Dreams and Visions in Islamic Societies

Özgen Felek, Alexander D. Knysh, Özgen Felek, Alexander D. Knysh

• Publisher: SUNY Press
• Year: 2012
• Print ISBN: 9781438439945, 9781438439938
• eBook ISBN: 9781438439952
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Islamic Theology

Dreams and visions have always been important in Islamic societies. Yet, their pervasive impact on Muslim communities and on the lives of individual Muslims remains largely unknown and rather surprising to Westerners. This book addresses this gap in understanding with a fascinating and diverse account, taking readers from premodern Islam to the present day. Dreams and visions are shown to have been, and to be, significant in a range of social, educational, and cultural roles. The book includes a wealth of examples detailing the Sufi experience. Contributors use Arabic, Persian, Indian, Central Asian, and Ottoman sources and employ approaches grounded in history, sociology, psychology, anthropology, religious studies, and literary analysis. This is an illuminating work, showing how ordinary Muslims, Muslim notables, Sufis, legal scholars, and rulers have perceived both themselves and the world around them through the prism of dreams and visions.

PART I

Dreams in Biographical, Historical, Theological, Poetical, and Oral Narratives, and on the Internet

CHAPTER 1

Dreaming the Truth in the Sīra of Ibn Hishām

Sarah Mirza

There are fifteen distinct dreams narrated in Ibn Hishām's (d. 213/828 or 218/833) redaction of the sīra work of Ibn Isḥāq (d. ca. 150/767), our earliest extant biography of the prophet Muḥammad.¹ These dreams usually are narratives given in the form of historical reports (akhbār) and placed within the accounts of major events of the Prophet's birth and career in both Mecca and Medina. Here they serve to increase dramatic tension and elaborate the central themes explored by the Sīra, including the favored nature of the Prophet's lineage, the miraculous protection of the Prophet, and the Muslim community as falling within the Abrahamic line. A few of these are dreams of the Prophet himself, but a larger number involve members of the Banū Muṭṭalib, the clan of the Prophet, and non-Muslims, including pre-Islamic figures, both men and women. Only a minority of the dreams involves prominent Companions of the Prophet. The Sīra is not interested in the act of dream interpretation or in the dreamers' biographies. Regardless of the dreamer's identity, all of the dreams are assumed to be prophetic by their hearers and acted on as such. Here, I explore examples from the Sīra of the dreams of Muslims, starting with the Prophet, and of non-Muslims, the second category including both male and female dreamers. These illustrate the distinct use of dreams in the early sīra, in which dreaming and dream-telling are communal experiences that serve to activate the community.

The terminology used to refer to dreams and visions in Ibn Isḥāq's Sīra corresponds directly with the customary usage in accounts of dreams drawn from Ancient Near Eastern (ANE) texts, as surveyed by Adolph Oppenheim in the introduction to his translation of an Assyrian Dream Book. Akkadian texts commonly use the term munattu, from the root n-y-m, and corresponding with Arabic nāma, which refer to “early morning,” but occasionally also to “sleep” in the sense of “dream.”² This is an example of the semantic relationship between “sleep” and “dream” in these texts. However, words for “dream” also are derived from roots dealing with visual experiences, such as ḥ-l-m, yielding “dream” in Hebrew, Ugaritic, Aramaic, and Arabic (in Ugaritic meaning “to see”).³ The expression used in Ibn Hishām's redaction of the Sīra for all fifteen instances of reported dreams and visions is invariably raʾā ruʾyā (he saw … a vision). Sometimes there is an additional mention of the dreamer going to bed or being in a state of sleep, although occasionally the experience is described specifically as a “visitation.”⁴

In the Sīra, the dreams of the prophet Muḥammad occur as symbolic dreams that are immediately translated by the Prophet. According to the reports collected by Ibn Isḥāq,⁵ prior to the Muslim engagement with the Quraysh at Uḥud in Year 3 of the Hijra, the Prophet related a dream to his followers that consisted of a series of images: a number of cows, a dent in his sword, and his hand thrust into a coat of mail. Only one image, the coat of mail, is interpreted by the Prophet, who considers it a reference to Medina. Thereafter, the Prophet seeks advice from his followers on whether they should stay in Medina or march out to meet the Quraysh. There is extensive discussion among the Companions, who eventually lean toward leaving the city, although some express discomfort with resisting the Prophet's suggestion to stay in Medina. The believers march out, and the dream and its interpretation are no longer an issue.⁶

A second example of how the Prophet's dreams are subsumed under the drama of the community deals with the battle of Muʾta against the Byzantines in Year 8. Prior to receiving any news of the battle, and with the community's concern growing over the fates of the battle leaders, the Prophet announces the successive martyrdoms of the standard-bearers ʿAbdallāh b. Zayd and Jaʿfar b. Abī Ṭālib, prominent men and early converts. The community's anxiety reaches a climax when the Prophet pauses dramatically before the name of the third-in-command, ʿAbdallāh b. Rawāḥa, a leader of the Medinan Khazrajite tribe. But the Prophet assures the Medinans that he too was martyred and concludes his announcement with a dream in which he saw three thrones of gold carrying the commanders to Paradise, with ʿAbdallāh b. Rawāḥa's throne ascending more slowly than the others because he had hesitated in throwing himself into battle.⁷

As Leah Kinberg has argued, ḥadīth (reports on the Prophet's saying and actions) on telling and not telling and on the fabrication of dream accounts are identical with such rules on the transmission of ḥadīth about the Prophet.⁸ Both ḥadīth literature and the Sīra emphasize that telling a dream is as vital an experience as the dream itself and the event it foresees. The dreams in Ibn Isḥāq's Sīra function as vehicles for authoritative guidance, but only through being points for exploring the drama of the community. Those of the Prophet himself are immediately related to his followers and convey eagerly awaited information to them. This seems to reflect a practice of communal dream-telling as a form of decision making. Along with being related in public, the dreams also are acted on communally, rather than providing information merely for and about the individual dreamer.

Here it is useful to compare the functions of the dreams in Ibn Hishām's redaction of Ibn Isḥāq with the contents and presentation of Saḥīḥ al-Bukhārī's chapter on dream interpretation, the “Kitāb al-Taʿbīr.” Al-Bukhārī's chapter, consisting of sixty ḥadīth, has the largest number of ḥadīth on dreams in any of the canonical collections' chapters on dreams. The presentation of dreams in this chapter shows that the work is not interested in the chronology related to the dreams, but in models, both for dream interpretation and for Muslim behavior. For example, the Prophet narrates a dream in which a bowl of milk is given to him, the remainder of which he gives to ʿUmar b. ʿAbd al-Khaṭṭāb. When asked about its interpretation, the answer is given in one word, al-ʿilm (knowledge).⁹ This dream and its interpretation are found under the subsection on seeing milk in a dream, as well as under the subsection on dreaming about a bowl. In another ḥadīth, the Prophet sees ʿUmar wearing a shirt dragging on the ground behind him, which he interprets simply as al-dīn (religion).¹⁰ When the Companions relate their dreams to the Prophet, he often interprets them as reflecting their levels of righteousness or anticipated entry into Paradise.

Several of the dreams in both the Saḥīḥ of al-Bukhārī and of Muslim concern the status of Abū Bakr and ʿUmar,¹¹ whereas these Companions have a minor role in the dreams given by Ibn Isḥāq. In fact, there is very little overlap between the dreams reported in Saḥīḥ al-Bukhārī and in the Sīra of Ibn Isḥāq. While al-Bukhārī gives two Prophetic ḥadīth related to Uḥud, one involving slaughtered cows and the other a broken sword, they are distinct transmissions and interpreted differently from the one in the Sīra.¹² In the single instance of the same dream being found in both of these works, the Prophet finds two gold bracelets on his arms that he is told to blow off, and interprets them to represent the defeat of the false prophets al-ʿAnsī and Musaylima. Although the wording of the dream itself is almost identical in al-Bukhārī and Ibn Isḥāq, they are from entirely different sources, with no common links in their chains of transmitters (isnāds).¹³

The Sīra has a distinct lesser interest in the dreams of the Prophet himself. Focused on the chronological account of events of the community rather than the Prophet's acts of interpretation, the dreamers in Ibn Isḥāq's Sīra are specific, named individuals, unlike some ḥadīth in al-Bukhārī where a generic and unnamed “man” or “Bedouin” relates a dream to the Prophet. A significant characteristic of the dreams in the Sīra is their relationship with speech acts and audition. Communication within these dreams occurs with unnamed and unidentified individuals, and information is often passed on through conversation and repeated command and response patterns, comparable to the traditional account of the Prophet's first reception of revelation. Most dreams in Ibn Isḥāq's Sīra feature disembodied voices.

Thus a more fruitful comparison may be made with dream accounts in Ancient Near Eastern texts, the genres of which are lucidly summarized by Oppenheim. The best attested dream type in the surviving material from the ANE is of the “message dream.” In this type, the intentions of a deity are revealed to kings and priests through a vision that always contains a message conveyed as either a command or warning in understandable terms without the need for interpretation. The message dream, which is a privilege to the leader of a social group, occurs under critical conditions, such as the brink of war. This type is commonly found recorded in royal inscriptions that compose a large portion of surviving Egyptian and Mesopotamian texts.¹⁴ This theophany admits only a reaction of submissive consent on the part of the receptor and dreamer, and rarely encompasses dialogue.¹⁵

Mesopotamian (in Sumerian and Akkadian), Egyptian, Hittite, Biblical, and Greek texts all follow the format of dividing the account of the message dream into two distinct sections. At first, the setting of the dream is described, which includes information on the dreamer, time, location, and noteworthy circumstances. This is followed by the content of the dream, embedded in the descriptive setting that serves as a frame. Following the content of the dream, the account will return to the frame, providing a conclusion that conveys the reaction of the dreamer and/or the actual fulfillment of the prediction or promise.¹⁶ It is common for the first part of the frame to state that the dreamer has gone to bed and is deeply asleep.¹⁷ The same frame system is applied in Ibn Hishām's redaction of the Sīra. At the level of verbal expressions it takes the following form: Ibn Isḥāq provides his narrative introduction to the episode in the third person, usually with an isnād provided. He introduces the dreamer and the fact that he or she saw some vision using the terminology raʾā ruʾyā. Ibn Isḥāq's phrasing in this introductory portion exactly repeats the phrasing used by the quoted report, the khabar, that follows, which almost invariably includes the dreamer's words describing the experience in the first person. The khabar first provides a description of the circumstances, following Oppenheim's characterization of the first part of the frame, then the content of the dream, usually occurring in the form of quoted speech of the dreamer him or herself, using the phrase raʾaytu ruʾyā (I saw … a vision). The conclusion to the episode is then given in the remainder of the khabar. In the surviving ANE texts of the other dream types, symbolic dreams are recorded only as followed by their (authoritative) interpretation, whereas dreams without interpretation fall under the category of “evil dreams.”¹⁸ In Ibn Isḥāq's Sīra, each of the dreams experienced by individuals other than the Prophet falls under the category of the message dream.

The Prophet is thus not the only one capable of conveying information to his peers as received through the medium of dreams. The institution of a vocal call to prayer, the adhān, is placed within Ibn Isḥāq's dis...

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Acknowledgments
• Note on Transliteration
• Abbreviations
• Dreams and Visions in Islamic Societies: An Introduction
• Part I: Dreams in Biographical, Historical, theological, Poetical, and Oral Narratives, and on the Internet
• Part II: Dreams in Sufi Literature
• Contributors