Designing the Educational Package of "Zekr" in Order to Reduce Depression Symptoms Based on Islamic Sources

Depression is one of the most common and most important mental disorders. On the other hand, using "zekr" (i.e. religious formula) with its particular themes, is one of the most important religious confrontations. So this study aims at designing educational package of "zekr" in order to reduce depression symptoms based on Islamic sources. This study is of applied type wherein qualitative method of content analysis and quantitative method of Delphi have been used. First, zekr functions in Islamic sources were investigated in this study. Then the zekrs which were relevant to depression were collected based on specified criteria. In the following stage, existing teachings in selected zekrs were analyzed. In short, the teachings are as follows: God Attribution, God Owning, God Sheltering, Confidence in Aliment, Hope in God, God centrism, God Glorifying, Compensation and Hope, Possible Mistaking, God Blessing and Believing in Benevolence. Finally the educational package was designed based on these the epistemic, spiritual, emotional and behavioral functions of zekr and in the framework of logic of monotheistic orders in Islamic thought. It's necessary to say that the content validity of the taechings and educational package was evaluated by experts using CVI and CVR indices and confirmed by them.