DPRK
May 19, 2021, 11:02pm
2
The Muslims and Jews talking about black, white, and red threads for determining the time of twilight/dawn are not talking about textiles. They mean the colour of the sky.
E.g. (from Allameh Tabatabaei’s Tafsir al-Mizan: )
Qur’an: and eat and drink until the white thread becomes distinct unto you from the black thread (of night) at dawn‑break:
There are two dawns: the first is called the ‘false’ dawn because it vanishes in a short time. It is also called the tail of the wolf because it looks as if a tail is raised. This false dawn is a beam of light like‑a vertical column; it appears at the end of the night on the eastern horizon when the sun reaches an angle of 18 degrees below the horizon. Then it gives way to a horizontal line of light which looks as if a white thread has been stretched on the horizon. This is the second dawn. It is called ‘true’ dawn because it truthfully announces the arrival of day‑time and is connected with sunrise.
Obviously, the white thread in this verse means the “true dawn”; and “at”(min) , in “at dawn‑break”(mina’l‑fafri) , is explanatory so as to clarify this phrase. This sentence is metaphorical and it likens the streak of light, stretched across the horizon, to a white thread and the darkness of night adjoining that light to a black thread.
On the red thread:
[Isha’a / Shema]:
This can be said from twilight, according to the Hanafi school, Isha begins when complete darkness has arrived and the white twilight in the sky has disappeared. According to the Maliki and Shafi’i schools, the time begins when the red thread has disappeared from the sky. It can be said until the beginning of dawn when the time for Fajr prayer begins. It should ideally be said within the first third of the night but in extenuating circumstances it can be recited up until dawn.