Dreams

All research or scholarship questions

Does your mascot dream?

Poll ended at Fri Jan 05, 2007 11:25 pm

yes
2
67%
no
0
No votes
Don't know
1
33%
 
Total votes: 3

Hasan
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Dreams

Postby Hasan » Thu Jan 05, 2006 11:25 pm

I made this topic trying to calm the heated discussions. :wink:

In our writings dreams are taken as a proof of another world. I would like to know your opinion about it, since science has demonstrated cerebral activity (dreams?) while some animals sleep.

If that is true, animals go to heaven!!! Or what kind of dreams are we talking about?

Baha'i Warrior
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Location: U.S.A.

Postby Baha'i Warrior » Fri Jan 06, 2006 4:20 pm

the writings state this but im too lazy to look it up

animals only have "animal" dreams. a dog maybe dreams about a piece of meat and his drools during the night. in my psychology book it talked about a cat who had brain damage and acted out his dreams while he was asleep (trying to catch mice).

spiritual dreams are rare and you have to be in a very spiritual state to have one (like maybe 'Abdu'l-Baha will appear to you in a dream -- there is actually a prayer that you can pray to have a spiritual dream). most of our dreams are meaningless. there is that story of Muhammad and He told someone that wanted to remember his father to eat a lot of salt, and because of that he dreamed about water.

so no again animals dont go to heaven. they are all the same, live on instinct and dont have free will so there would be no way they could spiritually progress

Keyvan
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Location: Los Angeles

Re: Dreams

Postby Keyvan » Tue Jan 10, 2006 11:50 am

Hasan wrote:I made this topic trying to calm the heated discussions. :wink:

In our writings dreams are taken as a proof of another world.



can you find the quote? thanks

Hasan
Posts: 194
Joined: Wed Jun 30, 2004 10:03 am
Location: Lima - Perú
Contact:

Re: Dreams

Postby Hasan » Sat Jan 14, 2006 12:44 pm

Keyvan wrote:can you find the quote? thanks


It is mostly in Gleanings LXXIX:

LXXIX. As to thy question concerning the worlds of God. Know thou of a truth that the worlds of God 152 are countless in their number, and infinite in their range. None can reckon or comprehend them except God, the All-Knowing, the All-Wise. Consider thy state when asleep. Verily, I say, this phenomenon is the most mysterious of the signs of God amongst men, were they to ponder it in their hearts. Behold how the thing which thou hast seen in thy dream is, after a considerable lapse of time, fully realized. Had the world in which thou didst find thyself in thy dream been identical with the world in which thou livest, it would have been necessary for the event occurring in that dream to have transpired in this world at the very moment of its occurrence. Were it so, you yourself would have borne witness unto it. This being not the case, however, it must necessarily follow that the world in which thou livest is different and apart from that which thou hast experienced in thy dream. This latter world hath neither beginning nor end. It would be true if thou wert to contend that this same world is, as decreed by the All-Glorious and Almighty God, within thy proper self and is wrapped up within thee. It would equally be true to maintain that thy spirit, having transcended the limitations of sleep and having stripped itself of all earthly attachment, hath, by the act of God, been made to traverse a realm which lieth hidden in the innermost reality of this world. Verily I say, the creation of God embraceth worlds besides this world, and creatures apart from these creatures. In each of these 153 worlds He hath ordained things which none can search except Himself, the All-Searching, the All-Wise. Do thou meditate on that which We have revealed unto thee, that thou mayest discover the purpose of God, thy Lord, and the Lord of all worlds. In these words the mysteries of Divine Wisdom have been treasured. We have refrained from dwelling upon this theme owing to the sorrow that hath encompassed Us from the actions of them that have been created through Our words, if ye be of them that will hearken unto Our Voice.
(Baha'u'llah, Gleanings from the Writings of Baha'u'llah, p. 151)

Also in SAQ, chapter 61 about the spirit:

In the time of sleep this body is as though dead; it does not see nor hear; it does not feel; it has no consciousness, no perception -- that is to say, the powers of man have become inactive, but the spirit lives and subsists. Nay, its penetration is increased, its flight is higher, and its intelligence is greater. To consider that after the death of the body the spirit perishes is like imagining that a bird in a cage will be destroyed if the cage is broken, though the bird has nothing to fear from the destruction of the cage. Our body is like the cage, and the spirit is like the bird. We see that without the cage this bird flies in the world of sleep; therefore, if the cage becomes broken, the bird will continue and exist. Its feelings will be even more powerful, its perceptions greater, and its happiness increased. In truth, from hell it reaches a paradise of delights because for the thankful birds there is no paradise greater than freedom from the cage. That is why with utmost joy and happiness the martyrs hasten to the plain of sacrifice.
(Abdu'l-Baha, Some Answered Questions, p. 227)


Of course, what I want is to understand better the nature of animals, have they ego? What is clear is that the animals dont have soul It is interesting that the Master says some faculties the animals are better than man, even memory!

This we cannot deny. If we say that these are effects of powers which animals also have, and of the powers of the bodily senses, we see clearly and evidently that the animals 187 are, in regard to these powers, superior to man. For example, the sight of animals is much more keen than the sight of man; so also is their power of smell and taste. Briefly, in the powers which animals and men have in common, the animal is often the more powerful. For example, let us take the power of memory. If you carry a pigeon from here to a distant country, and there set it free, it will return, for it remembers the way. Take a dog from here to the center of Asia, set him free, and he will come back here and never once lose the road. So it is with the other powers such as hearing, sight, smell, taste and touch.
(Abdu'l-Baha, Some Answered Questions, p. 186)


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