Hijri Calendar: Difference between revisions

Prophet Muhammad's hijra ("flight" or "migration") from Mecca to Medina in 622 AD marks the beginning of the Islamic lunar calendar (also known as the Hijri or Arabic Calendar). Thus, the Islamic calendar dates have the suffix AH (After Hijra). The Islamic lunar year (354 or 355 days) is between 10 and 12 days shorter than the "Western" or "Christian" Gregorian solar year (365 or 366 days)^[1], and so cycles through the seasons.^[2][3][4] The Islamic calendar is used in conjunction with the Gregorian calendar in some parts of the Muslim world, and is almost always referenced in relation to Islamic rituals (like the Hajj) and festivals (like Eid al-Adha), as it is with the Islamic calendar that these event correlate.

Calendar

{| class="wikitable"

|+Islamic Week Days !No. !Name !Arabic !Meaning !Gregorian Equivilant !Note |- |1 |al-ʾAḥad |ٱلْأَحَد‎ |the one |Sunday | |- |2 |al-ʾIthnayn |ٱلْإِثْنَيْن‎ |the second |Monday |Muslims are encouraged to fast on Mondays, as it is the day that Muhammad is said to have been born on |- |3 |ath-Thulāthāʾ |ٱلثُّلَاثَاء‎ |the third |Tuesday | |- |4 |al-ʾArbiʿāʾ |ٱلْخَمِيس‎ |the fourth |Wednesday | |- |5 |al-Khamīs |ٱلْخَمِيس‎ |the fifth |Thursday | |- |6 |al-Jumʿah |ٱلْجُمْعَة‎ |the gathering |Friday |This is the day on which Muslim men are required (fard) to participate in a congregational prayer, generally referred to as the Jumu'ah prayer |- |7 |as-Sabt |ٱلسَّبْت‎ |the rest |Saturday | |}

Origins

The Islamic lunar calendar is the same calendar that was used by the pre-Islamic pagan Arabs, as it refers to the lunar months by the same names and sanctifies the very four of the twelve months that were considered sacred by Arabs in the pre-Islamic period.

However, there were some changes made: whereas the pre-Islamic Arabs allowed a practice Nasi' whereby they would either choose a different set of four months to deem sacred or move about holy festivals to a more appropriate seasons (since the lunar calendar cycles through the seasons), the Islamic calendar system prohibited this practice.^[5][6] Some scholars suggest that Nasi' was in fact a practice where the pre-Islamic Arabs used to occasionally add an "intercalary" month in order to move religious festivals into more lucrative business seasons, rather than simply shifting the date of these festivals, though this is uncertain.^[7][8] Whatever the case, this too was prohibited by the Islamic lunar calendar.

Relevant quotations

Quran

The Qur'an refers to the month of Ramadan:

The Qur'an states that there are twelve months, four of them are sacred:

The Qur'an describes the "sacred" months (shar al-haram, sometimes translated as the "holy" or "prohibited" - that is, sanctified - months):

The Qur'an references the day of al-Jumu'ah (Friday) as it mentions the Friday Prayer:

Hadith

This hadith identifies the four months which are "sacred":

See Also

• Word Count Miracles in the Qur'an

References