Psalm 126: Those Who Dream...and Give Meaning to Dreams

When the LORD restored the fortunes of Zion, we were like those who dream (Psalm 126:1). In Hebrew scripture, dreams are ways in which God speaks to humanity. Joseph's dreams (and the ability to interpret them) are important (Genesis 41). Daniel is Joseph's successor as interpreter of dreams (Daniel 2). Jacob dreams of a ladder, ramp, or stairway to heaven on which God's messengers come and go from one realm to the other (Genesis 28). Solomon asks God for wisdom (a discerning heart) in a dream (I Kings 3).   

By the beginning of the 20th century, however, the perception of dreams has taken a turn. They are still a source of revelation according to Sigmund Freud's Interpretation of Dreams, revealing emotional truths. For the artists we call Surrealists, dream imagery was a major source of their work. Dreams tapped into truth as it was found in their unconscious minds, opposite of rationality and reason. 

How does that compare to the dreams dreamed by the people of God? Are those dreams dreamed in Psalm 126 rational and reasonable? Should they be? Scripture is filled with stories of God's plan (which seems like it can only be a pipe dream*) brought to fruition against all odds. Did those captives in Babylon fear their dreams of returning home and restoring the Temple were "only" dreams? How were their dreams different when they made it back home?

For both Surrealist and scripture, dreams express meaning. The biggest difference may be the intelligiblity of the meaning ahead of time. Surrealists' "automatic" drawings were based on dream imagery and without a preformed plan or idea. The artists simply started working. They themselves had to wait until the work was complete before they knew what it meant. In scripture, dreams are acknowledged as a sign from God. When dreams were unintelligible on their own, someone was provided to help the dreamer understand the meaning. Surrealists aren't especially interested in helping a viewer understand a (not necessarily "the") meaning of a dream-inspired painting.

That means Surrealist paintings are wide open to interpretation. How important is it that we begin to find meaning in our own or others' dreams? There are many "Dream Dictionaries" that want to associate particular dream elements with particular universal meanings? Is that right?  Does a red rose always mean love? Or does each dreamer find individual meaning in the elements of their own dreams?

Presented with the image below, how would you interpret it in light of the subject of dreams and people who dream? Is your interpretation influenced by what you know about God-given dreams? Is this a picture that depicts a God dream like the people mentioned in the psalm? Or is this just a Freudian-influenced painter's world of dreams? You can read one interpretation of the painting via the museum link under the painting, but maybe that's not the best interpretation. What do you understand this painting to mean? 

Rene Magritte. The False Mirror. 1929. NY: Museum of Modern Art. 

*"Pipe dream" refers to the dreams experienced by smokers of opium pipes. What kind of dreams are those? Rational? Real? Surreal? Scriptural?                                                                                                                                                                         

2 Peter 3.8-15a: A Thousand Years

With God a thousand years is like a day and a day like a thousand years. (2 Peter 3:8) How do you show everything that has happened in the last thousand years? These four books definitely do NOT represent EVERYTHING that has happened in the last thousand years. 

And yet this incomplete history manages to fill:

419 pages (Architecture)
428 pages (Painting)
816 pages (Civilization)

196 pages (English Literature)

That's more than 1800 pages. And you still don't have it all

And it all weighs: 
2.8 pounds (Architecture)
1 pound (Painting)
2.24 pounds (Civilization)
2.6 pounds (English Literature)

That's more than 8.5 pounds. And you still don't have it all.

Now imagine everything that has happened in the world since the year 1020: 

• the computer
• amusement parks
• anesthesia and medical advancements
• telephone
• electric light
• radio and television
• the development of planes, trains, and automobiles
• movable type
• telescopes and astronomical discoveries

Imagine that all of those things have happened in a day. Imagine a single day filled with all those developments. That's how it is with God. God isn't slow about the promise but is patient with us. And in the meantime, we continue to wait for the day of the Lord. 

Psalm 122: Looking Up

To it the tribes go up, the tribes of the LORD, as was decreed for Israel, to give thanks to the name of the LORD. For there the thrones for judgment were set up, the thrones of the house of David. (Psalm 122:4-5)

They go up. Up to the Temple and up to Jerusalem. Up to give thanks to the name of the Lord. What is it about "up"? 

How often do you look up? We probably more often look down in the course of daily life. Down to watch out feet and make sure we don't trip. Down as we tap out text messages on our phones. Down at the computer keyboards on our desks. Down as we prepare a meal on a kitchen counter or stove. When we are ashamed or embarrassed, we tend to lower our eyes. As humans we are bound to the earth. 

So when we have (or take!) the opportunity to look up, or when we are compelled to look up, something different happens to us. When we raise our gaze, we see things differently. Looking up changes the angle of our chin and neck as well as the angle of the eye pupil. Looking up lets more light onto the whites of our eyes. Lifting our eyes (and heads) automatically opens our chest a little more. There is evidence to suggest that raising our gaze, which focuses us beyond the here and now, also gives us a shot of dopamine, that neurotransmitter that is part of our brain's reward system. 

Interior of the Florence Cathedral (Santa Maria del Fiore). 

Detail of Giorgio Vasari's dome (Last Judgement). #iCathedral completed. c. 1357.

Designers of cathedrals may not have known about the dopamine, but they knew that something happened when people walked in to a massive space and looked up at the ceiling or dome. Here, the Florence Cathedral draws your attention upward. In the dome are frescoes painted to look like even more layers of clouds and figures, extending up and up and up like layers of cake and frosting.

Architects of today's giant buildings with massive multi-story foyers understand it. The tops of trees must know it, tempting us as they do to gaze into their uppermost branches, outlined against a blue sky. Around 2014, the American Institute of Architects began a campaign called #ilookup. Viewers were invited to submit images and videos showing what they saw then they looked up: architecture, nature, a mix of the two.

It's too distinct a line to actually draw, but ask yourself if you'd rather be a navel-gazer or a star-gazer. Perhaps it's both. If you've never thought about it and have, by unintentional practice, a navel-gazer, give the stars a try. Just look up. 

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