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A GLIMPSE OF TRUTH: Why we have dreams and what they really mean By Rabbi Y.Y. Rubinstein
People have always dreamed and then wondered what the
dream meant and if it foretold something that was actually going
to happen. It is an intriguing question to ponder: why does
the Divine make us dream and what function does this serve?
In the classic philosophical work, Michtav MeEliyahu, Rabbi Eliyahu Dessler cites the same Talmud to divide dreams into three distinct categories:
Caesar once said to Rabbi Yehoshua ben Chananyah, "You Jews
say about yourselves that you are very clever!"
Such a statement emanating from non-Jewish lips across the
long ages of exile have usually been the precursor to an assault,
either verbal or physical. In this case, it launched a challenge.
So tell me what I'm going to dream tonight.
Rabbi Yehoshua didn't hesitate and replied,
"You will dream that you will be made into a servant of [your nemesis]
the Persian king and will be made to tend his pigs. This you
will do with a staff made of gold.
The Talmud reports that Caesar thought about this disturbing
prediction the entire day, and at night he did indeed dream
exactly that!
Rabbi Yehoshua's certainty flowed not from some knowledge of
mystical wisdom but knowledge of psychological wisdom. Things
that preoccupy us and occupy our conscious minds are likely to
reemerge in our sleeping unconscious minds.
Rabbi Dessler explains that one type of dream shows us aspects
of our personalities that would otherwise remain hidden and unknown
to us. This allows us the chance to discover flaws and defects
within our personalities and act to put them right. Still, there
are many ways that the Divine could lead us to that self-discovery
— why use dreams?
Rav Moshe Schneider, zt"l, the founder and dean of
Yeshivas Toras Emes in London, had an interesting technique to
giving a boy rebuke. If he spotted a boy who had done something
wrong, he would take him for a walk and put an arm around his
shoulder.
"You know," he would begin, "if you enter a garage, and as the
mechanic comes out from beneath a car to talk to you a drop of
oil falls onto his overalls, you won't point that out to him for a
very obvious reason — his overalls are already filthy and covered
in oil. But if a groom at his wedding is wearing a new dark suit
and you see a white fleck lying on the lapel, you will tell him.
Again the reason is obvious. That one little fleck is spoiling an
otherwise perfect suit."
With that, Reb Moshe would go on to point out a fleck that
he had spotted in the lad's behavior. With his clever introduction Rabbi Schneider had, of course, prepared the boy for hearing
something about himself that needed attention and work.
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A dream is mostly nonsense. A person walks though a cloud
into a place where chocolate trees grow upside down. There he
meets someone whom he strikes on the face. Framed in such a
scene, the dreamer may be disturbed to see himself strike another.
He does not have to worry too much about his behavior, though;
after all, it is only a dream. Yet still: Could I have done such a
thing...could I do such a thing?
The surreal imagery resonates within a real part of the dreamer's
mind, and he might decide that he has to work on his temper.
Rabbi Dessler cites a second category of dreams, one that gives us
a glimpse at a possible future. The Talmud in tractate Berachos says that a
dream is a sixtieth of prophecy. This type of dream is also designed
to elicit a positive response from the dreamer. A dream that predicts
something worrying will provoke the dreamer to take action
to try to avert the dream coming true.
Rabbi Dessler's last category is almost identical to his first. Here,
though, the dreamer is shown something positive about his personality
that he might never have realized or discovered without
the dream.
The Torah introduces the subject of dreams through the conflict
between Josef and his brothers. The brothers already hated
Josef when he told them that he had a dream.
And the brothers saw that their father loved one from all his brothers
and they hated him, and they were not able to speak to him
in peace. And Josef dreamt a dream and he told it to his brothers,
and they hated him even more. And he said, "Listen now to this
dream which I have dreamt. Behold, we were binding sheaves
in the field and my sheaf stood erect over your sheaves, and your
sheaves surrounded mine and bowed to it." And they said to him,
"Will you rally be a king over us? Will you really rule over us?"
And they hated him more for his dreams and for his words.
(Genesis 37:4-9)
The story is baffling. The Torah states that the brothers hated
Josef even more for his dreams and for his words. But he hadn't
told them about dreams — he told them about a dream.
More puzzling still is the fact that all of the brothers were
prophets. Prophets experience prophecy when they dream (apart
from Moses, who was awake when he experienced
prophecy). Why then did the brothers not recognize Josef 's dream
exactly for what it was — a prophecy?
The Alshich HaKadosh (1508-1593) answers that the brothers had understood
and interpreted the dream perfectly. It was that accuracy
of understanding that caused them to reject the dream as being
prophetic.
Josef reported that his sheaf stood higher than theirs. They understood
that this predicted that he would dominate them. Then
he reported that their sheaves bowed to his. They understood that
this meant he would become king over them. In rejecting the
dream, they reversed the order and said, "Will you really be king
over us? Will you really rule over us?"
The Alshich points to the reason they rejected the prophecy.
Can a person be a king over ten people? Clearly not. You can be
the king of a country or even a city, but not ten people. If that part
of the dream could not be true, then neither could the first bit.
They did not foresee that the Divine would make Josef the king of
Egypt and then they would indeed bow down to him.
In rejecting the possibility of prophecy, they ascribed the dream
to the same mechanism that Rabbi Yehoshua ben Chananyah utilized
when he spoke to Caesar. This dream of Josef 's was merely
a continuation of something else he "dreamed" about during his
waking thoughts. These other dreams were his ambitions and
hopes to dominate his brothers. That's why the Torah reported
that they hated him for his dreams and not the dream, singular.
The dream at night outlined his dreams by day.
Rabbi Dessler points out the cruelty and hopelessness of what
befell Josef next. To be a slave, as the Talmud in Bava Basra (8b)
points out, is the worst thing that can happen to anyone, because
all of the worst things that can happen to anyone in life could
easily befall a slave on a daily basis. He has no rights whatsoever.
If his master wants to starve him or beat him or even kill him, he
can. The slave can be torn from his wife or children and sold to
another owner at any time.
Of all places to be a slave, though, none was as bad as Egypt.
They treated their slaves with particular cruelty. On top of all that,
no slave ever escaped from Egypt; it was a life sentence.
All this was brought on Josef by his brothers. The very ones
who should have guarded and protected him were the ones who
sealed his terrible fate.
Once in Egypt, Josef finds success in the house of Potifar
until the mistress of the house attempts to make him commit a
terrible crime. He refuses and passes the test. Still he is accused
of committing the crime and convicted. The name "Jew" is besmirched
throughout Egypt despite Josef passing the test.
Even the greatest Jews sometimes despaired. In Psalms 22,
King David cried out, "Keli Keli lamah azavtani — Lord, why
have you forsaken me?" It would not be hard to imagine Josef
despairing because his reward for withstanding Potifar's wife was
even more suffering and being forced to languish in prison.
But Josef had been shown in a dream that he would be a king.
Like the great rabbinic dean putting his arm around the lad and
pointing to something he needed to improve, the dream pointed
out the greatness that lay within Josef. He would be a king, and
so he did not despair; he never gave up hope.
The Netziv, Rav Naftali Tzvi Yehudah Berlin (1816 - d. Warsaw, Poland, August 10, 1893), once told those
who had gathered with him to celebrate the fact that he had finished
learning the entire Talmud a true story about himself. At
one stage, early in his life, he heard his parents discussing his future.
He had not been applying himself in his learning, and they
felt that he would do better if he was taken out of the rabbinical academy and apprenticed to become a jeweler instead.
Although his parents' analysis of his lack of dedication was accurate,
hearing what the outcome of that lack of dedication was
likely to produce gave him a shock. He asked for another chance
to prove himself and eventually emerged as one of the greatest
rabbis of his generation.
After he finished telling his tale, he turned to his listeners and
asked an intriguing question. "Suppose I had not overheard that
conversation and determined to change? I would have gone on to
become a jeweler and perhaps, like so many, moved to the United
States. One day, years later, I would be standing in front of the
heavenly court to give an account of my life. They would ask me,
'What is your name?' I would reply, 'Naftali Tzvi Yehudah Berlin.'
Then they would get started on my 'file' and ask me to tell them
something about my life.
"I would explain that I was born in the Old Country and
learned for a while in rabbinic school. I would then say that I become a
jeweler and moved to New York. I married a nice Jewish girl and
started a successful business. My wife and I had several children
whom we brought up to be loyal and good Jews. I myself gave
money to charity, observed Shabbos [Sabbath] faithfully, and attended religious lectures.
"Then they would ask me if I had ever heard of a work called
'Ha'amek Davar,' a commentary on the Torah. I would consider
the question and reply that I had never come across that particular
work. They would ask if I had ever heard of a work called
'Ha'amek She'alah,' and again I would say that I had never come
across that one either.
"After a pause, the judges would look at my file and appear
confused. 'That's strange,' they would say. 'It says here that you
wrote them!'
"I would be astonished and explain that there must be some
mistake. 'I am Naftali Tzvi Yehudah Berlin, the jeweler from Manhattan. I attended lectures certainly and tried my best to learn, but
I never wrote those holy books.'
"The angels would consult their records once more and then
point an accusative finger at me. 'Yes...but you could have!' "
Much more painful than having to watch the film or DVD
of your life would be watching the DVD of what your life could
have been if only you had made other decisions.
Two years after my first book, Dancing Through Time, was published
I was speaking in a place called Calabasas in California.
After the lecture, someone approached me holding a copy of the
book in his hand. He asked if I would sign it for him and I happily
agreed. After I did so, he announced that it was his Shabbos
treat.
I looked perplexed and he explained that he studied the
weekly Torah portion with the classic commentary, Rashi, for two hours on a Shabbos afternoon and
then another work for another hour. If he fulfilled his
full three hours, he rewarded himself by reading a chapter of my
book.
It was worth flying all the way to California just to hear that!
Suppose, though, that I had never spent the time and effort
to write that book. One day I would be standing in front of the
heavenly court, and they would ask me if I had ever heard of a
book called "Dancing Through Time," and I would look blankly,
moments before an accusatory finger would shoot out in my direction.
The Talmud reports that if seven days passes without a person
dreaming it is a bad sign. Dreams offer opportunities for a person
to change for the better. If you receive no such prompting or help
to achieve that goal, then it may be because in Heaven they know
you won't change even if you do receive a glimpse of truth in a
dream.
But a dream is only a sixtieth of prophecy. A bad dream is better
than a good one because it affords the dreamer the chance to
change. A bad dream need never come true. If its purpose is to get
the dreamer to change and he does so, then the dream has fulfilled
its purpose and its prediction becomes redundant. Maimonides
points out that even when true prophecy existed in Jewry,
the Divine might still cancel an evil decree. The Jewish people
may have reacted and corrected their behavior upon hearing the
prophecy so that the decree became redundant. But if a prophet
predicts something good will happen to the Jewish people, such
a prophecy comes with a cast-iron guarantee. The Divine will never
rescind a good prophecy.
In the troubled time that we are currently living
through, it is not hard to find our sleep troubled by the worries
and fears of our waking thoughts. It is certainly a time for repentance,
and dreams that alert us to weaknesses need to be exploited, and
those weaknesses addressed and corrected. If our dreams show us
glimpses of futures that are worrisome, then again our response
should be repentance.
Still, a dream may be reminding us of our potential, that we
have greatness within us — a greatness that allows us to withstand
even the most terrible of times. We are, after all, the children
of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel,
and Leah.
And true prophecy that foretells something good will always
come true. Our prophets have repeated the same message from
the Divine on countless occasions: the exile will end and
all of Jewry will live in safety in their land.
Repentance makes that dream come true. Any way we can help
our repentance along, including using our dreams to help us improve,
should be opportunities we exploit to the fullest.
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And in KINDLE EDITION for Just $9.99 by clicking here . Comment by clicking here. JWR contributor Rabbi YY Rubinstein is a world renowned educator, lecturer, radio broadcaster, and seasoned author whose articles have appeared in Hamodia and other periodicals.
• Is Your Child a Sufferer . . . Are You?
• A parenting guide for the perplexed
© 2011, Rabbi Y. Y. Rubinstein
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