday. This occurred all because of the fact that they weren't sighting the moon. How long does it take to sight the moon? All you need is 20 minutes, every 30 days, that's all you need to establish certainty. If You look and don't see it, the matter is finished, and if you look and see it, the matter is finished. Either way you have certainty. So why fight? Global sighting: I have already discussed this issue. Some have said that, “The school of Imam Ahmad (the Hanbali School of thought) advocate global sighting.” Do they? Global sighting! Some people might say, “I thought this was the dominant position of the Hanbali Mazhab (school of thought), isn't global sighting from the Mazhab.” Some people will say, “We are following the position of the Hanbali Mazhab, we are sighting globally.” Really? Lets look at the authoritative books to be sure how we are going to answer this question. Al-Qadi Abu-Ya’la, the elder, (the Imam, the fortunate father) said,”When the people of a land have seen the

crescent moon and the people of another land did not see it, it is compulsory for those who did not see it to abide by the rule of the one who did see it. This is whether or not the 2 lands are close together or far apart. (Al-Jami-us-Saghir, page 85 – 86). Now on the outset, someone reading this statement as it was would say, “Oh that appears to advocate global sighting. Imam Mahfuz Al-Kalwadhani, was the Sheikh of Imam Abdul-Qadir Al-Jilani and Imam Mahfuz, was called “the Shariah” because he was one of the only 2 people in the history who was able to give Fatwa in all 4 Mazhabs. Imam Mahfuz Al-Kalwadhani said, “When the people of a land sight the crescent moon, then it is necessary for the people of all the lands to sight the moon.” (Al-Hidayah, volume 1 page 95 – 96). Imam Muwaffaq ud-Din Ibn Qudamah, (who was one of the successors of Imam Abdul-Qadir Al Jilani), says, "And when the crescent moon has been sighted by the people of a land, it is necessary that all the people of the lands fast. This is the statement of Al-Laith ibn Sa’d and some of the Shafi’i scholars. One of them said, ‘If there is a distance between two lands, a near distance and the horizons do not differ, like in the case of Baghdad, al-Basrah, it is necessary for both communities to fast at the sighting of the crescent in either place….’" What it means is, if you have 2 cities in the same country, for example: Baghdad says, “We didn't see it,”But Al-basara says, “We saw it,” it is incumbent on Baghdad, to fast also. Imam Muwaffaq ud-Din continues on by saying, "…but if there is a far distance between the 2 lands, like Iraq, Hijaz, and Sham, then for every place, is their own sighting.” It was narrated from Ikrimah that he said, ‘Every land has a sighting. This is the Mazhab of Al-Qasim, Salim and Ishaq according to what was related by Kuraib.’”…Kuraib has said, “I came to Sham and the crescent moon of Ramadan appeared to me and I was in Sham. We had seen the crescent moon, the night of Jumu’ah, then I went to Medina at the end of the month. Ibn ‘Abbas asked me, then mentioned the crescent moon.” Ibn Abbas then said to Kuraib, “When did you see the crescent moon?” Kuraib replied, “We saw it on Friday night.” Ibn Abbas then said, “You saw it on Friday night?” Kuraib replied, “Yes. And the people saw it and fasted as well as Mu’awiyah.” Then Ibn Abbas said, “But, we saw it on Saturday night, so we fasted until we completed 30 days, but we saw it.” Kuraib then said, “Was the sighting of Mu’awiyah and his fasting not sufficient?” Ibn Abbas replied, “No. Likewise this is what the messenger of Allah, SAW, ordered us.” (Collected by at-Tirmidhi and he said that this hadith is authentic and it has been related by Imam Muslim as well – Al-Mughni,Volume 3 page 10 – 12). Now this should be telling you something. Notice that in the actual time of a Khalifa, Mu’awiyah is there, he is the Khalifa. So this shows you that, even in the presence of a Khalifa, there's still going to be differences in the dates. One group of people are fasting on this day and the other on another day, and they are both fine, and the difference of opinion that resulted, had to do with authentic sighting. So the idea that there has got to be this global sighting is not the position of the hanbali scholars. Further, Imam Majd-ud-Din Ibn Taymiyyah, says, ”The sighting of the moon in one of the lands is sufficient for all of them.” (Al-Muharrar fil-Fiqh, volume 1, page 227-228). Now that should start to tell you what he is meaning by all of the lands, and all of the men because of what Imam Muwaffaq ud-Din has just explained. Imam Shams ud-Din Az-Zarkashi, the Egyptian, said, "The third narration from Imam Ahmad is that the people follow the Imam in their fasting and breaking their fast." (Sharh uz-Zarkashi, Volume 2 pages 559 – 560). So, this is another thing that what some of these Hanbali

Imams are invoking in saying that, if the people of the land have seen the moon, then the rest of the people are obliged to do so, they are also talking about the khalifa because Mu’awiyah was the Khalifa. And the other Khalifas, if they say, “In this land where I am, this is when Ramadan is,” that carries down to all the other lands, but it has to do with saying by the Imam, the Imam was the Khalifa (The Scholar) not any local Imam. So the scholars are the people that are in charge of telling you, “This is when Ramadan is,” and it carries over to everyone else. Imam Badr ud-Din Asbaa Salaar al-Ba’ii said, "The sighting of the moon, in one land is for all the people." (At-Tashil fil-Fiqh, page 57 – 58). Imam Ibn al-Liham (who is a student of Imam Ibn Rajab Al-Hanbali) says, "The horizons differ according to the consensus of the people with knowledge on the matter. If they had agreed, than the fast becomes compulsory and if not, then it is not. This is the most authentic position of the Shafi’i scholars and it is a statement in the Mazhab of Imam Ahmad.” (Al-Ikhtiyarat ul-Fiqhiyyah min Fatawa Sheikh ul-Islam Ibn Taymiyyah, Page 105 – 106). So we can see then from here that, there is consensus of the people of knowledge, that horizons differ. So you can’t make one and say that Ramadan has to be all on this day. Imam Burhan ud-Din Ibn Muflih, (the descendent of Imam Shams ud-Din Ibn Muflih) says, "When the people of a land have seen the crescent, then it becomes compulsory for all the people to fast as the statement is general due to the fact that the month of Ramadan lies between two crescent moons." (Al-Mubdi’ Sharh ul’Muqni, volume 3, page 7-8). So, what he's saying is when you see that moon, the people of that land and all the people there are obliged to fast in that month of Ramadan because we only do this once when we consider taking the Khalifa’s position or the Imams position or the scholars who have given a judgement in a jurisdiction. We only do that on Ramadan because of the necessity of fasting in Ramadan and getting it right. Imam Musa al-Hajjawi (who was Marjah of his time) said, "When the people of a land have seen the crescent moon, it is compulsory that all of them fast." (Zad ul-Mustaqni’ Page 40 – 41). Imam Mar’ii ibn Yusuf al-Karmi (another Marjah) says, "It is compulsory to fast Ramadan by the sighting of the crescent moon which is binding on all the people." (Dalil ut-Talib Li-Nail il-Matalib, Page 134 – 135). Imam Mansur al-Buhuti, (Another Marjah) said, "When the moon has been seen - meaning that it has been established by sighting and seeing it - in a land, it is compulsory for all the people to fast, this is based upon the statement of prophet Muhammad (SAW); ‘Fast when you see it. Break fast when you see it.’ This is speech for the Ummah in totality. If a group saw the moon in one land, then they travel to a far away land and the crescent moon was not seen at the end of the month, then they must break their fast." (Ar-Rawd ul-Murbi, Page 187 – 188). What that means is you have a group of people that have seen it in their land, they have traveled. Now they can't do 31 days, they've got to complete from when they started, which means that the people that saw it in their land are correct and the other people that also saw it in their land are correct as well. They can stop them and say, “We've seen the moon in our land, you have to break yours,” and those who are there, they can't say, “Well we haven't seen it, so you must break yours.” So there is going to be variation in the Ummah and no one size fits all! The Moroccans are going to see it, sometimes where the people of England won't see it. Imam Ibn Qa’id an-Najdi says, "When the moon has been seen - meaning that it is established by sighting and seeing it - in a land, it is compulsory for all the people to fast. This is based upon the statement of His

SAW, ‘Fast when you see it. Break fast when you see it.’ This is speech for the Ummah in totality. If a group saw the moon in one land, then they travel to a faraway land and the crescent moon was not seen at the end of the month, then they must break their fast." (Hidayat ur-Raghib, Page 243 – 244). You start to see this uniformity, it's consistent. it wouldn't matter if we called it Shafi’is. Imam Abdur-Rahman al-Ba’ii (Another Marjah) said, "So when the crescent moon of Ramadan is established in one land, it is necessary for all the people to fast. If we had said that there were different horizons for different places, and that for every land, is a sighting with the rising and the setting of the sun, this would have led to difficulty in repeating the process of sighting with the different crescents in places; but this was done in the year but one time." (Bulugh ul-Qasid Hulla al-Maqasid, Page 129 – 130). What the Imam is talking about there is, Ramadan is the only time where the Ullama the Abdal or the Judges would impose and say, “We have seen it and this is what is to be patterned after everyone else.” We don't do it for Rabi’al Awwal, we don't do it for any other times of the year because Allah has commanded this, it is a severe command from Allah that it must be done whoever among you witnesses the month of Ramadan must fast. Imam Mustafa as-Suyuti ar-Ruhaibani and Imam Hasan ash-Shatti both say, "When the crescent moon of Ramadan is sighted by one people in a land, it is therefore binding on all other people and the ruling for the one we did not see it is like the one who saw it due to a direct statement of Imam Ahmad in his quoting the hadith, ‘Fast by sighting it.’ This is direct speech to the whole Ummah as the month of Ramadan is between two crescent moons….” It's been established today, that this is the case just as in other judgments, like settling a debt, the occurrence of Talaq (Divorce), the freeing of slaves and so forth. The same ruling applies for fasting when the moon has been sighted. If we speak of the different horizons, then the matter is judged according to that. Sheikh Taqi ud-Din Ibn Taymiyyah, has said, "There are different horizons according to the difference between the people of knowledge. We only speak of differing horizons and that every land in and of itself possesses its own sunrise and sunset; if we were to declare that every single land had to follow each sighting without exception, this would have caused great difficulty. However, the crescent moon for Ramadan occurs only once in the year, so this is what is done." (Matalib Uwl in-Nuha fi-Sharh Ghayat al-Muntaha, Volume 2, page 172 – 175). Know what these 2 Imams are showing us is this: if you say that everyone has to have their own sighting without exception, then you are going to create difficulty. Why? Because some places might not see it and they are near to other places. The Moroccans, they see it and with cloud cover, we are in the same time zone, we don't see it so what do we do? Bahrain sees it but Kuwait doesn't, through cloud cover so what do they do? So you can't impose a strict principle for each and every single country because some countries when they are near, they are allowed to follow the countries that are near to them, meaning they share the same horizon. So Morocco with us in the UK, the sunrise and sunset is the same, they share the same horizon.

SECTION-CHarmonizing advocates abandonment of the lunar calendar: Whether we say it is a global sighting it is calculated, harmonizing it advocates abandonment of the lunar calendar. Allah told us that the lunar calendar has been revealed to us. Allah has said about harmonizing the calendar he said very clearly, “Indeed the intercalation of months is only an addition to unbelief. The unbelievers are surely led astray due to this and they declare a holy month lawful one year and declare it holy the next year in order to adjust the number of months that Allah has declared sacred and they make the sacred months permitted. Their evil deeds have been made fair-seeming to them and Allah does not guide and unbelieving people.” (Quran: Surah ut-Tawbah, ayah 37). This is what Allah says about and people who tamper with the calendar that He has revealed, Allah revealed a 12 month calendar, 4 of the months are holy, do this, use my calendar People reject, arguing that their mathematicians have clearly said. Such and such is clearly spoken but these are not the people who can give Global Fatawa! Common doubts get raised. We can see that there are a number of common doubts as follows: 1.advances in science, 2.the excuse, ‘we can not see the moon’ 3. the moon cannot be seen in some places, 4. calculation, 5. Muslim unity, 6. Saudi and "back home" or the back-homian syndrome, and 7. the new moon/crescent moon. Now, let's look at these, one by one; Advances in science- they say, “Well listen we know today more than what they knew back then. They didn't have the knowledge that we did back then.”Really? do you know that they were 70 hospitals in Baghdad alone? There weren’t even 70 hospitals in London? Imam Ibn Al-Jawzi and Imam Muwaffaq ud-Din ibn Quadamah, had their own observatory; and if you look at the measurement that Imam Ibn Al-Jawzi made between the earth and the sun, it's almost exactly the measurement that we have of 93 million miles. The weight of the earth he said is 6 Sextillian tons is only a couple of points on the end which is 24 decimal points out different to what people are saying it is now, the weight of the earth. How many earths it takes to make one sun is only one decimal point different to what they have now, so what's changed? Nothing! Muslims had repeat action rifles in 1250 A.D. They look like Winchesters if you look at the museums. So what's changed? In 859 A.D. Muslims already had telescopes and people out here discovered the joys of soap and talcum powder. What did they have that we don't have? Nothing! There is a lot of gadgetry, but the information is the same. We cannot see the moon: People will tell you US, UK, Canada, you can't see the moon. A question arises: Is it true that the moon cannot be seen at all in some locations? No. this is incorrect. We've already established that the moon can be seen, the Hilal. can be witnessed. There is nothing more beautiful than looking at how Allah’s revealed law and how simple it is, because the vast majority of Islam is been revealed for the layman's use. The prophet Muhammad SAW, said in a hadith in Sahih ul-Jami, that “We are an Ummah that is illiterate.” So we do not calculate. The vast majority of the people of this Ummah are not scholars, they are not Astronomers, they are not solicitors, lawyers, they don't belong to those categories of people. The most of the people in this Ummah are laity. So the religion is a religion that was revealed to the laity. Calculation: You are in a situation as I said the center of North America was proven wrong decisively in 1996, the crescent moon with orange horns appears over an organization, the building the headquarters of their place. How much clearer does it need to be? It happened. Even here in the

UK, they have said, “There is no way you can see the moon of Dhul’Hijjah, because of its thinness,” However, people from all 4 Mazhabs have seen it! Why are we as laymen being put in this position, when it is supposed to be the people that are in the leadership positions that are supposed to be in charge of this?Muslim unity: They will say, “Well listen, we need to do this type of stuff because it will improve Muslim unity.” Has it? The entire time I've seen this whole system, I've seen families that have actually don't even want to speak to each other because they feel so ashamed of finding out when somebody started fasting. Uncles that don't speak to people because they don't want to talk about different Eids. The uncle is going to the Masjid on Wednesday and his wife and their kids are going on Thursday. And so there is the key is that think it's Eid and we respect it. were getting presents but as they get older they are thinking, why is it the western people with a gregorian calendar know, thye’ve got a lunar-solar calendar but they have got their month storted and we are still the odd ones out. Why? and we think we are bringing about about unity by doing this we will bring about more unity, that has created more Fitnah. Saudi and "back home issues:" – The idea that, That's where Islam came from, Saudi Arabia, so the Quran was sent down there and that's what we do, this is incorrect understanding for a number of reasons. Because, First of all, the government of that country and the current Cult that is running it, Our Ullama has said that called is not even Muslim so you can't an take witness from people who the Marajih and scholars have classed as Cultists. Let alone as place that’s far from you. Back-homian Issues: If back home, people have started, then that's got nothing to do with here where you are, as every land has its sighting. We have to follow what the companions have given us. The new moon/crescent moon: Some people will say, “You can't sight the crescent moon because the new moon is only so many hours old.” We have to be concerned about one thing. The new moon is where the moon has no illumination on it, wonderful! Now, we need to look for the crescent moon the day after that because that is when the illumination is going to start to occur on the moon, we're going to be able to start to see light. I've seen the moon, even very thin, I've seen moons that are so thin than they that look like a thumbnail; but again it's not impossible, basic principles to learn!

SECTION-DWhere the horizon is covered by clouds and we don't know if the moon is there, then what? So in a scenario, where wee have looked for the moon, and it is the 29th of Shaban, but we do not know if the moon is there or not, now what do we do? Well, Sheikh ul-Islam Mansur al-Buyuti says, "The issue of the day of doubt is not one to be fasted in, as this has been forbidden. The only way someone would be allowed to do so, would be if on Sunset of the 29th of Shaban, the sky was overcast due to massive smoke (1 of the 6 signs that took place for example), eclipse or interval where it was impossible to sight under normal circumstances. Then someone would fast on Sunset on the 29th of Shaban, intending it as Ramadan. Thus if one wakes up on the 29th of Shaban after sunset, the moon is sighted, then he would fast. But if it was not sighted, then this would depend. If the sky was clear, the crescent was not sighted, on the sunset of the 29th of Shaban, he would not intend fasting as it is the 30th of Shaban. If the

moon was obscure due to heavy clouding, eclipse, massive smoke or the like, then that person would fast, intending Ramadan as it was outside of their control and the hadith about calculation would be understood by them to mean to make it 29 due to the overcast or uncontrollable nature of it. This is the understanding that was held by Imam Ahmad ibn Hanbal, his teachers the Basrans and figures of Kufah and other places such as Umar, Abdullah ibn Umar, Amr ibn-Al’as, Abu Hurairah, Aisha and her sister Asma.” (Ar-Rawd ul-Murbi Page 187 – 188). This is actually a ruling that is peculiar to the Hanbali Mazhab. The Hanbali scholars are saying that, If the horizon has been obscured by clouding, smoke, eclipse, we don't know, but what we'll do is we'll fast just in case it's there, and if it's not, no harm has been done because it is halal to fast in Shaban. And the prohibition against doing so is Makrooh. But if it was, then Alhamdulillah, we are fine anyway! That is peculiar to the Hanbali school, and non of the other three schools of thought (Hanafi, Shafi’I and Maliki). That's the only time you would use that hadith calculating in a different way. So as I said, it's a peculiar ruling to the Hanbali Mazhab, and there would be no point highlighting and going into all the details on why that is, and the dispute around it. What happens when different countries share the same time zone? So Morocco and the UK are different countries sharing same time zone. Can we (The UK) borrow from them when they've seen it? Imam Ala’ ud-Din Al-Mardawi (another Marja) says, "When the people of a land have seen the moon, it is necessary for all the people to fast. There is no difference of opinion in the necessity to fast according to the one who saw the moon. As for the one who did not see it, if the horizons are in the same zone of sunrise, then it is necessary for them to fast if there are 2 lands and they are near to one another and there are not 2 different horizons. This would include Baghdad and Al-Basrah. Both peoples in these 2 cities must fast if the moon was sighting in either place. However, if there was a long distance between them, like in the case of Al-Hijaz or Iraq or Sham, then every land has its’ sighting. It was narrated from Ikrimah ibn Abi Jahl, who said, ‘Every land has its’ sighting.’" (Al-Insaf fi Ma’rifat ir-Rajihi minal Khilaf, Volume 7 page 335 – 338). So here we see, 2 places that are close. So upon watching the Moroccans for so much time sighting the moon of our sightings and their fuqaha and our sightings have coincided. So when they see it, we in the UK take by their position, Ramadan and even Rabi al-Awwal, they are the exact same time zone. And how much better can you get? because the people that are sighting the moon they are fuqaha and Qazis, that's the best way. So if they say, “We've seen it,” and I say, “Well I didn't see it,” I take by their position and that's the position that we advocate, which is to take the local sighting and when there is a City that shares the same horizon, sunrise, sunset, (it has the same time zone as yours) then you say, “Alhamdulillah!” If I in the UK don’t see the moon and they saw it, then it is binding on us, so we take by the ruling of Imam Al-Mardawi. Let's look at the sunnah: sighting the moon for your locale, how do we do that? Let's start with an example. Let’s say that, today is the 14th of Rajab and the 29th of Rajab occurs on the gregorian calendar on the 2nd of July 2011. After the sun has gone under the horizon, (the full disk has gone under the horizon) and after you finished praying Maghrib, you’ll need to watch the place where the sun has gone down, and diagonally above where the sun was where it set, you look for the moon. It will take you 20 minutes. If it's there and it's a clear sky, you will see the moon for Shaban. If it's not or it's cloudy, then you won't see the moon. We will

check with the Moroccans, we check with the Ullama (Scholars of Islam), that's how easy it is. In pure worship, Islam is for the layman. This is knowledge that you need to know, someone cant take that knowledge from you, you need this knowledge. Other countries that sight the crescent include: Bahrain, Morocco and Qatar. I don't understand why out of 48 majority Muslim countries and the vast majority of them doing it, we're having this Saudi Back-homian syndrome and saying we've got to calculate. When the Ullama and Fuqaha are looking to find the moon and don't see it, we can still look for it. Because we live in the northern latitude, are our brains constricted? Are we that stupid? Some of us come from countries where people stand on the roof (back home) at the night of Shaban looking for the Ramadan moon, so we come here to the UK and say, “The moon cant be seen. And some places in England almost the same latitude of the countries where we come from, it can be seen, what? It can be seen look for it. There is no global panacea. If you bring a Khalifa like Mu'awiyah or others, there were different ones, people were fasting on different days, even though Mu’awiyah gave his command and the command to follow down, there were Ullama and Mujtahids that had followed his command, but there were other Ullama and Mujtahids that were far from him that were under his Khilafa and said, “We didn't see it so we can't.” So even if he said there was a Khalifa,well even from a practical standpoint that's impossible unless you fall to the earth in half and destroyed all the time zones. It simply has to be the case that we do some local sighting. Next, find out from the local Observatory the next new moon and look for the crescent of the day after. So what I've told you that your next crescent moon, not your new moon, your crescent moon that you're looking for is on Sunset on the 29th on 2 July on Saturday, that means the new moon before it where there was no illumination was on Friday, 1 July, if anyone tells you I saw it, they are lying. because there is no illumination on the moon. So we have to return to this practice when you see, and if you look most of your Diaries, where you can write in your journals, they actually have the new moons listed there. So the main work has been done; because there’s non-muslims that need to know this information. Why? Because for trade rafts they have ships that are going over the water because of the moon has an effect on the tides of the earth, so they are people that need to know this. At 12: 54 in the morning you hear the shipping forecast, and they use this bizarre language but it is telling you the shipping and trade routes of the ships and what the waves are like and how things are functioning, etc. That's why. Because the moon affects the tides of the earth. Non-muslims need to know about the moon. The Einstein Observatory which is the main authority and Observatory for this country follow the moon. Even naked eye sighting of the moon occurs, because the effect that the moon is going to have on the human brain, sometimes people go insane when there is a full moon, they start killing people, there is a lunar eclipse. They want to study what? Lunacy! And the word ‘Lunacy’ comes from the root of ‘lunar.’ They are studying lunatics, lunacy, all these other things, has importance because it has an effect on the tides of the earth and even the brain waves. So in closing all this off, I want to mention that, the great bulk of Islam is easy. It can be done. It's not impossible. So, let us say, for the record, you are minding your own business, on 2 July. you see the moon. That means that, the next time you are going to be looking for it, you are going to be hunting the moon down like anybody's business, because you're going to be looking for the crescent moon for Ramadan.

So you can now start to get sort of a framework of when the months are. You can start to figure out when things are, rather than the waiting that goes and then one week before the sighting, there is the mad dash of the printing out of the timetables. Let's just get it right the first time! There are Muslims who are beginning to hate the coming of Ramadan and Eid, because of the tribulation that it creates. Because for example, The wife says “I'm not fasting on that day, I'm fasting on this day, I'm going according to this Masjid.” And then the husband says the contrary. Or even for example, the children fast different days to their parents. It is important because if you are in a situation where you know better, or you are trying to know better and you do foul up, then your fast could be hanging between the sky and the earth. So this is important information and we need to know, that it's not all about trying to tear people down and say they don't know, it's about getting and boiling everything back down. And, It's not impossible, it's not just do-able, it is know-able. We have to return to a standard. That standard is, by trying to take responsibility only 20 minutes, 20 minutes every 29 days out of your schedule, 20 minutes. Look on the horizon if your house is somewhere where you are blessed to see a clear horizon, look. If you can't and it's a clear sky don't worry the moon will eventually rise up and you will be able to see. Give it time, 20/30 minutes, look for it, and start to ask the leadership that is in charge that are the rightful leaders of this community, start to ask, “Why don't we gather all of the Imams from all the Masjids.” And then go out on the 29th of Shaban, and travel together to the highest point in the city and look for the moon together. You see there is no way to lie other than being caught out. You can't deny something that is in the sky, that appears to be the crescent moon. The moon sighting can be done, easily. This issue of fasting, and Ramadan, the reason why there is so much fitnah, because people are leaving a sunnah, so you have to fix that situation. How do you know where the moon will appear? The sun rises in the east and sets in the West. Which is going to occur until the final end of time but right now it is setting in the West, once it sets in the West, the crescent moon is going to appear in the western portion of the sky above that horizon. At the point when the sun first goes down, the reflection of the rays of the sun will be so bright you won't be able to see the Hilal at first, that's why you have to give it some time after, for the Hilal to be present. You will be able to see the Hilal. It may be faint, it may be very bright, but you will be able to see it, if you look. So you just have to look carefully along the sky, don't look in the eastern portion of the sky, look at the place where the sun sets, that's where its going to appear because the moon will be following along with the sun. The crescent moon: is sometimes only in the sky for short period of time, then it disappears again. So it does last for a while, about an hour but it can be seen, and increases in size and then it starts to break up a little bit. If you pay attention you can see fairly quickly. Now some people may claim they have seen the moon and other people go by the new moon birth. There have been record crescent moons that have been seen, but what we have to do, is weigh against the evidence of that particular locale of what we have seen. To weigh against the evidence there, when the new moon was, and then we look for the crescent. So there may truth in what they are saying but it may not be an absolute statement. And so we have to judge those things very carefully. We generally irrespective of what anyone says, we still go out on the 29th and if we don't see it, we get the reward and if we do see it then we have proven them wrong, because science is a man's

observation of phenomena around him, which can be wrong. So either way, we are on good ground. So to conclude, the Imams in Morocco have consistently had their sightings along the same sighting pattern as us living here in the UK. In Islam, Fiqh is practical. Fiqh, Encompasses your day-to-day life. Islam is incredibly practical, but when you bring in too many other elements that are not from it, it gets watered down. my advice is to look at matters and to be grounded and to be following the Ullama, the Fuqaha and the Marajih.