About Inshirah

A published resource rather than anybody’s practice. It is written by registered clinicians working alongside people trained in the sacred sciences, and every practice carries an evidence tier saying how strongly the evidence behind it supports it, including the tier that means it is long taught and no trial has established that it works.

Two things, really. It is religious psychoeducation: teaching about the mind and the self, drawn from the revelation and from published research, written for you to read on your own. And it is a directory of professionals and resources, for the point where reading is not what is needed and a person is.

It is not therapy, not a diagnosis, not treatment and not a fatwa. Reading it does not make you anyone’s client and creates no professional relationship. Nothing here is individual advice about you, because nothing here knows anything about you. Where a page teaches an exercise you can do on your own, it says plainly who it is not for and what would mean stopping and speaking to somebody in person. Where a question is genuinely religious it belongs with a qualified scholar, not with a website and not with a clinician.

If you are struggling in a way that needs more than this, here is where to go.

1. A theme is chosen from an area of life, and a specific, doable practice is written for it.
2. An āyah is matched to it, and a sound report of the Prophet where one fits. Qur’ān first.
3. A piece of published research is matched to it, retrieved and checked against Crossref, with its DOI recorded.
4. If it cannot carry both bases, it does not go in. It is swapped, not shipped half grounded.
5. It is given an evidence tier, which is the subject of the next section and is shown on the practice itself.

2,847 practices are written today, each one carrying its evidence tier.

Every practice carries one of these labels, and they are not decorative.

• Tested in trialsMore than one randomised trial, or a meta analysis of them.
• Seen more than onceReplicated observational or longitudinal work, not tested against a control.
• One line of researchA single study, or a theoretical account.
• Long taught, never testedWidely used and long taught. No trial has established that it works.

A mechanism is not an outcome, and this site tries hard not to report one as the other. A study that measured a slower heart rate has not shown that anybody felt better.

Two honest limits. Material drawn from couples work, including the Gottman and emotionally focused approaches, is well validated when a therapist delivers it in a room, and has not been shown to work as well delivered by a website. Read it as education, not as a treatment that has been tested in this form. And the evidence for religiously adapted therapy is clearest on engagement, that people stay with care that fits their faith, rather than on it outperforming ordinary good therapy.

Arabic Qur’ānic text is the Uthmānī script, Ḥafṣ ʿan ʿĀṣim, which is not subject to copyright. English renderings of the Qur’ān quoted alongside it are short attributed excerpts from M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur’an, Oxford University Press, 2004, and the attribution appears with every one.

Only reports graded ṣaḥīḥ or ḥasan are used, with the grading shown. Research is cited to the paper, not to a summary of it, and links to its DOI. The whole library is open at the source explorer, including the parts that are still thin.

Without an account, which is how most people use Inshirah and always will be possible: what you pick, what you save and which days you marked something done are held in a single cookie on your own device. Nothing about you reaches a server, because there is no record of you to reach one.

With an account, which is optional and adds nothing you need in order to be helped: we hold your sign-in, what you have marked done, and anything you write in your notebook.

• Your notebook is private by default Nothing you write is visible to anyone unless you mark that note shared, and sharing is per note.
• Administrators cannot read clinical notes at all Not as a policy, as a database rule. Nobody running this platform can open a note or see what you have completed.
• A therapist sees only what you shared, and only while you allow it You can see exactly what they can see, and ending it stops their access on the spot rather than at their next sign-in.
• No third party analytics or advertising None, on any page, signed in or out.
• You can erase it Signed out, clear your browser data for this site. Signed in, deleting your account removes your profile, your notes, your completions and every connection.

Inshirah is provided as an educational resource, as it is, without warranty. It is not therapy, not a diagnosis, not treatment and not a fatwa, and using it creates no professional relationship with anyone.

You are welcome to read, quote and share what is here with attribution. The Qur’ānic text and the reports are not ours to license; the English renderings quoted alongside them are short attributed excerpts and each carries its attribution. Photographs carry their own licences, recorded on the picture credits page.

If something here is wrong, particularly on the Islamic side, we want to know. That is what the address below is for.

Corrections are welcome and wanted, particularly on the Islamic side. Write to admin@inshirah.org.