7

Cultural Theories of Dreaming

197-234

p. 197

"a cultural theory of dreaming usually has pragmatic consequences -- implications for the waking life of everyday people (Lohmann 2010:228). A cultural theory of dreaming will usually involve praxis, a built-in social process for transforming dreams into practical use. Very often the theory-praxis relationship is ... on the order of "if you dream this, then you should do this, or not do that."

According to Anthony F. C. Wallace's (1958) classic paper, ... the dream theory of the 17th century Iroquois people held that dreams

p. 198

were considered to be an expression

of the soul,

{more specifically, of one's spirit-guide (guardian-spirit, guardian-angel)}

and hence such desire s had to be either literally or symbolically fulfilled in waking life in order to avoid illness and other possible calamities."

"the Dobu Island people of {the D'Entrecasteaux Islands off} eastern New Guinea ... claim that each person has ... a spirit [while living] or ghost [when dead], and that the ghost survives the death of the {material} body and lives on Bwebweso, the Hill of the Dead (Fortune ... [1932]:180). The shadowy spirits of the dead may take palpable shape while dreaming (ibid:181) :

[quoted] In sleep the spirit goes forth; ... the spirits of the sleeper sometimes go to Bwebweso ... and there hold conversations with the dead. There are magicians ... who ... possess incantations that send their spirits to Bwebweso to meet the dead, but lovers also send their spirits forth to play upon the spirit of the loved one ... ."

"to disattend dreaming and consider the experiences had in dreams to be unreal ... is true for ... most members of any extremely materialist society -- it is not true for all (Collins 1984). For instance, here in the United States there are groups, movements and associations full of people who highly value dreaming for spiritual and therapeutic purposes ... . There are "New Age" groups (Heelas 1996), lucid dream groups,

Freudian

{These must be omitted, for they slanderously disparage dreaming as though it were by nature derived from violent intents (to murder one's kinfolk, etc.).}

and Jungian dreamwork support groups (see various in Ullman and Limmer 1999)."

p. 199

"How a person feels and thinks about dreaming

depends in large measure upon their {his or her} society's worldview.

{While this may be true enough of uneducated, reactionary persons, it is often quite untrue of membres of countercultural, anarchist types of families.}

The worldview of intact traditional societies tends to be a cosmology ... . ...

p. 200

That does not mean that everybody's understanding or version of their group's cosmology are exactly the same ... . ... Keeping in mind that a culture is a pool of information more or less available ..., not everyone shares the same information or understands things in exactly the same way, or has the same ... opinions or memories, or for that matter agree about the meaning of things

(see Devereux 1957 for variance among the Mohave Indians;

Broch 2000 for variance in notions of reality among the Timpaus Islanders of Indonesia;

Hollan 1989 for different dream beliefs among the Toraja of Indonesia {specifically, of Sulawesi};

Kracke 1979 for differences in dream among the Kagwahiv of Amazonia."

"The cosmology is mainly carried around in people's brains ... ."

{Cosmological information may also be available (at least theoretically) from the Akas`ik Record, the storage-capacity whereof is greater than that of living persons' memories.}

"As Kennedy and Langness (1981:249) aptly wrote :

[quoted] Of all forms of supernatural revelation and supernatural intervention, dreams are by far the most universal, and the majority of people, surely the most interesting. ... The often enigmatic quality of dream images, coupled with ... their divine importance in human affairs, has given rise to countless systems of ... interpretation and to the widespread role of the dream interpreter."

"Laura Graham (1994) presents ... how young males among the Xavante Indians of Brazil process dream-songs. During their initiation-process, youths are encouraged to seek new song-performance while dreaming. ... Xavante celebrate the complex dialogic processes ... in ... sharing songs, ... first as individually dreamed ... then in collective performances in which the dream-song ... becomes socially shared ..." (ibid:725)."

[quoted from Lohmann 2010, p. 228] "For the Asabano, a true dream might be a supernatural revelation, the perceptions of wandering souls, or both. Those dreams judged false are supposed to be ... illusions shown to dreamers by supernatural beings."

"The Asabano have always held that dreaming is the time ... when one is free of one's {material} body and can wander around in supernatural realms and have direct interactions with spirit entities.

{"What Burridge (1995:252) observed for the Tangu of northeast New Guinea is true of the Asabano : the deceased are assumed to have greater knowledge than the living, and that they continue conversing with the living in dreams privileges dreaming as a way of knowingthem." ("AAC", p. 191)}

These entities ... show things to people and provide information, like where to hunt. If they dream of a supernatural entity, they consider that entity real, and the events shown to them may well come true."

"modern Moroccans ... ([Kilborne 1992]:185 ...) ... consider dreams divisible into :

(1) message dreams -- divinatory dreams dreamt in holy places,

(2) warning dreams -- messages received from ancestors, etc. offering advice and cautions about the future ...".

p. 211

"Descola (1989:441) notes that for the Achuar folk of Ecuador, all dreams foretell events. Moreover, "The Achuar distinguish three broad categories of dreams ... : the kuntuknar dream, the mesekramprar dream and the karamprar dream."

"Kuntuknar dreams : These "... are a positive precondition of hunting and, to a l.esser extent, of fishing. They ... can be dreamed by women and even by predatory animals (dogs, jaguars, anacondas). Although Achuar men are solitary hunters, they often bring along one of their wives to handle the pack of dogs; these belong to women and are trained and raised by them. ...

p. 212

In principle, no man can undertake a hunting expedition if he or his wives have not dreamed a kuntuknar the previous night,

{This would be understood as due to the hunted-animal's spirit-guardian's ability to control (from within the dream-universe) events in the wake-universe.}

particularly if he hopes to encounter big game such as peccary. Failing an adequate dream, the hunter might meet some animal but will not manage to kill it" (ibid:441).

These dreams may be incubated, peopled with unknown persons who may be equated with certain animal species,

{South-AmerIndian reversal of human-to-beast points-of-view, is often called "perspectivism" by anthropologists.}

feature inverted meanings, and should remain secret between the dreamer and spouse.

Mesekramprar dreams : These "... foretell a negative or dangerous event for the dreamer or his close kin : a death, an accident, an attack by an animal ... . These bad omens can be dreamt by anyone and they are commented on with concern ... . Their manifest content exhibits ... variety ... : they feature ... uncanny personal experiences ..., or seductive human beings, the latter being generally anonymous ... . ... For example, ... a man dreaming of sexual intercolurse with a woman is thus warned ..." (ibid:442).

Karamprar dreams : These "... are dreams wherein a personal relationship is established with a being spatially remote or ontologically distant, but always known to the dreamer. ... The entities that appear in this category of dreams may be living persons temporarily estranged or absent ..., a whole

p. 213

range of tutelary spirits, magical objects in human form ..., or the embodiment of personal destiny" (ibid:442)."

"Hunting societies ... will generally distinguish hunting dreams from other forms of dreaming. This has certainly been the case among Eastern Cree peoples ... making their living as hunters (Flannery and Chambers 1985; ... Ridington 1988a).

As Speck ([1935]:187) notes : "To dream (pwamu>) is a religious process of these people. The hunting dream is a major object of focus ... . It is a part of the process of revelation ... .""

p. 213

"for most peoples on the planet, dreaming is at least as real as waking experience, and sometimes more real. ... . ... dreams are often understood to make normally invisible forces visible, provide information about the otherwise hidden world of spirit, and give access to power ... . As Roger Lohmann writes, "Sleep is a doorway, and dreams are roads and destinations. In dreams, people visit other places, change the shape of reality, and gain insight into causes and connections secreted beneath the cosmos of waking life" (2003b:1). ...

p. 214

Thus, Native American dreaming "is given a strong ontological priority and is regarded as {the} primary source of knowledge and power" ([Irwin 1994]:19)."

p. 214

"Spirits ..., gods, heroes, etc., whose presence one may ... not observe in waking life, may take on form when they appear as characters in a dream (d'Andrade 1961:298). Dream characters may communicate in one way or another with the dreamer. As a consequence, people may understand dreaming as a means of ... perhaps obtaining valuable information.

Myths come alive during dreaming and in other ASC (Dennis Tedlock 1999). That is the cosmology-direct experience relationship ... axis of instantiation ... . ... A society's cosmology is ... the basis for comprehension within the dream-state. This is ... Lincoln (1935) ... culture pattern dreams. Over and above the numinous ..., culture pattern dreams gain their status because of their relationship with the sacred stories. Australian Aborigines recognize that dreams about the Dreamtime -- the spiritual dimension of reality -- are distinctly important (Hume 1999). Price-Williams and Gaines (1994), drawing from Franc,oise Dussert's unpublished doctoral dissertation on Warlpiri ceremonies, note that Dussert "... enumerates several categories of night dreams, and

the fourth type included night dream experiences over a period of two to three months, which have as their theme a specific Dreaming (i.e., a story)" (ibid[:]376)."

{This may well be a variety of "serial dreaming".}

p. 215

"As Waud Kracke (1991:205) puts it, "... in some cultures, dreams constitute a kind of democratic mode of direct contact of personal verification of mythic truth, in that dreams may be a mode of direct contact with supernatural beings, and means of visiting normally inaccessible cosmic realms, which are open to ordinary people

without shamanic vocation or priestly initiation ... .""

{It may be added that in non-class-ruled societies, shamanic vocation (calling, by deities, upon a mortal, requiring that mortal to practice praeternatural healing) must always occurr in dreaming, and that priesthood (when understood as healing by means of herbs) must also be acquired from dreaming (the herbs being shown in dreams).}

"Irwin (1994:21-22) writes, "In the Native American context, dreaming is a form of knowledge. It reveals the activities of the mysterious p;owers ... . The dream is a medium of knowing ..., a faculty of perception ... ." This is why among the Indian societies of the Great Plains, thne quest for spiritual vision dreams was (and continues to be) as common as it was important (Benedict 1922)."

p. 215

"Dream theory for the Muria of India ... involves the adventures of

the jiwa or soul which leaves the body.

{\Jiwa\ is a term much-employed in Jaina cosmology : cognate with Hellenic \zo-\ ('alive'; < *\jya\), it would be related to Skt \jya\ 'bowstring', such as that involved in beheading Vaidik god Makha who, "Unconquerable" (S`YV 37:12; cf. "Sol Invictus"), is implored "give me life."}

p. 216

... (Elwin ... [1947]:475) : [quoted] One day long ago two men went to a blacksmith's shop to rest.

{This detail may imply that life-souls are forged from metallic (glittery) sorts of praeternatural substance -- cf. the silvern cord and golden cord for the astral body and mental body, respectively.} {Strong's 2099 \Ziw\ (>iyyar) is employed (mistransliterated \zif\) as the name of a metal, in the Book of Mormon.}

One fell asleep ... . Presently from the sleeper's mouth there came out his jiwa in the form of a lizard ... .

{"The Dogon ... wooden locks ... are decorated with a carved lozenge that represents the head of a lizard" ("DDL"). Cf. the Bamana "Door with Lizard Lock" ("DLL").} {Would such a praeternatural lizard retain a sleeper's life locked within that sleeper's material body?}

A dog saw it

{During the festival Robigalia, the Flamen Quirinalis "offered a dog ... that rust {mildew, smut} might not attack the crops." (OCD, s.v. "Robigus")}

and chased it into an ant-hill. There it saw a pot full of rupees. ...

{Cf., as reported in Herodotos 3:102, the legend told in the Northwest Frontier of India that, in their territory, murmekes (emmets) mine for gold.} {A "pot full of gold" is said to be located at an end of a rainbow : thus, seemingly implying an African method for attaining the "rainbow body" (Bodish \>ja> lus\), the iridescent rN~in-ma aequivalent to the Taoist "body of pearl" to be praeternaturally attained in the dream-universe.}

The other man covered the sleeper's face with coal-dust as a joke. ...

{This would apparently be aequivalent to (and provide an oneiric context for) the interaction, with facial smudging, when "Oxlahun-ti-ku ... seized by Bolon-ti-ku ... was despoiled of ... his smut" (BChBCh, p. 50).}

This is a true tale of what actually occurred."

p. 216

"Among many African peoples, cultural dream theory holds that it is quite common for ancestors to pass on to a higher plane of existence and that they may mediate between divine (normally hidden) forces and the living (Parrinder 1962:61). They may communicate via dreams of a distinctive character, and may warn the living of impending dangers, and even suggest the cause of the dangerous events.

The So (Tepes, Tepeth) people ... who live on the sides of mountains in Karamoja District, northeastern Uganda recognize the existence of

a high god called Belgin ...

{Strong's 1078 \Bel\ (= Strong's 1167 'owner') + <arabiy \jinn\ 'genie'}

who lives atop the mountains ... . The ancestors aere considered intermediaries between the living people and

p. 217

Belgin. Dreams are an important vehicle for interacting with the ghosts of the ancestors, especially dreams by important male elders who belong to a ghost cult called the Kenisan (Laughlin 1972)."

[quoted from Devereux 1957, p. 1036] "All students of Mohave culture report that magical powers ... are ... to be acquired in dream .... .

Given the ... curing rites of various shamans, ... this knowledge remains barren, i.e., ineffective, unless it is also "dreamed." Thus, after allowing me to record his ritual curing songs, a shaman explained that this would not enable me to cure people by singing these songs, because I had not "potentiated" them by learning them also in dream."

"Denise Nuttall (2007:345) reports that during her lengthy apprenticeship with the great East Indian tabla player, Usted Zakir H{.}ussain, she repeated had what she calls "tabla dreams" in which Zakirji would visit and instruct her.

The same experience was reported by Katherine Ewing (1994:574) who was visited by her teacher in dreams while researching S{.}ufi practices in Pakistan."

"The Esa Eja of Peruvian Amazonia seek the names of their children from dreams (Peluso 2004). In their dreams, people interact

with animals

{i.e., with dreamworld-ensconced divine spirit-guardians of tropical-forest animal-species}

and receive the "true name" of their child. This process brings direct experience in dreaming ... into accord with the spiritual aspects of

Esa Eja."

{If "Eja" be pronounced \EHA\, then EKAnkar (with its heavy dependence on dreaming for communication with divine world) would be pertinent.}

p. 218

"Australian Aborigines ... tell us that in mythical times -- or what they call the Dreaming, Dreamtime, the Law {= Dharma}, or more recently Power (Hume 1999) -- hero{-and-heroine} spirits created the world people later inhabited. People understand that

the Dreamtime happened a long time ago, and yet is still present to[-]day.

{After the events of the mythic Dreamtime occurred, the participating immortal deities all departed into the sky (each leaving on Earth an animal-simulacrum species), wherein each such deity is now visible as a caelestial constellation, and can thus be invoked currently invoked by mortals in religious rite-and-prayer.}

In other words, Dreamtime is essentially timeless (ibid:2).

{In order to invoke the deities who all had long-since departed into the visible night-sky, it is deemed sufficient to refer (in rite-and-prayer) to their activities accomplished by them when they were as-of-then on Earth, nothing apparently having been done by those deities since their departure into the night-sky; for, each of those deities hath ever since then (in their constellation-counterparts) remained as motionless as the fixed stars (as if effectively "timeless").}

Dreamtime is "still and moving all at once ... in a regular sequence, a sequence ... of sameness" (Williams 1968:16). ...

{When observed in the sky, the constellation-figures are motionless; but when visited in a dream, those deities may act out their myths, such acting portraying the myth's events in propre sequence.}

All the power accrued by shamans derives from the Dreamtime and is accessed by way of "night" dreaming (as Price-Williams and Gaines 1994:373 call dreams that are actually experienced by Aborigines). ...

p. 219

Every landmark has its place in the sacred stories of the Dreamtime and these features are recognized during "night" dreaming. ...

Nancy Munn in reporting on a Warlbiri Aborigine's "night" dreaming noted that "the dreamer felt himself to be ... at the ... time ... in the dream, identified with the ancestors" (1973, 114)."

"Ellen Basso (1992) has made the important point that, contrary to the Freudian orientation towards past events ..., many cultural theories of dreaming are oriented toward events yet to come.

The Kapalo ... are a people whose dreaming is interpreted ... with so ..., during the dreaming the dreamer's akua ("interactive self") leaves the {material} body and wanders about ... . The soul may be visited by powerful spiritual beings that are able to cast "song spells"

and are given the names of living forms from waking life. ...

{That is to say, the deities appearing in dreaming may identify themselves as "owners" (guardian-spirits) of species of animals and of plants

These contacts ... afford the dreamer the opportunity to derive

knowledge about the beings,

{such as, knowledge about how to hunt the wild animals whereof those deities are the "owners"}

information about events and the ability to use that information in the future.

People who accrue many contacts with these beings may become shamans.

Interpretation of dreams pertains to the future constitution of the dreamer ... [ibid., p. 101]."

p. 221

"The classic example of [dream-]incubation is that practiced by the ancient Greeks (Meier 1966, 1967 ...). ... A "large proportion" of their dreams would seem to have been theophanic -- that is, featured deities -- and "... as long as the god {or goddess} appears true to his {or her} attributes and to his {or her} cult-image, the dream is favorably interpreted.

The slightest flaw in this respect, however,

{There are sure to be such variations ("flaws") in all dreamings, though the "flaws" may fail to be noticed if the dream-contact be very brief and lacking in detail.}

renders its meaning ominous" (Meier 1966:311). ... .

p. 222

... at the oracle of Trophonius {Trophonios ('increaser of sales')} ... at Lebadea in Boeotia {Boiotia} ..., the incubant was bathed

in the waters of the Hercyna,

{water-spring of the goose of Herkune, nymph-companion of Perse-phone (DCM, s.v. "Hercyna")}

made to drink out of two springs near the cave which were said to wipe past thoughts from the mind. ...

{Cf. the Orphic "spring of forgetfulness" ("OBT&EFT", p. 129) quaffed from by non-initiated souls of the dead.}

The incubant then ... had theophanic dreams ... . ... The priests would offer an interpretation ... (Bulkeley 2008:159) and then ... his friends ... took him away to a temple ... ."

p. 222

"[Dream-]incubatorium at Tarakeswar {Taraka-is`vara} in the state of West Bengali, India. ... E. A. Morinis (1982:257) describes the dream incubation ... :

p. 223

[quoted] ... the dharna-jatri (pilgrim) performs the following ritual. ... He or she initiates the ritual by having the fingernail of the smalled finger chipped by a temple barber (right hand for a man, left for a woman), has a last ritual meal and bath in the temple tank, then ... under the portico before the deity's shrine room ... will lie fasting until the deity appears in a dream to give instructions ... . ... Not infrequently, pilgrims die while giving dharna, ... from the seriousness of their illness ... ."

[quoted from Lorand 1974, p. 151] "dreams were interpreted as having ethical and religious significance as well as prophesying the future ... . Dreams became a source of guidance for heads of colleges in making decisions on moral and spiritual matters, and were used quite frequently in this manner."

p. 224

"The scriptural tradition differentiates between ... kinds of dreams.

First come true spiritual dreams, ru>an, inspired by God;

second come dreams inspired by the devil {viz., by >ibliys} ... (Edgar and Henig 2010:251).

p. 225

Throughout the Islamic world, Istikhara or dream incubation is practiced to resolve uncertainty and cure sickness."

"Fred Voget (1984) ... notes that ... In olden days, people received their Sun Dance bundle through dreaming, and were thereafter able to sponsor a Dance (ibid:105). ...

Dancers participate in a Sun Dance ... because ... they have been told to participate by a spirit person in a dream. (Voget 1984:313)"

p. 226

"Vishvajit Pandya (2004) offers a ... description of dream theory, incubation and social praxis among the Ongee people ... that inhabit Little Andaman Island ... . ... During the day time, as people go about their daily tasks while inhabiting their physical bodies, they leave their distinct smells behind wherever they move. At night, when they fall asleep, their souls leave their {material} bodies and must go back to all the places they have been the previous day and collect all their olofactory spore. A dream is like a spider web to the Ongee, made up of all the sundry connections between paths, places and objects encountered during the dream journey.

p. 227

... When they lay {themselves} down at night, there is a great deal of talking and singing, most of it having to do with ... what people have dreamed and expect to dream that night. It is a time of collective dream interpretation, and ... discussion of dreams around the group is intended to reach a consensus understanding of what is going on in their collective dreaming. ... While this group exchange is going on, one member after the other falls asleep with the intention of dreaming about material of interest and relevance to the group, a lot having to do with hunting pig and turtle, and collecting jackfruit ... . ...

p. 228

Ongee dream theory emphasizes ... the social process of bringing dreams ... into a concerted interpretation and praxis. ... Collective dreaming may in turn determine what groups of people will spend their day doing. ...

In addition, ... the Ongee emphasis upon the olofactory phenomena ... tell ... something, for as Alfred Gell (1977:29) has argued, "There is a profound connection between the olfactory dimension and the dimension of other-worldliness ... expressed in the phrase 'odor of sanctity.' ..."

p. 229

This is ... why some peoples acknowledge the power of olfaction and associate it with dreaming.

[p. 229, fn. 5 "wonder how important olfaction might be in canine dreaming, or audition in dolphin dreaming, or song in passerine bird dreaming (see also Sperber 1996 on olfactory symbolism)."]

Gell (ibid:29) goes on to describe "... the Umeda villagers of New Guinea, for whom smelling is intimately connected with dreaming, and for whom dreaming means having access to higher truth." ... So in order to magically attract wild pigs, the Umeda hunter makes up a sachet of specfic plants the combined odor of which is considered pleasing to pigs. He will also sleep with that sachet close to him or under his head so that the odor will evoke a dream "... which betokens good hunting according to the system of dream-augury followed by the Umedas" (ibid:32)."

p. 229

"Johann Georg Kohl, writing in the 19th century, described an Ojibwa male ...'s experience ... (... [1860]:136) :

[quoted] I remember ..., when I was a half-grown lad, ...

p. 230

My grandfather ... led me deep into the forest. Here he selected a lofty tree,

a red pine,

{C^>ih-sun ('red pine') bark is a longevity-promoting substance : Pinus pinaster, having "bright red-brown ... bark" (D:"MP"), "is used to slow the aging process" (M+:"Pycnogenol").} {"Leihtzu, the immediate disciple of Laotzu, inquired of Ch'ih Sung-tzu ... how the power of traversing the air, of living unscathed in fire ..., might be acquired" (QuCMS, 5th series, no. 13 [1886], p. 327).}

and prepared a bed for me of branches ... . ... [end of quote]

In his dream a spirit in the form of a man visited him and invited him to attend a council. After flying there through the air, he found a wigwam ... . ... Then he was ordered to look up and saw the entire sky hovering close above him. ... He chose the sky and was told to ascend, at which point the back of the white rock became a ladder-like pillar. He climbed the ladder to a great height where he found four white-haired old men sitting in the air around the pillar (ibid:138-139) :

[quoted] ... the four old men shouted ... "Look on our white hair : ...

p. 231

whenever thou art in difficulty, think of us, and all thou seest with us. When thou prayst to us, we will help thee, and intercede for thee ... . ... Look around thee on{c}e more! Look and forget not!"