The final frontier

This is pretty crazy - 2 blog posts in 10 minutes.

Oh, well, anyway...

I've been thinking about this since last week. And today, I even had a discussion (albeit informally) on this matter. Remember the Malaysian mission to outer space? Well, everyone knows that we're sending an astronaut to space, and anyone who has been following the news would be aware that there is an interesting discussion on how to determine the prayer times in space.

What we know is this:

• Muslims pray five times a day (which is a period of 24 hours)
• The Earth makes one complete rotation on its axis in approximately 24 hours, where one complete rotation is equal to one day and one night
• The astronaut will be on a spacecraft that will orbit the Earth 16 times in 24 hours

The questions that arose are:

• Does this mean that the astronaut (assuming that the chosen one is Muslim) will have to pray 80 times in 24 hours because of the above facts?
• If not, how do we solve this situation?

This is my 2-cent on this matter, bearing in mind I'm no expert on either fiqh nor astronomy:

• We already understand the definition of "one day and one night" in the context of somebody who is on the planet Earth, whereby "one day and one night" is in the context of the Earth's rotation relative to the sun. However, we now need to define "one day and one night" in the context of somebody who is in space, where time and space is, in a manner of speaking, relative to an object of reference. If my limited understanding is correct, in space, there is no up and no down, no north, no south, no east, no west. In other words, no sense of direction since everything is relative. If direction is relative in space, wouldn't time also be relative? The question is, relative to what? To Earth? To the sun? To the nearest stellar object?
• We know that Islam is suitable for all people, for all time, for all places (which should include outer space, and any other planets for that matter). So, theoretically, there is a solution to this problem. We just have to get the right experts to deliberate on this.

This is indeed something very interesting to ponder upon. I'd love to know what the solution is. This problem is completely on the other end of the spectrum of the problem faced by somebody who is in the poles, where you get 6 months of day and 6 months of night. Does this mean that the people in the North and South Poles pray 5 times in a year? And if Ramadhan falls in winter, does that mean that they don't have to fast since fasting is only during the day? On the other side of the coin, when Ramadhan falls in summer, does this mean that they'll have to fast for 6-month long?

Indeed, there is a solution to this problem, as most ulama decreed that those experiencing 6 months of daylight and 6 months without, should follow the prayer times (and therefore, fasting times) of the nearest Muslim country.

So, essentially all this is a matter of ijtihad. If the problem in the poles can be solved, I'm quite sure that there is a solution to the problem in outer space.

But whatever it is, don't scream at the people trying to think up a solution. Because as they say, "in space, no one can hear you scream!"