The images visualizedand dreams

It takes but a moment when our eyes are closed to call to mindan image
of the school we attended. An image forms in our brains rightaway. But
our eyes are closed. When we look at a view for a while and then
subsequently close our eyes we can again see that image in our minds
when we want to recall it. But again our eyes are closed. Although it
is not our eyes that are doing the seeing and although there is no
image of a school in front of us, thisimage still exists in our minds
in almost the exact same form. The production of an image in the mind
despite the lack of an eye to perceive it is evidence that the
perceiver is something different than the eye and something not
dependent on matter. It is the "soul" created by our Almighty Lord to
be independent of matter and bestowed on humanbeings by Him that does
the perceiving.
Dreams are of great importance to a proper understanding ofthis
subject. Events, space, people, feeling and three-dimensionality are
all the same in dreams as they are in this world. Somuch so that it is
almost impossible to be convinced that these arenot real when one is
dreaming. Everywhere one dreams of is very real, people are real,
andevents take place in sucha vivid way that the dreamer feels
excitement in the face ofthem, and when one runs one actually grows
out of breath. One can feel fear while dreaming, strive with all one's
might to escape from danger, or feel alarm in the face of the threat
concerned. But while all this rushing around is going on for hours,
you are actually lying comfortably in bed with your eyes closed. You
are in a perfectly secure environment, andthere is no-one trying to
catch you, no rain fallingand no danger confronting you. Furthermore,
an event that seems to last for hours actually took placein your dream
in a matter of minutes. And most important of all, these events were
all created in your mind.
One important point that needs to be stressed with regard to dreaming
is this: You do not have any direct experience of any element of the
outside world when dreaming. The world you experience at that moment
is generally different from the life you regard as real life. The
environment you are in may be different, and the people you meet, even
your parents,may be different. Your home and your fears may be
different. It is impossible for you to actually see anything because
your eyes are closed. But even if they were open the place youare in
is not the place you see. The smell of grass you know so well is
perfectly clear in a dream. But you are actually asleep on the tenth
floor of an apartment block. You have no doubt about it when you eat
and taste an apple; indeed, what you are eating may sometimes be a
peach, but it tastes like an apple. And, what is more, there is
nothing odd about that in that world. However, you arenot really
eating anything at all as you are asleep lying in bed. This is merely
somethingcreated in your dream.
One may suffer pain in a dream. So much so that if you slip while you
are running over grass you see you have cut your knee. You try to
staunch the bleeding and feel the pain from your knee with perfect
clarity. Yet no such thing has happened as you lie in bed. You feel
the pain in the real sense, but no injury has occurred to your body.
But how is it you feel the pain of an injury that does not actually
exist in just the same way as in reality? How is it that, although you
are fast asleep, you can enjoy the taste of a delicious apple, and
howcan you feel fear, excitement and worry inorder to escape from
danger, despite being asleep in bed, perfectly and in a way identical
tonormal? How is it that, despite being asleep in your bed at home,
you can run for hours over boundless expanses of land? And why are
those hours in fact only minutes?
If you are not actually in that environment, then what is the power
that shows you these things and causes you to feel them as if they
were real?
It is of course our Almighty Lord Who causes you to feel these things
in that way and Who keeps the soul under His constant supervision. In
the same way that Allah (God) creates a perfectly clear and beautiful
world in our minds in this world, so He can very definitely create an
equally clear and perfect world in ourdreams. There is no doubt that
this is very easy for Him.
Our Lord has created the same naturalcauses for the real worldand for
dreams: electric signals. The things we think we see actually stem
from electric signals, as do those in dreams. Although both have the
same cause andalthough both are created in your minds, you still think
that dreams are not real, but that this world is. The fact is,
however, that they are essentially the same; both are illusions.
Time is differentin dreams. And so is space. The laws of physics are
sometimes different. But these are the only things that are real for
you when you are dreaming. That being the case, since there is no
difference between the way you perceive the world you are perceiving
now and the world in your dreams, then this world clearly consists of
an image created in your mind. The same physical activities take place
in the brain whether you envisage something in your mind, whether you
experience it in real life or whether you dream it. You generally
think that the factor that givesrise to these activities is an
external stimulus, such as light rays. But there is actually no light
striking the retina, or nothorn pricking your finger, to give rise to
images or sensations when you envisage a thing in your mind or when
you dream it.
This makes the following fact perfectly obvious: The way this world is
created is the same as dreaming. Therefore, the images you see in this
world arecreated as illusions for you, just as in dreams. You watch
events arisingin your brain in a world also forming in your brain; you
laugh at them, enjoy them or feelexcitement at them. But Allah creates
them all in your mind. If a person loses the five senses he or she
possesses, this colorful, vivid, clear and perfect looking world that
we are shown will also disappear, even though the outside world
continues to exist.It is therefore impossibleto maintain that
something we see is the same as the original on the outside. It exists
onlyin a world that Allah "creates for us" in our minds. We can never,
ever know whether other people can see it or not, or whether we see
the same image as the original on the outside.