Man on the moon
Hitler may want a united Eid…
…but no one agrees.
Efforts of the Senate’s standing committee on religious affairs to observe Ramazan and Eid on same days throughout the country went futile on Friday when clerics from Peshawar’s Qasim Khan Mosque refused to accept the authority of the Ruet-i-Hilal Committee.
The entire account is fascinating, including a debate on whether the Met Office’s reports should be followed and science and Sharia
Maulana Bashir Ahmed Kakakhel, a member of the Ruet-i-Hilal Committee, said he had learned about procedures for fixing Ramazan and Eid days in various countries, including Saudi Arabia and Malaysia.
“Reports of Met offices are taken seriously in most Muslim countries and we should not ignore this practice in Pakistan,” he said, adding that there were also many false evidences and that too during the time when moon had not even originated as per the Met Office report. Maulana Kakakhel`s remarks led to a brawl between the two groups of ulema and Mufti Popalzai asked: “If you have to choose between science and Sharia what will you believe?” He said science was evolving, but Sharia laws would be there till the day of judgement.
The Minister for Religious Affairs Khursheed Shah chimed in with what has to be the quote of the day:
If a committee is sent to the moon even then many ulema will say that the moon is not visible
Here’s a post from 2009 on the moon sighting debacle.
