Wish you a successful 1429

Published on Thursday, January 10, 2008 in Spiritual
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We are well into 2008 but that has not stopped my inbox from accepting new year’s wishes from friends and family. The latest greetings come with good wishes for a new Islamic year of 1429.

I wish you all a successful year as well, regardless of the calendar you follow.

We don’t celebrate the coming of a new year like most do and I’ll explain that soon. In fact it passes by quite uneventfully, and to prove that, let me tell you that the Islamic new year actually arrived last Wednesday. So I am a couple of days late !

The first month of the Islamic calendar is called Muharram and the 10th of this month, which will fall on January the 18th, is considered to be one of the most auspicious days of the year. On this day Muslims celebrate the exodus of Moses and the Children of Israel from Egypt and it is traditionally marked with fasting over a period of two days. One can choose to fast on either on the 9th and 10th or on the 10th and 11th.

A bit of History

It is interesting to note that in the pre-Islamic era, the Arabs fasted on the 10th of Muharram as a repentance for their sins. When the Prophet Muhmmad (PBUH) arrived in Medinah, he saw the Jews there also fasted on this day but to celebrate the Exodus. It was only then did he recommend his followers to celebrate this day as well.

Now since the Hebrew and the Islamic calendars no longer coincide, the two celebrations will fall at different times of the year. The Jewish celebration is called Pesach or more popularly known as Passover and it will fall on April 19th this year.

The epoch of the Islamic calendar occurs in the year Muhammad (PBUH) and his followers migrated from Makkah to Medinah in 622 CE. During his lifetime, there was no concept of numbering or even the concept of the beginning and the end of the year. All this was established seven years after his death during the caliphate of Umar bin Al Khattab.

One day he received a letter from Ali bin Abi Taalib. The date on the top of the letter also included the number of years that had passed since the migration. Umar was so impressed that he made it official.

It is obvious from this that the migration was the happiest event among the Muslims who lived to see it.

There are 4 comments

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	Lee	January 13th, 2008 at 10:45:50 EST
	Jaffer, Thank you for sharing this bit of Islamic history. There are so many shared traditions between the Islamic, Christian and Hebrew faiths. If only we could emphasize the commonalities instead of the differences.

	Jaffer	January 13th, 2008 at 12:02:57 EST
	It’s no problem Lee ! I could go on and on writing about shared traditions among the Abrahamic religions - thanks to the exposure and a formal education in World Religions. I am actually very glad to see your comment. I think I am going to focus more on this subject whenever I’ll think of writing about religion. Believe me Lee - that what I’ve written above, can also be considered controversial and that too among some Muslim communities ! I’ll cover more ground on that when I get a chance ! Thank you very much !

	Faiza	February 19th, 2008 at 11:11:12 EST
	Assalamu alaikum, wrb! I just happened to land on your blog through another one. Alhamdhulillah, you seem to be having a good circle of non muslim friends around you and a couple of posts like this on Islam will surely be a great eye opener for them..continue with ur good work..

	Jaffer	February 19th, 2008 at 13:25:38 EST
	Walaykum-Salaam-wrb Thank you very much Faiza and welcome to the community ! I write about Islam mostly as an eye-opener to muslims actually as a majority of us have forgotten the history behind our actions and why we perform them. I do remember your blog through ARN’s Fishtank. He’s been my friend since high-school.