Advice from the Shaykh on fasting from food.

The Shaykh : He says that the cause of most diseases is the deposition of food residues on the walls of the intestines. Because of these deposits, the food that is purified by the decree of the Almighty, the All-Knowing, is what purifies the blood. Because of the deposits, the process of blood purification does not take place. Therefore, over time, there become walls that prevent the absorption of these beneficial, blood-purifying foods. He says that when you abstain from food, you will continue to see, as you expel, crumbs from the walls that were dry and are decomposing because there is no new food, no new deposits, and water enters to break them down. Then these intestines are purified and begin to resume absorbing. I saw this myself after twenty days or more of that; I was not eating. Where do these wastes come from? They are the deposits on the walls. Therefore, this is an experience. I advise you: if you see someone like you, I say this is his cure: applied fasting. You should do it and strive with yourself. Strive with yourself.

The questioner : I will try, if Allah wills.

The Shaykh : And then, at least, be like one of our companions who was afflicted with something resembling epilepsy. He would be sitting among his family in the house, and they would not notice until he stood up and broke anything around him. He was treated at the American University in Beirut, long ago, with electric shocks, but he did not benefit at all. We have Ibn Nafis Hospital, but he did not benefit at all, and so on. One day he told me, so I said, "O Abu Sulayman, what do you think about trying this experience that I tried?" He said, "Since you have despaired of treatment, and this American University has the most famous doctors there, and there is no benefit, then try it yourself." In truth, he was afraid of this matter because a person cannot endure forty days without food and drink. A person thinks he is digging his own grave, as they say, with his nails. And indeed, I was told by students at the Syrian University, after I had fasted for twenty-three days, that I had a tour in northern Syria and my tour reached a town called Idlib, west of Aleppo. There were professors and students and so on. They saw that I had lost weight, half a kilo every day, and they said, "May it be good, if Allah wills." I said to them, "I am not in a state of..." And when they understood that I wanted to fast for forty days, they said, "We do not advise you. Our doctors say that more than thirty days will expose him to death." And I completed the journey, and nothing but good befell me. The point is that this companion of ours, Abu Sulayman, fasted for seven days. He could not endure it; the desire for food overcame him. But he says, "I felt the difference." This feeling encouraged him to repeat it after a few months. Perhaps you will take a lesson from this.

The questioner : I constantly take medications, totaling about twelve pills a day. What should I do with these pills? Should I leave them too?

The Shaykh : You leave them, of course.

The questioner : I leave the pills.

The Shaykh : Everything is important. This man, this man fasted in three stages. The first stage was seven days, the second stage was twelve, and the third, I do not remember, thirty or thirty-two. And what is the guest? He no longer saw the epilepsy at all. I mean, very strange things. We told this joke: a friend came complaining about his mother's illness. His mother was an old woman bedridden. She had two daughters who were nurses in the hospital. They were fed up with their mother because she could not get up to relieve herself. They had to come and clean her, and they would feel disgusted and nauseous, and so on. So the friend of our companion Abu Sulayman complained to Abu Sulayman about this situation. He said to him, "I advise you to fast her." He understood what fasting means: that they do not put the table in front of her, and a pitcher and a glass of water, and that is all. "O Abu Sulayman, she is an old woman, we are afraid she will die like this without talking." "What do you have? Do you believe she will die? Put the pitcher and the glass, she will cry. Let her cry, but let her have the water." And indeed, after five or six days, she got up on her own to relieve herself, and so on. And they have a recorded material: fasting, this is the cure.