Al Ghazali’s Concept of Diseases of the Spiritual Heart and its Significance to the DSM-5-TR Diagnosis

The intertwined relationship between religion and mental health has been accounted for since the earliest recorded history. This study aimed to explore the relationship between the concept of diseases of the spiritual heart (DOTSH) from the Islamic–Sufi perspective and the medical–psychiatric concept of mental disorder. We examined two essential documents as our primary data sources: (1) Al Ghazali’s Ihya Ulumuddin (Revivals of Religion Sciences) Volume III entitled the Quarter of the Destructive and (2) The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, Fifth Version, Text Revision (DSM-5-TR). We employed a document analysis of the qualitative method by applying six steps of data analysis. We reviewed the English version of Al Ghazali’s book to identified DOTSH. In this stage, we found six DOTSH categories which comprised of 40 DOTSH. Then, we searched the correspondence of DOTSH’s categories to the DSM-5-TR criteria for mental disorders. We found that all DOTSH categories correspond to DSM-5-TR diagnostics criteria, diagnostic features or diagnostic associated features. We concluded that spiritual heart diseases not only present as symptoms but also can be regarded as mental disorder preconditions that require preventive intervention. © The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature 2023.