Chapter I: Repentance
Once a man came to Ibn Sir in and said : (1) I saw in dream as if there is a seal in my hand with which I am giving impression in the faces and places of shame. He said : It seems you are a Muzzen and will proclaim before dawn in the month of Ramzan.
He said : You have spoken the truth. (2) Another man came and said : I saw in dream that 1 am puring olive oil on my head. He said : Enquire into the condition of your slave if you have got any.
It seems that she is your mother and was a prisoner in your childhood, as the root of oil is olive tree and it returned to its root.
After examination, it was found that she was his mother and that she was taken a prisoner in his childhood, (3) Another man said to him : I saw in dream that I am dressing the neck of a swine with a necklace of emeralds. He said : It means that you are teaching wisdom to underserving persons.
The interpretation of dream occurs in such a way from the beginning to the end. The Prophets used to speak to men by way of illustrations and examples as they were ordered to speak to men according to the degree of the intelligence of men. The intelligence of men is as it were confined to the mist of dream.
Nothing is expressed to men who see anything in dream without examples. When they die, they wake up and understand that the illustrations are true. For this reason, the Prophet said : The heart of man is situated within two fingers of the Merciful. Nobody except the wise can understand it. The fools take it literally and understand this that God has got hands and fingers, from which He is pure. Similarly the Prophet said : God created Adam according to His imige. They understand it as material figure and colour. So they construct the images of God, while He is pure of all forms. Similarly the affairs of the next world are explained by illustrations! Many take it literaly true. The Prophet said : On the Resurrection Day, death will be presented in the form of a goat without hairs and it will be slaughtered. Some say it is a flase Hadis as death has got no body and goat has got a body. It is just like the saying of a man : I dreamt that a goat was tak,n to me and it was slaughtered. It means that the epidemic disease of the town slaughtered.
Vol-IV THE BOOK OF CONSTRUCTIVE VIRTUES 27