The Physiological and Spiritual Impact of Fasting: Evidence from Recent Studies

The obligatory fasting of Ramadan is not only an Islamic ritual to enhance the Godconsciousness (called Taqwa), it may also lead to improvement of health status offasting person(s). In other words, it is a complete overhauling instrument of Muslimssoul/body in terms of faith and health. This can be termed as “Islamic fasting: acombination of spiritual elevation and prevention of diseases”. During fasting Muslimstry to maintain integrity of the human body both physically and spiritually. It not onlykeeps us healthy physically/spiritually but also makes us healthy in social obligations.Furthermore, with full devotion it brings long-lasting changes in the individual’s lifeand relate to the level of righteousness and strength of character to resist desires. Inhealth fasting plays an important role, for example the improvement of hyperlipidemia,obesity (fat loss), diabetes, cognition, cell functions, immunological factors,inflammation, stress and lifespan etc. This article is an effort to review and discussresearch carried out on the listed conditions during the holy month of Ramadan onvarious aspects of human health.