Louis Braille

Today, braille has been adapted to almost every major national language and is the primary system of written communication for visually impaired persons around the world. (For details, please see Islamic calendar.) All future dates listed below are only estimates:. Thomas Armitage, along with a group of four blind men, established the British and Foreign Society for Improving the Embossed Literature of the Blind (later the Royal National Institute of the Blind), which published books in Braille's system. Furthermore, the method used to determine when each Islamic month begins varies from country to country. The significance of the braille system was not identified until 1868, when Dr. While Ashurah is always on the same day of the Islamic calendar, the date on the Western calendar (the Gregorian calendar) varies from year to year due to differences between the two calendars, since the Islamic calendar is a lunar calendar and the Gregorian calendar is a solar calendar. He had always been plagued by ill health, and he died in Paris of tuberculosis in 1852 at the age of 43; his body would be disinterred in 1952 (the centenary of his death) and honored with re-interrment in the Panthéon in Paris. Some scholars, however, suggest that this day is the tenth most important day that God has blessed Muslims with; hence the name Ashurah.

Although he was admired and respected by his pupils, his braille system was not taught at the Institute during his lifetime. The general consensus is that the day is the tenth day of the month of Muharram. Braille became a well-respected teacher at the Institute where he had been a student. In his book Ghuniyatut Talibin, Sheikh Abdul Qadir Jilani writes that the Islamic scholars have a difference of opinion as to why this day is known as Ashurah. Braille and his friend Pierre Foucault went on to develop a machine to speed up the somewhat cumbersome system. The word Ashurah is Arabic for tenth. In 1839 Braille published details of a method he had developed for communication with sighted people, using patterns of dots to approximate the shape of printed symbols. The 2004 (1425 AH) Shi'a pilgrimage to Karbala, the first since Saddam Hussein was removed from power in Iraq, was marred by bomb attacks, which killed and wounded hundreds despite tight security.

The first book in braille was published in 1827 under the title Method of Writing Words, Music, and Plain Songs by Means of Dots, for Use by the Blind and Arranged for Them. [3]. Braille later extended his system to include notation for mathematics and music. Recently, Pakistan, Iraq and Afghanistan have all seen suicide Sunni bombers killing Shiite mourners. The Braille system also offered numerous benefits over Valentin Haüy's raised letter method, the most notable being the ability to both read and write an alphabet. In countries that have significant populations of both sects, there is often violence during the holiday. The six dot system allowed the recognition of letters with a single fingertip apprehending all the dots at once, requiring no movement or repositioning which slowed recognition in systems requiring more dots. The Sunni and Shi'a schism is highlighted by the difference in celebrations by Sunni and Shia Muslims.

Braille's system, "braille", used only six dots and corresponded to letters, whereas Barbier used twelve dots corresponding to sounds. Hence, Sunni practices commemorating Ashurah generally do not involve Hussein or his death and consist mainly of fasting and prayers. That year, Braille began inventing his raised-dot system with his father's stitching awl, finishing at age fifteen. While Sunnis generally consider the martyrdom of Hussein to be an unfortunate event and one of great historical importance, they do not ascribe religious significance to it as the Shi'a do. Although the code ended up being too difficult for the average soldier, Braille picked it up quickly. The day carries considerably less significance for Sunnis than it does for Shi'as. Barbier shared his invention called "night writing," a code of twelve raised dots that let soldiers share top-secret information on the battlefield without having to speak. Today,Sunnis regard fasting on the 10th of Muharram as a recommended, though not obligatory, act.

In 1821, a former soldier named Charles Barbier visited the school. They remember the day when Children of Israel were liberated from the slavery of Egyptians. However, because the raised letters were made using paper pressed against copper wire, the students never learned to write. According to Sunni tradition, when the Prophet led his followers to Medina, he found the Jews of that area fasting on the day of Ashurah in rememberance of Moses. They were also taught how to read by feeling raised letters (a system devised by the school's founder, Valentin Haüy). Sunnis also commemorate Ashurah, but for different reasons. At the school, the children were taught basic craftsman's skills and simple trades. Many of the events associated with Ashurah are held in special congregation halls known as "Hussainia".

Braille, a bright and creative student, became a talented cellist and organist in his time at the school, playing the organ for churches all over France. [2]. Braille was served stale bread and water, and students were sometimes beaten and locked up as punishment. [1] The practice is not universal - many Shia enact the ritual by beating their chests symbolically. However, the conditions in the school were not much better. Some Shia celebrate Ashurah with a traditional flagellation ritual called zanjeer zani or zanjeer matam, involving the use of a zanjeer (a chain with a set of curved knives at the end). The scholarship was his ticket out of the usual fate for the blind: begging for money on the streets of Paris. The Iranian Revolution and social and political change and the anti-government uprising of the 1990s.

At the age of ten, Braille earned a scholarship to the Institution Royale des Jeunes Aveugles (Royal Institution for Blind Youth) in Paris. In neighboring Iran, the festival became a major political symbol during the Islamic Revolution, as also occurred in the Lebanese Civil War, and in Bahrain during the History of Bahrain. Despite his disability, Braille continued to attend school, with the support of his parents, until he was required to read and write. The regime of Saddam Hussein saw this as a potential threat and banned Ashurah commemorations for many years. Braille was completely blind by the age of four. Hussein's martyrdom is widely interpreted by Shi'a as a symbol of the struggle against injustice, tyranny, and oppression. This destroyed his left eye, and sympathetic ophthalmia led to loss of vision in his right. This is intended to connect them with Hussein's suffering and death.

At the age of three, Braille injured his left eye with a stitching awl from his father's workshop. Shi'as also express mourning by thumping their chests. His father, Simon-René Braille, was a harness and saddle maker. Many Shi'a make pilgrimages on Ashurah to the Mashhad al-Hussein, the shrine in Karbala, Iraq that is traditionally held to be Husayn's tomb. Braille was born in Coupvray near Paris, France. This day is of particular significance to Shi'a Muslims, who consider Hussein the third Imam and a rightful successor of Muhammad. . .

It has been adapted to almost every known language. The word ashurah means simply tenth in Arabic; hence the festival's name, literally translated, means "the tenth day". Braille is read by passing one's fingers over characters made up of an arrangement of one to six embossed points. It was adopted by Muslims as a recommended fast in respect to the tribulations of Musa (Moses). Louis Braille (January 4, 1809 – January 6, 1852) was the inventor of braille^[1], a world-wide system used by blind and visually impaired people for reading and writing. Ashurah corresponds to the Jewish Yom Kippur, which was held by the Jews of Medina. Ashurah is also commemorated by Muslims as the traditional date on which Noah's ark came to rest, the Prophet Ibrahim (Abraham) was born and the Ka'ba was built in Mecca.

It is a day for mourning. It commemorates the martyrdom of Husayn ibn Ali, the grandson of Muhammad at the Battle of Karbala in the year 61 AH (AD 680). The Day of Āshūrāh, sometimes spelled Aashurah, ‘Ashurah, Ashoura or Aashoorah (Arabic: عاشوراء, ʿĀšūrāʾ), is on the 10th day of Muharram in the Islamic calendar and marks the climax of the Festival of Muharram but not the Islamic month. 2010: December 16.

2009: January 7, then December 27. 2008: January 19. 2007: January 29. 2006: February 9.

2005: February 19. 2004: March 2. 2003: March 13.