Professional Documents
Culture Documents
1
It should be used to prove the validity of the eye sighting, but cannot be used as a
sole source to start or to end any lunar month, this was the conclusion reached the
same conference held in Cairo, Egypt in 1386:
- Eye sighting is the way that should be used to decide on the start of the month, if
this sighting is reliable.
- The reliability of the sighting is collaborated by either a shared sighting between
a large group of people, or even one single individual, be it male of female, if the
sighting does not contradict decisive scientific visibility calculations.
The ruling regarding whoever sighted the moon himself, but his sighting was
not adopted by the group of Mulsims for any reason?
The particular individual can either follow his own sighting or he can follow the
group. Both opinions were expressed by Muslim Scholars, however the majority of
scholars has adopted the second opinion, for the Hadeeth of the Prophet (PBUH)
that says “The beginning of Ramadan is when you begin fasting, and the Eid day is
when you stop fasting and Adha day is when you slaughter your animals (Eid-ul-
Adha)” which basically means that deciding the begging and/or end of the month is
a group decision, once it is reached by the group, it should be adopted by all of the
individual members of that group.
The previous paragraphs briefly summarized the jurisprudential differences about
the issue of the sighting. The golden rule in such matters where there is a genuine
acceptable difference of opinions is that there should be no condemnation in such
debatable issues. A Muslim should simply follow any of the two opinions as
adopted by his country or community, even if he believes that the other opinion is
closer to the truth.
AMJA also favors the opinion that the individual should differentiate between
starting Ramadan and starting Shawal. If he witnesses the crescent of Ramadan is a
sighting that was not adopted by the community he should fast himself, in secret
such that he would not stir controversy around himself. However if he witnessed
the beginning of Shawal in a sighting that was not adopted by the community then
he should continue to fast this one extra day with the group.
The issue of adopting a moon sighting is a governmental issue in the first place,
meaning that the authority or government is the only entity that is capable of
settling the dispute, by adopting one stand versus the other. Disagreement with the
accepted legal authority is a form of rebellion that is inexplicable. It is the absence
of such a counseling or governmental authority that keeps the dispute in the issue
dragging. Only such an authority can settle the disagreement and end the debate.
2
And due to the lack of such an authority, it became prudent upon AMAJ to adopt
the ruling of Ittihad-ul-Matali`. Whenever the new Ramadan moon is sighted in a
country or locality and the sighting was consequently adopted by that country, it
becomes mandatory to start the fasting in all countries that share at least a
part of the night with the sighting country. Unless of course that the country that
is adopting the sighting has been known to go against the consensus of the Ummah
for its own political Agenda. This is the easiest to implement and most correct
methodology to adopt for Muslims living in the west. A direct contact should be
established with the scholars in charge of adopting the Fatwa in that country to
verify their acceptance of the sighting. AMJA delegates adopting scientific
visibility calculations as part of adopting the sighting to the particular country with
the sighting (at least from a practical point of view) for the following reasons:
This is the same opinion adopted by the majority of scholars, and was
recommended by the authoritative scholars.
The argument for Ikhtilaf-ul-Matali` is no longer valid with the huge advancement
in communications technology. News travel across the globe in a matter of
seconds.
This opinion is closer to achieve an important goal of this religion, which is
uniting the Muslims.
This opinion does not favor a country or create any form or regional tension,
whichever country adopts a sighting, all countries, and communities should follow.
Removing whatever hardship arising because of Ikhtilaf-ul-Matali` in Eid-ul-Adha
if the local sighting is different from the sighting in Mecca. The followers of this
opinion will have one of two choices: either to disagree with the pilgrims, breaking
the global Muslim unity, or to agree with the pilgrims and leave their opinion.
3
The extreme difficulty faced during Dul-Hija moon sighting, it is now a global
consensus that people follow the pilgrimage in that particular situation. Breaking
such a practical consensus is very ill advised. Even strict followers of this opinion,
adopt the sighting in Mecca for these reasons, even that this is completely against
their methodology.
The difference of opinions about adopting the scientific visibility calculations,
even though AMJA favors the opinion that these calculations should be used to
reject an impossible sighting, but cannot be used as the sole source to rely on for a
beginning of the month.
- Above all; our aim is only to please ALLAH (SWT), we only seek his guidance.
AMJA Members:
Please see these links for the list of scholars
http://www.amjaonline.com/members.php
http://www.amjaonline.com/members_2.php