Rethinking efficacy: People's perception of ritual healing and trance religious practices at shrines in Pakistan. 2020

Iftikhar Ahmed Charan, and Shen Xin, and Wang Zezhuang, and Dewei Yao
Department of Anthropology, School of Sociology and Political Science of Anhui University, No: 111 Jiulong Road, Jingkai District, Hefei City, Anhui Province, 230601, PR China.

Ritual healing is one of the core topics in anthropology and is also important in psychology. The key aim of this study is to investigate and explore the understanding of religious perspectives of ritual healing and trance practices in Muslim shrines in Pakistan. Several studies have been conducted to highlight the shrines in Muslim countries to demonstrate the Sufi tradition in Islam, where the followers seek healing and use the Sufi saints as intermediaries for the fulfillment of their desires. In Pakistan, the shrine of Hazrat Lal Shahbaz Qalandar provides a vital cultural, religious, psychological, and social resource where people get involved in religious rituals and trances. A sample of 70 devotees was randomly interviewed with the help of qualitative research methods such as semi-structured and in-depth interviewed, key informants included observation were used for data collection. The major focus of this study is on the religious rituals of healing and the overall assumption that people engage in this practice according to their socio-cultural needs, and followers of the shrine in the living community seek healing rituals to address their social ailments as well as physical and emotional problems. They engage in different types of rituals, including trances, with different objectives. The research goal is to discover the chief motive of devotees who visit the shrine for the rituals and religious practices. These findings of this study propose that shrine ritual healing is powerful not so much because of the specific practice of exorcist rituals, but because the practice is associated with sacred activities and religious rituals performed by thousands of people throughout the years.

UI MeSH Term Description Entries
D007514 Islam A monotheistic religion promulgated by the Prophet Mohammed with Allah as the deity. Mohammedanism,Muslims,Islamic Ethics,Ethic, Islamic,Ethics, Islamic,Islamic Ethic,Muslim
D010154 Pakistan A country located in southern Asia, bordering the Arabian Sea, between India on the east and Iran and Afghanistan on the west and China in the north. The capital is Islamabad. Islamic Republic of Pakistan
D010465 Perception The process by which the nature and meaning of sensory stimuli are recognized and interpreted. Sensory Processing,Processing, Sensory
D002562 Ceremonial Behavior A series of actions, sometimes symbolic actions which may be associated with a behavior pattern, and are often indispensable to its performance. Rituals,Behavior, Ceremonial,Behaviors, Ceremonial,Ceremonial Behaviors
D006801 Humans Members of the species Homo sapiens. Homo sapiens,Man (Taxonomy),Human,Man, Modern,Modern Man
D001523 Mental Disorders Psychiatric illness or diseases manifested by breakdowns in the adaptational process expressed primarily as abnormalities of thought, feeling, and behavior producing either distress or impairment of function. Mental Illness,Psychiatric Diseases,Psychiatric Disorders,Psychiatric Illness,Behavior Disorders,Diagnosis, Psychiatric,Mental Disorders, Severe,Psychiatric Diagnosis,Illness, Mental,Mental Disorder,Mental Disorder, Severe,Mental Illnesses,Psychiatric Disease,Psychiatric Disorder,Psychiatric Illnesses,Severe Mental Disorder,Severe Mental Disorders

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