Good company and good food, and a thoughtful lecture, were the order of the evening at the annual iftar/dinner hosted by IIIT at its office on Thursday, September 10. Muslim and other faith friends of IIIT joined the staff at the event attended by some 90 persons.

The highlight of the evening was the Isma’il al Faruqi Memorial Lecture delivered by Professor Cemil Ayden who is the first occupant of the IIIT Chair in Islamic Studies recently endowed by IIIT at George Mason University. Prof. Ayden traced the history of Islamic studies in the American academia and spoke of ....

This book shatters the myth that naked-eye sighting of the new moon and completing thirty days in the case of weather-related or other obscurities are the only two valid methods of determining the month of Ramadan. The author explains that certainty, not actual sighting, is the real objective of the Sharicah and that the Qur’an does not mandate physical sighting. A careful analysis shows that those hadiths that seemingly require sighting actually require certainty. The assertion that all Muslim scholars prohibit the use of astronomical calculations, both in affirming or negating the month of Ramadan, is not correct. As calculation is now more accurate than naked-eye sighting, due to certain astronomical and scientific advancements, the use of calculation is the closest to the real objective of the Shari‘ah and to the spirit of the hadiths.