Proving the crescent moons of Ramadan and Shawwal still raises controversy every year.
Because it brings us back to the duality of optical vision and astronomical calculation, a duality that seems problematic from a scientific point of view;
It compares two means: one is traditional or primitive, and the other is scientific, and then it seems as if it were a comparison between those who believe in science and those who insist on sticking to traditional means to prove the beginning and end of the lunar month.
My purpose in this article is to make it clear that this duality is reductive and does not meet the complexities of the issue in question, as the dispute over the adoption of astronomical calculations is not related to the development of knowledge tools, as much as it has to do with determining the competencies of the jurist and astronomer or their fields of work, especially since the issue is under discussion here. It has two sides: a scientific-material aspect (evidence of the birth of the crescent), and a devotional aspect (the obligation of fasting), which helps us broaden the horizon of consideration and understand the doctrinal dispute.
There are two possible approaches to discussing the doctrinal dispute over the method of establishing the crescent moon:
The first entry:
deals with the issue of distinguishing between the means and the destination, and that visual vision here is a means, and it can provoke discussion about whether it is variable (the astronomical calculation takes its place) or fixed, and whether it is devotional (specified by the Lawgiver to enter the month) or ordinary, but it is mentioned because it is familiar to the Arabs at the time, and because it is accessible to all;
In other words, it is underway for the most part, because the law of legal costs is based on the republican understanding in the expression of Ibn Rushd and Al-Shatiby.
The second entry:
deals with the positive legal ruling and what is related to its details and who is competent to decide on it, because the legal rulings are of two types: one of them: the mandated rulings that include the five well-known rulings, which are: the obligatory, the recommended, the permissible, the makrooh, and the forbidden.
The second: the man-made rulings that deal with the context of transposing the previous mandated rulings, which include what was a reason, a condition, or an impediment. Others added to them the license and determination, health and corruption, and some of them consider the latter to be rational rulings and not among the man-made rulings.
The mandated legal ruling is that fasting is obligatory on every obligated person who witnessed the month, and the positive legal ruling is the entry of the month by sighting the crescent without which the mandated legal ruling is not fulfilled.
If ten crescent moons are seen and this is not well-known among the general population of the country, for some reason (their testimony is not accepted, or they did not testify), the rule of these ten would be the same as the rule of all Muslims in breaking the fast.
Whoever sees - alone - the crescent does not break his fast except with Muslims, according to the doctrine of the majority;
Because they included the breaking of the fast with sacrifice (or fasting for Hajj).
The basis for this - as Ibn Taymiyyah said - is that “God, Glory be to Him, has attached legal rulings to the names of the crescent and the month, such as fasting, breaking the fast, and sacrifice.” The Almighty said: “They ask you about the new moons, say they are times for people and Hajj” [Al-Baqarah: 189]. Fasting upon you” to his saying “the month of Ramadan in which the Qur’an was revealed, a guidance for people” [Al-Baqarah: 183-185].
That is, God Almighty has enjoined fasting in the month of Ramadan, but the problem here arises from defining the concept of the crescent and the month to set the limits of the obligatory, and the terms crescent and month may have two meanings:
The first meaning:
It is a name for what appears in the sky, even if people are not aware of it, and with it the month enters, meaning that it is linked to an astronomical sign only.
The second meaning:
that the crescent is a name for what people begin with, and the month is a name for what is famous among them, that is, it is linked to an astronomical sign with a social impact.
The first meaning requires the priority of the individual aspect in worship, so whoever sees the crescent - alone - has entered the month of Ramadan in his right, and that night is from Ramadan in reality, even if no one else knows about it.
As for the one who did not see the new moon, if it became clear to him that it was rising, he must make up the fast.
Although the analogy requires that this take place in the month of Al-Fitr (Ramadan) and in the month of sacrifice (Hajj), Ibn Taymiyyah said: “I did not know that anyone said: Whoever saw him standing (on Arafat) alone without the rest of the pilgrim, and that he sacrifices on the second day (i.e. after Arafat), and he stoned Jamrat al-Aqabah, and he disassociated himself from the rest of the pilgrim.” That is, the dispute was limited to the month of Ramadan, not the month of sacrifice, or fasting without the pilgrimage.
The second meaning requires giving priority to the collective aspect in worship, so the condition that it be a crescent and a month: its fame among the people and their initiation with it.
If ten crescent moons are seen and this is not well-known among the general population of the country, for some reason (their testimony is not accepted, or they did not testify), the rule of these ten would be the same as the rule of all Muslims in breaking the fast.
Whoever sees - alone - the crescent does not break his fast except with Muslims, according to the doctrine of the majority;
Because they included the breaking of the fast with sacrifice (or fasting for Hajj).
While others went to linking the two days of al-Fitr and fasting (i.e. the beginning of Ramadan and the beginning of Shawwal), and that God Almighty did not command His servants to fast for thirty-one days;
Whoever has completed thirty must break the fast.
Regardless of the rest of the people.
Based on this, the witnesses are not in (whoever of you witnessed the month, let him fast it) except for a month that is famous among the people, so that it is possible to imagine its witnesses and absence from it, and that it is a speech to the group if any, otherwise whoever is alone must fast due to the absence of the group in his right.
Based on the previous two meanings, and in the case of adopting the astronomical calculation in determining the significance of the month or the crescent, we find ourselves in front of more complexity, and here we must distinguish again between two different matters that are usually confused, namely:
The first matter:
the criterion for the entry or beginning of the lunar month as a legitimate sign (a positive legal ruling);
The legislator made it a reason for the obligation to fast (a mandated legal ruling).
The second matter:
the criterion for entering the month as a purely astronomical sign according to the astronomical calculation.
The problem here arises from the extent of the legitimacy of adopting the authority of the astronomer in determining the positive ruling (the entry of the month), which is originally a legitimate sign according to the jurist’s perspective, but is determined according to his cognitive tools and based on the search for “the meaning of the lawgiver” expressed in texts;
Because we are in front of a legal ruling mandated linked to the legal status of the situation.
Then, if we go over the second matter (the astronomical calculation), we will face several possibilities related to the criterion that we will adopt to determine the beginning of the month, and in which disagreement may occur, and this is the reality between some countries that adopt astronomical calculations;
Because each of them adopts a different mechanism from the other to determine the beginning, here are two possibilities offered by the astronomical calculation:
The first:
the criterion for the conjunction between the sun, the moon and the earth, which is what some countries, such as Tunisia, adopt, as far as I know.
The second:
the birth of the crescent moon, which is adopted by some countries, but this birth is exposed - in turn - to three possibilities, namely: the birth of the crescent during the day and its disappearance before sunset, the birth of the crescent during the day and its disappearance shortly after sunset, and the birth of the crescent and its remaining after sunset for a sufficient period of sighting.
Which of these possibilities will we adopt?
Is it necessary for the crescent to remain after sunset?
And how much is it?
There are three ways: the first considers that it is not required that it remain after sunset, and the second believes that the crescent remains absolutely after sunset, even for a minute, even if it disappears after, and the third believes that it must remain until it is seen by any means.
If we use a telescope - for example - the crescent needs about 25 minutes after sunset to be seen, and if we use the naked eye, the crescent needs 30 minutes after its birth to be seen.
Apart from these possibilities and how to choose one of them to determine the beginning of the month astronomically, we are here in front of two different perspectives or specializations in proving a concept that the astronomer sees as a natural phenomenon, and the jurist sees it as a legal issue, and then the jurist sees that he is authorized to determine the two types of legal rulings: positive and mandated;
Because they are inseparable and both of them are concerned with searching for the will of the Lawgiver from the person in charge, and that the Lawgiver arranged the obligation of fasting on sighting the crescent and not the conjunction or the birth of the new moon astronomically. The birth of the crescent, which is the field of astronomy, but will this be an expression of the will of the Lawgiver who made the sign “vision”?
Here the difference in the perspective of the jurist and the astronomer appears, which shows its effect through, among other things, I mention them:
the first:
In the case of denying the possibility of seeing the crescent, as happened more than once, where astronomers say that it is impossible to see the crescent, however, a number of countries prove its sighting and the fasting is proven.
Other than determining the birth of the crescent or not.
Seeing - as Ibn Taymiyyah established - "is a sensory matter that has multiple causes, such as the clarity and cloudiness of the air, the height and the lowness of the view, the sharpness and ominousness of the sight," meaning that the causes of vision are not controlled by arithmetic. Rather, some of the later people spoke about it, such as Koshiar Al-Dailami and the like.” When they saw the Shari’a, the legal rulings were attached to the crescent, and they resorted to arithmetic as a way in which the vision is controlled.
Ibn Taymiyyah said: "It is not a straight or moderate method, rather its error is many and has been tried, and they differ a lot: is it seen or not seen? The reason for that is that they controlled by calculation what is not known by calculation."
The second:
That there is no correlation between rejecting the adoption of the astronomical calculation in the past and its definitiveness, as a number of jurists accepted its finality, including Ibn Taymiyyah, who said: “If the news of the people of the account conspire, they will hardly err, and with this, their news does not result in legal knowledge,” and Al-Qarafi who said: Sanad (Ben Anan [died 541 AH]) of our companions (the Malikis): If the imam (the politician) saw the reckoning, and the crescent was established with it: it was not followed, because the predecessors agreed on the opposite, even though the calculation of the new moons, eclipses, and lunar eclipses is definitive.” And based on this chapter is revealed. Imam al-Subki’s distinction between the cases of denial and proof in the adoption of astronomical calculation, where he saw its introduction in the denial without proof, and Ibn Daqiq al-Eid, where he saw its introduction in proof in the case of clouds only, not at all, and all this shows that the dispute is not about definitive and presumptive, but has a different take .
Moreover, the presumptive here is the criterion on the basis of which we determine the entry of the month that is legally considered;
Due to the necessity of fasting and breaking the fast, and balancing between the reckoning and the impossibility of seeing, as in the case of clouds, for example.
The third:
The assumption that adopting the astronomical calculation will resolve the dispute over the confirmation of the crescent, resulting from the ambiguity of the complexities of the issue previously explained, as well as the illusion that the issue is based on the development of knowledge tools and that if the means change or develop, it must be taken into account, is a perception contrary to the reality of scientific discussions. On both sides: astronomical and jurisprudence.
In the past, the adoption of astronomical calculations was absolutely attributed to the follower Mutref bin Abdullah Al-Shukhir, and this saying was transmitted from some previous scholars, including Ibn Qutayba, Ibn Sarij Al-Shafi’i, Al-Qaffal Al-Kabeer Al-Shashi and Judge Abdul-Jabbar Al-Mu’tazili. Subki taking it in the case of denial as previously.
These sayings disturb the idea of evolution that some of them talked about, or the dualism of taking knowledge in matters of worship or not, meaning that the issue is more complex than these quick conclusions.
The defect in conceptualizing the issue can be attributed to two things:
The first: the
predominance of the politicization of religion, which included even worship with the prevalence of the dynamic and political conception of Islam, and linking worship to the political implications of the concept of the nation;
Although the political authority was not on the same line, and this matter needs more detail so that I may return to it in a separate article at the end of this holy month and before Eid al-Fitr.
The second:
the lack of scrutiny of the dimensions of the issue and its perceptions, astronomically and jurisprudence, and the liberalization of the field of competence of each science;
Some of them even thought that all that was in the matter was that the jurists stood at the apparent meaning of the text and stuck to the words without the intentions, and God knows best.