Traditional Islamic Psychotherapy and Psychiatry.

[Nehustan]

As Salaam Alaykum ya Ukwaty wa Akawaty,

I am currently carrying out research for my MSc dissertation. It is in Medical Anthropology, and my Professor has suggested I look at Islam and psychiatry, both historically and contemporarily.

Most of my research for this dissertation is likely to be based around secondary sources (i.e. Literature review), but as I once again have access to this forum, I thought that it might be a good place to ask questions and/or sound out some hypotheses.

Hopefully my MSc dissertation will lead onto a PhD programme, which will see me able to carry out primary research with traditional healers on the ground in the Levant. I've already been discussing this with a coordinator and I will probably be based out of Amman with its easy access to the whole of Bilad As Sham, but also the close Maghrib, i.e. Aegypt.

I was hoping that I might initiate a discussion of your experience of traditional healers, either first hand, familial, or by how ever many degrees of separation might apply.

I'm more than happy to expand upon my research to date, as this may allow us to set the boundaries of what might be usefully discussed.

Jazak Allahu Khiran,

Allah Hafiz.

[Peace]

Wa 'alaikum as-salam ya akhi,

I just want to wish you all the best in your research Hope our brothers and sisters here in RF could be of help to you.

[Nehustan]

Thanks peace, I'm hoping that people who may have had/known persons suffer from what could be loosely described as a 'mental health condition' might be open enough to discuss what resources were open to them. In our own family we had someone suffer from cannabis induced psychosis, and currently a friend of the family is experiencing a similar situation, so I'm aware of the dynamic that can exist in conflicting sources of advice/treatment. There seems to be a definite dynamic between traditional healing practices and the current paradigm of the biomedical model. Its a very common occurence (25% of the population will at some time experience it), and I'm hoping in the near anonymous environment of the web, people might be open to discussing instances (minus names and specific location i.e. breach people's right to privacy) and their thoughts.

[TashaN]

By traditional healers, do you mean those who use herbs to treat psychological cases or those who use the Quran to do so?

[Nehustan]

Originally Posted by TashaN

By traditional healers, do you mean those who use herbs to treat psychological cases or those who use the Quran to do so?

Basically, if it exists, and someone is prepared to talk about it, then I'm interested. It can really be anything as I a particularly interested is superstitions etc also.

[TashaN]

Do you believe that Jinn can control humans if they entered into their bodies?

Is that relevant to your current research too?

[Nehustan]

Well to post a quick excert from my dissertation (thus far)...

Despite the rejection in some quarters of an unseen world as an aetiology for mental illness, in fact perhaps a practical denial to nullify anything that cannot be quantified, the word for madness in Arabic, al-junun, and its variations are said to derive from the same root as the word jinn with the ‘literal meaning of the word Jinn’ coming ‘from the verb Janna, Yajunnu: “to cover, hide or conceal”’ (Philips, 1997, p.78). As Al-Issa delineates, ‘for most Muslims, al-junun (being possessed by the jinni or spirit) is madness’ (Al-Issa, 2000, p.xv). A famous Arabic saying states, ‘Al-junun funun "madness is of many kinds"’ (Al-Ezabi, 1994, p.192); Ibn Imran writes that ‘diversity is confusing in the eyes of the doctors, who do not have an exact knowledge of the illness because of the variety in the symptoms of the soul [nafs]’ (Dols, 1992, p.73). It is typical of the Arabic language that the linguistic root of a word leads to words of many kinds,


"The basic sense of the triliteral root "j-n-n" in Arabic is concealment (istitar); hence, all its derivations retain aspects of this meaning. And so, as al-Naysaburi illustrates, we say the night has janna, meaning night has fallen, covering everything in its darkness. The janan is the heart, since what occurs in it is concealed; it is also the tomb that shrouds and covers up. Al-jinn are the invisible beings, concealed from the eyes of mortals. Al-janna is the dense garden, with obscuring intertwined trees, as well as the warrior's armour since it shields. Al-janin is the unborn child, concealed in its mother's womb. Finally jinna is madness, and al-majnun is he whose mind's workings are concealed from others, and from himself."

Al-Ezabi, 1994, p.194

Thus ‘Majnun’ could also relate to myriad ‘‘altered states’ of consciousness...whether possession...by evil-working spirits or by the minions of God' (Dols, 1992, p.216).

[Nehustan]

As an aside to this thread I have decided to give something a crack next month. Partly inspired by our sisters in Masr, I have decided to take the Graduate entry test for a local medical school. It would mean that I'd do my MSc in Medical Anthropology this coming year, and the following year would take an MBBS over the subsequent 4 years. Quite a daunting prospect, but definitely worth a shot...