Early version. Transcripts and tags are labelled by accuracy tier. A position is shown only after two independent reviews have found it in his own words.
Mufti Abu Layth ArchiveBeta

Recordings › Jinn: Myth and Reality in Islam by Mufti Abu Layth · 15 Apr 2018 › Segment 12 of 17

machine

If jinn do not possess people, what is ruqya for?

muftis kufr kuffar kafir kaafir kufar kaafirun imaan eemaan eeman djinn jin jinnat jinni ruqyah ruqyaa koran quraan al-quran ayah aya ayat ayaat aayah aayat duaa duas duaas supplication

What is ruqya for? The Quran as a cure for what is in the hearts, and ritual as a scaffolding for iman

LessonRecorded 15 Apr 2018Debunking Myths On: Jinns, Magic, the Evil Eye, and SuperstitionsSegment 12 of 17 in the recording2018-04-15-S12

Play from 44:33 The video loads from YouTube only when you press play. Click a time in the transcript to seek.

Watch this part

Open on YouTube at 44:33

The player starts at 44:33, the beginning of this part.

This segment44:33 to 48:28 · 3 min 55 sGeneral teaching

What this part covers

machinesummary, machine-written

The Quran is a cure for what is in the hearts, meaning disbelief and superstition, not a medical treatment. Ruqya and the du'as taught against omens are a scaffolding that steadies a person's faith until it can stand on its own, because the mind clings to ritual.

In more detail

Asked what the purpose of ruqya would then be, Mufti Abu Layth says the verse calling the Quran a shifa must be read in full: it is a cure for what is in the hearts [?], meaning disbelief, superstition and myths, the very things Islam came to eradicate, not heart disease. As to why ruqya exists at all, he says Allah knows his creation and how he helps it is not always understood, and that these practices work as a scaffolding to hold people until their iman is stable, since humans slip too easily into superstition. He cites Kaptchuk's further finding that rituals and drugs use the same biochemical pathways in the brain. Ruqya and such things are therefore a Zimmer frame to help one walk until one can; when people asked the Prophet about omens he did not simply tell them there was nothing to worry about but taught them a du'a with an almost ritual rhythm, because the mind clings to rituals and people need that to grow strong in faith. He then begins a list of psychological disorders, starting with prosopagnosia or face blindness, which affects some two to two and a half percent of people from birth and others after a stroke, and locates it in the facial fusiform area of the brain.

  • Some terms in this segment are uncertain

Position stated

correctedChecked by two independent reviews, not by the channel

Mufti Abu Layth holds that the Quran's healing is for what is in the hearts, meaning disbelief and superstition, and that ruqya and the du'as taught against omens are a scaffolding, like a walking frame, that steadies people's iman because the human mind clings to ritual.

In his words

“rukia and these things have been set as a scaffolding with a large name to guide people to a pure Iman so it is a scaffolding it's like a Zimmer frame to help you walk until you can walk”

Category: teaching

Report an error

Kind: general teaching

Transcript

machine44:33 to 48:28 · click a time to seek · dotted terms open the glossary
44:21

get better so when people are going through gin exorcisms or rupiah or things like this things can actually work it's not that they but they could work anyway it's like you heard chefs say that you know but some people would get better anyway it's not an it's a bit like that scam you know if I go through it with so many people by the end of it I'm gonna have a hard coke cult that definitely always get better like imagine you did that same experiment but with exorcism or with rupiah same thing somebody could ask her what is the purpose of Rokia see a Rukia in my

44:59

understanding first of all the Quran when it came to say that the Quran is a Schieffer we need to read the full verse don't just stop way says what Schieffer he says she fell only Muffy's so - it is a surefire for what is in the hearts what is it talking about like what like like cardiological heart diseases it's not talking about heart diseases it's talking about disbelief qu4 superstitions myths these very things which islam came to eradicate now you might say well give up you know what so

45:38

what what why these Rukia then why this first of all we do believe that look Allah knows his creation and how he helps his creation is not sometimes truly understood by us but at the same time these things work as a scaffolding to help people until they a man becomes stable because when you come from it is very easy for humans to fall into superstitious behavior it's very easy we too easily in fact part of the study and the that I spoke about of Ted Kaptchuk they realized that you know with the

46:16

acupuncture that rituals one of the findings was that rituals and drugs use the very same biochemical pathways in the brain that was groundbreaking to realize that that when people are undergoing rituals it's highlighting the same neural activity that Y that drugs would use the same pathways so there is this that human beings are very easily misguided into superstition so rukia and these things have been set

46:55

as a scaffolding with a large name to guide people to a pure Iman so it is a scaffolding it's like a Zimmer frame to help you walk until you can walk it's that kind of to help you along the way because you need you see when people said over I'm like to the Prophet or what about superstition and he told them to do all along my Latoya Latoya voila Haider Allahu Allah Allah have a look he could have just said relax there is no top layer there is no you know especially you don't need to worry about it why teach them at though are that too

47:34

one which has almost a ritualistic rhythm to it because the mind clings to rituals and people need that to become strong in their Iman so with this I want to just give you some examples of some conditions psychological disorders now check these out and just think in the past trying to examine these now this a condition known as you've got prosopagnosia yeah now this is a condition known as face blindness it can happen to people who are stroke victims or they could happen due to mental

48:13

health sometimes and they say maybe two to two-and-a-half percent of people in the world are born with it it is an inability to distinguish between faces so there's a section in what we said the fusiform gyrus which is known as the FFA the facial fusiform area which humans used to distinguish between faces why does your face not look like his face not look like like if you think about like if you look at a crawl right a crawl all their faces all look the same to us but to the crows they I'm sure they can distinguish so how do humans distinguish

Paragraphs overlapping 44:33 to 48:28. Full text on the recording page.

Cite this segment

Stable id, transcript version and tier are part of the citation. Every change to a transcript is logged.

Mufti Abu Layth Archive, segment 2018-04-15-S12, auto-transcribed, may contain errors. https://muftiabulayth.org/r/lexzvtf9yga/s/12/ (accessed 1 November 2026)

APA 7
Mufti Abu Layth. (2018, April 15). If jinn do not possess people, what is ruqya for? [Video, segment 2018-04-15-S12, auto-transcribed, may contain errors]. Mufti Abu Layth Archive. Retrieved November 1, 2026, from https://muftiabulayth.org/r/lexzvtf9yga/s/12/
Chicago author-date
Mufti Abu Layth. 2018. "If jinn do not possess people, what is ruqya for?" Video, segment 2018-04-15-S12, auto-transcribed, may contain errors. Mufti Abu Layth Archive. Recorded April 15, 2018. Accessed November 1, 2026. https://muftiabulayth.org/r/lexzvtf9yga/s/12/
BibTeX
@misc{abulayth-2018-04-15-S12,
  author = {Mufti Abu Layth},
  title = {{If jinn do not possess people, what is ruqya for?}},
  year = {2018},
  month = {4},
  date = {2018-04-15},
  howpublished = {\url{https://muftiabulayth.org/r/lexzvtf9yga/s/12/}},
  url = {https://muftiabulayth.org/r/lexzvtf9yga/s/12/},
  organization = {Mufti Abu Layth Archive},
  urldate = {2026-11-01},
  note = {Segment 2018-04-15-S12, auto-transcribed, may contain errors}
}
Something wrong here?

Tell us what is wrong and it will be checked against the recording. Nothing changes until a person has reviewed it.

Sending a note needs JavaScript, which is off or unavailable in this browser. Nothing has been sent.

No name, email address or account is asked for or stored, and the inbox does not store your IP address. For rate limiting it keeps an unreadable fingerprint of your connection for 48 hours, and our database provider's own logs record connections as every website's do. Only your note, its kind, the page and the moment in the recording are kept, for review.