The limits of medicine

Retroactive prayer: lots of history, not much mystery, and no science

BMJ 2004; 329 doi: 10.1136/bmj.329.7480.1444 (Published 16 December 2004)
Cite this as: BMJ 2004;329:1444

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  1. Jeffrey P Bishop, associate professor of medicine (jeffrey.bishop@utsouthwestern.edu)1,
  2. Victor J Stenger, adjunct professor of physics2
  1. 1 Department of Internal Medicine, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, 5323 Harry Hines Boulevard, Dallas, TX 75390-9030, USA
  2. 2 Department of Physics, University of Colorado, Boulder Campus Box 232, Boulder, CO 80309-0232, USA
  1. Correspondence to: J P Bishop

    Many claims are made for the power of prayer, but the idea that it could work retrospectively has caused considerable controversy. It is also beyond current scientific knowledge

    Leibocivi first raised the possibility of retroactive prayer in 2001. He reported a study that showed prayer done for patients well after they had left the hospital, had reduced the length of stay in hospital and duration of fever from blood stream infections.1 In short, prayer somehow seemed to act backward in time to shorten patients' stay in the hospital. The study was intended lightheartedly to illustrate the importance of asking research questions that fit with the scientific model of the world.2 Olshansky and Dossey subsequently argued that a logical explanation might be found for Leibovici's results.3 They point to numerous other randomised controlled trails to support their thesis that prayer could work at a distance of space and that it might be plausible that prayer could act retroactively in time. We argue that their claim is built on a confusion and lacks a deep physical model. There is considerable fogginess about what science means in relation to the world of spirituality, and we wish to throw some light on the subject.


    Embedded Image

    Praying at the Wailing Wall

    Credit: JACQUELINE LARMA/AP

    Examining the clinical science

    The latest reported clinical trial of intercessory prayer is a three year study of 750 patients in nine hospitals and 12 prayer groups from around the world, including lay and monastic Christians, Sufi Muslims, and Buddhist monks.4 Prayers were even emailed to Jerusalem and placed in the Wailing Wall. Patients awaiting angioplasty for coronary artery obstruction were selected at random by computer and sent to the 12 prayer groups. The prayer groups prayed for complete recovery of patients. The clinical trial was double blind; neither the hospital staff …

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