Ignorance of the lunar calendar caused persistent confusion about Muslim feasts

Evidence

The general failure to realise that the Muslim year is lunar, and, being shorter, moves back through the solar year, made all confusion worse. — Norman Daniel, Islam and the West, 2356 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Now historia, as I mentioned earlier, means to learn by inquiry; ta’rı¯kh comes from an old Semitic word meaning the moon. It means, in other words, dating: a system of dating by natural phenomena, and it reflects the concern to establish a precise and accurate chronology. Ta’rı¯kh means, in the modern American idiom, to tell it like it was, or, in the more elegant phrase of von Ranke, “wie es eigentlich gewesen ist.” — Bernard Lewis, From Babel to Dragomans, 1923 (#expands, via linked claim)

Most conspicuous to us is the inability of any of these systems of thought [European Christian] to provide a fully satisfying explanation of the phenomenon they had set out to explain [Islam]—still less to influence the course of practical events in a decisive way. At a practical level, events never turned out either so well or so ill as the most intelligent observers predicted; and it is perhaps worth noticing that they never turned out better than when the best judges confidently expected a happy ending. Was there any progress [in Christian knowledge of Islam]? I must express my conviction that there was. Even if the solution of the problem remained obstinately hidden from sight, the statement of the problem became more complex, more rational, and more related to experience.… The scholars who labored at the problem of Islam in the Middle Ages failed to find the solution they sought and desired; but they developed habits of mind and powers of comprehension which, in other men and in other fields, may yet deserve success. — Edward W. Said, Orientalism, 168 (#expands, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Medieval confusion about Islam stemmed from not knowing the lunar calendar — Norman Daniel, Islam and the West, 2356; The Arabic word for history derives from moon-based dating — Bernard Lewis, From Babel to Dragomans: Interpreting…, 1923; Medieval Christian knowledge systems failed to explain or influence Islam — Edward W. Said, Orientalism, 168 (+1 more)

Related

• Medieval confusion about Islam stemmed from not knowing the lunar calendar (similarity 0.91)
• Medieval Christian writers confused Muslim dating because they missed the lunar calendar’s solar drift (similarity 0.85)
• The Arabic word for history derives from moon-based dating (similarity 0.84)

Broader Connections

• Medieval confusion about Islam stemmed from not knowing the lunar calendar #corroborates (0.95) — Norman Daniel, Islam and the West, 2356
• The Arabic word for history derives from moon-based dating #expands (0.75) — Bernard Lewis, From Babel to Dragomans, 1923
• Medieval Christian knowledge systems failed to explain or influence Islam #expands (0.70) — Edward W. Said, Orientalism, 168
• Representations of Islam ignored Muslim self-understanding and resisted factual correction #expands (0.70) — Edward W. Said, Orientalism, 166