Fatwa

Fatwa (pronounced faht-wah)

(1) In Islam, a religious decree issued by a high authority (such as a mufti) or the ʿulama (a body of Muslim scholars who are recognized as having specialist knowledge of Islamic sacred law and theology).

(2) In Islam, a non-binding judgment on a point of Islamic law given by a recognized religious authority.

1620s: From the Arabic fatwā or fetwā (a legal ruling given by a mufti) and related to fata (to instruct by a legal decision).  The Arabic فَتْوَى‎ (fatwā) was the verbal noun of أَفْتَى‎ (ʾaftā) (to deliver a formal opinion; he gave a legal decision), مُفْتٍ‎ (muftin) (mufti) the active participle of the same verb.  The noun mufti, one of a number of titles in the Islamic legal and institutional structures, dates from the 1580s muphtie (official head of the state religion in Turkey), from the Arabic mufti (judge), the active participle (with formative prefix mu-) of afta (to give) a conjugated form of fata.  The alternative forms are fatwah, fetwa, fetwah, futwa & (the archaic medieval) futwah although in some early sources it appeared as fotyā (plural fatāwā) & fatāwī; in English use, it’s written usually as fatwa.  Fatwa is a noun & verb and fatwaing & fatwaed are verbs; the noun plural is fatwas or fatawa.  The occasionally used adjectives fatwaesque & fatwaish are non-standard.

Portrait of the Imam as a young man: Grand Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini (1900–1989; Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran, 1979-1989).

Apart from the work of historians and other scholars, the word was rare in English, popularized in the West only when, on Valentine’s day 1989, Ayatollah Khomeini issued a fatwā sentencing to death the author Salman Rushdie (b 1947) and others associated with publishing The Satanic Verses (1988), the charge being blasphemy.  The fatwā was revoked in 1998.  Interestingly, in purely juristic terms, The Satanic Verses fatwā is thought neither remarkable nor innovative, the call for extra-judicial killings, the summary execution of those condemned without judicial process, was well grounded in the historic provisions of Shiʿite (and Sunni) jurisprudence.  What lent this fatwā its impact was it had been issued by a head of state against the citizen of another country and seemed thus archaic in late twentieth century international relations.

A fatwā is the authoritative ruling of a religious scholar on questions (masāʾel) of Islamic jurisprudence either (1) dubious or obscure in nature (shobohāt) or (2) which are newly arisen and for which there is no known precedent (mostaḥdaṯāt) and it’s in connection with the latter category that the word fatwā has long been regarded as cognate with fatā (young man); the sense of something new.  However, the enquiry eliciting a fatwā may relate to an existing ordinance (ḥokm) of Islamic law (particularly one unknown to the questioner) or to its application to a specific case or occurrence which is sufficiently different to the way something has historically been applied.  In this case, the fatwā functions as an act to clarify the relevant ordinance (tabyīn-e ḥokm).  This can apply to something novel like new technology.  The International Space Station (ISS) operates at an altitude of 250 miles (400 km) and travels at 17,500 mph (28,000 km/h), thus orbiting Earth every ninety minutes so when a Muslim astronaut requested guidance about the correct protocols to ensure he was facing towards Mecca when in prayer, a Malaysian scholar issued a fatwā.

The process of requesting a fatwā is termed esteftāʾ; the one who requests it is the mostaftī; its delivery is the eftāʾ; and the one who delivers it is the moftī.  There is nothing in Islamic law which dictates a fatwā must be either requested or provided in writing although this has always been the common practice and certainly followed in matters of importance.  However, request and fatwā may be delivered orally and the practice is doubtlessly widespread, especially when merely confirming things generally known. The technical process of the fatwā wasn’t an invention of Islam.  In Roman civil law, the principle of jus respondendi (the right of responding) was an authority conferred on senior jurists when delivering legal opinions; thought essentially the right to embellish a ruling with an opinion, some historians maintain it was even a right to issue a dissent although there’s no agreement on this.  Perhaps even closer was the Jewish practice of Responsa (in Latin the plural of responsum (answer)) which in practice translated as “ask the Rabbi”.

As a general principle, fatwās exist to address specific and actual problems or uncertainties, although rulings are not infrequently sought on a set of interrelated questions or on hypothetical problems the occurrence of which is anticipated.  A legal scholar can thus provide what is, in effect, an advisory opinion; something generally unknown in the Western legal tradition.  Nor are fatwās of necessity concerned purely with legal matters, doctrinal considerations necessarily involved whenever a fatwā results in takfīr (the condemnation of individuals or groups as unbelievers).  This is a feature especially in Shiʿite collections of fatwās which are sometimes prefaced with a summary of essential doctrines, intended to create concise handbooks for the common believer of both theology and law.

A misunderstood aspect of the fatwā is the extent to which it can be held to be mandatory.  Because of the structures of Islam, a fatwā is not comparable to a papal bull which is an absolute ruling from the Holy See; a fatwā is intrinsically obligatory simply because there is in Islam not the one lineal hierarchy, it is an expression of learned opinion which relies for its authority upon the respect afforded to the author and the willingness of followers to comply.  That’s not to say that some strains of Islam don’t attempt to formalise a structure which would impose that obligation.  In Shiʿism, the authority to deliver a fatwā is generally restricted to the mojtahed (the jurist qualified to deduce the specific ordinances of the law (forūʿ) from its sources (oṣūl), and obedience to the mojtahed of their choice (the marjaʿ-e taqlīd) is incumbent on all who lack learned qualifications.  As a specific point of law, the ruling given in the fatwā of a mojtahed is obligatory for those who sought.

Holy Quran commissioned by the last Shah of Iran, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi (1919-1980).

One curious aspect of the fatwās is that while the process is only partially based on anything from the Holy Quran, by definition the content of a  fatwā can be based on nothing else.  The theological point is that while there are Quranic verses in which the Prophet was asked for rulings (yasʾalūnaka (they ask you) & yastaftūnaka (they ask you for a ruling)), the Prophet himself is not the source of the rulings for in these versus he is instructed to say, “God provides you with a ruling” (Allāho yoftīkom); a fatwā, ultimately relying for its authority not on the scholarship of the writer but upon it being Quranic: the word of God.  This relationship is made explicit in the injunction in 16:43 (“Ask the People of Remembrance (ie those learned in the Holy Quran) if you do not know”).  This accounts also for the brevity of most fatwās compared with Western traditions, it being superfluous for the moftī to cite textual or other evidence simply because all that can be issued is what can easily be referenced in the in Holy Quran.  It can be no other way because, under Islamic doctrine, Muhammad was the last prophet and thus, after his death in 632, God ceased to communicate with mankind through revelation and prophets; from that point onward, for all time, there are only the words of the Holy Quran.

Lindsay Lohan in hijab.

The vexed matter of the wearing of the hijab (or any of the other variations in Women’s “modest” clothing associated with Islam (as it is with some other faiths)) is an example of the fatwa in operation.  The Holy Quran contains passages discussing the concept of modesty in attire (for both men and women) but the interpretation and application of these has varied greatly within Islam’s many strands.  The Quranic verse most commonly cited is in Surah An-Nur (24:31) where it instructs believing women to “draw their veils over their bosoms and not display their beauty except to their husbands, their fathers, their husbands' fathers, their sons, their husbands' sons, their brothers, or their brothers' sons or their sisters' sons, or their women, or their slaves whom their right hands possess, or male attendants who lack vigor, or children who are not yet aware of the nakedness of women.”  So there’s no explicit mention of “heads or hair” but many Islamic scholars have constructed this as a directive for women to cover their hair when in the presence of those not immediate family members or close relatives.

Lindsay Lohan in hijab.

It’s not only in Islam that interpretations of religious texts can vary widely but in the early twenty-first century (and the trend has been accelerating since the triumpt of the 1979 revolution in Iran) it’s upon Islam where much of the liberal West’s attention has been focused, this interest not the garments but the allegations of coercion imposed on women.  Some in the West have even gone as far as to deny Islamic women the possibility that in choosing to hijab they are exercising free will, suggesting they are victims of what the Marxists call “false consciousness”.  In Islamic communities, cultural, regional and historic customs also play a significant role in how hijab is understood and practiced which is why there have been fatwas which interpret the Quranic verses as severely as dictating a burqa, as a head-scarf or merely a mode of dress and conduct which could be described as “modest” or “non-provocative”.

Lindsay Lohan in hijab.

So when there are competing fatwas, a choice must be made.   Were one to take a purely theoretical position, one might hold that choice would be made on the basis of an individual's personal beliefs, level of religious observance and understanding of Islamic teachings and, because within Islam there is such a diversity of opinion, a follower might be encouraged to consult with knowledgeable scholars and from that make an informed decision.  However, it’s absurd to suggest that process might be followed in a state like Afghanistan which maintains a “hijab police” and enforces a dress code as specific as a military parade ground.  A fatwa thus exists in its cultural, social and legal context and even in for those living in the liberal West, forces may within families or communities operate to mean the matter of choice is a rare luxury.

Mufti

Mufti (pronounced muhf-tee (U) or muff-tee (non-U))

(1) Civilian clothes, in contrast with military or other uniforms worn (as applied to persons who usually wear a uniform (used in the English-speaking world except North America); the synonym is civvies.

(2) As Islamic scholar & jurist expert in the shari’a law and the interpretation of legal principles written in the Koran who issues fatwas.

(3) In the Ottoman Empire, a deputy to the Sultan’s chief adviser on matters of Islamic law.

(4) As Grand Mufti, a senior figure in some Islamic systems.

(5) The acronym of Minimum Use of Force and Tactical Intervention, used in the military and law enforcement.

1580-1590: From the Ottoman Turkish مفتی‎ (müftî), from the Arabic مُفْتِي‎ (muftī) (one who delivers a fatwa (literally “deliverer of formal opinion”), from مُفْتٍ‎ (muftin), the active participle of أَفْتَى‎ (ʾaftā) (to give), a conjugated form of fata (he gave a (legal) decision).  The use to describe civilian clothes (worn by military officers when off-duty) as opposed to military uniform dates from 1816 and was a term used in the British Indian Army under the Raj.  The origin is murky but is presumed to reference a mufti’s costume of robe and slippers in stage plays of the time and was thus a synecdoche for plain clothes.  The archaic alternative spellings in English were muftee & mufty; the noun plural is muftis.

Of Muftis, the Sheikhs, Mullahs, Imams and Ayatollahs

Sheikh Hasina Wazed (b1947; Prime Minister of Bangladesh 1996-2001 & since 2009).

Like many religions, In Islam there are a number of titles, some of which seem to overlap and the use in one place can in detail differ from the duties and responsibilities undertaken in another.  An added complication is that Islam does not have the same distinctions between religious and other matters familiar in many other faiths.  A Mullah (the word a substitute for molvi or molai) is one who has studied and attained a degree in the fields of Hadith, Tafseer & Fiqh from any authentic Jamia or Madrassah (University of Islamic Sciences) and holds a qualification of Sanad or Ijazat-e-Hadees.   A student is announced Scholar (Molvi) in a graduation ceremony after when he has attained Ijazat e Hadith from his teacher of Hadith (Sheikh-ul-Hadith).  With this qualification, the graduate is deemed able to understand & explain Ahadith (plural of Hadith (the entire collection of hadiths (sayings and deeds) of Muhammad within a particular branch of Islam or Islamic jurisprudence).  A Mufti is one who, after graduating, has undertaken further study in a specialization in one or more of the field such as law or history.  A Mufti is able to issue a fatwa, a written authorized verdict on any of the Islamic problems brought to his attention.  The best known of these judgments are those associated with Dar-ul-ifta (the institution with the authority to write and publish verdicts on the Islamic issues of every nature).  A Grand Mufti is the highest ranked Mufti at a Dar-ul-ifta and can be thought of as something like a chief judge in a court but, because Islam is structurally more integrated than the pattern understood in many countries, such comparisons are merely indicative.

Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini (1900-1989; supreme leader of Iran 1979-1989).

The widely used Sheikh is often misunderstood.  It is an honorific title for someone and need not be formally conferred and, unusually, it can be used by women; a mark of respect vaguely similar to “sir” in English or “san” in Japanese.  However, in some parts of the Arab world, Sheikh can be used instead of mufti (or molvi).  An Imam is a leader, the term used for a recognized religious scholar or authority in Islam and in Sunni Islam, it is the Imam is the one who leads formal prayers, even in locations beyond a mosque and for a mosque formally to be constituted, there must be an imam to lead the prayers, even if in circumstances it may be someone from the gathered congregation rather than an appointed official.  Such a person is chosen on the basis of their knowledge of the Quran, and Sunnah (the prophetic tradition) and their good character; their age is not relevant.  Imams, formal and otherwise are almost always male and in some traditions exclusively so but in some cultures women certainly lead women in prayer and there is a long history of women fulfilling the role when the congregation is comprised exclusively of family members, even if it includes men.  The Sunni branch of Islam does not have imams in the same sense as the Shi'a where the role is best understood in the position of Ayatollah, the most famous of which are those of the Islamic Republic of Iran.  The founder of that state, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, was within the country usually referred to as “the Imam”, a courtesy title not extended to his successor.

The Führer and the Grand Mufti, Berlin, 1941.

The 1941 meeting in Berlin between Adolf Hitler (1889-1945; Nazi head of government 1933-1945 & head of state 1934-1945) and the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem (Mohammed Amin al-Husseini (1897–1974) Mufti (Grand Mufti after 1922) of Jerusalem 1921-1948) cast a long shadow.  In 2015 then Israeli prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (b 1949; prime minister 1996-1999 & 2009- 2021) claimed Hitler at the time of the meeting was not considering exterminating the Jews, but only expelling them from Europe and that it was al-Husseini who inspired the genocide of the holocaust to ensure they didn’t come to Palestine.  Mr Netanyahu is marvelously unscrupulous and inclined, where there's some gap or inconsistency in the historical record, to insert alternative facts which suit his purposes.

The only record of the meeting is the official German report, published decades ago and there’s nothing in it to support Mr Netanyahu’s accusations.  Of course, an official government record of a meeting involved his head of state may not be a complete record of the conversation and it may be that the views attributed to the mufti by Mr Netanyahu are exactly those expressed to the Führer and not included in the official record for reasons of political sensitivity.  It’s just that there’s no basis for the accusation and that all the available evidence does confirm the Nazis had months before the meeting taken the decision to proceed with the holocaust and the planning was well-advanced before the mufti arrived in Berlin.  The mufti was anti-Semitic and collaborated with the Nazis as a broadcaster and propagandist, helping recruit Balkan Muslims to form a division of the Waffen-SS.  He also appears to have known about the Holocaust as early as 1943 but there is no evidence to support the assertion he was in 1941 either its inspiration or even an advocate.

Australia’s most entertaining mufti was the Egyptian-born Sheikh Taj El-Din Hamid Hilaly (b 1941; Mufti of Australia 1988-2007),  After a quiet start he was never far from the news but his most celebrated moment came in 2006 when he delivered a sermon discussing the relationship between rape and the clothing women choose to wear.  The essence of his message was:

Were one to leave uncovered meat in the street, in the garden, in the park or in the backyard, just leave it without a cover, when the cat comes and eats it, is that the fault of the cat or the uncovered meat?  Of course it is the fault of the uncovered meat.  If she was in her room, in her home, in her hijab, no problem would have occurred.

Covered meat: Lindsay Lohan in hijab (al-amira).

After repeating his comments in public, there was an unfavorable reaction and he issued a statement: "I unreservedly apologize to any woman who is offended by my comments. I had only intended to protect women's honor, something lost in (the newspaper’s) presentation of my talk.  I would like to unequivocally confirm that the presentation related to religious teachings on modesty and not to go to extremes in enticements. This does not condone rape. I condemn rape.  Women in our Australian society have the freedom and right to dress as they choose; the duty of man is to avert his glance or walk away."

Auspicious

Auspicious (pronounced aw-spish-uhs)

(1) Promising success; propitious; opportune; favorable.

(2) Favored by fortune; prosperous; fortunate (rare).

1590s: From the Latin auspicium (divination by observing the flight of birds), the construct being auspex (augur) (genitive auspicis) + -ous (the suffix used to form adjectives from nouns, to denote possession or presence of a quality in any degree, commonly in abundance.  It's from the Middle English -ous, borrowed from Old French -ous and -eux, from Latin -ōsus (full, full of); Doublet of -ose).  The usual modern rendering of the Latin auspicium is “augury” which reflects the influence of French on the adoption of Latin forms in English.  Auspicious has long been understood to mean “of good omen” and, although it’s still sometimes used to mean “fortunate”, this probably indicates a misunderstanding.  The related forms are the adverb auspiciously and the noun auspiciousness.  Unfortunately, most may be more familiar with the companion adjective inauspicious (ill-omened, unlucky, unfavorable), dating from the 1590s, from the Latin inauspicatus (without auspices; with bad auspices) which briefly enjoyed a place in seventeenth century English as inauspicate.

The Auspicious Incident

Janissary soldiers in the red and white colors dating from the pre-firearms era.

The Auspicious Incident (in the Turkish Vaka-i Hayriye (fortunate event) and spoken of in the Balkans as Vaka-i Şerriyye (unfortunate incident)) was the forced disbandment of the Janissary corps by the Ottoman Sultan Mahmud II on 15 June 1826.  Formed during the fourteenth century, the Janissaries (in Ottoman Turkish يڭيچرى‎ (yeñiçeri) (new soldier)) were an elite formation, essentially the Sultan's private army and, remarkably for such blood-soaked soil, the first standing army in the region since antiquity.  Although, as a military unit, the Janissaries were for centuries indispensable to sultans, the character of the corps changed over the years with the creation of bureaucratic and mercantile structures, both run by civilians and thus creating an independent power-base.  It was the kind of mission-creep not dissimilar to the evolution of the Sturmabteilung (the Storm Troopers (SA) or brownshirts) in the Third Reich or the Praetorian Guard in Ancient Rome and like both of them, the Janissaries came to be seen a threat to the leader rather than a protective guard.

Depiction of Janissaries during the slave era.

Curiously, the origin of the Janissaries was in a group of slaves, bound for their lives personally to the sultan after being captured as children and forcibly converted from Christianity. Despite this unpromising beginning, the Janissaries gained a reputation for bravery and loyally and were a critically important military component in many of the Ottoman’s most celebrated battles, most famously the fall of Constantinople in 1453.  The battle-readiness however was affected as a gradual decline in the standards of recruitment and training diminished both their effectiveness and loyalty to the sultan; by the early nineteenth century the Janissaries were effectively an armed political party focused on extending their economic interests and controlling the empire by implied military threat which sometimes was expressed in the several coups in which they were implicated, their oath of loyalty which once had been to a sultan personally instead arbitrarily re-interpreted as being to the throne which left them free to overthrow any tiresome sultan and replace him with one more compliant.  From being the king’s protectors, they had become the king-makers.

Depiction of Janissary soldiers in the age when battlefield skirmishes were decided by the "blade of the sword and the splutter of musketry".

The character of the formation had certainly changed but Ottoman law had not been amended to reflect what had happened.  As slaves the Janissaries had no money and were thus untaxed but after the rules began to allow those with an established income to become Janissaries, these recruits brought their businesses and profits with them, thus becoming part of an elite military force yet still exempt from tax, an imbalance which sparked jealously and resentment throughout the empire.  Sultans and their advisors had long been aware of the problem and the threat posed but attempts at reform had always been resisted.

Mahmud II.

When Mahmud II (Mahmud-u s̠ānī (محمود ثانى in Ottoman Turkish) 1785-1839; Sultan of the Ottoman Empire 1808-1839) became sultan in 1808 he was under no illusions, having watched several of his predecessors lose their thrones and lives in Janissary-led coups but he had to be both cautious and furtive for whatever decline in military effectiveness might have afflicted the Janissaries, their intelligence operation had infiltrated much of the state.  Instead of direct conflict, Mahmud choose gradualism, imposing minor reforms which annoyed the Janissaries who resisted things like changes to their uniform which had been suggested as part of a military modernization.  In the face of their opposition to this and other minor matters, the sultan relented, inducing in the Janissaries a complainant assumption that their immunity from change would continue.  Quietly however, Mahmud was forming a modern, Western-style army and when ready, he issued a fatwa which detailed his intended military re-structure, marginalizing the Janissary.  This prompted, as the devious sultan had intended, a Janissary rebellion, the disaffected troops taking to the streets, planning another act of sultanicide.  At this point was executed a brutally efficient plan was using the Sipahi, a cavalry division with a pedigree more ancient even than the Janissaries and with which they shared a bitter rivalry.  Striking without warning, the Sipahi took advantage of their greater mobility to drive the Janissaries back to their barracks which, secretly, Mahmud II had surrounded with artillery imported from Europe disguised as farm machinery.  In a ferocious siege, the barracks were subject to a barrage of such intensity that in the ensuing blaze, over 4,400 Janissaries were incinerated before the survivors scattered, many subsequently exiled while the last were put to death by decapitation in the Thessaloniki fort which Turks came to call the Tower of Blood.  As a reward, the Sipahi formed the core of a new elite force called the Victorious Soldiers of Muhammad and the sultan continued his programme of military modernization.  

The bloody business came to be known to the Turks as the auspicious incident because it lent the Ottoman army (and therefore the empire) a Turkish rather than multi-national character and the structures endured until the empire was dissolved in 1922 (formally in 1924).  In other parts of the caliphate, the events came to be called the unfortunate incident because the consequential centralization of authority in Constantinople dissipated what had been a hard fought for regional autonomy.

Conjunction

Conjunction (pronounced kuhn-juhngk-shuhn)

(1) In grammar, any member of a small class of words distinguished in many languages by their function as connectors between words, phrases, clauses, or sentences, as and, because, but, however.

(2) Any other word or expression of similar function, as in any case.

(3) The act of conjoining; combination.

(4) The state of being conjoined; union; association.

(5) A combination of events or circumstances.

(6) In formal logic, a compound proposition that is true if and only if all of its component propositions are true.

(7) In formal logic, the relation among the components of such a proposition, usually expressed by the ∧ (∧) operator.

(8) Sexual intercourse (obsolete except for historic or poetic use).

(8) In astronomy, the coincidence of two or more heavenly bodies at the same celestial longitude; also called solar conjunction (the position of a planet or the moon when it is in line with the sun as seen from the earth. The inner planets are in inferior conjunction when the planet is between the earth and the sun and in superior conjunction when the sun lies between the earth and the planet).

(9) The state of two or more such coinciding heavenly bodies.

(10) In astrology, the coincidence of two or more heavenly bodies at the same celestial longitude, characterized by a unification of the planetary energies; an astrological aspect (an exact aspect of 0° between two planets, etc, an orb of 8° being allowed).

1350–1400: From the Middle English conjunccio(u)n, a borrowing from the Anglo-French and Old French conjonction, from the Latin conjunctiōn- (stem of conjunctiō (joining) from coniungere (to join), the second-person singular future passive indicative of coniungō.  Conjunction is a noun, conjunctive is a noun & adjective and conjugate is a noun, verb & adjective; the noun plural is conjunctions.

Beginning a sentence with a conjunction

Unlike French, which has the Académie Française, English has no central authority; assessments of correctness can be made by anyone, judgments of whom others can make of what they will; it's something like the concept of the fatwa in Islam and from this linguistic free-for-all emerged the “rule” a sentence shouldn’t begin with a conjunction.  In English, there’s actually no rule against a sentence beginning with a coordinating conjunction like and, but or yet but the mistaken belief in some sort of prohibition is widespread.  In the literature, thoughts on the origin of this are all conjecture but the theme of most suggestions is the practice is somehow inelegant (although harsher critics describe it as lazy and sloppy) and with a little effort, a more complex and pleasing construction might emerge.  That said, the prohibition has no historical or grammatical foundation and examples exist in the Magna Carta (1215), the United States Constitution (1787), judgments from the US Supreme Court (since at least 1803) and Abraham Lincoln's (1809–1865; US president 1861-1865) Gettysburg Address (1863) and Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary of English Usage traced instances of use even in Old English.  That one is allowed to do something doesn’t mean one should do something and even then, it can be done too often.  A work like however doesn’t have the same feel as but; it’s in a higher register so the choice of which to use to start a sentence may be dictated by style as much as meaning.  So while beginning a sentence with and is permissible English, if overused it makes for dull and repetitive text.

The Great Conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn, 21 December 2021.

In an alignment dubbed the “Christmas Star”, Jupiter and Saturn, the solar system’s two largest planets, appeared on 21 December 2021 to be closer together than they have in nearly 400 years.  From the earth, the giant planets appeared a tenth of a degree apart although they are hundreds of millions of miles apart.  Also, as NASA confirmed, it’s been some 800 years since the planets aligned at night, timing that gave almost everyone on planet Earth the chance to observe the astronomical event known as a “Great Conjunction”, a similar alignment not due until 2080, with the next close conjunction following 337 years later, in 2417.  The event was unusual also because it fell on the winter solstice, the longest night of the year, a “rare coincidence,” NASA advised because “the date of the conjunction is determined by the positions of Jupiter, Saturn, and the Earth in their paths around the Sun, while the date of the solstice is determined by the tilt of Earth’s axis.”

Lindsay Lohan (2011).

Screened in conjunction with the 54^th international exhibition of the Venice Biennale (June 2011), Lindsay Lohan was a short film the director said represented a “new kind of portraiture.”  Filmed in Malibu, California, the piece was included in the Commercial Break series, presented by Venice’s Garage Center for Contemporary Culture and although the promotional notes indicated it would include footage of the ankle monitor she helped make famous, the device doesn't appear in the final cut.

Directed by: Richard Phillips & Taylor Steele
Director of Photography: Todd Heater
Costume Designer: Ellen Mirojnick
Creative Director: Dominic Sidhu
Art Director: Kyra Griffin
Editor: Haines Hall
Color mastering: Pascal Dangin for Boxmotion
Music: Tamaryn & Rex John Shelverton