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Summary of Question:	Are Dreams A Signal From God?
Category:	Gurbani
Date Posted:	Sunday, 3/14/2004 6:19 AM MDT

Respected Khalsa ji,

Waheguru ji ka khalsa, Waheguru ji ki Fateh!

I have few question to ask:
1. WHAT IS THE PLACE OF DREAMS IN GURBANI?
2. ARE DREAMS A SIGNALS FROM GOD?
3. SOMETIMES DREAMS SEEMS TO BE TRUE, WHY IT HAPPENS?

I am confused after reading a few articles from newpapers which I am pasting below. Please go thru each of them and also please make me understand thru the verses of Gurbani that dreams have or do not have anything to do with life.

Guru Fateh,

Vimal jit Kaur

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Theme for a dream!

[ SUNDAY, FEBRUARY 22, 2004 01:43:41 AM ]

Dream experiences are as significant as waking experiences. They can be life changing, directive, revealing, and comforting at times of crisis. In dreams, we travel through layers of connection that may be blocked by the rational, more constrained and censoring aspect of our waking being.




By working with a trained dream therapist, you can gain insight into the messages held for you within your dreams, and use those insights to find solutions to problems. Rather than having your dreams interpreted by someone else, which is just short of fortune telling, dream therapy is the process by which you learn to decipher your own dreams which may, in turn, help you to overcome your fears or emotional dilemmas.



Dream therapy is as individual as you are. What one symbol means to your subconscious is probably totally different for someone else. Dream therapy is more than dream interpretation. It is a means of confronting our subconscious, or even our conscious dilemmas, and finding ways to lead a healthier and more creative life. Dream, and you will see!



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Strange signals
by Roshni Johar

ONCE I dreamt I saw a few foreigners in western attire in a jubilant mood. Next morning when I unfolded The Tribune, exactly this picture appeared on Page 1, the caption stating that devotees of Baha faith were celebrating their religious day. Wasn’t it strange?

Years ago, I often dreamt that my husband, children and I are just throwing our baggage in our car and travelling at midnight in great haste. Obviously it meant an emergency. For many days I felt uneasy fearing news of someone seriously ill or God forbid, sad tidings. After a month or so, my family and I went to Delhi, reaching there late in the evening. After dinner we got a phone call from Shimla informing us that children’s school admission tests were to be held next morning at 9 a.m. So we rushed back to Shimla travelling at midnight exactly as I had seen in my oft-repeated dream!

Unfortunately, all dreams do not end happily. One such dream was perhaps the strangest one I saw. I vividly recall waking up with a start at 4 a.m. on a Monday. I had pictured my cousin with her two infant daughters in a sad and pensive mood, standing before a photo of her husband, wearing a floral garland around his neck. Obviously he was no more. I became very perplexed. I had not met my cousin for years. How could I ring up any relative to enquire about his welfare, leave alone death? Impossible. They would think me crazy. On Thursday I was informed that this young pilot had been killed in a plane crash near Jamnagar. But I had dreamt of this tragedy three days before his death. The dream shook me.

My maternal grandfather penned his hand-written autobiography of 75 pages and 111 paragraphs in 1950s describing his experiences in France during World War I, his job, etc. Years ago, I read it and returned it to my mother. Recently as I wished to keep a copy of it, I borrowed it from her. And what followed is really amazing.

As I typed it on my computer, I discovered that certain descriptions and events, of which I had full knowledge, were not written in the autobiography! All these years I had thought that they were mentioned in the book. No one had told me about them either. My grandparents’ house in Rawalpindi was of grey colour and had a platform in front, my great-grandmother’s bier was well-decorated as per her wishes, my uncle was named Manohar whereas everyone wanted him to be called Mubaraq Singh etc., are a few of unwritten and untold events that took place in undivided India, several years before my birth.

Sometimes fragrance creeps into my life too. Years ago, sweet smells akin to champa/chameli, would waft around me. But no such plant grew in my vicinity. Soon Daddy was posted to Trivandrum. Certain plants having this scent grew in Pangode House, our residence there. Do coming events cast even their scents before?

Undeniably, our life is pre-destined. I wonder, is our mind like a wireless sometimes catching signals of coming events? Perhaps our mind glimpses them in dreams or visions. Therefore, is it possible that if we intensely desire to know our future, we should just delve deep into our mind’s recesses to get the answer? Seek and ye shall find it in the world of your dreams (if you remember them). For, they hold the key to your destiny, the biggest mystery to be unraveled by mankind!
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Of dreams & diverse images
B.N. Goswamy


A dream image of an owl in a Pahari painting, possibly from Nurpur, ca 1700


THIS is a piece not so much about dreams as about their interpretation through images.

When Indian philosophical texts speak of turiya, the ‘fourth’ or the highest state of the spirit, that which is pure and impersonal, they imply the existence of the first three, those of waking, dreaming and deep-sleep, each defined by a precise term. Svapna is the word that refers to the state of dreaming and, through it, to ‘seeing a vision in a dream’. The Rig Veda, the most ancient of Indian texts, refers to it; later , the Atharva Veda has a whole chapter, the 68th, on dreams. The entire visible world around ourselves can, following the philosophical doctrine of maya or illusion, be seen of course as a svapna-prapancha, something ‘spread out like a dream’. But at a lesser, everyday level, there is also this consuming interest in dreams, for are they not pointers too, rising from some mysterious levels of the mind, foretelling things, presaging developments? There are some things, the texts state, which are perceptible to the mind only when in a state of sleep or dreaming. At the same time, svapnas can be seen as having been all too real for many, for over a long period of time in Indian history, they seem to have affected minds, guided actions, led to major decisions, changed the very course of events.

Dreams, everyone understands, are complex things, opaque, defying easy access, elusive and layered at the same time. They need to be interpreted, therefore, and thus a whole body of works related to them, as much as an array of categories of wise men who ‘know’ them, the svapnavid-s. Even that most famous of all ‘Indian’ dreams – for it travelled to every corner of the world to which Buddhism spread – that of queen Maya, mother of the Buddha-to-be, seeing a white elephant enter her body, had to be interpreted by wise men who were called in for this purpose by her kingly husband. Clearly, to the interpreters, the dream foretold the birth of a world conqueror from the queen’s womb. Far more elaborate, however, and thus requiring careful reading, were the dreams associated with the birth of the great ascetic-teacher, Mahavira, the virtual founder of Jainism as we know it. The mother of the future saviour dreamt fourteen auspicious dreams, and they had to be interpreted. But, in this case, the relationship of the dreamt objects with what they stand for is direct, easily comprehended. This is not always the case with dreams, however; and the Books of Dreams, that appear at a later point of time, explore other, more layered, aspects of the subject.
Slowly, it all begins to merge with other areas, and means, of foretelling the future. In fact, it would be difficult to think of many ways of divination, of attempts at seeing past the fog that is the future that cannot be found in the Indian subcontinent. Omens have been as much a part of many peoples’ lives as have been auguries; astrology has been a major concern, a distinct branch of learning, for more than a score of centuries; soothsayers abound as much as horoscope-casters do; as many people follow the Islamic practice of taking out a fal, omen, from opening a book of poems by Hafiz as they do in other parts of the Islamic world. The future is sought to be foretold, in one manner, through one means, or the other. Not everyone believes in this, and countless lives are led without recourse to these devices. But the interest in knowing the future is palpable.

Of obvious interest, in the midst of all this, are images which tie in with these concerns, with foretelling and presaging. One knows a great many of them, and they are not exclusive to any one faith or sect or class. Astrological charts and representations – geometric or figural – belonging alike to Hindu, Buddhist, Jaina or Islamic strains, are among the most sumptuous things rendered by the painters of the past: signs of the zodiac, personifications of planets and constellations, the movements of the stars in their course through the heavens. But, in a category apart, are whole books of dreams with each leaf illustrated, each dream envisioned. One knows of old texts, even though not always illustrated, like Svapna-chintamani, Svapna-pariksha, Svapna-darshana, Svapna-phalaphala, each related, as is obvious from the titles, to svapna-s or dreams. Closely allied to these are others which deal with shakunas and prashnas: omens and random queries. To these again, whole texts are devoted, some of them illustrated. At some point, in this context, it is to be understood that dreams and omens and ‘questions’—svapna-s, shakuna-s, and prashna-s— merge. For a dream could be seen as an omen, an omen might appear in a dream; and so forth. Boundaries are fluid here, and many things converge. Especially in the area of visual imagery. Interesting in this context is the fact that in this body of material, all images are single, isolated. Dreams do not figure in the form of narratives, and there are no references – at least direct ones – to states of mind, as they generally are in the west. The images could take any form: an owl, a human representation of a planet, a man dancing, a crow pecking at a fruit, a tiger standing under a tree, and the like. And more often than not, in these illustrated texts, they are interpreted simply as being ‘auspicious’ or ‘inauspicious’, foretelling the turn that events are likely to take.

I could go on in this strain for long, for there is much to write and tell, but cannot, at least not here. At the same time, I find the paintings in these texts irresistible.

Simple prognostication

Of these another time, perhaps. But, in fairness, I should cite at least one example or two. The text at the back of a Pahari picture of a tiger, thus, pronounces in terse terms: "Bhala 11. Simhe de darsane dhan labh hoye, sukh hoye, sada labh visekha kari hoye" (Auspicious. 11. If the image in the dream is that of a tiger, the gaining of wealth, of happiness, in fact of all kinds of gains, will follow.) The text at the back of the image of Saturn reads: "Manda 41. Sanichare de darsane dukh vyadhi hyoe, agni da chor da bhaya hoye, apamoha hoye" (Inauspicious. 41. If the image is that of Sanichar, i.e. Saturn, grief and illness, fear of fire and of thieves, and a state of confusion will follow.)

Considering this, wouldn’t many of us wish that one could choose one’s dreams?

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Dreams are usually some kind of reflection from your subconscious mind. They may be important messages, necessary to listen to...maybe not. Many times they reflect our fears or other emotional tendencies. If looked at objectively, they can be used as a self-reflective tool to evaluate what one needs to work on. Meditation and reading Gurbani are wonderful tools to heal the "garbage" floating from the subconscious, ending up in our dreams. Most spiritual people who meditate in the ambrosial hours of the morning, before the rising of the sun, find that their dreams greatly lessen and change. If you have a relationship with a spiritual teach and/or the Gurus, it is possible to receive messages in dreams from the radiance of these beings. Be careful though. Much harm has been done in the name of God. "God told me to invade Iraq," President Bush. Listen carefully and if a message will harm someone else, it is probably not a divine message but rather your own subconscious mind and personal ego and agenda speaking. GTKK