The Background of Spiritual Healing
- Author:
Graham Ikm, M.A.,
M.Sc. Geo. Allen & Unwm Ltd. 6/-.
Those who have read Miss Ikin’s earlier little book on ” Religion and Psycho-therapy” will expect to find in this present work a clear and simple treatment of her subject and they will undoubtedly not be disappointed. Miss Ikin has stated with great clearness and simplicity the case for spiritual healing, than which few studies to-day are of greater interest to thoughtful people.
Since the beginning of the Century there has been discernible in the writings of many of the leading psychologists a steady advance in the direction of recognition of a spiritual background to the science. Many psychologists have travelled a long way from the purely materialistic outlook which at first characterised the modern aspect of this science. As Miss Ikin’s interesting article in the last number of this journal indicated,* she is devoting her work at present to bringing these views to the notice of the clergy on the one hand and the rank and file of the medical profession on the other in the endeavour to promote a sympathetic and close working co-operation. The present book is one means, and a very useful one, of carrying out this idea. It is a fact to-day that the public insist upon knowing more about the healing aspect of modern psychology, and its original materialistic bias has been res* Religion and Psychotherapy. Mental Welfare, April, 1937.
ponsible for much clerical lack of sympathy. Miss Ikin is doing valuable work in removing prejudices from both sides.
Her first chapter on the emergence of the spiritual factor in the treatment of disease is an attempt to take a historical review of the ground that has already been covered.
The chapter on the relationship of psycho-analysis to confession is again a helpful contribution in delimiting the special fields of usefulness of work from the medical and clerical angles of approach.
The book is expanded from a series of lectures given on the subject, but the psychological stand-point is definitely accentuated for reasons which Miss Ikin makes clear. There is no doubt that this distinction between scientifically psychological and merely miraculous bases of healing will help very many people to a clearer appreciation of the possibilities in regard to a given case. The book, however, will be found very helpful to many who do not realise that psycho-therapy generally necessitates a facing up to reality if cure is to be obtained. It is a book which can be usefully prescribed to many of one’s more intelligent patients, and I have already made practical use of it in this way; moreover, there are few members of the medical profession who would not themselves be greatly helped by its perusal; indeed, it will be helpful to all but the expert clinical psychologist, by whom, of course, its teaching is put into regular practice. It is to be hoped that the book will be very widely read, even by those who are not directly in need of treatment themselves. I have seldom read a book of its type so likely to be both informative and practically helpful to the more intelligent laity, particularly clerics and teachers.
Maxwell Telling.
Disclaimer
The historical material in this project falls into one of three categories for clearances and permissions:
Material currently under copyright, made available with a Creative Commons license chosen by the publisher.
Material that is in the public domain
Material identified by the Welcome Trust as an Orphan Work, made available with a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
While we are in the process of adding metadata to the articles, please check the article at its original source for specific copyrights.