In antiquity, just as with the modern age, dreams occupied a prominent place in the human psyche and imagination. The very word "dream" conveys a dual content: fantasies during sleep and our aspirations for the future.
Which are they? Do dreams simply reveal the imagination of the mind liberated by the welcome presence of sleep? Or, do drams clarify our own intentions, thereby illuminating our hopes and ideals for our relationships, careers, and activities in the time yet to come?
By and large, the ancients favored understanding dreams in the latter category. Dreams, for them, were the indispensable tools for peeking under the curtain separating the future from the present. Dreams revealed the time yet to be. Armed with this advance knowledge, a sort of mental press release, our ancestors felt better prepared to cope with whatever life would offer.
Not so modern dream experts. Other then the fringe charlatans who advertise late at night on television, most scholars of dreams view dreams more narrowly, seeing them as only indicative of a mind set loose, reviewing the events of the past day and construing anxieties in the light of hope. Dreams, for modern psychotherapy, reveal the past.
In our Torah portion, Joseph reveals his own God-given ability to read dreams. Confronted in last week's parashah with the dreams of Pharaoh's imprisoned baker and vintner, Joseph is able to reveal to them the meaning of their dreams. With striking piety, Joseph denies that his ability with dreams is due to special talent. Instead, he asserts, "Surely God can interpret! Tell me your dreams."
Joseph's interpretations are so accurate that he is able to reveal events that have not yet happened. That ability pays off in this week's Torah portion, as Pharaoh himself suffers from dreams so complex that no one in his court is able to make sense of them. Joseph, summoned from prison, does so.
The ancients, Jews included, saw dreams as messages revealing the future. The moderns, Jews included, understand dreams to be the mental equivalent of chewing one's cud--reworking the events of the recent past.
Are these two views so starkly exclusive as they sound? Perhaps we would do well to strain the wisdom we can from both positions. Assuming that dreams do not literally reveal the future, they nonetheless can shape it. By revealing our deepest hopes, fears, and struggles, by illustrating how we would hope a problem might work itself out, dreams can--if properly interpreted--reveal the path we ought to take to achieve peace of mind or to restore harmony in our friendships or family. In that sense, dreams--although the reworkings of the past and our inner life--can properly be seen as uncovering our futures.
One of the rabbis of the Talmud offers a lovely prayer on dream interpretation. He said, "Sovereign of the Universe?! I am Yours and my dreams are Yours! I have dreamt a dream and do not know what it is. Whether I have dreamt about myself or my companions have dreamt about me, or I have dreamt about others, if they are good dreams, confirm and reinforce them like the dreams of Joseph, and if they require a remedy, heal them as the waters of Marah were healed by Moses our rabbi, and as Miriam was healed of her leprosy, and Hezekiah of his sickness, and the waters of Jericho by Elisha. As You did turn all my dreams into blessings, may the blessings of your Kohanim come to me: May the LORD bless me and guard me, May the LORD show me favor and be gracious to me. May the LORD show me kindness and grant me peace.
To which we can all say, "Amen." Pleasant dreams, and Shabbat Shalom.