Illustration on Religion, Faith and Miraculous Healing (A Case Study of Salfi House, Rawalpindi)

Author(s) : Aneela Sultana, Hamna Naru

Abstract:

The concept of faith healing exists in every society. “Faith Healing” refers to the healing achieved by religious faith and prayers. Healing through faith is also referred as “Spiritual Healing” and mostly considered the last and only resort of solution. In Islam, the tradition of spiritual healing was basically derived from the Quran and Sunnah. For the sake of spiritual healing Muslims visit various aalims, pirs, and shrines, recite Quranic verses and offer prayers.
The present study has been conducted with the main objective to explore social, economic and religious background of the people who believe and practice faith healing for the solution of their problems. The study explains how faith healing help people in resolving their socio-economic and medical problems and what are the motivating factors which persuade people to approach these faith healers. The study was conducted at Salfi House located in District Rawalpindi, Pakistan to explore relationship between the socio-economic statuses of the female clients and type of treatment they seek from faith healer. The data was collected by employing anthropological techniques including participant observation and in-depth interviews from 77 respondents which were conducted during the period of six months.