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Dream
interpretations date back to 3000-4000 B.C., where they were documented on clay tablets.
For as long as we have been able to talk about our dreams, we have been
fascinated with them and have strived to understand them.
In
some primal societies, members were unable
to distinguish between the dream world and the waking world. Or they could
simply choose not to make the distinction. They saw that the dream
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world was not only an
extension of reality, but
that it was a more
powerful world. In the Greek and Roman
eras, dreams were seen in a religious context.
They were believed to be direct messages from the gods or from the dead. The
people of that time look to their dreams for solutions on what to
do or what course of action to take. They believed dreams forewarned and predicted the future.
Special shrines were even built where people can go there to sleep in
hopes that a message could be passed to them through their dreams. Their belief in
the power of a dream was so
strong that it even dictated the actions of political and
military leaders. In fact, dream
interpreters even accompanied military leaders into battle to help with
war strategy. Greek
philosopher, Aristotle believed that dreams were a result of physiological
functions. Dreams were able to diagnose illness and predict onset of
diseases. During
the Helllenistic period, the main focus of dreams was centered around its
ability to heal. Temples, called Asclepieions, were built around the
healing power of dreams. It was believed that sick people who slept in these temples
would be sent cures through their dreams. Dream
interpreters even aided the medicine men in their medical diagnosis.
It was believed that dreams
offered a vital clue for healers to finding what was wrong
with the dreamer. In
Egypt, priests also
acted as dream interpreters. The Egyptians recorded their
dreams in hieroglyphics. People with particular vivid
and significant dreams were believed to be blessed and were
considered special. People who had the power to
interpret dreams were looked up to and seen as divinely
gifted.
Dreaming
can be seen as an actual place that your spirit
and soul leaves every night to go and visit. The
Chinese believed that the soul leaves the body to go into
this world.
However, if they should be suddenly awakened, their
soul may fail to return to the body. For this reason,
some Chinese today, are wary of alarm clocks. Some Native
American tribes and Mexican civilizations share this same
notion of a distinct dream dimension. They believed that
their ancestors lived in their dreams and take on
non-human forms like plants. They see that dreams as a way
of visiting and having contact with their ancestors. Dreams
also helped to point their mission or role in life.
During
the Middle Ages, dreams were seen as evil and its images were temptations
from the devil. In the vulnerable sleep state, the devil was believed to
fill the mind of humans with poisonous thoughts. He did his dirty
work though dreams attempting to mislead us down a wrong path.
In
the early 19th century, dreams were dismissed as stemming from
anxiety, a household noise or even indigestion. Hence
there was really no meaning to it. Later on in the 19th
century, Sigmund Freud revived the importance of dreams and
its significance and need for interpretation. He
revolutionized the study of dreams.
Tracing back to these ancient cultures, people
had always had an inclination to interpret dreams The bible
alone has over seven hundred references to dreams.
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