Others concur that it was originally a lunar calendar, but suggest that about 200 years before the Hijra it was transformed into a lunisolar calendar containing an intercalary month added from time to time to keep the pilgrimage within the season of the year when merchandise was most abundant. It was not intended to establish a fixed calendar to be generally observed.' The term 'fixed calendar' is generally understood to refer to the non-intercalated calendar. The Encyclopaedia of Islam concludes 'The Arabic system of can only have been intended to move the Hajj and the fairs associated with it in the vicinity of Mecca to a suitable season of the year. The similarity between the religious concept of this ancient inscription and the Qur'an suggests that non-calendaring postponement is also the Qur'anic meaning of Nasī '.

According to the context of this inscription, the verb ns'’ has nothing to do with intercalation, but only with moving religious events within the calendar itself. This is corroborated by an early Sabaic inscription, where a religious ritual was 'postponed' ( ns'w) due to war. This interpretation is supported by Arab historians and lexicographers, like Ibn Hisham, Ibn Manzur, and the corpus of Qur'anic exegesis. According to this view, Nasī ' is related to the pre-Islamic practices of the Meccan Arabs, where they would alter the distribution of the forbidden months within a given year without implying a calendar manipulation. Some scholars, both Muslim and Western, maintain that the pre-Islamic calendar used in central Arabia was a purely lunar calendar similar to the modern Islamic calendar. ĭifferent interpretations of the concept of Nasī ' have been proposed. According to Muslim tradition, the decision of postponement was administered by the tribe of Kinanah, by a man known as the al-Qalammas of Kinanah and his descendants (pl. The Qur'an links the four forbidden months with Nasī ', a word that literally means 'postponement'. However, Muslim historians do not link these months to a particular season. A similar if not identical concept to the forbidden months is also attested by Procopius, where he describes an armistice that the Eastern Arabs of the Lakhmid al-Mundhir respected for two months in the summer solstice of 541 CE. The forbidden months were four months during which fighting is forbidden, listed as Rajab and the three months around the pilgrimage season, Dhu al-Qa‘dah, Dhu al-Hijjah, and Muharram. The Islamic tradition is unanimous in stating that Arabs of Tihamah, Hejaz, and Najd distinguished between two types of months, permitted ( ḥalāl) and forbidden ( ḥarām) months. Both al-Biruni and al-Mas'udi suggest that the ancient Arabs used the same month names as the Muslims, though they also record other month names used by the pre-Islamic Arabs. At least some of these South Arabian calendars followed the lunisolar system. Inscriptions of the ancient South Arabian calendars reveal the use of a number of local calendars. Historyįor central Arabia, especially Mecca, there is a lack of epigraphical evidence but details are found in the writings of Muslim authors of the Abbasid era. In the Gregorian calendar reckoning, 1445 AH runs from 19 July 2023 to approximately 7 July 2024. Since 19 July 2023 CE, the current Islamic year is 1445 AH. In English, years prior to the Hijra are denoted as BH ('Before the Hijra'). In Muslim countries, it is also sometimes denoted as H from its Arabic form ( سَنَة هِجْرِيَّة, abbreviated ھ). In the West, dates in this era are usually denoted AH ( Latin: Anno Hegirae, 'in the year of the Hijrah'). During that year, Muhammad and his followers migrated from Mecca to Medina and established the first Muslim community ( ummah), an event commemorated as the Hijrah. This calendar enumerates the Hijri era, whose epoch was established as the Islamic New Year in 622 CE.

In almost all countries where the predominant religion is Islam, the civil calendar is the Gregorian calendar, with Syriac month-names used in the Levant and Mesopotamia ( Iraq, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon and Palestine) but the religious calendar is the Hijri one. It is used to determine the proper days of Islamic holidays and rituals, such as the annual fasting and the annual season for the great pilgrimage. The Hijri calendar ( Arabic: ٱلتَّقْوِيم ٱلْهِجْرِيّ, romanized: al-taqwīm al-hijrī), also known in English as the Muslim calendar and Islamic calendar, is a lunar calendar consisting of 12 lunar months in a year of 354 or 355 days. Islamic calendar stamp issued at King Khalid International Airport on 10 Rajab 1428 AH (24 July 2007 CE)

Islamic calendar year 2000