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HELWAN,
Egypt—In synch with the sun and the moon, the traditions
of 1,400 years and the acts of Muslims all over the
world, members of one of Egypt’s seven official
moon-sighting committees pulled into a parking lot high
on a ridge overlooking hazy Cairo at sunset on Saturday,
August 30.
There
were government astronomers in open-neck shirts,
snapping open tripods to support their telescopes.
Taking a preliminary look through the scopes at Cairo’s
western horizon, the astronomers didn’t bother to
announce what they saw at first glance: nothing.
There
was a 70-year-old Muslim cleric, wearing glasses of
stratified thicknesses, a gauzy black robe with gold
tassels and a beatific smile. Declining a look through
the telescopes, the cleric, Abdul Monim al-Berri, only
sat and looked on, his presence as one of Egypt’s
leading religious scholars giving the gathering the
stamp of religious approval.
“I’m the
legitimacy,” he said.
And
there was an al-Jazeera satellite news crew, trying to
go live to tell the world the news from the parking lot,
but having trouble with audio.
Frustrated, the network’s reporter folded her arms
across her chest and rocked back on her heels in the
gravel, staring blindly at the sky.
Together, the committee members were on a mission: to
look for the crescent moon that signals the start of
Ramadan, Islam’s holiest month, and tell the world
whether they had seen it.
From
Senegal to Saudi Arabia and beyond, moon-spotting
committees scaled minaret staircases and fanned out
across deserts at twilight on August 30, as Muslims have
since the founding of Islam in the 7th century, looking
for a sliver of white in the sky.
Word
from the committees would plunge the world’s more than 1
billion Muslims into Ramadan.
For
religiously observant Muslims, Ramadan is four weeks of
daytime fasting and nighttime feasting with family and
friends, interspersed with works of charity for the
poor.
“This
night of witness is extremely important for us, Muslims.
It is the night that unifies us all,” Berri said.
In the
parking lot, as around the world, ancient ways met with
modern advances on Saturday.
The
prophet Muhammad said Muslims should begin fasting when
they saw the crescent moon that opens the lunar month of
Ramadan. But since the 7th century, science has provided
the extras—telescopes and observatories, for example.
The
57-nation Organization of the Islamic Conference even
proposed to launch a satellite to monitor the moon for
Ramadan.
Science
has also enabled precise tracking of the moon and the
sun, allowing astronomers to know in advance that the
crescent moon starting Ramadan will be visible in the
Middle East no sooner than Sunday, August 31.
In the
parking lot and in most of the Middle East, technology
deferred to religion. Astronomers went through the
motions, at least, of looking for the crescent.
“It’s a
matter of Islamic law we have to be here. But it’s
100-percent sure we’re not going to see it today,” Faleh
Mohammed, head of one of Egypt’s government astronomy
institute, told the al-Jazeera reporter.
A rumor
went through the crowd that Libya had announced the
start of Ramadan—different countries often pick
different days for the start and squabble over each
other’s decisions.
Mohammed
scoffed. “What do they see in Libya that we don’t see
with our telescopes?” he asked.
Mohammed
Yousuf, an astronomer in his eighth year of moon-watch
duty, rose from another telescope.
The last
time a member of a moon-watch committee thought he had
spotted a crescent moon at this point in the lunar month
was in 1991, Yousuf said. Other members of the committee
were able to convince the man he had seen light glancing
off a bird’s wings, and error was averted, Yousuf said.
Even in
Muhammad’s time, Yousuf recounted, a man who believed he
had spotted the crescent moon was about to announce
Ramadan to the world—until a friend leaned in and
removed a stray eyelash from the man’s eye.
At the
next telescope over, astronomer Ahmed Mohem Fathi
grumbled at Cairo’s pollution, thick enough to veil any
moon.
By 6
p.m., Mohammed was speeding off, rushing toward a news
conference in Cairo with some of Egypt’s top religious
and government officials to announce the findings.
The word
of Egypt’s grand mufti, Ali Gomaa, would be: No moon
Saturday, therefore the moon’s appearance Sunday was
inevitable, and Ramadan would start Monday.
Egyptian
radio and television carried the grand mufti’s
announcement live. For many of Cairo’s 16 million
people, the joint broadcasts were a jolting reminder
that Ramadan almost was upon them.
Traffic
slowed to gridlock in a half-hour. Families rushed to
buy food for the first of the month’s lavish meals and
aid baskets.
At 6:17
p.m., the same time when the crescent is expected to
appear Sunday, the astronomers bent in earnest over
their telescopes.
Bystanders fell silent.
The men
stood in the hush, minute after minute, squinting at the
rim where earth met sky.
In the
silence, the rusty voice of a single old man rose from a
mosque in the valley below. Carrying out a ritual older
than the moon-watch committees, the man called the
faithful to evening prayers.
“Allah
akbar,” the mosque singer cried. “God is great.”
From his
chair in the parking lot, Berri raised his fingers to
the sky as if to pinch the absent crescent moon.
He then
brought his fingers to his mouth and kissed them.
“This is
the best part, the mingling of science and religion,”
Berri said. “It’s beautiful.” |
