Book of Healing - Qur'anic Healing - Allusions of Dreams
Allusions of Dreams
Tags: Dreams, Hazrat Ibrahim, basirah, astral body, interpretation of dreams
1. With regard to spiritual healing, the importance and utility of dream is extremely amazing. That is to say that, during sleep the countless symbols of knowledge, awareness and spirit and spirituality in the dream which man sees during sleep, work for those who reflect upon it. And in this connection, it is also a very detailed x-ray of the intellect and soul, which is automatically prepared under the Divine law and comes in front of man, so that, every wise and realistic person, who cherishes (spiritual) progress, may assess himself. He can judge to what extent, intellectually and spiritually, he is healthy or sick and cure his diseases and maintain his health accordingly. X-rays mean unknown rays. This means that the world of dreams also works under the influence of a light, which itself is not visible.
2. Although the scientists of the present age, have invented new instruments and devices better than x-rays for research, by which many diseases are diagnosed easily, such as, optical microscope, thermography, electron-microscope, endoscopy etc. and may invent many more in the future, which will greatly help to diagnose diseases. Yet the way this single instrument of the spiritual science (dream) has always been working miraculously, is certainly unique and unprecedented, provided someone duly understands its meanings and knows the symbols.
3. In this connection, the verse (30:23) can be interpreted in this way: One great miracle, among the miracles (signs) of God, which embraces uncountable wonders and marvels, is your dream by night and by day and your seeking of His bounty for the body and soul. That is to say that, dream, in addition to physical rest, is also an occasion for thought and reflection. Indeed in dream there are many miracles for those who heed. That is, its symbols are understood only by the people of wisdom (30:23). Here an ignorant person may ask, how can a disorderly dream be among the miracles of God, the Exalted? The answer is that if the dream is not good, it is due to man's own word and deed. It is the beauty of the function of dream, that it has taken the exact x-ray of the internal chaos of man and placed it in front of him, so that he may organise himself in word and deed in the light of the Qur'an and Islam, and protect himself from every kind of chaos and perplexity.
4. It is not possible to understand the symbols of dream without Divine guidance and help. His guidance is on the straight path, which is the path of the Prophets, the truthful (siddiqin), the martyrs (shuhada') and the righteous (salihin) and those servants of God, who obey them (4:69). This means that the symbols of dream are understood first and foremost, by the Prophets and then, by those who are mentioned here, respectively. In this regard, let us see the verse (37:84), whose medical interpretation is: Hazrat Ibrahim had attained the special proximity of God through a sound heart. This was the principal place of the recognition of tawhid (Oneness of God). Thus, once when he saw the stars in a dream or in imagination, he said: I am sick (37:88-89). For, his standard of spirituality was higher than seeing the stars, the moon and the sun (6:75-79), although in the view of an ordinary dream and its glad tiding, let alone heaven and things related to it, in which are certainly good news of spiritual progress, even in seeing certain things of the earth, lie allusions to success (in spirituality), such as, to see a mountain, a garden, pure water, a thing related to Islam and faith and to find oneself attached to it, etc.
5. The world of dreams of the noble Prophets and the great awliya' is, in fact, different from that of the common people. For theirs is the dream of the friends of God, which is linked with spirituality. With respect to consciousness, it is like wakefulness, but the feeling and understanding in it is directed towards the spiritual world. It was because of this that Hazrat Ibrahim immediately started to act upon that command of his dream, in which he was asked to sacrifice his dear son (37:102).
In the Qamusul-Qur'an (p. 556), it is mentioned from Bukhari (IX, 96) that the holy Prophet said: "A good dream is the forty-sixth part of Prophethood". Further, in Bukhari, it is narrated from Abu Hurayrah that the holy Prophet said: "Nothing is left from Prophethood except the mubashshirat". People asked the Prophet: "What are mubashshirat?" He said: "Good dreams (i.e. luminous dreams)" (Bukhari, IX, 98).
6. From this Hadith, it appears that the awliya' of God, in their true dreams, are very close to the light of Prophethood, which results in the form of spirituality. After them, it appears that there is the possibility of two forms of dreams for all mu'mins: either they are verbally given glad tidings of a pleasant event, or they are warned by some means, so that they should check the health and sickness of their soul and in every condition, they should take more and more benefit from the medicine of Divine remembrance.
7. From the wisdom-filled verse (39:42), it appears that spiritual death, physical death and sleep are, all three, alike in many respects. For, the soul is seized in all three states. Nonetheless, after spiritual or physical death, each individual is given a complete book related to his deeds. However, for those who are alive, only a part of his record of deeds is given daily to each of them, in sleep as an example, which is dream. So that every time he should necessarily rectify and make it better, lest, on the Day of Resurrection, he regret that he did not cure his diseases, when he had been aware of the basic diseases of his soul (batin).
8. In verse (75:14), it is said: "But man is aware (basirah) of his state". In this noble verse, the way the word "basirah" is used is the key to its wisdom, which in the true sense, is applicable only to the Perfect Man. For, basirah is the name of insight or the sight of the heart, by which is meant a complete spirituality. This verse is directly related to the verse (12:108), in which light is shed on the word basirah, by using it for the holy Prophet, as well as for those who obey him. As for the common people, the share which they have received of it is dream, in which the result of their good and bad deeds comes in front of them.
9. Man in fact, sees himself in the mirror of dream, but he thinks that it is someone else. For, dream is a kind of record of deeds, whose writings are utterly different from the worldly writings, for every word and deed in it is attired in symbolic or allegorical form. It is obvious that the record of deeds which speaks in the language of symbol and parable, is one's own and nobody else interferes in it. See the glory of the power of God, the Omnipotent, what a great and wonderful soul He has granted man, the best of the creatures! It is the subtle world or the world of similitude; it contains innumerable capacities; it contains every treasure of God and medicine for every disease. In this connection, it should always be remembered that, if the human being is deeply studied from the Sufic point of view, he is an universe and if the universe is studied from the same view, it will appear in the form of a subtle man. For the astral body is the compendium of all the subtleties of the universe and all external values are condensed in man. Thus, where he is perfect and complete, he can be the vicegerent of God.
10. The dreams of a righteous Muslim can be good or luminous and those of a negligent one, bad or dark and those of the one who is in between, can be of both kinds. Therefore, rising above personal prejudice, evaluate your own dreams critically and improve your state by curing the inner diseases. How great is the favour of God, the Blessed, the Great, to the mu'mins, that He has created a living book with pictures and symbols in the state of dream, which is always in a veil and makes everyone aware of his sickness and weakness, and unless someone divulges his dream, nobody else can know whether his dream was good or bad. It is a Qur'anic law, that general reformative exhortation should be made in a collective way, so that it may serve as a veil and each person may understand his sickness in his own heart of hearts.
11. The poor human intellect is astonished by the magnitude of the wonders and marvels of knowledge of the wise Qur'an. Thus among the many other sciences in the Qur'an, there is also the science of the interpretation of dreams. For instance, to be dressed in nice and clean clothes, shows taqwa (7:26), whereas to wear dirty or tattered clothes, or to be naked, shows the absence of taqwa (7:27); to see pollution alludes to idolatry (22:30); to see the stars, the moon and the sun shows advancing towards the destination of tawhid (6:76-79); to see a garden is a sign of knowledge and spiritual progress (27:60) and to see precious stones or coins, is an allusion to the precious pearls of knowledge and wisdom (15:21; 18:19).
12. It should be known that things are of two kinds: mental and external. The thing which is mental, does not have a fixed form of its own, nor does it have any body, such as: rancour, sleep, greed, knowledge, forbearance, anger, etc. Those which are external have a fixed form and also a body, such as snake, rabbit, duck, water, camel, dog, etc. If someone has rancour, it will come to him in the form of a snake. For, the external form of rancour is snake. Similarly, the external form of sleep is rabbit, that of greed is duck or ant, that of knowledge is water, that of forbearance is camel and that of anger or oppression is dog. This means that, although the mental things are without body or form, nonetheless, the external things serve as their external forms or embodiments, so that the Divine law may convey his sickness and his success in symbolic language in the dream of every person.
14 Jumada II, 1406/24th February, 1986.
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