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Differing prayer times for Fajr and Isha?

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hegymo View Drop Down
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    Posted: 02 September 2008 at 8:44am
Hi all,

I am just wondering if anyone can shed light on why the Fajr and Isha prayer times vary so much between this site and IslamicFinder.org?

For example, if I look up zip code 02155, this is what I found:

IslamiCity.com: Fajr - 4:31, Isha - 8:55
IslamicFinder.org: Fajr - 4:52, Isha - 8:37

All the other times are pretty close (within 1 minute or exactly identical), which is understandable, but a difference of 20 minutes is a lot, especially for Fajr now that Ramadan is here and we like to stretch out Suhoor as long as possible :-)
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote icforumadmin Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 02 September 2008 at 3:35pm

Fajr and Isha Prayer Times Variations

The hadith says that Isha (night prayer) start when the redness in the west has gone, and Fajr (morning prayer) start when the redness in the east appear. So we have to define scientifically how many degrees the sun bellow the horizon when the incident (people call it twilight) happen. We use the conservative one, 18 degrees bellow horizon (astronomical twilight), Some organizations use 15 degrees. So our isha will be later and our fajr will be earlier compare to those organizations. So you can choose whatever you confortable with.

 

Here the definition of twilight from US Navy site.

http://aa.usno.navy.mil/faq/docs/RST_defs.php

Twilight: Before sunrise and again after sunset there are intervals of time, twilight, during which there is natural light provided by the upper atmosphere, which does receive direct sunlight and reflects part of it toward the Earth's surface. Some outdoor activities may be conducted without artificial illumination during these intervals, and it is useful to have some means to set limits beyond which a certain activity should be assisted by artificial lighting. The major determinants of the amount of natural light during twilight are the state of the atmosphere generally and local weather conditions in particular. Atmospheric conditions are best determined at the actual time and place of events. Nevertheless, it is possible to establish useful, though necessarily approximate, limits applicable to large classes of activities by considering only the position of the Sun below the local horizon. Reasonable and convenient definitions have evolved.

Civil twilight is defined to begin in the morning, and to end in the evening when the center of the Sun is geometrically 6 degrees below the horizon. This is the limit at which twilight illumination is sufficient, under good weather conditions, for terrestrial objects to be clearly distinguished; at the beginning of morning civil twilight, or end of evening civil twilight, the horizon is clearly defined and the brightest stars are visible under good atmospheric conditions in the absence of moonlight or other illumination. In the morning before the beginning of civil twilight and in the evening after the end of civil twilight, artificial illumination is normally required to carry on ordinary outdoor activities. Complete darkness, however, ends sometime prior to the beginning of morning civil twilight and begins sometime after the end of evening civil twilight.

Nautical twilight is defined to begin in the morning, and to end in the evening, when the center of the sun is geometrically 12 degrees below the horizon. At the beginning or end of nautical twilight, under good atmospheric conditions and in the absence of other illumination, general outlines of ground objects may be distinguishable, but detailed outdoor operations are not possible, and the horizon is indistinct.

Astronomical twilight is defined to begin in the morning, and to end in the evening when the center of the Sun is geometrically 18 degrees below the horizon. Before the beginning of astronomical twilight in the morning and after the end of astronomical twilight in the evening the Sun does not contribute to sky illumination; for a considerable interval after the beginning of morning twilight and before the end of evening twilight, sky illumination is so faint that it is practically imperceptible.

 

Some popular prayer calculation methods:

Organization

Angle of the sun under the Horizon (Fajr)

Angle of the sun under the Horizon (Isha)

Region

University Of Islamic Sciences, Karachi

18 Degrees

18 Degrees

Pakistan, Bangladesh,
India, Afghanistan, Parts of Europe

North America

15 Degrees

15 Degrees

Parts of the USA, Canada, Parts of the UK

Muslim World League

18 Degrees

17 Degrees

Europe, The Far East, Parts of the USA

Umm Al-Qura Committee

19 Degrees

90 minutes after the Sunset Prayer
120 minutes (in Ramadan only)

The Arabian Peninsula

Egyptian General Authority of Survey

19.5 Degrees

17.5 Degrees

Africa, Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, Malaysia, Parts of the USA

 
 
 
Islamicit Prayer Times
 
 


Edited by icforumadmin - 02 September 2008 at 3:42pm
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