Muharram 1450 AH

Muharram is the first month of the Islamic Hijri calendar and one of the four sacred months in which warfare and bloodshed are explicitly prohibited by the Qur'an. The name Muharram derives from the Arabic root harama, meaning forbidden or sacred. The month opens the Islamic year and contains the Day of Ashura on the tenth, observed across Sunni and Shia traditions in different but profound ways. For Sunni Muslims, Ashura commemorates the deliverance of the Prophet Musa and the Israelites from Pharaoh, marked by a recommended voluntary fast. For Shia Muslims, the entire first ten days of Muharram are a period of mourning culminating in the remembrance of the martyrdom of Imam Husayn ibn Ali at the Battle of Karbala in 680 CE.