Ruqyah is the Islamic practice of reciting verses of the Qur'an and prescribed supplications over a person to seek healing and protection from illness, the evil eye, sorcery and the harm of malign spirits. It rests on the belief, grounded in the Qur'an's description of itself as a healing and a mercy for the believers, that the sacred word carries a real power to protect and to cure. The one performing the ruqyah recites over the afflicted person, often particular chapters and verses long associated with protection, such as the opening chapter, the Throne Verse, and the two short chapters of "taking refuge", sometimes accompanied by light blowing over the person or the passing of the hands, and by supplications asking God for healing.
Islamic scholars distinguish a legitimate ruqyah from a forbidden one. The permitted form uses only the words of God and lawful supplications, is understood as a means through which God alone heals, and contains nothing of idolatry or reliance on other powers; the forbidden form invokes spirits or unknown names, uses talismans and amulets of dubious content, or attributes power to the words themselves apart from God, shading into the sorcery the religion condemns. A person may perform ruqyah on themselves or have it done by another, and the self-recitation of the protective chapters morning and evening is a widespread everyday devotion. The practice overlaps with the Islamic treatment of possession and exorcism, where Qur'anic recitation is the principal remedy.