to the Ramadan crescent twenty-nine days after the first witness’s sighting, their testimony would necessarily be admissible, because the second witness corroborates the first: the second witness’s testimony cannot be true unless the first witness’s testimony is also true. He means that fasting begins upon the completion of thirty days reckoned from his sighting. He said: “This is a subtle point.”

I say: To me, however, the reasoning is not clear. Just as the second witness corroborates the first here because the crescent cannot be sighted on the twenty-ninth night, so too, in the first case, the first witness corroborates the second because the crescent must be sighted on the thirty-first night. The correct view, in my judgment, is therefore that there is no distinction between the two cases, and that the same two opinions can be applied to both. Both witnesses agree that fasting becomes obligatory upon the completion of thirty days from the first witness’s sighting, even though they differ in what they have testified to. When two witnesses differ in their testimony but agree on the legal consequence it entails, the well-known position is that their testimony is inadmissible.

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If a great multitude sights the crescent, or its sighting is established before the ruler through the testimony of two witnesses and he orders fasting, fasting becomes obligatory upon everyone who receives this information through a single upright transmitter. This falls under accepting an individual’s report, not formal testimony. This is reported from Ahmad ibn Muyassar, who said: “If an upright person informs you that the sighting of the crescent has been established before the ruler and that he has ordered fasting, or conveys this information to you from another town, you must fast on the basis of his report, as a matter of accepting an individual’s report, not formal testimony.” Ibn Abī Zayd said: “This is like a man conveying the information to his family and children: they must fast on his word.”

Abū Imrān is reported to have challenged this, saying: “A man is not obliged to fast in this case on one person’s word, because that person is a witness. This is not like a man conveying the information to his family and children, for he is responsible for them, and they must therefore fast on his word.” He said: “The original report from Ibn Muyassar states only: ‘If a group sends a man to a town and he informs them that its inhabitants have sighted the crescent, they must fast on his word.’” He said: “This provides no proof, because, by sending him for that purpose, they made him their investigator, and his report therefore obliged them to fast.”

Abū Imrān’s position has no sound basis. There is no distinction between his informing them without their having sent him, informing them after they have sent him, or informing his own family and children.

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In my view, this distinction applies only to the rulings issued by the ruler. For if the ruler sends a man to