Transcendental Meditation

Impact of Islamic spiritual therapy on altering psychosomatic symptoms of emotional reactivity.

Another important measurement of psychophysiological change is

the variation in the resistance of the skin to a weak electric current, and

is known as the measurement of the psychogalvanic skin response. Such

resistance to an electric current, which is too small to be felt by the person under test, decreases with the increase of perspiration and humidity in the palm of the human hand, and vice versa. Thus, when a person is anxious, and the sweat glands in the palm secrete more sweat, the moist hand becomes a better conductor for the mild electric current; whereas when the person is relaxed, the dry palm offers a greater resistance to

the current. The results can be recorded easily by attaching special electrodes to a person’s palm and feeding the resulting electric current to a specialized instrument or computer.

In his book, How to Meditate, L.

Le Shan says that transcendental meditation brings about a condition

directly opposed to that of anxiety and anger, and that it increases the

resistance of the skin by more than 400 per cent.

Accordingly, a contemplating, practising Muslim can achieve a high

level of meditation with minimum time and energy. Just listening to the words of the Qur’an chanted by a beautiful voice can bring about

all the fine meditative responses in a few minutes.

After a series of sophisticated experiments conducted at Akbar Clinics in Florida in the United States, Dr. Ahmed Elkadi concluded that when Muslims listen to the recitation of Qur’anic verses, whether they are Arabic speakers or

not, they experience all the physiological changes indicative of the release from stress and anxiety, as well as warm feelings of tranquillity and an increase of immunity against disease, and the other changes described earlier about *transcendental meditation*.

In these experiments, Elkadi used the most advanced electronic equipment to measure *blood pressure, heartbeat, muscle tension and skin resistance to electric current, and found that the recitation of the Qur’an clearly had a

calming effect in 97 per cent of cases*.

The subjects naturally also experienced a heightened spiritual reaction which he could not measure since there is no ‘spiritometer’ for measuring this sacred dimension.

These results were supported by doctoral experimental research

carried out under my supervision in the University of Khartoum by Dr.

Muhammad Khair al-Irgisoosi. He selected a variable that lends itself

to accurate physical measurement, namely, the increase or decrease in

blood pressure, which was measured by millimeters of mercury.

Physicians from the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Khartoum

helped by supplying us with patients suffering from essential hyperten-

sion, which is high blood pressure caused by a stressful lifestyle or

other unknown reasons. The study compared treatment by muscular

relaxation combined with verbal supportive therapy to treatment with

muscular relaxation combined with Islamic spiritual therapy containing selected verses from the Qur’an and sayings of the Prophet that deal

with curing disease.

Patients were divided into three groups: an experimental group, a carefully matched control group, and a group that

received muscular relaxation training without supportive therapy or

readings from the Qur’an.

The results were unequivocal. Though all the patients improved,

the rate of improvement in subjects *who received relaxation therapy

combined with Islamic spiritual therapy* was significantly better than

the other two groups. This statistically significant improvement was

sustained for months after therapy and, in the case of some patients,

their doctors told them to stop taking their medication because their

blood pressure had returned to its normal level.

Cited from 'Contemplation' (Tafakkur) by Prof. Malik Badri (May Allah be pleased with him)