Eid ul-Fitr (
Arabic:
عيد الفطر ‘Īdu l-Fiṭr), often abbreviated to
Eid, is a three-day
Muslim holiday that marks the end of
Ramadan, the
Islamic holy month of
fasting (
sawm).
Eid is an Arabic word meaning "festivity", while
Fiṭr means "conclusion of the fast"; and so the holiday celebrates the conclusion of the thirty days of dawn-to-sunset fasting during the entire
month of Ramadan. The first day of Eid, therefore, falls on the first day of the month
Shawwal
Eid al-Adha (
Arabic:
عيد الأضحى
‘Īdu l-’Aḍḥā) "Festival of Sacrifice" or "Greater Eid" is an important religious holiday celebrated by
Muslims worldwide to commemorate the willingness of
Abraham (
Ibrahim) to sacrifice his son Ishmael as an act of obedience to
God, but instead was able to sacrifice a ram (by God's command).
[1] Eid is also about spending time with family and friends, sacrifice, and thanksgiving for being able to afford food and housing. In traditional or agrarian settings, each family would sacrifice a domestic animal, such as a sheep, goat, cow, or camel, by slaughter (though some contemporary Muslims do not sacrifice an animal as part of their observance.
Mawlid (Milād an-Nabī) (
Qur'anic Arabic:
مَوْلِدُ النَبِيِّ
mawlid(u) (n-)nabiyy(i), “Birth of the Prophet”
Standard Arabic: مولد النبي
mawlid an-nabī, sometimes simply called in
colloquial Arabic مولد ,
mawlid, mevlid, mevlit, mulud, milad among other vernacular pronunciations) is a term used to refer to the observance of the birthday of the
Islamic prophet Muhammad which occurs in
Rabi' al-awwal, the third month in the
Islamic calendar Muslim scholars differ on whether observing the Prophet's birthday is appropriate or not.
