The Correct Hijri Calendar

The short answer

Why “The Creator's Calendar” and not “the corrected” or “correct” Hijri?

This is the calendar sought by those who say “the correct Hijri calendar,” “the corrected” or “the true” one. But we call it by another name, for these reasons:

• “Hijri” names the count of years, not the calendar. Lunar months fixed in their seasons are older than the Hijra: the Arabs used them before it, and the oldest calendars knew them. The Hijra was made the starting point of the year number alone, so calling the whole system “Hijri” ascribes it to an event that came long after it.
• “Corrected” turns the truth upside down. The word suggests that the original is the purely lunar calendar and that we have corrected it. In fact the purely lunar calendar is the one that was altered, when intercalation was abolished in Muawiya's time, and what we compute is the original.
• “Correct” and “true” are descriptions, not names. Proponents of different approaches apply them to different calendars, so they do not identify any one calendar.
• The name points to the source. This calendar was not made by human beings, so it is named after the One who made it.

Why is it called “The Creator's Calendar”?

• Because it is the system God set on the day He created the heavens and the earth:

  ﴿ إِنَّ عِدَّةَ ٱلشُّهُورِ عِندَ ٱللَّهِ ٱثْنَا عَشَرَ شَهْرًا فِى كِتَـٰبِ ٱللَّهِ يَوْمَ خَلَقَ ٱلسَّمَـٰوَٰتِ وَٱلْأَرْضَ ﴾ “The number of months with God is twelve months in the Book of God, on the day He created the heavens and the earth” [At-Tawbah: 36]

  And at the Farewell Pilgrimage: “Time has come round to its form on the day God created the heavens and the earth.”
• Because it is read from the sky, not from a human-made table: the month by the moon, the year by the sun, and the day by the light: “The sun and the moon move by precise reckoning” [Ar-Rahman: 5].
• Because it needs no epoch: which month we are in is known from the season and the moon's position alone (see Read the month from the sky), whereas the months of human-made calendars can only be known by counting from their first day.
• Because all calendars began from it and were then changed by people: the Babylonian, Hebrew, Chinese, Egyptian and others were originally lunisolar, then were altered in each civilization until they reached the Gregorian and the purely lunar Hijri. The count of twelve months remained in all the world's calendars as a witness to the original. Details in the history of the calendar.

What is wrong with the current Hijri?

Twelve lunar months add up to about 354 days, while the solar year that makes the seasons is about 365 days. So the purely lunar calendar moves ahead about 11 days each year, and Ramadan, the Hajj and all the months travel through every season in about 33 years. As a result:

• The month names lose their meaning: “Rabi” (spring) falls in summer, “Jumada” (drought) in the rains, and “Ramadan” in the cold; the names were given to fixed times of the year (next section).
• The dates of the Prophet's life do not fit: when dates of the Prophet's era are converted with purely lunar months, the weekdays stated in the narrations fall in the wrong places, and the seasons contradict the heat and cold the narrations describe.
• The month cannot be known from the sky: neither the season nor the moon's position tells you the month in the purely lunar calendar, so Ramadan is known only by counting months from the start of the calendar. In the lunisolar calendar, the month whose moon is two days old at the spring equinox is Rabi al-Awwal wherever it falls in history.

The witness of the month names

Lisan al-Arab quotes Ibn Durayd: “When they carried the month names over from the old language, they named them after the times in which they fell.” Among its witnesses:

• Rabi al-Awwal and Rabi al-Akhir: “The Arabs have two rabi’s: the rabi of water and rain, and the rabi of plants,” in which “truffles and blossoms” appear — the season that follows winter.
• Jumada: from drying up, as in the verse “when Jumada withheld its rain,” i.e. the month in which the rain stops.
• Ramadan: from al-ramad, and “al-ramadi among clouds and rain is what comes at the end of the hot season and the beginning of autumn” — the first rain on the hot ground.

So the names only make sense in a calendar whose months stay in their seasons. Details, and the order of the months in the seasons, in About the Calendar: the linguistic evidence.

Al-Nasi: intercalation, not manipulation

This verse is usually taken as forbidding Al-Nasi altogether. But the verse describes a specific act: they make the sacred month lawful one year and forbidden another year, to match the number of sacred months in appearance. What is condemned is the pre-Islamic manipulation of postponing the sacred months from their places, not intercalation itself.

Intercalation is an astronomical necessity: the difference between the solar year and twelve lunar months (about 11 days) accumulates, so a thirteenth month is added in a year with 13 new moons — about 7 times in every 19 years — bringing the months back into their seasons. Al-Nasi is inserted in the season that gathered four moons.

The reason for the change to the purely lunar calendar is unknown, but all the evidence and indications point to intercalation having been abolished in Muawiya's time. The full rules of intercalation are in About the Calendar: intercalation and Al-Nasi.

The evidence of the events

The narrations state the weekdays of the best-known events of the Prophet's life. These days fall exactly in The Creator's Calendar, and not in the purely lunar Hijri:

These are not hand-picked examples: the Events Evidence page compares the weekday stated in the source with the weekday of the same date in both calendars, for every event from the birth of the Prophet ﷺ to the handover of rule to Muawiya whose source states a weekday (69 events):

The epoch itself is tested: had year 1 begun in 622 or 624 instead of 623, the number of exact matches would drop from 42 to 8 and 9 — the level of chance (about 12). Details in the fingerprint of the epoch.

The seasons bear witness too: the narrations describe Tabuk in Rajab of year 9 with “intense heat,” the Trench with “intense cold,” and al-Hudaybiyya with the rain-star of Sirius; these match their seasons in The Creator's Calendar and contradict them in the purely lunar one. After Muawiya the picture reverses: the events match the Lunar Hijri calendar, which marks the point of the change.

It is no surprise that the events of the Prophet's era contradict the purely lunar Hijri: the proponents of the prevailing view themselves acknowledge that Al-Nasi was in force until the end of year 10 AH, so converting what came before it with purely lunar months drops the months that were intercalated. Every event, with its text, source and verdict, is on Events Evidence.

Ramadan in its season

Ramadan comes from al-ramad, the first rain at the end of the hot season and the beginning of autumn. In The Creator's Calendar it begins every year in autumn, between late September and mid-October, whereas in the purely lunar Hijri it travels through the seasons:

Computed by the site's engine with Madinah as reference; the Lunar Hijri here is astronomical, and its first day may differ by a day from Umm al-Qura or sighting. The seasons are astronomical, for the northern half of the earth. To find Ramadan and the months in any year: Monthly Calendar.

Read the month from the sky yourself

You need neither a table nor a count from the start of the calendar; the season and the moon are enough:

1. Know the season by its boundaries: the spring equinox (about 20 March) opens spring, the summer solstice (about 21 June) opens summer, the autumn equinox (about 23 September) opens autumn, and the winter solstice (about 21 December) opens winter.
2. The first month of the season is the month whose new moon (conjunction) falls after the start of the season, or at most two days before it: Rabi al-Awwal for spring, Jumada al-Akhira for summer, Ramadan for autumn, and Dhu al-Hijja for winter. A new moon more than two days before it belongs to the previous season.
3. Count the months after it in order: three in each season (spring: Rabi al-Awwal, Rabi al-Akhir, Jumada al-Ula · summer: Jumada al-Akhira, Rajab, Shaban · autumn: Ramadan, Shawwal, Dhu al-Qada · winter: Dhu al-Hijja, Muharram, Safar). If a season gathers four moons, one of them is Al-Nasi, placed as in the Al-Nasi table.
4. The first day of the month: the day after the new moon if it falls before sunset, and two days after if it falls after sunset (Madinah time). If you see the crescent for the first time after sunset on some day, the new moon was about a day or two before.

The site shows the moon's age and position and the month of The Creator's Calendar every day on the Today page, and the full rule for assigning a month to its season in About the Calendar.

Approaches to the “corrected Hijri calendar”

Those who hold to the lunisolar calendar agree that the months must stay in their seasons, and differ over the method of intercalation. These are the best-known approaches:

Two things set The Creator's Calendar apart: it needs no epoch to fix its months, since a month is known from the season and the moon's position; and it is verifiable, since every event of the Prophet's life can have its weekday compared with the narration. Details in A calendar that needs no beginning.

Frequently asked questions

Is The Creator's Calendar the “corrected Hijri calendar”?

In idea, yes: a lunisolar calendar with Al-Nasi that counts its years from the Hijra. It differs from some versions of the “corrected” calendar in method, being astronomically computed rather than a fixed cycle (previous section).

Was Al-Nasi not abolished at the Farewell Pilgrimage?

That is the prevailing view. But its proponents themselves acknowledge that Al-Nasi was in force until the end of year 10 AH. And the dated events after that, up to the handover of rule to Muawiya in 41 AH, match The Creator's Calendar in their weekdays, then the match switches to the Lunar Hijri after it; so all the evidence points to intercalation having been abolished in Muawiya's time.

Why does the day begin at dawn and not at sunset?

Because the day is a unit made by light: “nor does the night outstrip the day” [Ya-Sin: 40]. Details, and the history of the day's start among the nations, in The start of the day through history and Units of Time.

Why Madinah as the reference?

Because it is where dating was done in the Prophet's era. So the starts of the months, years and seasons are computed for it on every page, while the times of the day (dawn and sunset) are for your location.

How is it computed without sighting the crescent?

From the true positions of the sun and moon in NASA's astronomical tables (JPL DE441): the month begins on the day after the conjunction if it falls in daytime, and two days after if it falls at night — a criterion that stands in for sighting the crescent.

What is today's date in the correct Hijri calendar?

The Today page shows it in The Creator's Calendar and the other calendars, with the times for your city.

Use it

Convert a date to The Creator's Calendar Today's date Monthly Calendar Events Evidence About the Calendar