Reformatted: Dream and Waking States

[Guest guest]

Dear Sri Bharat,

 

Sorry. The first mail had really long lines. So resending after reformatting.

 

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Thanks for the response. I have some doubts. Please clarify.

 

karma and dreams:

I agree that every suffering and comfort that the Atman

experiences in this life are due to its karma vinai. So in that

sense, even the unreasonable experiences through one's dreams

could also be dictated by karma. Afterall the dreams are

dictated by one's waking state experiences.

But how do we explain the haphazard dreams which don't seem

to make any sense at all?) I am sure I am not the only person

experiencing such dreams:) When I contemplate on the contents

of these dreams it more appears to me to be some superfluous

unconsequential mental images owing to weak or lack of

inner-control. We can let this one pass if we don't have much

to discuss about karma and dreams.

 

God and dreams:

Next one is regarding God being creator of the dreams. I

wholly agree that God is behind everything in this world subtle

and gross equally. But please clarify.

God commands the outcome of one's actions and inactions. But

does He also command what and how one should think and act ?

If the answer to this is Yes, then doesn't it give a sense

of non-ownership on the part of the jIva, of its actions ? This

is what my problem is, I guess. I totally agree that God is the

basis of everything in all states. This is clearly brought out

in the divya nAmA viz., "thri kakubh dhAma" (vishnu

sahasranama) which means "substratum in all three avasthas".

But does He also command the way one should act etc., ?

If the answer is No, then same holds in the case of dreams

too. In an ocean if a boat gets tossed upside down, then to

describe more specifically the cause of the tossing, I tend to

attribute it to the wave and not the ocean, while I completely

agree that the wave is part of ocean and the ocean forms the

basis for the wave. Similarly in the dreams and waking state

thoughts, while the brahman remains as Supreme monitor and

basis for all that happens, the immediate event that happens is

owned by the jIva and hence it incurs the karma by that. But

while it enacts this, if it realises that it's afterall a part

of the brahman and sheds the sense of doership, it avoids

effects of the karmas.

 

reality of dreams:

I actually gave the example of the burning house in the

context of reality of dreams and not for karmas. But I think

you have quoted that for proving karma.

 

I request you to answer the following basic questions for me,

so that I can fill the gap in my understanding of the basics of

this discussion on reality.

"what is unreal in this world if at all there is any such thing?";

"Shouldn't an object, to be called "real", be real in the

True sense to one and all and in all states?"

"If I think of a tree and make a mental picture of it, can

that tree be described as real?"

 

In this regard, I wish to draw similarities between dreams and

thoughts. Sometimes we will notice at the verge of falling

asleep that, dream slowly emerges and evolves and that dream

happens to be centered around the thing that we were thinking

about just before falling asleep. This means that thoughts and

dreams are different manifestations of the same thing in the

two states. So they are similar in their characteristics.

 

I don't know if we are talking about the same thing. I agree

that the images in the dream are "real" as part of the dream

because we know we dreamt. But as objects they are unreal even

during the dream. Similarly in the thoughts, "tree as a

thought" is real and as a tree-object is unreal. Is this what

you also mean? If yes, I think we have come to a conclusion.

 

I sincerely apologise if the above discussion seems naive

and insignificant and is wasting your time.

 

Thanks and regards,

 

adiyEn,

chandrasekaran.