User:Chicumber/sandbox

Islalmic healers, since the medieval times and even earlier, have used faith healing as a means to heal their people. Faith healing is healing through spiritual and/or ritualistic means, often including much prayer. Some form of spiritual connection is made between the healer and the one being healed, and then healing takes place.

The Oath of a Muslim Physician
Adopted in 1977 by the Islamic Medical Association of North America, the Oath of a Muslim Physician is a composite drawn from the historical and contemporary writings of Muslim physicians.

"Praise be to Allah (God), the Teacher, the Unique, Majesty of the heavens, the Exalted, the Glorious, Glory be to Him, the Eternal Being Who created the Universe and all the creatures within, and the only Being Who containeth the infinity and the eternity. We serve no other god besides Thee and regard idolatry as an abominable injustice. Give us the strength to be truthful, honest, modest, merciful and objective. Give us the fortitude to admit our mistakes, to amend our ways and to forgive the wrongs of others. Give us the wisdom to comfort and counsel all towards peace and harmony. Give us the understanding that ours is a profession sacred that deals with your most precious gifts of life and intellect. Therefore, make us worthy of this favoured station with honor, dignity and piety so that we may devote our lives in serving mankind, poor or rich, literate or illiterate, Muslim or non-Muslim, black or white with patience and tolerance with virtue and reverance, with knowledge and vigilance, with Thy love in our hearts and compassion for Thy servants, Thy most precious creation. Hereby we take this oath in Thy name, the Creator of all the Heavens and the earth and follow Thy counsel as Thou hast revealed to Prophet Mohammad (pbuh). "Whoever killeth a human being, not in lieu of another human being nor because of mischief on earth, it is as if he hath killed all mankind. And if he saveth a human life, he hath saved the life of all mankind." (Qur'an v/35)"

While faith healing is still widely practiced among Muslim nations, there has been widespread borrowing and learning from European physicians, especially for diseases that were less known the the Islamic people. As new medicinal practices came about (quarantines, use of mercury, etc...) it had to be shown that these practices were in line with Islamic law before implemented into practice. Today western medicine is well established throughout the Muslim world. Traditional remedies can still be purchased rather inexpensively in bookshops and other small stores, but serious illnesses today are more readily treated with western medicine.

Islamic communities have taken their newfound medical training and established inexpensive and efficient medical services in the slums and lower middle-class neighborhoods of Cairo and Algiers, Beirut and Mindanao, the West Bank and Gaza. Muslims have created strong networks of medical and social services, which are widely supported by mainstream Islamic groups.