Dream and Consciousness

The moment man sleeps all those rules are cancelled, for he can travel to the States and come back several times in few moments. He can also see strange things and new places that he has never visited before. All that he can see with closed eyes although if someone approaches his eyes and almost touches it, he will not see or feel it because the eyes are closed, but yet with those eyes closed he can see very clear and he may say strange things that no one can argue about just like the king of Egypt saw in his dreams at the time of prophet Youssef (Joseph) (Peace be upon him). Allah says about what the king saw in his dreams:

 “I saw (in a dream) seven fat cows, whom seven lean ones were devouring.” [Surat Yousuf, Ayah 43]

Is it possible that a cow can eat another in our day life? Of course, we have never seen that happen before. And can the weak cow eat the strong one? No, that is really unbelievable. And man walks in his dreams with his legs on bed not even moving, and he moves from one place to another with his body staying in the same place, not even few centimeters away. Man also sees the people who died many years ago and chats with them. He sees himself young when he is already old and he sees himself fighting a lion and killing it.

All those and other things happen to us in our sleep, we dream about it and we see it and it never happens outside the area of mind and memory and that’s why when we wake up we can tell people what we saw in details because it is stored in our memories. And some kind of seeing device other than the eyes saw what happened clearly with all the details or else how could we describe our dreams. And the discussion with the people that moved to the hereafter life is one that we are aware of because we can remember it and repeat may be the same phrases and words.

So man moves within a moment from some set of laws to another that we know nothing about, but to which we submit in our sleep. The question here is whether we have will or control over those laws that we submit to while sleeping, or not? That is can any of us while sleeping chose the events that he would like to see in his dreams? Can he say that he is going to see this and not that? Or say that this night he can go to Europe and the following night to the Soviet Union? Of course not, because when man is asleep he is out of the area of human choice. He is not free to choose what he can or cannot see and he is no more able to choose the words that he talks with and those that he hides within himself and does not utter.

He is not controlling anything he sees although his dream coincides with the notion of the human brain. For example if someone tells you that he  saw something in his dream, you do not deny him that and you do not argue with him because you know that there is dreams and that sometimes  you are exposed to it. So you do not accuse him of bringing out a subject that is above the human mind, but instead you give the day life laws a break so you do not use it as a measure to what happens during sleep. Your mind also does not question anyone’s dream and you do not try to argue with him about it because you know from your own experience that man can see in his dreams things that do not submit to the normal day life laws.

But still no one is able to give us a scientific explanation for the laws that controls man in his sleep and how the soul moves from one set of laws to another within the same moment and then returns to the day life laws the moment he wakes up from his sleep and again back to the sleep time laws. And no one regardless of the scientific degree that he reaches, can explain how this transfer from one law to another happens, but we know that sleep is a reality and that everyone experiences it. We also know that in the sleep time laws we go beyond the measures of time and that’s why when Allah (Glorified and Exalted be He) made the people in the cave (Ahl Al-Kahf)[1] asleep for three hundred and nine Hijri[2] years, by the time they were awake they did not know how long they slept. And although they have slept all those years, what did they say by the time they woke up? Allah (Glorified and Exalted be He) says:

 “Said one of them: “How long have you stayed (here)?” They said: “We have stayed (perhaps) a day or part of a day.””  [Surat Al-Kahf, Ayah 19]

So  man  when  sleeping  does  not  feel  the  time  and  that’s  why the  seven sleepers - Ahl Al-Kahf - measured the time that they have slept by the normal sleep time measures which is usually part of the day or by most a whole day if he is very exhausted, but not more than that.

And to apply that on our selves, when we go to sleep and then wake up we do not know for how long have we been sleeping  until we look to some  kind of time measurement device as the watch or any other sign for time measurement like day and night. So we might have slept in the day light and then wake up late at night or vice versa, but no one can know the actual number of sleeping hours unless he turns his eyes to the watch.