The traditional version of the Islamic calendar requires an authorized person or committee to make an actual sighting of the Crescent Moon to determine the length of each month. How accurate are different calendar systems? Difficult to Predict An Islamic year consistently falls about 11 days short of the solar year.įor that reason, the Islamic calendar cannot be used for agriculture or other activities traditionally linked to the seasons, and most Muslim countries officially use the Gregorian calendar as their civil calendar alongside the Hijri system. Unlike other calendar systems that use leap days or leap months to synchronize the calendar with the solar year, the Islamic calendar is completely detached from astronomical seasons, which are marked by the equinoxes and solstices. The Waxing Crescent Moon is the Moon phase which starts right after a New Moon. A new month can only begin after a Waxing Crescent Moon is observed shortly after sunset. The timing of the months in the Islamic calendar is based on astronomical observation. This Moon cycle encompasses all the phases of the Moon.

Each month lasts for a full lunation, which is the time span from one New Moon to the next. The Islamic calendar is a lunar calendar whose time reckoning is tied to the Moon phases. The Hijri calendar is not to be confused with the Solar Hijri calendar used in Iran and Afghanistan. Business Date to Date (exclude holidays)Ī New Moon - and Islamic month - is born.

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