Masalat Taqdim Waqt Adhan al-Fajr, wa Takhir Tawqit al-Isha
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- Masalat Taqdim Waqt Adhan al-Fajr, wa Takhir Tawqit al-Isha
Masalat Taqdim Waqt Adhan al-Fajr, wa Takhir Tawqit al-Isha (The Issue of Advancing the Call to Prayer for Fajr and Delaying the Timing of Isha) is a legal treatise by Adnan al-Arur addressing errors in contemporary astronomical timetables concerning the prayer times of dawn (fajr) and night (isha).
Background and Purpose
The treatise was authored to resolve ongoing debates regarding the accuracy of printed prayer schedules—most notably the Umm al-Qura calendar used in Saudi Arabia. The author states that he investigated the matter for over fifteen years following disputes between researchers who asserted that published timetables contradicted direct observational reality and defenders who maintained their validity despite lacking knowledge of the compilers' legal expertise. The text concludes with a signature dated 1410 AH.
Advancing the Fajr Prayer
The author argues that modern astronomical timetables erroneously set the time for the morning call to prayer (adhan) according to the false dawn (al-fajr al-kadhib) rather than the true dawn (al-fajr al-sadiq). In Islamic law, the false dawn permits eating for the fasting person and prohibits the Fajr prayer, whereas the true dawn prohibits eating and marks the start of the prayer time. Al-Arur explains that cartographers, military experts, and astronomers calculate the dawn from the first appearance of vertical light in the east, which precedes the true horizontal dawn by approximately twenty minutes (varying by about five minutes across seasons). Consequently, individuals praying immediately after the timetable's adhan—such as women at home, the sick, travelers, and hasty mosque imams—risk performing their obligatory prayer before its valid legal time.
To establish classical consensus on the distinction, the work cites juristic statements from al-Nawawi, Ibn Abd al-Barr, Ibn Hazm, Ibn Rushd, Ibn Qudamah, al-Sarakhsi, and Kamal al-Din ibn al-Humam. It also adduces historical warnings and field observations:
- Classical critiques by Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani in Fath al-Bari against advancing the second adhan in Ramadan by about twenty minutes, and by Shihab al-Din al-Qarafi in al-Furuq against relying solely on astronomical degrees when dawn is not visible.
- Modern analyses by Muhammad Rashid Rida, Muhammad Taqi al-Din al-Hilali, Muhammad Nasir al-Din al-Albani, and Muhammad ibn Salih al-Uthaymin.
- Observational reports by scholars in Saudi Arabia, Sudan, and Egypt.
- Formal studies, including research by Sulayman ibn Ibrahim al-Thunayan, Abd Allah ibn Ibrahim al-Turki, the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA), and a comprehensive twilight study by the Astronomy Research Institute at King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology (KACST). The KACST study recorded an interview with the earlier compiler of the Umm al-Qura calendar, Dr. Fadl Nur, who acknowledged basing the calendar on first light at 18 degrees and later shifting it to 19 degrees as a precaution for fasting.
Delaying the Isha Timing in Ramadan
The second section addresses the practice in some countries of altering printed timetables to delay the time of the Isha prayer by thirty minutes during Ramadan to grant people extra time after breaking their fast. Al-Arur distinguishes between three practices:
- Delaying the congregation of the prayer (ta'khir al-salat), which is permissible and Sunnah for Isha.
- Delaying the adhan itself (ta'khir al-adhan), which he designates as impermissible.
- Altering the defined legal timing within published calendars (ta'khir al-tawqit), which he condemns as an unlawful alteration of sacred boundaries.
He notes that printing a delayed time leads worshippers to pray Maghrib past its expiration under the assumption that Isha has not yet begun, and fosters the false belief that Ramadan has an intrinsically different canonical prayer time. He maintains that the adhan should remain at its fixed time in calendars and mosques, while delaying only the iqamah according to public convenience.
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