Swapna
Svapna (IAST)Translation: "The Dream State"
From Mandukya Upanishad (Verses 4, 5, 10)
A Concise Dictionary of Indian Philosophy
Sanskrit: स्वप्न
Transliteration: Svapna
Translation: "dream; the dream state"
Definition:
- It is to be immersed in one’s own self.
Glossary to the Record of Yoga (Sri Aurobindo)
"Svapna, dream, dreaming; the state of sleep in which dreams occur, in contrast to deep and dreamless sleep (Suṣupti); internal vision in Svapna-Samādhi."
Mundaka and Mandukya Upanishads (Swami Sharvananda)
Sanskrit: स्वप्न, स्वप्नं
Transliteration: Svapna, Svapnaṃ
Translation: "dreams "
Māṇḍūkyopaniṣat and Kārikā (Swami Paramarthananda)
Commentary: "In dream, one and the same waker divides himself into the experiencing individual and the experienced world. Similarly I, the Ātma, with Māyā-Śakti bifurcate into the experiencing mind and the experienced world; the experiencing thought and the experienced object."
The Māṇḍūkya Upaniṣad (Swami Krishnananda)
Sanskrit: स्वप्न, स्वप्नं
Transliteration: Svapna, Svapnaṃ
Commentary: "The subtle desires repressed within manifest themselves in dream, when the will does not operate. The desires cannot all operate in the waking world, because the ‘reality’ is there, opposing them from outside. You cannot go on tom-toming your desires to people. They will oppose you, censure you, and make your life hard in the world. And the desires, too, are very intelligent. They know where to express themselves, and where not. But in the dream world there is no such censure from the reality outside. There is, then, no will and intellect or ratiocination working, and there is only the instinct operating. You live in an instinctive world. Your real personality, at least partially, comes out in the dream world.
Dreams, therefore, are due to repressed desires. This is one of the causes behind dreams. This is the only factor that the psychoanalysts of the West emphasize. But Indian psychologists and psychoanalysts, like the Rāja Yogins and the philosophers of the Vedānta, have touched another aspect of dream. The dreams may be, to some extent, of course, the results of complexes created by frustrated desires. But, this is not wholly true. Dreams may be due to other reasons also; one such reason being the working of past Karma. The effects of past Karma, meritorious or unmeritorious, may project themselves into dream when chances are not given to them for expression in waking life. Also, a thought of some other person may affect you. A friend of yours may be deeply thinking of you; and you may have a dream of him, or you may have a dream with experiences corresponding to his thoughts. Your mother may be far away, crying for you, and her thought can affect you; you may have a dream. All this is equal to saying that a telepathic effect can produce dream. In the case of spiritual seekers, guru’s grace can cause a dream; and catastrophic experiences that one may have to pass through in the waking world may pass lightly as a dream experience by his grace. Due to the power of the guru, one may have a dream suffering, instead of a waking one. If the disciple has to fall down and break his leg due to a Prārabdha, the guru will make him experience it in dream, and save him the trouble in waking. One may have a dream temperature, or fever, instead of a waking fever. One may have a calamity in dream instead of its coming in waking. This is due to the grace of the guru. So, Śaktipata can also be a cause of dream. All this the psychoanalysts of the West do not know. And, Īśvara’s grace, also, can bring about dreams. God may bless you and give you certain peculiar experiences in dream. You may ask, “Why should they not come in waking? Why should the guru work only in dream, and Īśvara’s grace come only in dream?” The reason is that you oppose their function in waking life, due to the assertions of the ego. You counteract Īśvara’s working and guru’s blessing by the action of your own egoism. But, in dream, the ego subsides, to some extent. You become more normal, one may say, and you approximate yourself more to reality, rather than to artificiality, in dream. Thus, it is easier for these powers to operate in dream than in waking. The opposing will of the ego, which functions in waking, subsides, to a large extent, in dream, and so there is a greater chance provided for the diviner forces to function in the dreaming condition. The physician puts the patient to sleep first, before the healing process can take place, because the ego opposes interference in the waking life, while there is no such opposition in dream and sleep. In hypnosis, the patient is put to sleep. The nerves must be soothed; the agitation of the mind should come down; the ego should not oppose the healing forces. Dream is helpful, in this way, for the operation of the higher powers coming from the guru, or from Īśvara.
Dream, therefore, can have umpteen causes. Whatever the causes be, dream in the individual is regarded as an effect of waking, and is often judged as a consequence of impressions of waking perception and cognition. The world of dream being subtle, projected only by the mind, is regarded as Pravivikta, Sūkṣma, non-physical – this is so both in the case of Taijasa and Hiraṇyagarbha. While Hiraṇyagarbha has Cosmic Knowledge, the Jīva has no such knowledge, for the reason already explained. Hiraṇyagarbha is Īśvara’s form, and Taijasa is Jīva’s form. Thus is the twofold mystery which dream bolsters up before us."
Lessons on the Upanishads (Swami Krishnananda)
"In the dream state something else happens. The actual physical world – which is seen, contacted through the sense organs in the waking state – is absent, but it looks as if it is present even in the dream state due to an action of the mind. Without the assistance of the gross senses and of the organs of action which are active in the waking condition, the mind alone concocts, imagines, projects a world of its own and we see a world in dream. We exist there, in the dream, in the same manner as we exist in the waking state. We can see ourselves now seated here in the waking state; in a similar way, we can see ourselves seeing certain things in the dream state also. There is a ‘dream me’ in the same way as there is a ‘waking me’. There is also a dream world. We see all sorts of things in the waking state – mountains, rivers, sun, moon, stars, and all kinds of people. We can see all that in the dream world also. There is space, time, and externality in dream, as there is in the waking state. The difference between the waking and the dream is that the mind has created the entire world of external cognition and perception of its own accord without the assistance of externally existing physical objects or physical sensations.
In dream also there are nineteen mouths operating. We have dream eyes, dream ears, a dream nose, a dream tongue that tastes, dream touch and dream legs, dream hands, dream organs of every kind. In dream we run with legs; we eat a good meal in dream. We can even live and die – even that experience is possible in dream. One can feel that one is born or one can feel that one is dead; one can observe one’s own cremation in dream. All kinds of fantastic things can be experienced in dream. A new world is projected by the mind. Space, time, causation, objects, people, all blessed things are in the dream world because the psyche is operating through the vital energy, the mind and the intellect in a diminished form – not in an active way. The only difference is that the physical body is not there as an object of awareness. People sometimes sleep with their mouths open; if a few particles of sugar are put on the tongue of a sleeping man, he will not taste it because his mind is withdrawn.
The mind is the main operative organ that causes the sensations of seeing, hearing, tasting, etc. Even the ego is very active in dream. If somebody calls us – either in dream or deep sleep – by a name that is not ours, we will not listen to it; we will not wake up. If John is sleeping and he is called Jacob, he will not wake up. John must be summoned only as John. That is, the ego is so very intensely identified with this particular name-form complex that it is active even there, in the submerged condition of dream and sleep. So the nineteen mouths of the waking condition are psychologically projected by the mind in the dreaming state also. There also we have all these experiences, every blessed thing, as we have in the waking state."
References:
- Grimes, John (1996). A Concise Dictionary of Indian Philosophy: Sanskrit Terms Defined in English. Albany: State University of New York Press
- Hartz, Richard. Glossary to the Record of Yoga (Sri Aurobindo). Retrieved from http://wiki.auroville.org.in/wiki/Glossary_to_the_Record_of_Yoga
- Sharvananda, Swami (1920). Mundaka and Mandukya Upanishads: With Sanskrit Text; Paraphrase with Word-For-Word Literal Translation, English, Rendering and Comments. Mylapore, Madras: Sri Ramakrishna Math
- Paramarthananda, Swami. Māṇḍūkyopaniṣat and Kārikā. Coimbatore: Arsha Avinash Foundation. p. 186.
- Krishnananda, Swami (1996). The Māṇḍūkya Upaniṣad. Retrieved from https://www.swami-krishnananda.org/mand_0.html. 68-70.
- Krishnananda, Swami (1991). Lessons on the Upanishads. Retrieved from https://www.swami-krishnananda.org/upanishad.html. p. 102-103.
