Acharya Mahaprajna
Science Christian Society is an institution in America having thousands of members. One of the rules, voluntarily observed by all members, prohibits them from taking medicinal cures. Whether one suffers from a minor cold or fever, from T.B. or heart-attack, from fracture of a bone or skin-disease whatever the malady, the sick member neither consults a doctor nor resorts to traditional curative measures. Then, how do they cure themselves? Their answer to this question is "God is merciful; His infinite mercy is our remedy and cure. We have unshakable faith in His mercy and no other remedy is necessary." This is a classical instance of faith-healing. When one develops such unflinching faith, one does not need material remedies.
In the above, the word 'God' stands for "one's own spiritual power". It is the power of one's spiritual self which gives one a sense of wisdom and authority to control the operations of the physical self i.e. the body and the spiritual self can exercise its power to cure the sickness. What is needed is to contact the spiritual self via the sub-conscious mind. One, who can do so, does not care for the external treatment for his malady.
In ancient times, both man and animal had the instinct to guide them to whatever they needed to keep them healthy. But man, with the progress of civilization, gradually lost the instinct. Somebody, however, in the community did retain enough ability to consult his animal instincts and usually was accepted as the 'healer'. Apart from nature healing—diet, medicinal herbs, bone-setting, minor surgery etc, he also used faith-healing, in which, he made the patient to relax and gave suggestions. In all cultures for centuries, faith-healing followed a pattern, but later on faith-healing tended to be left to sorcerers and quacks.
With further progress of civilization, belief in the effectiveness of faith-healing began to dwindle and vanish except among the very credulous and very poor.
Franz Mesmer provides the link between the ancient healing techniques with faith-healing in its various manifestations today.
The simplest from of faith healing, however, dispensed with techniques, apparatuses and even with healers, and let the healing force come through the individual's own internal powers.
Sigmund Freud, the founder of Psychoanalysis, and later still Jung found that a patient could fall straight into a hypnotic sleep without any action on his part. This implies the process of auto-suggestion which was made the basis of later clinics where cures depended entirely on suggestion administered by the patient himself.
Healing and Suggestion
Faith-healing, in fact, is nothing else but applied suggestion. In 1953, Professor H.J. Eysenck described a scientific experiment in which a group of children with warts - virus induced tumours - was treated by suggestion; while another, the controulled group, was given the then orthodox medicaltreatment which was shown to be far less effective. It must be remembered that the warts are organic.
That suggestion given to patients under deep relaxation can produce striking and significant alterations in their bodily behaviour is proved by ample evidence [1].
In other words, it is possible to use suggestion to effect a wide range of organic changes for treatment of the sick.
Nor is it essential to employ hypnosis. What is important in promoting health, is not suggestion coming from other but auto- suggestion. In other words, the healing power lies wholly within the patient's own organism. The healer or the hypnotist is merely an agent helping to stimulate it. This hypothesis has received ample confirmation from countless experiments. Autosuggestion is a simple explanation of the centuries old faith-healing. The trouble is, that it is too simple. It does not exhibit any apparently miraculous element.
Anuprekṣā—Contemplation—is an important exercise in the system of prekṣā. In this, auto-suggestion plays a very significant role.
By use of auto-suggestion and intense willing, the practitioner can modify his psychological distortions, change his attitude and behavioural patterns and generally develop his personality.
Faith-healing is a System of Psycho-therapy
In the western countries, a system of therapy called autogenic therapy is recently developing. In this system, the patient himself reaches his subconscious mind and effects the cure by developing the inherent immunological forces. First he visualises the desired state of health, sustains the visualisation, repeatedly recites the desired change and finally experiences it.
