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Monday, May 7, 2012

Psychic Healers

A few weeks ago I published an article: The Healing Powers of Rabbi Mendel Morozow

This weekend the NY Post published the article below, entitled ''A too-high price for ‘faith healing’ by Eliyahu Federman - Source: NY Post
[HT: Josh ]

Just a note: to be fair to Rabbi Morozow, a doctor [or healer] is entitled to charge for their services.  If some people think the price is too high, that doesn't necessarily mean the healer is not to be trusted - I don't know what the going rate is for a ''healing'' session generally, but I think it is somewhere around the $200 mark for one appointment [if you know, please leave a comment].  Does anyone personally know someone who has been psychically healed?


''A too-high price for ‘faith healing’ by Eliyahu Federman 

The practice of “faith healing” carries obvious dangers, such as discouraging those who need conventional medical help from seeking it. When the “healer” charges for it, the obvious worry is financial exploitation of the vulnerable and naïve. And I, for one, am more disturbed when the person charging for this “help” is a respected figure such as a rabbi.

Yet in my own Jewish community, I’m seeing a rise in rabbinical authorities charging money for psychic healing sessions.

Rabbi Mendel Morosow, for instance, in a recent interview on the Jewish news site COLlive, claimed to have healed a boy by simply “focus[ing] energy on him for a few minutes,” so that the boy “no longer need[ed] any operation.” He further claimed to have healed someone from gout — also through “focused energy.”

According to his own site, Morosow charges $300 an hour for his services.

Over the years, I’ve personally come to know at least five psychic healers in my Jewish community. I have family members who’ve paid for these “services.”

It was troubling to see Rabbi Morosow, like me a member of Chabad-Lubavitch, describe his practice as being consistent with Chabad and Judaism.

I’m sorry: Charging exorbitant hourly rates for faith-healing “services” belie Chabad values and Jewish tradition. It’s what televangelist faith healers like Peter Popoff do, not mainstream rabbis.

Yes, countless stories attest to the efficacy and care of the late Rebbe Menachem M. Schnerson’s blessings and counsel. But the Rebbe never claimed to possess psychic or supernatural healing powers. He even once crossed out the word “psychic” when a PhD student used that term to describe his powers.

And he never charged money to those who sought his advice or blessings. Indeed, he customarily gave them dollars.

And the Rebbe encouraged those with physical issues to seek medical help; often suggesting they seek the advice of several doctors to ensure the right treatment was being pursued. Maimonides, the physician and Torah scholar, embraced the need to work within nature in order to heal sickness. He scoffed at the notion that disregarding nature, by avoiding medical advice, could ever be the will of God — and prohibited using spiritual incantations to cure physical wounds.

Rabbi Morosow does recommend medical intervention in the case of a “serious health issue,” which certainly suggests any of his positive results are merely from the placebo effect. A widely cited Journal of American Medical Association study showed “therapeutic energy” healers couldn’t even detect the presence of a concealed hand from a few inches away. Bottom line: As appropriate as it may be for clergy to treat spiritual and emotional issues, physical ailments should be the sole province of medical professionals. Religious authorities who charge money for mystical treatments are tarnishing the faith.

Eliyahu Federman contributes to the Huffington Post, Algemeiner Journal and Jerusalem Post.

14 comments:

  1. I have a lot of experience with energy/prayer healing, both personal and professional. I have even done such healings myself, although not being a professional I never charged. Just like not all illnesses are cured by standard medical treatment, and just like not all doctors are real healers, so too energy/spiritual healing, but I have seen WAY too many miracles to ever doubt that it is real. I understand the discomfort of mixing spirituality and money, and yet, if someone is spending their time and expertise to effectively help someone else, and this is their craft and calling, why should they not be paid for that?

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    1. I agree they have a right to payment, everyone has to earn an income with whatever talents they have been given.
      And actually he charges $150 for a half hour session: people may only need 30 minutes - so by saying he charges $300 an hour is a bit misleading.

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  2. I call bs!! Let him put his sessions on YouTube and make it transperant.

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    1. Spiritual healing cannot be ''transparent'', it is hidden, just like spirituality is hidden. It is an energy transferred from the healer to the patient.

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  3. Hmm, Well......
    A kabbalist contacted me and said he could help remove any evileye, or black magic done to my family or myself... his charge:: $500.00, for his amulets, and he lives in Israel, and he also has a site on the internet.
    What does any one think of this?
    As for charging $300.00 for an hour or S150.00 for half an hour, whats the difference, in an half hour he would do less, nu?
    and then he would probably say.: you need more time, so time and money, and all in the name of healing.. I say where does he get the power from? Everything comes only from Hashem, nu?

    So why not go directly to the source, and Hashem will not charge money... :)

    Hmmm... food for thought.

    Any insight??

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    1. No, I meant that in half an hour he could complete the healing session, making an extra half hour redundant.
      A healing session does not take very long, as far as I'm aware.

      Regarding the removal of ayin haras - that's a whole other dimension - personally I don't buy it at all because even if theoretically someone could remove an ayin hara, you could walk out in the street and receive another one from someone else straight away. That is, if you believe in these things. The last rabbi who came to Australia to remove ayin haras was charging $100 per session. He made a lot of money here, but I don't know if those people experienced anything different once they parted with their money. And how can such a thing be proved anyway?

      But healing is different: first of all the patient feels the effect of the healer, and knows that something happened. Just as you can feel spirituality in holy sites, you can feel a spiritual healing taking place when it's done by a genuine healer.

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  4. Okay.. Thanks Devorah.

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  5. Thank you for maintaining this very interesting blog.

    With regards to your question of rates - I do not know going rates for healing sessions, but in general one should consider the various factors resulting in a quoted rate.
    As a reader from Europe a rough calculation would result: 300 € - VAT Tax (on average here 20%) - costs (office, training, etc.) - various social security fees - on average income tax = gain for the professional.
    To provide some comparison: a good, but still not BIG law firm brand, lawyer starts around 200/250 Euros/h. Last visit to a specialized doctor was around 300 € (including a on the spot test). He was seeing me like 15 minutes for a waiting time of 4h + 15 minutes testing by a "nurse".

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  6. The shoemakers are the only legitimate heelers that I am aware of , they do an
    honest job replacing the heels of your shoes every time without fail !
    Just kidding , but a healthy dose of skepticism is sometimes helpful .

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  7. Shifra,

    How can I learn energy/prayer healing? What books do you recommend?

    Toda raba,

    Tom

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  8. To echo some of the other comments here: Anyone can do energy healing, although like anything else, some have more natural talent than others. I can do it, too, but have only used it on my children. It's very simple to learn. It is not that different than very intense, focused davening. Or Rabbanit Sara Yosef's method of Jewish Positive Thinking.

    You can't really do healing on yourself, but you can intensely daven for yourself.

    Prices differ according to location, but I wouldn't pay too much. It's not like the healer has a college debt and years of intensive learning invested in order to have become a healer.

    Finally, you can unconsciously block the healer (a psychic analogy might be, for example, if you went to a regular doctor for an injection and kept pushing his hand away so he couldn't stick in the needle) or you can unconsciously immediately replace whatever physic muck was removed, which is why a healing session either didn't work or one needs many to break through. My point is, if your subconscious is very closed about an issue, the healing probably won't work. And if it's subconscious, how can you know? This is another reason why you shouldn't pay too much.

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    1. Very interesting Tali, thanks, I never thought about the subconscious being closed to it.

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  9. B'H

    Hi Tom,

    Shifra's email is shifra@kabbalahoftransformation.com - her website is http://www.kabbalahoftransformation.com/. If you are interested in Jewish energy/prayer healing and you are in Australia then feel free to email me on info@kindtokidz.com.au as I currently exploring possibilities of arranging a Jewish course here. There are many general courses on energy healing and I'm sure healing through prayer, but not authentic Jewish ones.

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