Dreams: God’s Forgotten Language 1968, 1989

1. Dreams: God’s Forgotten Language1968, 1989 By John A. Sanford Central Thesis: Dreams should be regarded as God’s “Forgotten Language” or “Voice of God”

2. Chap 1: Agree With Thine Enemy • Dreams: clear expressions of our nature • Problem: dream speak in symbols • Solution: talk to dreamer to understand symbolic language • Source: the unconscious: What if it has something to say? • Meaning of Dream: not found in conscious

3. Tom’s 3 Dreams • Psychosomatic symptoms • Repeated Dreams: unconscious psyche communicating an important idea/theme • Hints at a spiritual or psychological problem • Golf dream; Sinister adversary 1 and 2 • Who is trying to “kill” the dreamer? • What does it mean to die in a dream?

4. Sanford’s Analysis • The enemy is our self • Difficult to face our self • Guilt, shame, weaknesses • We banish these unacceptable things to the unconscious : becomes our Shadow • Death: extinction or transformation? • Change, transformation, growth, only occurs when the “old” in us dies • Mystery (paschal) at heart of Christianity • Paul: “I die daily” (Cor 15:31)

5. Tom’s Transformation • Perhaps shadow wants to transform Tom • Inner conflict and running away from self • Third Dream: facing the Shadow • Biblical parallel: Jacob Wrestling with Adversary • Physical condition immediately improved • Intelligence behind these meaningful dreams? God?

6. Dangers with dealing with God Directly? • Louise: middle age, capable, respected • The “important things” in our lives and the anxiety when we lose them • The “dark maid” and cleaning up the back yard • Who is the servant woman? A positive shadow • Clothes usually represent persona

7. The Young Minister and the Dangers in Ignoring Our Shadow • Insisting on a one-sided personality and becoming its victim • Behind every human attribute there hides it’s opposite • Meeting the “beatnik” at the round table • Do you recognize me?: A vital relationship of the two • Who is the real self? • Symbol of Wholeness? The Table • Religious symbols of squares, circles, spirals

8. Biblical Examples of Shadow Opposite Sides of Nature • Cain and Abel; Jacob and Esau; Mary and Martha; The Elder and Prodigal son • Message for Today? • Unrecognized Shadow projected out to society and “Other” • Example: the demonic side of Humanity: WWII, the Holocaust • Darfur: Israeli/Palestinian conflict; culture wars • Talking of peace, preparing for war today • Where is our unredeemed shadow found today?

9. Summary • The Shadow is real • Our dreams compensate our conscious attitudes by exposing us to our shadow • Shadow has value • Feared and rejected, it becomes evil: recognized and accepted it becomes part of whole person • Projection of Shadow onto Other • Dreams tell us there is something important beyond ego • Unity of self is needed if world is to escape disaster

10. Summary continued • Dreams not nonsense but intelligible communications from Self (Image, or Voice of God) • Jesus: “Agree with thine adversary quickly while thou art in the way with him (Math 5:25) • Not just our outer adversary but our inner

11. Chap 2: Though Your Sins are Like Scarlet • Margaret : cruel, abusive childhood; successful, multiple marriages • Dream 1: large square, shadowy room: tubular iron shift in center with shining white paper floating in water • Dog jumps in and she screams • Dream 2: Looking up and seeing shower of square paper: blank, shiny: pleasant feeling

12. Margaret’s Dream Analysis • 3 main ingredients: • The iron well, the paper, the dog • Well: symbol of earth, hell, also life, fruit: center of things, must be looked at, entered into • Paper: clean, totality, wholeness; symbol of her life: promise of renewed, whole life received from up high (Heaven, God) • Dog: domesticated animal: saving significance: instinctively knows what our conscious mind does not

13. Path to Whole (Holy)ness • Isaiah 1:18: “Though your sins be like scarlet, they will be as white as snow” • Guilt eventually removed • Sequel dream: man pushes her into well: finds a pleasant garden: fear reduced after • Cross as symbol of forgiveness • Forgiveness as ‘Work of the Soul’: an inner experience • Belief in Christ’s redemption of us: many still don’t feel redeemed

14. Guiltless Society • Cause? Lack of recognition of own guilt • Pop culture promotion of guiltlessness • *You can and should “have it all”! • Casual Christians: Christ has forgiven so why feel guilty? • Guilt often repressed, not resolved • Unconscious guilt prevents resolution • Result: nameless anxieties, self-sabotage, psychosomatic illness

15. Source of Our Morality? • Freudian approach: guilt caused by overbearing super-ego (reflects what Jung calls collective thinking) • Development of conscience key tool for ego: to rise above basic animal desires • For Jung, source of morality beyond collective or parent’s morality: • God’s morality communicated through the Higher Self within (Dreams • Conscious acceptance, unconscious rejection of behavior

16. Two-Headed Dragon • Freud: Cannot repress our sexual nature in name of religion • However, we also cannot repress religious or moral nature in name of our instincts • Strive for balance of two • Redemptive potential of guilt • Tend not to take our guilt or potential for forgiveness serious enough

17. Conclusions • Dreams remind us both of our guilt, and our forgiveness • Compensates for one-sided conscious attitude • appears that an unconscious wisdom lives within: sees ourselves differently • Goal: healing and wholeness • Dreams speak in symbols: source both personal and collective unconscious