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From: abdali@tekchips.UUCP (Kamal Abdali)
Newsgroups: net.misc
Subject: Re: Counting years
Message-ID: <598@tekchips.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 28-Aug-86 20:56:53 EDT
Article-I.D.: tekchips.598
Posted: Thu Aug 28 20:56:53 1986
Date-Received: Sun, 31-Aug-86 01:57:14 EDT
References: <1408@tektools.UUCP> <6018@fortune.UUCP> <142@csustan.UUCP>
Organization: Tektronix, Inc., Beaverton, OR
Lines: 22
Keywords: Lunar Solar Calendar Years Religion

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> >Islam was founded by Mohammed around 750AD, and they have their own calendar,
> >now in the 1300's.
> >[patrick, {ihnp4, hplabs, amdcad, ucbvax!dual}!fortune!stirling]
> 
> No argument here, but I would like to note that the Islamic calendar is also
> a lunar based calendar.  Some years are twelve months long, others are
> thirteen months; it's all phase-of-the-moon-dependent.
> [Scott Hazen Mueller,  lll-crg.arpa!csustan!smdev]
> 

The Islamic calendar is purely lunar and consists of exactly twelve
months.  The practice of intercalation of an extra month, used in
pre-Islamic Arabia to bring the lunar calendar in phase with the solar
calendar, was expressly forbidden by Islam.  The reason usually given
for this command is that because of it the fasting and pilgrimage times 
rotate through all seasons.  Otherwise, it could have happened, for
example, that the people of one hemisphere always had to fast during the hot 
summer days while the people of the other atmosphere always had easier
time fasting during the short, cool winter days.

Incidentally, we are now at the end of Year 1406 in the Muslim calendar.