Dr M slams fixation with ghosts and superstitions

(MM) – Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad today questioned the Malay community’s preoccupation with the supernatural that he said were not part of Islam.

This was apparent from the community’s love affair with movies and television shows on ghosts and all manner of spiritual creatures, the former prime minister pointed out, and by their influence that has forced its way even into official affairs.

These included rituals such as the burying of eggs and sprinkling of holy water in government offices and hospitals by “bomoh” or Malay shamans, ostensibly to “protect” these from spirits.

“The al-Quran makes no reference to ghosts and spirits. What is mentioned are Satan, demons and djinns that would lead people astray from the word of Allah.

“I want to know from the clerics what truth is there to ghosts and spirits? What is their place in Islam. If we believe them to have power over us, does this not lessen Allah?” he wrote on his blog today.

The former prime minister has previously criticised Muslims for their obsession with the appearances of the religion rather than its teachings.

At the International Conference on Teacher Education in the Muslim World last month, he suggested that Malaysians might have better ethics if schools had focused more on building their character and were less dogmatic on the proper form of religious doctrine.

“Holding to honourable values, not doing bad things … those are part of Islamic teachings too, but we’re focusing on how to pray, how to recite doa (prayers), how to ask things from God,” he said in his keynote.

Today, he pointed out Westerners who paid no mind to the paranormal or superstitions did not appear to be suffering from the hauntings and such, even when they did not partake in the rituals he mentioned above.

“I believe in the evil of men and their violence. I do not believe in nor fear these ghosts and supernatural things,” he said.

In October, The Malay Mail Online reported of a so-called spiritual cleansing conducted at Hospital Putrajaya by some 40 faith healers.

The cleansing included the sprinkling of holy water throughout the premises and the placement of mounds made of salt and pepper to ward of evil spirits.