Hey, Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind. My name is Robert Lamb. Into the vault we go once more for dream Fall into the Dark, Part two, which originally published six twenty twenty three. Please enjoy Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of iHeartRadio.

Hey, Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind. My name is Robert Lamb. Into the vault we go once more for dream Fall into the Dark, Part two, which originally published six twenty twenty three. Please enjoy Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of iHeartRadio.

Hey, Welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. My name is Robert.

Hey, Welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. My name is Robert.

Lamb and I am Joe McCormick.

Lamb and I am Joe McCormick.

In the last episode, we discussed the power of dreams to impact the waking world, with a particular focus on times and places where the mystique of dreams seems to have held particular sway over prominent intellectual and or theological circles in a given society. So you know, what does it mean for a people when the gateway of prophetic dream is open wider and what factors seem to contribute to these upticks in dream fascination in particular. In the last episode, we discussed European Romanticism in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, as discussed by authors Lynn A. Struve and Jennifer Ford in their respective works. In this episode, we're going to continue looking at some of the times and places that Struve singles out in her twenty nineteen book The Dreaming Mind and the End of the Ming World, drawing in additional sources as well. Now, I believe the plan is to get into Struve's thoughts on the late Ming Dynasty dream culture in part three of this series. But to kick things off here, I thought we might discuss another movement another time in place that she highlights, and that is Quakerism of the mid seventeenth century, with religious and political strife in England, pushing immigrants out, religious dissenters out of England and into a new hotbed of religious and political strife in the New World. Now, I don't know. This is definitely one of those cases, and this is going to continue to be the case with some of the examples we draw on. Certainly we would love to hear from anyone out there who has actual roots in Quakerism. I know I have a cousin that is a Quaker. So this is very quake Quakerism still is very much alive, but we're going to be dealing with mid seventeenth century Quakerism in particular. Here Struve points out that the majority of Puritans of the time period considered quake heretical. It rejected the traditional Puritan power structure in favor of a meeting structure where anyone in the group could openly share their own account of seeking God through Christ. And accounts of dreams factored into these oral presentations, and sometimes these were written down as well. Quaker dream testimonials lost much of their prophetic qualities, but continued to be important in to the nineteenth century.

In the last episode, we discussed the power of dreams to impact the waking world, with a particular focus on times and places where the mystique of dreams seems to have held particular sway over prominent intellectual and or theological circles in a given society. So you know, what does it mean for a people when the gateway of prophetic dream is open wider and what factors seem to contribute to these upticks in dream fascination in particular. In the last episode, we discussed European Romanticism in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, as discussed by authors Lynn A. Struve and Jennifer Ford in their respective works. In this episode, we're going to continue looking at some of the times and places that Struve singles out in her twenty nineteen book The Dreaming Mind and the End of the Ming World, drawing in additional sources as well. Now, I believe the plan is to get into Struve's thoughts on the late Ming Dynasty dream culture in part three of this series. But to kick things off here, I thought we might discuss another movement another time in place that she highlights, and that is Quakerism of the mid seventeenth century, with religious and political strife in England, pushing immigrants out, religious dissenters out of England and into a new hotbed of religious and political strife in the New World. Now, I don't know. This is definitely one of those cases, and this is going to continue to be the case with some of the examples we draw on. Certainly we would love to hear from anyone out there who has actual roots in Quakerism. I know I have a cousin that is a Quaker. So this is very quake Quakerism still is very much alive, but we're going to be dealing with mid seventeenth century Quakerism in particular. Here Struve points out that the majority of Puritans of the time period considered quake heretical. It rejected the traditional Puritan power structure in favor of a meeting structure where anyone in the group could openly share their own account of seeking God through Christ. And accounts of dreams factored into these oral presentations, and sometimes these were written down as well. Quaker dream testimonials lost much of their prophetic qualities, but continued to be important in to the nineteenth century.

So I tried to do some digging to learn a bit more about the role of dreams in Quaker history and the more general historical context, and I came across a lot of references to what looks like a highly relevant and well regarded academic book on the subject. It's by Carla Jirona called Night Journeys, The Power of Dreams in Transatlantic Quaker Culture, University of Virginia Press in two thousand and four. I was not able to read this book itself, but I read a couple of academic reviews of it to get a sense of its arguments and major themes. So one of the reviews I'm going to reference was by Robert Cox in the Journal of the Early Republic Winter two thousand and five, and the other was by Michelle Lisa Tartar in the Journal of Quaker Studies two thousand and seven. But before I get into this book directly, I think it'd be good to do a little bit of background on the Quakers. So the Quakers are officially known as the Religious Society of Friends, and this tradition was founded in England in the mid seventeenth century by a man named George Fox. So I was reading about him in a book exerpt published in the New York Times by historian named James Walvin. The book is called The Quakers, Money and Morals. And before going any further, I just have to note a physical detail Walten includes in the description of George Fox, which is that he was described at the time as a man with hair like rats tales.

So I tried to do some digging to learn a bit more about the role of dreams in Quaker history and the more general historical context, and I came across a lot of references to what looks like a highly relevant and well regarded academic book on the subject. It's by Carla Jirona called Night Journeys, The Power of Dreams in Transatlantic Quaker Culture, University of Virginia Press in two thousand and four. I was not able to read this book itself, but I read a couple of academic reviews of it to get a sense of its arguments and major themes. So one of the reviews I'm going to reference was by Robert Cox in the Journal of the Early Republic Winter two thousand and five, and the other was by Michelle Lisa Tartar in the Journal of Quaker Studies two thousand and seven. But before I get into this book directly, I think it'd be good to do a little bit of background on the Quakers. So the Quakers are officially known as the Religious Society of Friends, and this tradition was founded in England in the mid seventeenth century by a man named George Fox. So I was reading about him in a book exerpt published in the New York Times by historian named James Walvin. The book is called The Quakers, Money and Morals. And before going any further, I just have to note a physical detail Walten includes in the description of George Fox, which is that he was described at the time as a man with hair like rats tales.

I'm having trouble picturing that because rats tales don't really look like hair hair. They are by their very nature hairless. Maybe he had kind of like a wet look and had kind of like white or grayish hair.

I'm having trouble picturing that because rats tales don't really look like hair hair. They are by their very nature hairless. Maybe he had kind of like a wet look and had kind of like white or grayish hair.

Perhaps it was an ambiguous evocation for me as well. But I'll keep trying to picture it as we go on. So George Fox was born in sixteen twenty four. He was the son of devout Puritan parents in Leicestershire, which is a city in the English Midlands. His father was a somewhat wealthy we and in sixteen forty three George Fox had an unpleasant experience seeing friends drinking alcohol at a local fair, and so the teenage Fox, after this experience, heard the voice of God Almighty telling him to leave home, abandon his friends, abandon his family, and seek the truth. And after this he spent several years a sort of itinerant, just wandering the country with his Bible in hand, seeking enlightenment of some sort, and apparently harassing local priests and ministers along the way. One example is in sixteen forty nine he was arrested and jailed for getting up in the middle of a church service in Nottingham and arguing with the minister about his interpretation of the Bible. Now, in defining Fox's early preachings and the Quaker's early beliefs, it's kind of interesting because several sources I've read mentioned that they're more easily defined in opposition to other beliefs than in the positive substance of themselves. But one thing seems to be that Fox's theology developed to include a belief in the necessity of inner spiritual rebirth. Sometimes this is known as born again theology. It was very much about having the inner light of God or the inner light of Christ revealed within yourself and experiencing God directly. And Fox also came to preach a message that was basically against the institutional structure of Christianity. It seems. Fox's unique thesis was that you do not need a church or a congregation or a cleric to act as any kind of intermediary or interpreter between you and God, that you should interact with God honestly and directly on your own terms.

Perhaps it was an ambiguous evocation for me as well. But I'll keep trying to picture it as we go on. So George Fox was born in sixteen twenty four. He was the son of devout Puritan parents in Leicestershire, which is a city in the English Midlands. His father was a somewhat wealthy we and in sixteen forty three George Fox had an unpleasant experience seeing friends drinking alcohol at a local fair, and so the teenage Fox, after this experience, heard the voice of God Almighty telling him to leave home, abandon his friends, abandon his family, and seek the truth. And after this he spent several years a sort of itinerant, just wandering the country with his Bible in hand, seeking enlightenment of some sort, and apparently harassing local priests and ministers along the way. One example is in sixteen forty nine he was arrested and jailed for getting up in the middle of a church service in Nottingham and arguing with the minister about his interpretation of the Bible. Now, in defining Fox's early preachings and the Quaker's early beliefs, it's kind of interesting because several sources I've read mentioned that they're more easily defined in opposition to other beliefs than in the positive substance of themselves. But one thing seems to be that Fox's theology developed to include a belief in the necessity of inner spiritual rebirth. Sometimes this is known as born again theology. It was very much about having the inner light of God or the inner light of Christ revealed within yourself and experiencing God directly. And Fox also came to preach a message that was basically against the institutional structure of Christianity. It seems. Fox's unique thesis was that you do not need a church or a congregation or a cleric to act as any kind of intermediary or interpreter between you and God, that you should interact with God honestly and directly on your own terms.

And I think already we can see how this is going to line up with the importance of dreams, the idea that there's some sort of direct communication. We saw that already with the example of Fox having heard the voice of God. As we've been discussing already in this series, there's this long standing human tradition of potentially interpreting dreams as such as well.

And I think already we can see how this is going to line up with the importance of dreams, the idea that there's some sort of direct communication. We saw that already with the example of Fox having heard the voice of God. As we've been discussing already in this series, there's this long standing human tradition of potentially interpreting dreams as such as well.

That's right, so we will get there. But another thing I should note before we move on is that this is happening in England in the sixteen forties, which is the same time as the English Civil War. Or directly after the English Civil War in the interregnum period. And this is a time of major change, political, social, cultural upheaval in England. I want to read a brief passage from Walven summarizing the cultural climate in England at the time. Quote Fox was not alone in suffering turmoil in the sixteen forties. The entire nation was racked by personal and social agitations that had been whipped up by a bloody and vengeful civil war. That decade and the interregnum years of the sixteen fifties formed what Christopher Hill has described as the greatest upheaval in English history. Old assumptions and beliefs, old certainties were shattered by the convulsion of religious and political freedoms, which had scarred most people in some way or other. The traditional acceptance that all English people belonged to the National Church and must worship as a matter of obligation was destroyed forever. And another feature of this period that Walvin notes is that this is a time when there was sudden dissolution of the strict censorship laws that had up until then controlled the printed word. There was kind of a sudden explosion in different kinds of materials that could be disseminated in print, including books and tracts that advocated radical and unorthodox points of view in civil and religious life. Now, the people around George Fox when he was traveling and preaching in the sixteen forties or sixteen fifties, these would mostly include members of the Church of England, the mainstream Protestant church in England at the time, and also Puritans, people who dissented from, or at least wanted to reform the Church of England, largely on the ground, sorry to oversimplify, but largely on the grounds that it was not removed enough from its Roman Catholic roots and not sufficiently based on Sola scriptura. Church of England was not Protestant enough. Now, I mentioned that Fox was jailed at least one time for interrupting a church meeting in Nottingham. He was jailed other times, I think, for blasphemy of various sorts. Fox made a lot of people angry, but he also won a lot of converts, if that's the right word. At least you could say he persuaded a lot of people to see their relationship with God in his way, and his movement spread rapidly in England and also to the colonies in North America in the sixteen fifties. In fact, the colony of Pennsylvania was founded by William Penn, who was a wealthy English Quaker, to serve as a safe haven for Quakers who were sometimes viciously persecuted in England. Now, once again, it's sometimes easier to say what Quakers don't believe than what exactly they do believe. But though there's some variation, overall, Quakers were known for rejecting hierarchy and rejecting the enforcement of orthodoxy and religious matters, and they were also known, though this might not have been a direct result of their theology, they were known for at certain times, but not always, having many members who supported radical social and political causes such as pacifism, advocating for women's rights, and the abolition of slavery. One thing that I think is worth noting with relevance to the role of dreaming is the format of Quaker religious meetings, which very often were just sort of like gatherings of the religious society of Friends, the Friends that would typically allow anyone to speak men and women alike, rather than just having a minister sermonized top down to the congregation.

That's right, so we will get there. But another thing I should note before we move on is that this is happening in England in the sixteen forties, which is the same time as the English Civil War. Or directly after the English Civil War in the interregnum period. And this is a time of major change, political, social, cultural upheaval in England. I want to read a brief passage from Walven summarizing the cultural climate in England at the time. Quote Fox was not alone in suffering turmoil in the sixteen forties. The entire nation was racked by personal and social agitations that had been whipped up by a bloody and vengeful civil war. That decade and the interregnum years of the sixteen fifties formed what Christopher Hill has described as the greatest upheaval in English history. Old assumptions and beliefs, old certainties were shattered by the convulsion of religious and political freedoms, which had scarred most people in some way or other. The traditional acceptance that all English people belonged to the National Church and must worship as a matter of obligation was destroyed forever. And another feature of this period that Walvin notes is that this is a time when there was sudden dissolution of the strict censorship laws that had up until then controlled the printed word. There was kind of a sudden explosion in different kinds of materials that could be disseminated in print, including books and tracts that advocated radical and unorthodox points of view in civil and religious life. Now, the people around George Fox when he was traveling and preaching in the sixteen forties or sixteen fifties, these would mostly include members of the Church of England, the mainstream Protestant church in England at the time, and also Puritans, people who dissented from, or at least wanted to reform the Church of England, largely on the ground, sorry to oversimplify, but largely on the grounds that it was not removed enough from its Roman Catholic roots and not sufficiently based on Sola scriptura. Church of England was not Protestant enough. Now, I mentioned that Fox was jailed at least one time for interrupting a church meeting in Nottingham. He was jailed other times, I think, for blasphemy of various sorts. Fox made a lot of people angry, but he also won a lot of converts, if that's the right word. At least you could say he persuaded a lot of people to see their relationship with God in his way, and his movement spread rapidly in England and also to the colonies in North America in the sixteen fifties. In fact, the colony of Pennsylvania was founded by William Penn, who was a wealthy English Quaker, to serve as a safe haven for Quakers who were sometimes viciously persecuted in England. Now, once again, it's sometimes easier to say what Quakers don't believe than what exactly they do believe. But though there's some variation, overall, Quakers were known for rejecting hierarchy and rejecting the enforcement of orthodoxy and religious matters, and they were also known, though this might not have been a direct result of their theology, they were known for at certain times, but not always, having many members who supported radical social and political causes such as pacifism, advocating for women's rights, and the abolition of slavery. One thing that I think is worth noting with relevance to the role of dreaming is the format of Quaker religious meetings, which very often were just sort of like gatherings of the religious society of Friends, the Friends that would typically allow anyone to speak men and women alike, rather than just having a minister sermonized top down to the congregation.

Yeah, I believe streve mentions that of the various written dream reports that would survive, a lot of these were by women.

Yeah, I believe streve mentions that of the various written dream reports that would survive, a lot of these were by women.

That's right. So that brings us back to a couple of the reviews I wanted to talk about of that book by Karla Girona, Night Journeys, The Power of Dreams in Transatlantic Quaker Culture. Not only did early Quakers believe that dreams contained genuine revelatory prophetic content, the culture of Quakerism in the North American colonies was substantially downstream from the contents of dreams, or what they might call night journeys.

That's right. So that brings us back to a couple of the reviews I wanted to talk about of that book by Karla Girona, Night Journeys, The Power of Dreams in Transatlantic Quaker Culture. Not only did early Quakers believe that dreams contained genuine revelatory prophetic content, the culture of Quakerism in the North American colonies was substantially downstream from the contents of dreams, or what they might call night journeys.

I don't know why night journeys is is such a cool term for dreams. I mean, it just ties in with a lot of what we're talking about here. But then it also sounds like it could be like an eighties rock anthem. I don't know where the.

I don't know why night journeys is is such a cool term for dreams. I mean, it just ties in with a lot of what we're talking about here. But then it also sounds like it could be like an eighties rock anthem. I don't know where the.

Dream warriors don't want to dream no more, except they did want to dream more. They in fact, wanted to dream quite a lot and discuss all their dreams. So Cox sort of summarizes Jirona's point as quote, dreams are not only models of culture, they are models for it, and I think a way of understanding this better is that while we today often think of dreams as simple reflections of individual internal psychological states and fixations, in the case of early American Quakerism, during the colonial and revolutionary periods, dreams were quote a collective endeavor. So the way I understand it is that for these seventeenth and eighteenth century Quakers, there was not only an emphasis placed on prophetic visions received through dreams, but the development of a collaborative prophetic dream culture, where stories of other Quakers prophetic dreams would be shared either in meetings or disseminated and circulated in print, and then interpreted by the community. Coxwrites, quote more than any of their sectarian peers, Quakers developed a uniquely intense practice of recording and circulating their prophetic dreams within their meetings and beyond, each minister sharing in the discussion and interpretation, each dreamer and each auditor imparting his or her own shades of meaning, dialectically collectively shaping a common Quaker identity in the process. So this really captured my imagination because it's sort of describing a scenario where dreams are such a common topic of conversation and a common subject of printed material circulated within the Quaker community, that they really kind of become a major facet of what the culture is. A lot of what it meant to be a Quaker in these times came from discussing dreams and what you thought you learned from.

Dream warriors don't want to dream no more, except they did want to dream more. They in fact, wanted to dream quite a lot and discuss all their dreams. So Cox sort of summarizes Jirona's point as quote, dreams are not only models of culture, they are models for it, and I think a way of understanding this better is that while we today often think of dreams as simple reflections of individual internal psychological states and fixations, in the case of early American Quakerism, during the colonial and revolutionary periods, dreams were quote a collective endeavor. So the way I understand it is that for these seventeenth and eighteenth century Quakers, there was not only an emphasis placed on prophetic visions received through dreams, but the development of a collaborative prophetic dream culture, where stories of other Quakers prophetic dreams would be shared either in meetings or disseminated and circulated in print, and then interpreted by the community. Coxwrites, quote more than any of their sectarian peers, Quakers developed a uniquely intense practice of recording and circulating their prophetic dreams within their meetings and beyond, each minister sharing in the discussion and interpretation, each dreamer and each auditor imparting his or her own shades of meaning, dialectically collectively shaping a common Quaker identity in the process. So this really captured my imagination because it's sort of describing a scenario where dreams are such a common topic of conversation and a common subject of printed material circulated within the Quaker community, that they really kind of become a major facet of what the culture is. A lot of what it meant to be a Quaker in these times came from discussing dreams and what you thought you learned from.

Them, Yeah, which is something that I honestly did not know about Quakerism until we started getting into this research here.

Them, Yeah, which is something that I honestly did not know about Quakerism until we started getting into this research here.

But there's another side to it too, which is, as with many religions that contain the possibility of individual revelation, whether that's through dreams or visions or you know, you believe in God speaks to you directly or whatever, there's evidence of a kind of push and pull effect with radical beliefs emerging through supposedly prophetic visions and dreams, and then a kind of taming or watering down process that comes through interpretation or through selective publication.

But there's another side to it too, which is, as with many religions that contain the possibility of individual revelation, whether that's through dreams or visions or you know, you believe in God speaks to you directly or whatever, there's evidence of a kind of push and pull effect with radical beliefs emerging through supposedly prophetic visions and dreams, and then a kind of taming or watering down process that comes through interpretation or through selective publication.

So, if you think.

So, if you think.

About it, there's kind of an inherent tension between the wild individual agency of democratized dream revelation. Again, thinking like somebody could have a dream and share it with us, and that may well be God himself speaking to us. There's that, and then there's also just like the practical necessities of maintaining a stable social group or the self interested motives of leaders in maintaining their positions of power.

About it, there's kind of an inherent tension between the wild individual agency of democratized dream revelation. Again, thinking like somebody could have a dream and share it with us, and that may well be God himself speaking to us. There's that, and then there's also just like the practical necessities of maintaining a stable social group or the self interested motives of leaders in maintaining their positions of power.

Yeah, I think it's easy to imagine for any of you out there who are a part of say a modern Protestant or Catholic denomination, like imagine going into church one day and it being announced, okay, from now on, starting right now, everybody can have an input on what we believe and what our individual relationships with God happens to be. And also a second part of that, dreams count as well. Whatever's happening in your dreams, bring that into the conversation. Like I think for people who are who have not had had any either aspect of this be part of their religious and organized religious experience, that would seem chaotic. That would that you would wonder, what does that mean that my faith is now going to be like a Wikipedia article where anyone can edit it and they can cite dreams, or is it going to be something to where organically something will emerge to sort of keep it in check, kind of like you see with many mainstream Wikipedia pages.

Yeah, I think it's easy to imagine for any of you out there who are a part of say a modern Protestant or Catholic denomination, like imagine going into church one day and it being announced, okay, from now on, starting right now, everybody can have an input on what we believe and what our individual relationships with God happens to be. And also a second part of that, dreams count as well. Whatever's happening in your dreams, bring that into the conversation. Like I think for people who are who have not had had any either aspect of this be part of their religious and organized religious experience, that would seem chaotic. That would that you would wonder, what does that mean that my faith is now going to be like a Wikipedia article where anyone can edit it and they can cite dreams, or is it going to be something to where organically something will emerge to sort of keep it in check, kind of like you see with many mainstream Wikipedia pages.

But there's another layer of difficulty there too, because it's not just like, oh, William had this opinion about what we should believe, and that comes from William. Beliefs potentially come directly from the Divine. The creator of the universe is telling you this through your dreams.

But there's another layer of difficulty there too, because it's not just like, oh, William had this opinion about what we should believe, and that comes from William. Beliefs potentially come directly from the Divine. The creator of the universe is telling you this through your dreams.

Yeah, when anyone in a given congregation, any given group is opened up to the like direct communications from the Divine or you know, certainly things that are interpreted or reinterpreted or presented as such. Yeah, that brings a whole new way to everything.

Yeah, when anyone in a given congregation, any given group is opened up to the like direct communications from the Divine or you know, certainly things that are interpreted or reinterpreted or presented as such. Yeah, that brings a whole new way to everything.

Now, It's one thing if these supposed revelations are just about you know, theological beliefs, understanding of the nature of Christ or something. Not to say that's not important, but that's you know, a different kind of subject matter than dream revelations supposedly from God that are things like maybe we should could overthrow the government, or maybe we should all stop going to work or something like that. Where it turns out that a lot of these early dream revelations in Quaker Friends meetings did have direct political connotations and direct political implications. There was often a tendency for dreams of the early Quakers to be interpreted as granting license to revolt against church and state, and one thing documented in this book is that in response, influential Quaker ministers often kind of counteracted these radical explosions of dream revelation that threatened political or social stability by guiding collaborative dream work sessions and by controlling the publication of prophetic dreams to sort of like steer them toward different interpretations, often having more to do with individual morality and regulation of personal behavior rather than having these radical political implications. And this was especially true apparently for the dreams of Women. To illustrate this, I'm going to quote from the review by Lisa tartar Now who writes quote At the beginning of the Quaker movement, such dreamings were experienced and expressed as apocalyptic prophesying, replete with symbolic language. They promoted friends religious enthusiasm, often attacked political leaders, and addressed contemporary issues, similar to their public tradition of prophesying. Seventeenth century friends shared their visions and dreams quite often and in public. But then by the eighteenth century there was a transition to a more corporate dream work within Quaker culture that was facilitated by leaders of specific Quaker groups who assumed control of the publishing of these dreams, and they regulated and sort of censored how dreams were discussed in Quaker print. Tartar writes, quote no longer confrontational or enthusiastic, This newly shaped corpus of dreams sought to regulate Quaker behavior and self discipline. Was more introspective in nature and focused on the individual, but extended to community wide meaning. And so she says that leaders at the time saw dreams as powerful tools that like, if you selected the right ones to publish and share with other Quaker groups, and if you interpreted them the right way, they could be used to encourage unity among the friends, to make everybody sort of like you know, fit together and function well as a social group. But you had to be careful to avoid letting dream prophetic dreams rock the boat too much, basically. And this is interesting to me because it seems this would probably be the case for any religion that allows new beliefs or new theology to evolve from individual direct experiences that people have, whether that's they believe to be waking visions or just sort of verbal revelations got speaking to people or through dreams. There's always going to be this battle going on within a religious culture that believes in these kinds of revelations, anyone can present the contents of their own mind and their own imagination as a kind of new scripture carrying the terrifying authority of the almighty. But then these dreams have to be quote interpreted, and there will be various pressures guiding that process of interpretation, often trying to resist the radical authority that leaps like lightning out of the mind of a single parishioner.

Now, It's one thing if these supposed revelations are just about you know, theological beliefs, understanding of the nature of Christ or something. Not to say that's not important, but that's you know, a different kind of subject matter than dream revelations supposedly from God that are things like maybe we should could overthrow the government, or maybe we should all stop going to work or something like that. Where it turns out that a lot of these early dream revelations in Quaker Friends meetings did have direct political connotations and direct political implications. There was often a tendency for dreams of the early Quakers to be interpreted as granting license to revolt against church and state, and one thing documented in this book is that in response, influential Quaker ministers often kind of counteracted these radical explosions of dream revelation that threatened political or social stability by guiding collaborative dream work sessions and by controlling the publication of prophetic dreams to sort of like steer them toward different interpretations, often having more to do with individual morality and regulation of personal behavior rather than having these radical political implications. And this was especially true apparently for the dreams of Women. To illustrate this, I'm going to quote from the review by Lisa tartar Now who writes quote At the beginning of the Quaker movement, such dreamings were experienced and expressed as apocalyptic prophesying, replete with symbolic language. They promoted friends religious enthusiasm, often attacked political leaders, and addressed contemporary issues, similar to their public tradition of prophesying. Seventeenth century friends shared their visions and dreams quite often and in public. But then by the eighteenth century there was a transition to a more corporate dream work within Quaker culture that was facilitated by leaders of specific Quaker groups who assumed control of the publishing of these dreams, and they regulated and sort of censored how dreams were discussed in Quaker print. Tartar writes, quote no longer confrontational or enthusiastic, This newly shaped corpus of dreams sought to regulate Quaker behavior and self discipline. Was more introspective in nature and focused on the individual, but extended to community wide meaning. And so she says that leaders at the time saw dreams as powerful tools that like, if you selected the right ones to publish and share with other Quaker groups, and if you interpreted them the right way, they could be used to encourage unity among the friends, to make everybody sort of like you know, fit together and function well as a social group. But you had to be careful to avoid letting dream prophetic dreams rock the boat too much, basically. And this is interesting to me because it seems this would probably be the case for any religion that allows new beliefs or new theology to evolve from individual direct experiences that people have, whether that's they believe to be waking visions or just sort of verbal revelations got speaking to people or through dreams. There's always going to be this battle going on within a religious culture that believes in these kinds of revelations, anyone can present the contents of their own mind and their own imagination as a kind of new scripture carrying the terrifying authority of the almighty. But then these dreams have to be quote interpreted, and there will be various pressures guiding that process of interpretation, often trying to resist the radical authority that leaps like lightning out of the mind of a single parishioner.

Yeah, this is fascinating, and I mean you can even compare it to to situations where individual ideas and opinions within a given movement or a given group, you are not tied to dreams and visions. But even in those situations, like say like a protest environment environment like a protest movement, is there going to be an effort to sort of amplify certain voices and bands within that group? Is there going to be an effort to like to lessen the impact of other ideas? And then and then also how do you make it all actionable? Like what ultimately is the sort of the what are you going to end up nailing to the church doors? In other words?

Yeah, this is fascinating, and I mean you can even compare it to to situations where individual ideas and opinions within a given movement or a given group, you are not tied to dreams and visions. But even in those situations, like say like a protest environment environment like a protest movement, is there going to be an effort to sort of amplify certain voices and bands within that group? Is there going to be an effort to like to lessen the impact of other ideas? And then and then also how do you make it all actionable? Like what ultimately is the sort of the what are you going to end up nailing to the church doors? In other words?

You know, mm hmm, But.

You know, mm hmm, But.

It is interesting, Yeah, that you bring up that like through publication and selective publication, there is kind of like a theological hierarchy that comes into play here determining exactly what sort of gets presented, what actually gets put forth for further discussion. Yeah, exactly, Struve and in her book rights that in the cases she covers, including those early on involving Euro American dream mystique and also the example get to here in a minute, there is ultimately a trichotomy of opinions concerning the nature of dreams, fed by various influences, including philosophy, really, doctrine, and folklore. And they are one dreams as residue of thought and or byproducts of bodily processes. We've just we've talked about that. The second area dreams is seen as being caused by demonic or satanic forces. And then three, in rare cases with exceptional individuals, they are divine visions or messages. And with the Quaker example, of course, we see item number three taken and democratized. It's no longer the chosen few who have the vision. It's everyone who has insight into the vision, everyone who's potentially hearing the words of God.

It is interesting, Yeah, that you bring up that like through publication and selective publication, there is kind of like a theological hierarchy that comes into play here determining exactly what sort of gets presented, what actually gets put forth for further discussion. Yeah, exactly, Struve and in her book rights that in the cases she covers, including those early on involving Euro American dream mystique and also the example get to here in a minute, there is ultimately a trichotomy of opinions concerning the nature of dreams, fed by various influences, including philosophy, really, doctrine, and folklore. And they are one dreams as residue of thought and or byproducts of bodily processes. We've just we've talked about that. The second area dreams is seen as being caused by demonic or satanic forces. And then three, in rare cases with exceptional individuals, they are divine visions or messages. And with the Quaker example, of course, we see item number three taken and democratized. It's no longer the chosen few who have the vision. It's everyone who has insight into the vision, everyone who's potentially hearing the words of God.

Yeah, that is interesting, and it seems like so Struve is saying with those that trichotomy you mentioned, basically that every place you look in history there is sort of a three way understanding of dreams, where there's some understanding that they might just be essentially natural, you know, nothing much to them. They're either something arising from the digestion of beef in your gut, or they're just what you were thinking about in the day. Second thing is they're from an evil spiritual entity, and the third is they're from a good spiritual entity. And so, yeah, it seems like the Quakers really opened the floodgates on option number three.

Yeah, that is interesting, and it seems like so Struve is saying with those that trichotomy you mentioned, basically that every place you look in history there is sort of a three way understanding of dreams, where there's some understanding that they might just be essentially natural, you know, nothing much to them. They're either something arising from the digestion of beef in your gut, or they're just what you were thinking about in the day. Second thing is they're from an evil spiritual entity, and the third is they're from a good spiritual entity. And so, yeah, it seems like the Quakers really opened the floodgates on option number three.

Yeah, and it does make me wonder like today are we are we still living in an age where predominantly the floodgates are open on item one, like like they are we? You know, can I this doesn't cover everybody. You're gonna still have certain areas and parts of society where two and three are gonna have more weight. But for the most part, yeah, do we just sort of default too? Well? You know, I shouldn't have eaten that potato, or I shouldn't have like in my case just the other night, shouldn't have watched that horror movie messed up my dreams all night long, gave me a terrible night of sleep. But I'm not blaming it on a satanic force, but true what chimes in on this idea of like, you know, prophetic dreams and how they're managed, and she says that, yeah, it then falls to authority figures to employ these categories as needed to quote, protect their respective creeds against challenges to orthodoxy from the random mental effusions of neophytes. So that means that, you know, in more sort of balanced situations, if someone's saying, hey, God spoke to me in a dream, then you would have someone in a position to say so come forward and say, well, I don't know that that's God's voice. Perhaps that is the potato you ate, or you know, there are other reasons we have the dreams that we have and perhaps that's what it was, or even potentially dipping into number two and saying, you know, there are other forces that may influence our dreams and they are not all divine.

Yeah, and it does make me wonder like today are we are we still living in an age where predominantly the floodgates are open on item one, like like they are we? You know, can I this doesn't cover everybody. You're gonna still have certain areas and parts of society where two and three are gonna have more weight. But for the most part, yeah, do we just sort of default too? Well? You know, I shouldn't have eaten that potato, or I shouldn't have like in my case just the other night, shouldn't have watched that horror movie messed up my dreams all night long, gave me a terrible night of sleep. But I'm not blaming it on a satanic force, but true what chimes in on this idea of like, you know, prophetic dreams and how they're managed, and she says that, yeah, it then falls to authority figures to employ these categories as needed to quote, protect their respective creeds against challenges to orthodoxy from the random mental effusions of neophytes. So that means that, you know, in more sort of balanced situations, if someone's saying, hey, God spoke to me in a dream, then you would have someone in a position to say so come forward and say, well, I don't know that that's God's voice. Perhaps that is the potato you ate, or you know, there are other reasons we have the dreams that we have and perhaps that's what it was, or even potentially dipping into number two and saying, you know, there are other forces that may influence our dreams and they are not all divine.

Now, one last thing I think is worth emphasizing about the Quakers is I think Struve selects them because they do conform to her general idea that times and places where there is a sudden profusion of writing about dreams. This often coincides with times of extreme social and cultural change, where there's a lot of like churn and who has power and there's a lot of uncertainty and anxiety, which again would have been true about England in the sixteen forties that remember that passage from walvin Abound, like it being the greatest time of upheaval and English history.

Now, one last thing I think is worth emphasizing about the Quakers is I think Struve selects them because they do conform to her general idea that times and places where there is a sudden profusion of writing about dreams. This often coincides with times of extreme social and cultural change, where there's a lot of like churn and who has power and there's a lot of uncertainty and anxiety, which again would have been true about England in the sixteen forties that remember that passage from walvin Abound, like it being the greatest time of upheaval and English history.

Yeah, yeah, so you can definitely see those pressures in place. And then yeah, and then not only on the British side of the ocean, but then once they get to the new world, like, yeah, there are all sorts of new stresses and problems, like it is not it is not just this world of new opportunity. Obviously there are there's you know, an indigenous population, there are all these other groups. There's just sort of the you know, the potentially harsh nature of the reality of a colonial life and so forth. Now, with all of that in mind, it's it's interesting that one of the other main examples that she makes in the book that Struth makes concerns Southism in the Ottoman Empire. And as we get into this here and discuss it, I think it'll become like more obvious how this particular example falls in line with what we've been discussing, but also some of the things that seem to make it unique if I'm understanding everything correctly. So, dreams are of great importance in Islam, especially as referenced in the Qur'an and the revelations of the prophet Muhammad. In Sufism, a more mystical branch of Islam, dreams are even more important given the emphasis on quote direct experience of the divine and on achieving is static union with God through dreams, visions, and trance unquote. The interest in dreams was, according to Struve, generally prognostic, and there were various manuals for dream interpretation, but they also probed their dreams and journaled the contents of their dreams as a way of seeking quote indications of their current spiritual state unquote, which you know to a certain extent, Like that kind of jives with the way we see dreams today, right though, And I guess in a non spiritual sense, like you could look at your dreams and you could learn something perhaps about the state of your own mind if you had, you know, the ability or the tools to sort of dig through like the nonsense that is inherent in our dreams. But again in Sufhism, particularly Ottoman Sufhism. Here, according to his story of dreams were seen as sacred bestows rather than subjective, and it all contributed to an intense intellectual focus on the contents of dreams. Under the Ottoman Empire, intellectuals of the day look to dreams for solutions, for inspiration, and also for introspection. Quote. Every change in daily life was believed to have a counterpart in dreams or to possess another worldly dimension. So I did a bit more reading on the subject of Sufi Ottoman dreaming, and according to scholar Osgen Fhelik in twenty twenty three, quote, the study of dreams in the Ottoman and greater Islamic worlds is still in its early emergent stages unquote. So it seems like that's an important caveat to make here that there is. It seems to be quite a bit more on all of this for academics to consider and to analyze. Now. Felick had previously edited a volume titled Dreams and Visions in Islamic Society, in which Alexander D. Denesh shares that the Arab mystic Iban al Arabi, who lived eleven sixty five through twelve forty, suggested that quote, the only reason God plays sleep in the animate world was so that everyone might know that there is another world similar to the sensory world.

Yeah, yeah, so you can definitely see those pressures in place. And then yeah, and then not only on the British side of the ocean, but then once they get to the new world, like, yeah, there are all sorts of new stresses and problems, like it is not it is not just this world of new opportunity. Obviously there are there's you know, an indigenous population, there are all these other groups. There's just sort of the you know, the potentially harsh nature of the reality of a colonial life and so forth. Now, with all of that in mind, it's it's interesting that one of the other main examples that she makes in the book that Struth makes concerns Southism in the Ottoman Empire. And as we get into this here and discuss it, I think it'll become like more obvious how this particular example falls in line with what we've been discussing, but also some of the things that seem to make it unique if I'm understanding everything correctly. So, dreams are of great importance in Islam, especially as referenced in the Qur'an and the revelations of the prophet Muhammad. In Sufism, a more mystical branch of Islam, dreams are even more important given the emphasis on quote direct experience of the divine and on achieving is static union with God through dreams, visions, and trance unquote. The interest in dreams was, according to Struve, generally prognostic, and there were various manuals for dream interpretation, but they also probed their dreams and journaled the contents of their dreams as a way of seeking quote indications of their current spiritual state unquote, which you know to a certain extent, Like that kind of jives with the way we see dreams today, right though, And I guess in a non spiritual sense, like you could look at your dreams and you could learn something perhaps about the state of your own mind if you had, you know, the ability or the tools to sort of dig through like the nonsense that is inherent in our dreams. But again in Sufhism, particularly Ottoman Sufhism. Here, according to his story of dreams were seen as sacred bestows rather than subjective, and it all contributed to an intense intellectual focus on the contents of dreams. Under the Ottoman Empire, intellectuals of the day look to dreams for solutions, for inspiration, and also for introspection. Quote. Every change in daily life was believed to have a counterpart in dreams or to possess another worldly dimension. So I did a bit more reading on the subject of Sufi Ottoman dreaming, and according to scholar Osgen Fhelik in twenty twenty three, quote, the study of dreams in the Ottoman and greater Islamic worlds is still in its early emergent stages unquote. So it seems like that's an important caveat to make here that there is. It seems to be quite a bit more on all of this for academics to consider and to analyze. Now. Felick had previously edited a volume titled Dreams and Visions in Islamic Society, in which Alexander D. Denesh shares that the Arab mystic Iban al Arabi, who lived eleven sixty five through twelve forty, suggested that quote, the only reason God plays sleep in the animate world was so that everyone might know that there is another world similar to the sensory world.

Oh that's interesting, though, I wonder if I'm interpreting this right. So it would mean that under Ibn al Arabi's view, that God gave us dreams so we would know that the material world is not all there is, that there is another world, and dreams are like one demonstration of that.

Oh that's interesting, though, I wonder if I'm interpreting this right. So it would mean that under Ibn al Arabi's view, that God gave us dreams so we would know that the material world is not all there is, that there is another world, and dreams are like one demonstration of that.

Yeah, yeah, which is which is quite quite fascinating to see this stress especially. I mean, I can't help but think about things that I've read in the past concerning say, witchcraft persecution in Europe, and the idea that like that, this, this world of the alleged occult was perhaps a focus for witchcraft persecutors because it gave them some idea of like, here is the supernatural world, and if the infernal version of that is real, then so is the divine. But here this stress seems to be like look no further than the world of dreams, Like that is kind of the proof right there again if I'm understanding this correctly. But according to even l RB here, the dream state allows one to probe mysteries of God and creation that are normally quite invisible to us. Densh describes this view as one detailing dreams as an instrument of cognition that enable people to better understand not all only the inner workings of the waking world, but to better understand the next world as well. For as even al Arabi would frequently quote, the prophet said that people are asleep and when they die, they awake. So dreams are like this hidden window. Now, the author stresses that while not all Muslims of the time would have agreed with even al Arabi on this, they would at least still value the importance of dreaming and of waking visions in the Muslim life. Pre modern Muslims, Danish writes, saw dreams as things that revealed not only hidden personal insights, but hidden aspects of the wider universe, things otherwise hidden, citing the words of the prophet, with his death, tidings of prophecy would end, but quote true dreams would endure, and with this in mind, believers in the Sufi school of Islam saw dreams as a kind of a font of continued revelations. It's kind of like the main font of revelation is now closed. It's the message is complete, but there's kind of this continued signal that will be open to those you know who will listen to it, who can receive these true dreams. So Denesh writes that the result is kind of twofold here for this particular example. First of all, a devout Muslim could expect the guidance of God in dreams, and two Sufi's in particular made broad use of dreams and dream lore quote from training Sufi disciples and prognostication to confirming the special status and authority of individual Sufi masters, as well as authenticating spiritual genealogies and mystical orders. At the same time, Deniesh points out that dreams and visions were and still are seen by Muslims as not only cosmological and social, but also reflections of the dreamers inner world quote expressions of both inner and outer voices. So again coming back to this, this this idea that yeah, dreams may reveal things about the world unseen, they may reveal things about the future, but also they may reveal things about yourself, which again that kind of compares rather favorably with sort of the secular way that that many people, certainly in the West, few dreams today.

Yeah, yeah, which is which is quite quite fascinating to see this stress especially. I mean, I can't help but think about things that I've read in the past concerning say, witchcraft persecution in Europe, and the idea that like that, this, this world of the alleged occult was perhaps a focus for witchcraft persecutors because it gave them some idea of like, here is the supernatural world, and if the infernal version of that is real, then so is the divine. But here this stress seems to be like look no further than the world of dreams, Like that is kind of the proof right there again if I'm understanding this correctly. But according to even l RB here, the dream state allows one to probe mysteries of God and creation that are normally quite invisible to us. Densh describes this view as one detailing dreams as an instrument of cognition that enable people to better understand not all only the inner workings of the waking world, but to better understand the next world as well. For as even al Arabi would frequently quote, the prophet said that people are asleep and when they die, they awake. So dreams are like this hidden window. Now, the author stresses that while not all Muslims of the time would have agreed with even al Arabi on this, they would at least still value the importance of dreaming and of waking visions in the Muslim life. Pre modern Muslims, Danish writes, saw dreams as things that revealed not only hidden personal insights, but hidden aspects of the wider universe, things otherwise hidden, citing the words of the prophet, with his death, tidings of prophecy would end, but quote true dreams would endure, and with this in mind, believers in the Sufi school of Islam saw dreams as a kind of a font of continued revelations. It's kind of like the main font of revelation is now closed. It's the message is complete, but there's kind of this continued signal that will be open to those you know who will listen to it, who can receive these true dreams. So Denesh writes that the result is kind of twofold here for this particular example. First of all, a devout Muslim could expect the guidance of God in dreams, and two Sufi's in particular made broad use of dreams and dream lore quote from training Sufi disciples and prognostication to confirming the special status and authority of individual Sufi masters, as well as authenticating spiritual genealogies and mystical orders. At the same time, Deniesh points out that dreams and visions were and still are seen by Muslims as not only cosmological and social, but also reflections of the dreamers inner world quote expressions of both inner and outer voices. So again coming back to this, this this idea that yeah, dreams may reveal things about the world unseen, they may reveal things about the future, but also they may reveal things about yourself, which again that kind of compares rather favorably with sort of the secular way that that many people, certainly in the West, few dreams today.

So I'm understanding this as the difference being that many Muslims would view dreams not as a source of sort of new theology that would change anything revealed in the Qur'an or anything like that, but that it would offer sort of specific guidance that is more particular to your time and place in history.

So I'm understanding this as the difference being that many Muslims would view dreams not as a source of sort of new theology that would change anything revealed in the Qur'an or anything like that, but that it would offer sort of specific guidance that is more particular to your time and place in history.

Yes, yeah, that's that's my understanding. And now, as with our example with the Quakers, you know, same here. If you have have a particular expertise in background in Islam or in Sufism, you know, we would love to hear from you and get your your your individual take on all of this. But based on what we've been reading in researching herea, it does seem like dreams important in Islam broadly, with a heightened importance in Sufism, and then during the Ottoman Empire particularly so particular focus of time and place, though it is kind of a broader period of time. We'll get into details on that in just a second. Even more focus on the power of dreams now. Danish also drives home though that, Yeah, it is important to note that dream cultures will vary from one Muslim society and one time to another. So yeah, don't again, don't take any of this as meaning like all Muslims, all Sufis, et cetera, believe this about any given dreams. Now. The book I reference covers different topics under this umbrella of dreaming, but there's another author in it, Gottfried Hagen, who singles out Ottoman dream culture as well. I just wanted to share a quick quote from Hagen on this quote. Throughout the pre modern era and probably much longer, people in the Ottoman Empire were firmly convinced of the reality of dreams. Now. Another interesting thing to think about, especially with this particular case, is that, you know, naturally one sees the importance of dream culture reflected in folklore as well, you know, because a lot of this is concerning I guess my understanding anyway, like the upper parts of like the Sufi system at the time. But beneath all that, you're also going to have sort of underlying folklore, right that is, I'm assuming working both ways, like folklore influenced by the prominent dream culture of the day, but also perhaps contributing to the general energy of it as well. I looked at a paper titled dream Motif in Turkish Folk Stories and sh Homanistic Initiation, and it discusses some examples of this, such as a motif of a young man or woman having an important dream, either after a traumatic event or after they pray to God for help following such an event. And then in the dream that follows, a holy man or holy men, and then sometimes it's a maiden offers the youth a cup of wine to drink, and this is sometimes described as like a love potion. They predict his future love or her future love. They give them a pseudonym under which to write poetry, and they offer guidance in the future. And then there's additional dream imagery that occurs in this motif, including the like the burning of the body like the mortal body, and the dream burns away and they awake with all this inspiration brought on by the dream. Now they're inspired to write poetry inspired by both this dream cup of wine and also inspired by God. The author rights quote the dream motif Complex and Turkish folk Stories provides a valuable case to illustrate how a ceremonial right, a shamanistic initiation right, turns into a fiction motif through long social and historical development. There is a striking resemblance between the initiation of a candidate into a shamanistic profession and the dream motif complex which initiates the candidate into the new life of an artist and lover. And the author here links these folkloric stories, including the one that I just shared and also some that are discussed elsewhere in this particular ride up to magico religious life of the Turko Mongol Shamans.

Yes, yeah, that's that's my understanding. And now, as with our example with the Quakers, you know, same here. If you have have a particular expertise in background in Islam or in Sufism, you know, we would love to hear from you and get your your your individual take on all of this. But based on what we've been reading in researching herea, it does seem like dreams important in Islam broadly, with a heightened importance in Sufism, and then during the Ottoman Empire particularly so particular focus of time and place, though it is kind of a broader period of time. We'll get into details on that in just a second. Even more focus on the power of dreams now. Danish also drives home though that, Yeah, it is important to note that dream cultures will vary from one Muslim society and one time to another. So yeah, don't again, don't take any of this as meaning like all Muslims, all Sufis, et cetera, believe this about any given dreams. Now. The book I reference covers different topics under this umbrella of dreaming, but there's another author in it, Gottfried Hagen, who singles out Ottoman dream culture as well. I just wanted to share a quick quote from Hagen on this quote. Throughout the pre modern era and probably much longer, people in the Ottoman Empire were firmly convinced of the reality of dreams. Now. Another interesting thing to think about, especially with this particular case, is that, you know, naturally one sees the importance of dream culture reflected in folklore as well, you know, because a lot of this is concerning I guess my understanding anyway, like the upper parts of like the Sufi system at the time. But beneath all that, you're also going to have sort of underlying folklore, right that is, I'm assuming working both ways, like folklore influenced by the prominent dream culture of the day, but also perhaps contributing to the general energy of it as well. I looked at a paper titled dream Motif in Turkish Folk Stories and sh Homanistic Initiation, and it discusses some examples of this, such as a motif of a young man or woman having an important dream, either after a traumatic event or after they pray to God for help following such an event. And then in the dream that follows, a holy man or holy men, and then sometimes it's a maiden offers the youth a cup of wine to drink, and this is sometimes described as like a love potion. They predict his future love or her future love. They give them a pseudonym under which to write poetry, and they offer guidance in the future. And then there's additional dream imagery that occurs in this motif, including the like the burning of the body like the mortal body, and the dream burns away and they awake with all this inspiration brought on by the dream. Now they're inspired to write poetry inspired by both this dream cup of wine and also inspired by God. The author rights quote the dream motif Complex and Turkish folk Stories provides a valuable case to illustrate how a ceremonial right, a shamanistic initiation right, turns into a fiction motif through long social and historical development. There is a striking resemblance between the initiation of a candidate into a shamanistic profession and the dream motif complex which initiates the candidate into the new life of an artist and lover. And the author here links these folkloric stories, including the one that I just shared and also some that are discussed elsewhere in this particular ride up to magico religious life of the Turko Mongol Shamans.

But this is not particular to the Ottoman Muslim period in.

But this is not particular to the Ottoman Muslim period in.

Turkey, no no. But though the particular dream motif that is shared here I believe has some clear Islamic cultural cultural labeling, like the way that that the Holy Men are presented. They're presented, at least in this version of it, as Islamic kolu Men. Yeah. But I bring it up though, just to sort of try to dig at and explore the idea that yeah, that any given culture you're going to still have like these other folkloric energies going on as well, that are going to have certain stresses regarding let's say, the reality of dreams, the cause of dreams, and the prophetic nature of dreams as well. But to come back to the Ottoman dynasty specifically, which ultimately runs twelve ninety nine through nineteen twelve. According to Struve, one has a strong dream tradition of Sufi Islam, the influence of Turkish Shamanism, and by the sixteenth century one sees a particularly strong Ottoman empire quote as the empire was brought by successive conquests to nearly ring the Mediterranean Sea, and also on top of that the prominence of the Sufi Halvetti order and also growing excitement in the Muslim world over quote anticipation of the appearance of a messiah, the Mahdi, who would prepare the world for judgment day, a millennial belief affirmed in Sufism. So if I'm understanding everything correctly here, Struve seems to outline less of an external stress based inward gays and one more like deeply deeply rooted in religion and culture and then heightened by theological prominence and millennial excitement. So it was a like a high time of dream reports, dream journaling mythologizing dream lore and consultation of one's own dreams for daily guidance. Struve quotes the modern historian draworza Hevy on all of this, who is a historian with a particular expertise in Ottoman culture. Quote. Ottoman culture may be described as a dream culture in the sense that true or imaginary every change in daily life was believed to have had a counterpart in dreams, or to possess an otherworldly dimension. People seem to have used dreams for introspection, to interpret the past, to anticipate the future, and to calculate their moves. Dream Lore was a unifying discourse, uniting people in a bond of shared experience, knitting together insights from politics, medicine, and religion.

Turkey, no no. But though the particular dream motif that is shared here I believe has some clear Islamic cultural cultural labeling, like the way that that the Holy Men are presented. They're presented, at least in this version of it, as Islamic kolu Men. Yeah. But I bring it up though, just to sort of try to dig at and explore the idea that yeah, that any given culture you're going to still have like these other folkloric energies going on as well, that are going to have certain stresses regarding let's say, the reality of dreams, the cause of dreams, and the prophetic nature of dreams as well. But to come back to the Ottoman dynasty specifically, which ultimately runs twelve ninety nine through nineteen twelve. According to Struve, one has a strong dream tradition of Sufi Islam, the influence of Turkish Shamanism, and by the sixteenth century one sees a particularly strong Ottoman empire quote as the empire was brought by successive conquests to nearly ring the Mediterranean Sea, and also on top of that the prominence of the Sufi Halvetti order and also growing excitement in the Muslim world over quote anticipation of the appearance of a messiah, the Mahdi, who would prepare the world for judgment day, a millennial belief affirmed in Sufism. So if I'm understanding everything correctly here, Struve seems to outline less of an external stress based inward gays and one more like deeply deeply rooted in religion and culture and then heightened by theological prominence and millennial excitement. So it was a like a high time of dream reports, dream journaling mythologizing dream lore and consultation of one's own dreams for daily guidance. Struve quotes the modern historian draworza Hevy on all of this, who is a historian with a particular expertise in Ottoman culture. Quote. Ottoman culture may be described as a dream culture in the sense that true or imaginary every change in daily life was believed to have had a counterpart in dreams, or to possess an otherworldly dimension. People seem to have used dreams for introspection, to interpret the past, to anticipate the future, and to calculate their moves. Dream Lore was a unifying discourse, uniting people in a bond of shared experience, knitting together insights from politics, medicine, and religion.

Oh well, there is a kind of similarity with the Quaker example of the emergence of a sort of collective dream culture in a way where people would share and discuss their dreams and the meaning of dreams. And there was it was more than just like an individual private experience that you have, believing that it reflects the you know, the contents of your own mind. That there was something bigger and more collective to it.

Oh well, there is a kind of similarity with the Quaker example of the emergence of a sort of collective dream culture in a way where people would share and discuss their dreams and the meaning of dreams. And there was it was more than just like an individual private experience that you have, believing that it reflects the you know, the contents of your own mind. That there was something bigger and more collective to it.

Yeah, I was really taken by that as well, a unifying discourse, which there's so many things that are different about the Ottoman example in the Quaker example, but this does seem to be the thing that they both have in common in their own ways. And again both in both cases it's so different from the way we think about our dreams today, like since we often have this idea that it is at best this kind of thing we extrude that has if you tease it apart enough, going to have some sort of insight or about our own inner world. It's the kind of thing where if you imagine yourself going to work, if you're you know, among your coworkers and go like, hey, everybody, you want to hear about my dream last night? Like that would that would feel more like a social faux pas, right, that would seem like something you should not do, like nobody wants to hear that, or perhaps you're oversharing by mentioning it, you know, unless you have something I guess just the right calibration to share. Whereas in these accounts like the Drink, sharing your dreams was just was part of the culture and it brought people together rather than making them seem like you know, the office weirdo as it might be in today's world in the West. All right, on that note, we're going to go ahead and close this episode out, but we'll be We'll be back for at least one more episode dealing with this whole topic of dream mystique and dream fascination and dream culture, so be sure to tune in on Thursday for that. In the meantime, you can check out other core episodes of Stuff to Blow Your Mind and the Stuff to Blow Your Mind podcast feed on Tuesdays and Thursdays. On Mondays we do a listener mail, on Wednesdays we do a short form artifact or monster effect, and on Fridays we set aside most serious concerns to just talk about a weird film on Weird House Cinema.

Yeah, I was really taken by that as well, a unifying discourse, which there's so many things that are different about the Ottoman example in the Quaker example, but this does seem to be the thing that they both have in common in their own ways. And again both in both cases it's so different from the way we think about our dreams today, like since we often have this idea that it is at best this kind of thing we extrude that has if you tease it apart enough, going to have some sort of insight or about our own inner world. It's the kind of thing where if you imagine yourself going to work, if you're you know, among your coworkers and go like, hey, everybody, you want to hear about my dream last night? Like that would that would feel more like a social faux pas, right, that would seem like something you should not do, like nobody wants to hear that, or perhaps you're oversharing by mentioning it, you know, unless you have something I guess just the right calibration to share. Whereas in these accounts like the Drink, sharing your dreams was just was part of the culture and it brought people together rather than making them seem like you know, the office weirdo as it might be in today's world in the West. All right, on that note, we're going to go ahead and close this episode out, but we'll be We'll be back for at least one more episode dealing with this whole topic of dream mystique and dream fascination and dream culture, so be sure to tune in on Thursday for that. In the meantime, you can check out other core episodes of Stuff to Blow Your Mind and the Stuff to Blow Your Mind podcast feed on Tuesdays and Thursdays. On Mondays we do a listener mail, on Wednesdays we do a short form artifact or monster effect, and on Fridays we set aside most serious concerns to just talk about a weird film on Weird House Cinema.

Huge thanks to our excellent audio producer JJ Posway. If you would like to get in touch with us with feedback on this episode or any other, to suggest a topic for the future, or just to say hello, you can email us at contact at stuff to Blow your Mind dot com. Stuff to Blow Your Mind is production of iHeartRadio.

Huge thanks to our excellent audio producer JJ Posway. If you would like to get in touch with us with feedback on this episode or any other, to suggest a topic for the future, or just to say hello, you can email us at contact at stuff to Blow your Mind dot com. Stuff to Blow Your Mind is production of iHeartRadio.

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In ratatator,

In ratatator,