Q:
What is the purpose of dreams nowadays?
A:
One purpose of dreams today is to make us aware of our faults. I’ll give you an example. Did you ever dream that you were sitting in a bathtub full of money? You never dreamed that? I remember years ago I once dreamed I was sitting in a bathtub full of money. It was a dry bathtub packed with money. It was a pleasant dream but then I asked myself, “Why is it that I don’t dream about Hashem?” A very big kasha! Why don’t I dream about Hashem?! Maybe that Hashem spoke to me, something else maybe. It never happened! Years and years pass by. I talk about it all the time but I never dreamed about it.
The answer is now I see what a hypocrite I am. Ein marin lo l’adam elah m’hirhurei libo, a man is shown in a dream what he really thinks about. It shows what I was thinking about; it shows. It’s tells you the truth about yourself. You understand that? A dream sometimes reveals to you important things about yourself. There are other purposes in a dream but that’s very important. There are some people who have the wrong kind of dreams.
You could dream about learning. Now, many times people dream about gemara. They have nightmares that they can’t answer a kasha, a difficult question, they have in the gemara. All night they’re rolling in bed, they can’t figure out the difficult gemara. Then, when he wakes up in the morning, he sees there’s no kasha at all. It happens many times. That’s also a good dream. It shows you that you’d better start learning better; otherwise you’ll have these half kashas left in your mind. So dreams have a purpose, yes.
TAPE #851
