Eid Is Tomorrow?
Assalamu alaikum, what a surprise! Could someone explain how this “happened”? I mean considering how the moon is not supposed to have been “sightable”? I actually did some research and according to http://www.wunderground.com, in Makkah, Saudi Arabia, the moon set one minute before sunset, the moonset time being 5:58 and the sunset time being 5:59. Even in Madinah, where the sunset time was 5:30 and the moonset time was 5:59, the graph showed the moon as 0% eluminated which, well, technically would mean that it couldn’t have been seen.
In fact, we here in Florida, would have had a better chance of seeing the moon given that the moon here was 1% elmuninated, although the sunset to moonset time difference was only 5 minutes, the sunset time being 7:02 and the moonset time being 7:07.
Our masjid is celebrating Eid tomorrow, and well, I have to work and sadly, did not take off the time to attend the Eid prayers. For the sake of not causing fitna, I’ll say that people should do what they feel comfortable with, and I’ll withhold my feelings on this except to say that I’m surprised, and something about this “decision” has me feeling more uncomfortable than I normally do, as normally, I just do what I feel is best and much of the itme, it doesn’t affect anyone as in years past, I had not been able to attend the Eid prayers anyway, and if I did, I did not know much about this whole controversy anyway. I just followed my local masjid who I think followed ISNA and left it at that.
Anyway, not to beat a dead horse but astronomy has been an interest of mine, and if I had sight I’d sight the moon myself. I’ve not quite found a way of letting people know my “feelings” on the subject without making it sound as thought I’m being a fitna-mongerer or something. And I don’t know how to “teach”, for lack of a better word, the nuances and differences in this whole debate, and that perhaps, in moon sighting, people do indeed make mistakes (and we’re not saying they’re lying).
I feel like in writing this, that I’m somehow negating others feelings, that I’m saying that “people who say they saw the moon are lying”, etc., and I’ve been accused of that too, when I suggested once that perhaps people were not actually seeing the moon!
Anyway, really, though, not to beat a dead horse or anything, Inshallah, everyone has a blessed and happy Eid, no matter when they celebrate it, and do what you feel is best, unless of course, you’re somewhere where, well, you can’t, like where the authorities make the decision or something.
I was just surprised, that is all, very interesting. And that is all I’ll say.
otowi said,
October 12, 2007 at 8:38 am
moonsighting.com is the best site, I think.
In most of the world last night, it was pretty much impossible to see the moon.
Yusuf Smith said,
October 12, 2007 at 12:26 pm
As-Salaamu ‘alaikum,
The only places the moon could have been sighted easily yesterday night was one corner of the south Pacific; with instruments, it might have been possible to sight it in Patagonia, which is a very sparsely inhabited region of Chile and Argentina, and most of the Muslims in those two countries live in the big cities much further north. I was really annoyed that the Islam Channel and other outlets were calling today Eid, and that many people followed them.