crescent

[brionon]

Does anyone know the significance of the Crescent in Islam, please?

[Foxglove]

Both the star and the crescent which make up the symbol for Islam are reminders that Islam guides and lights the way through life, just as the star and moon do in the night.

[jno]

crescent means 'growing', from the Latin, so a crescent moon is getting bigger night by night (a decrescent one is getting smaller). The partly circular shape gives its name to curved roads, Acacia Crescent and so on.

Turks sometimes complain that Armenians put Mt Ararat on their flag - it's the Armenian national symbol, but the mountain was forcibly handed over to Turkey in the 1920s. The Turks say it's outrageous to have land you don't even own on your flag. The Armenians say, well, you've got the moon on yours...

[Clanad]

Another explanation, with a remnant of the original beliefs incorporated into Islam (not unlike Pagan beliefs incorporated into Chrisitanity) and found in Surah 74:32 of the Koran, is that for some 2,000 years before Mohammed, Moon worship had been practiced in Arabia. In Mecca, a holy city of Islam, the local diety was named Hubal (one of 360 such dieties) and was a moon god. Apparently the symbol of this local diety was the crescent moon and this was placed on top of the Ka'bah in Mecca. In fact every minaret in Mecca today has the crescent on top. The moon god was reffered to as "ai-lah", which is a general reference meanin "the god". This, according to Hafiz Ghulam Sarwar, a Muslim, in his book, Mohammed, the Holy Prophet. This term was shortened to "Allah" prior to Mohammed's rise in AD 610. It appears that the Prophet incorporated the name Allah, but dropped all references to Hubal. The crescent was retained, however as an important symbol of Islam. (Sources: The Moslem Doctrine of God, Samuel Zwemer, Mohammed: The man and his faith, Tor Andre, et al)