Is Medicine a Spiritual Vocation1 Presented at the IMANA program in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia 29 December 2013
Professor Omar Hasan Kasule Sr. MB ChB (MUK), MPH (Harvard) DrPH (Harvard)
Professor of Epidemiology and Bioethics, Faculty of Medicine, King Fahad Medical City, Riyadh Email: omarkasule@yahoo.com WEB: www.omarkasule-tib.blogspot.com 1 Based on Presentation by the author ‘Concepts of life and health in religious spiritual support for patients’ at the Religious Spiritual Support Conference held at the King Fahad Medical City Riyadh 1-3 January 2013
Medicine is a profession that uses empirical evidence-based modalities of diagnosis and treatment of disease or protection and promotion of health. Imam Shafei equated it to religion and spirituality when he said that there were two kinds of knowledge: knowledge of the body, ‘ilm al abdaan, and knowledge of the spirit, ‘ilm al adyaan2. We can map medical practice to various manifestations of spirituality that the Qur’an explained.
2 Imam Al Hafidh Abu Nu’aim Ahmad bin Abd al Allah Bin Ahmad Bin Ishaq bin Musa Bin Mahran Al Asbahaniin his book ‘Kitaabhaliyat al awliyawatabaqaat al asfiya’ Dar al Fikr li AltibawaAlnashr page 142 reported from Ibrahim bin Muhammad bin Yahya al Nisapuri who reported from Abu TuraabMuhmmad Bin Shal Al Tuusi who said I heard Al Rabei bin Sulaiman say ‘ I heard AL Shafei say; knowledge is two types knowledge of bodies , ilm al abdaan, and knowledge of religions, ilm al adyan. Hadith No. 13868 (amqtu’u)
The Qur’anic term ruh is the source of spirituality in Islam. Ruh is the permanent and eternal essence of each human life, was created before Adam. Ensoulment, nafakh al ruh, occurs in intrauterine life. It is a spiritual event that also sustains biological life. Desoulment, naza’u al ruh, is followed rapidly by biological death.
The limited knowledge of humans about the ruh is only from revelation, wahy. The Qur’an used several terms that seem to be referring to various manifestations of the same essence of human life that can be mapped to specific therapeutic modalities: ruh to spiritual, nafs to psychological, aql to cognitive therapies, emotional qalb / fuad to emotional modalities, / to social, and / to physical modalities. These modalities can therefore be said to offer holistic spiritual support to the patient.
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Spiritually patients should be supported to reach calmness devoid of fear anxiety by accepting death as a transitional event from inferior life temporary on earth, hayat al duniyat, through the interregnum, hayat al barzakh, to the superior and eternal life in the hereafter, hayat al akhirat. Death is not a terminal event and neither does it break the reassuring direct communication between the human and the Creator.
ď ˝ Psychologically,
the patient should be supported to ascend from the evilinclined soul, nafs al ammarat, through the self-conscious soul, nafslawaamat, to the high levels of the calm soul, nafsmutmainnat. ď ˝ At the highest level the patient bravely faces the suffering and pain of illness.
Cognitively the patient should be supported to appreciate illness as just one minor phenomenon in the wide and expanding spatio-temporal dimension of the universe. ď ˝ The patient should be helped to appreciate that illness can have beneficial aspects such as forgiveness of sins and bringing out the best in the human who can overcome pain and suffering and stay calm and composed. ď ˝
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Emotionally the patient’s self-worth, self-esteem, and self-confidence to face the challenges of illness should be enhanced based on the superiority of human creation. Human superiority is based on the capacity to overcome innate weakness such as evil-doing fisk, and spilling blood, safk al dima, to become a vicegerent, khalifat, who with limited control of the universe, taskhiir, is able to build a material civilization, imarat al ardh.
Socially the patient should be given support to live the remaining life with the highest quality of social relations with the family and the wider community. ď ˝ A balance must be found between the requirements of medical technology and the requirements of social connectivity. ď ˝
Thank you.