The Eid App

We have gone a long way since Islam was brought to this world. So many new technologies were invented, like this wonderful Ipad app. Using it, you can know the following information at any date and time with atomic accuracy, all wrapped up in beautiful graphics:

• Times of rise and set for the Sun, the Moon, and the 5 classical planets
• Times of the beginning and ending of twilight
• Heliocentric orrery (display of the planets in orbit around the Sun)
• Altitude and azimuth for the same bodies (one body at a time)
• Current phase and apparent orientation and relative size of the moon
• Current regions of day and night on a world map
• The Equation of Time, solar time, UTC time, and sidereal time
• Month, day, year, and leap-year indicator
• Displayed times are synchronized via NTP to “atomic clock” standard
• Uses iPad location, or the latitude and longitude may be set manually

And yet, for the life of me, I will never understand why Islamic authorities still want us to wait out and observe the moon, using our human eyes in a clear night, to know whether or not Eid will officially take place. It makes even less sense that different sects and different countries disagree over the date. That’s way too much uncertainty for modern times, and in my opinion something we ought to move away from.

I digress: Eid Mubarak to you all..