The Global Islamic Calendar as a Solution for Unified Religious Rituals: Its Relevance to Fiqh and Astronomy

Abstract

Muslims had time differences in carrying out Islamic religious rituals. The last two international congresses in 2016 in Turkey and 2017 in Indonesia carried their own criteria and were used in several countries. Meanwhile, the majority of the calendars that Muslims refer to are the Ummul Qura' Calendar of Saudi Arabia. This article aims to compare the results of that three calendar regarding the determination of the beginning of the months of Ramadan, Shawwal, Dzulhijjah from 1444 to 1448 H. and the implication of each criterion in the aspects of sharia and astronomy. This article is a qualitative research with descriptive and comparative analysis. The result shows, the differences betweean the three calendar is 53.33% and the similarity is 46.67%. Turkey's criteria for 2016, are the most established to become the Global Islamic Calendar from fiqh and astronomy perspective, but there is a weakness in the application of the conditions for reporting new moon sighting until 00.00 UT, meaning that the day changes at midnight which results in areas that are more eastern have to wait a long time and can have an impact on the law of other worship. The Indonesia criteria have accommodated the weaknesses of Turkey criteria but the scope of the hilal visibility limits is too narrow. Ummul Qura’ calendar does not meet the requirements of international congress so far. Therefore, three calendar above must complete each other to realize unified Islamic Global Calendar and new fiqh formulation of the global Islamic calendar and related worship.