01-19-2005, 11:37 PM
KeeptheFaith wrote:
> Brother, Here Where I m, first they said eid is friday,
> then changed we make eidsalah 20 jannuar. So we
> will make tomorrow eid, but i m interessed why
> these change of day.
I'm not a muslim, but this morning when I heard about the start of Eid changing, I too was curious to know the reason why. Here's what I discovered.
"Saudi authorities" first announced that Eid was going to start on Friday. I don't know exactly who these authorities are, but I assume they are religious authorities of some sort. This announcement was based upon the prediction that the new moon would be sighted on Tuesday January 11 (Eid would start ten days later, on Friday January 21).
Last week, there were supposedly some people in Saudi Arabia who sighted the new moon on Monday January 10, and not Tuesday January 11 as predicted. As a result of these supposed sightings, the Saudi Arabian government decided to move Eid to Thursday January 20.
But now the story starts getting interesting. All astronomers without exception, including Muslim organizations such as the "Arab Union for Astronomy and Space Sciences" (AUASS), say that it is impossible that the new moon was sighted in Saudi Arabia on the Monday. On Monday, the moon set at least three minutes before the sun set, therefore Muslim astronomers insist that Eid should be on Friday as originally scheduled.
This leads to the question: why did the Saudi Arabian government decide to move the start of Eid from Friday to Thursday? The most logical reason I have seen is that the government was scared that, with Eid starting on a weekend (Friday), the crowds would have been too big. By moving Eid to Thursday, the crowds in Saudi Arabia will be smaller since most Saudi citizens will have to work.
For Muslims in the west who base the start of Eid upon the moon sighting in Saudi Arabia, this decision has of course caused many problems. For example, I read one report where a group of American Muslims lost $13,000 they paid to rent a hall on Friday. And on this short notice, they are unable to find another hall for Thursday. Plus, many of them had arranged to have Friday off from work, and now they must try to get Thursday off.
Personally, I think that the start of Eid should be based upon local moon sightings, and not the sighting in Saudi Arabia. But this is obviously a very controversial subject amongst Muslims, so I don't expect this matter to be settled anytime soon.