Dream but Don’t Sleep
A dream is the bridge between reality and fantasy. A prophetic dream is the bridge between an other-worldly experience and our human mind. To make the prophecy accessible to the world of human reality, it comes through the medium of a dream. When we sleep our souls withdraw from our physical existence and become more receptive to ideas and goals that are more sublime than that which we can consider when we are awake and our souls are constrained by our bodies.
Jacob’s Ladder
Dreams and their meanings have intrigued the minds of both the ancients as well as moderns. What significance do dreams have? Are they prescient or are they just the products of our most common thoughts. .Do they reflect our sub-conscious aspirations, or are they just some chemicals of the brain gone awry? The Talmud devotes several pages to the subject of dreams. From the Talmud’s analysis it appears that dreams contain all these elements. Some dreams are nonsense and some have profound significance and are indeed prophetic.
Beginning with this week’s Torah reading, and continuing throughout the rest of the Book of Genesis, dreams play a very important part in the unfolding of events. Throughout the book, the dreams discussed have a definitely prophetic facet.
Jacob dreams of a ladder standing on the ground with its head reaching into the heavens. On the ladder he sees angels ascending and descending. When Jacob awakens he is troubled by the fact that he slept in such a holy place. He exclaims: “Behold, G-d is in this place and I didn’t know!” According to Rashi and other commentaries, he was troubled by the fact that he had slept in the site that was to become the location of the holiest place on earth – the Holy Temple in Jerusalem.
One can raise the question: What was G-d’s purpose in having him sleep in this holy place. Conversely, if G-d communicated with him through this dream – the way G-d communicates with every prophet with the exception of Moses – why was he disturbed to have been given prophetic inspiration?
The answer to the first question can be given by way of a story. When the famed Rabbi Meir Shapiro was planning the establishment of the greatest Yeshivah in Poland, Yeshivat Chachmei Lublin – some cynics and critics derided him for his ambitious goal. One of them put it this way: “Rabbi you must be dreaming, if you think this plan could succeed.”
Rabbi Shapiro’s quick retort to the critic was, “At least I’m dreaming and not sleeping!”
Dreams: Brdige between Reality and Fantasy
A dream is the bridge between reality and fantasy. A prophetic dream is the bridge between an other-worldly experience and our human mind. For G-d to enter directly into one’s conscious mind, would have overwhelmed the greatest of prophets (with the exception of Moses). To make the prophecy accessible to the world of human reality, it comes through the medium of a dream. When we sleep our souls withdraw from our physical existence and become more receptive to ideas and goals that are more sublime than that which we can consider when we are awake and our souls are constrained by our bodies.
Our sages say that a person who goes seven days without a dream is called an evil person. One possible interpretation of this enigmatic statement is that a person who sleeps through life and do not reach beyond into a higher realm will stagnate. Stagnation, in turn, can lead to evil. When we don’t grow we fall.
So G-d’s communication to Jacob by way of a dream was His way of taking Jacob out of his mundane existence on earth and elevating him to the heavens. This, however, reinforces our second question: Why was Jacob troubled by this dream?
A Sign of Tension and Obscuring of Reality
The answer lies in the fact that a dream, no matter how holy and prophetic is still imperfect. It is a sign of tension that exists between the world of G-d and the world we inhabit. To get around the dichotomy that separates heaven from earth G-d created the dream, where everything is obscured to make room for the world of the future to enter into the world of today.
Jacob wanted direct revelation of G-d without the need for a dream to serve as the medium. He hoped that the world, instead of obstructing holiness, would be a window to it.
Exile a Dream
The relevance of this to us is that we too are in a dream. King David compares the exile to a dream state. No matter how pleasant and sweet our dreams may be, they are still not reality and the ultimate good. A dream by definition is not truth. Dreams express inconsistencies. Jacob’s dissatisfaction with seeing G-d in a dream is echoed by every one of us in our daily prayers when we say to G-d, ““Ad masai?!” – How much longer do we have to contend with living in a confusing and cognitively dissonant exile experience? When will Moshiach – G-d’s human messenger – liberate us from exile, by opening up our potential to relate to G-d without any barriers? We say to G-d, it is not enough that we dream in exile and we do not sleep. We want to be fully awake and bring the G-dly reality into our reality without any obstructions. We are confident that G-d will respond to our requests imminently.
From the book Light from the Future: Parshas Vayeitzei by Rabbi Heschel Greenberg, published by the Jewish Discovery Center.
