A Reflection on Dr. Abdolkarim Soroush's Theory of the Prophetic Dream, by Khosrow Bagheri Noaparast

This writing seeks to appreciate the theory of the prophetic dream. Appreciation both in the sense of honoring (and not excommunicating) the theorist, and in the sense of recognizing the theory's worth and determining the limits of its strengths and weaknesses. In the first aspect, this theory represents a thoughtful endeavor in religious inquiry and is itself a response to a fundamental necessity in understanding the prevalent religious beliefs in our society and world, and for this reason, it is worthy of appreciation and even welcome. In the second aspect, no theory is immune to error and deserves to be placed on the scales of evaluation. Every evaluated theory, with both its strengths and weaknesses, paves the way for the growth of thought...

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1. Introduction:
   1. This writing seeks to appreciate the theory of the prophetic dream. Appreciation both in the sense of honoring (and not excommunicating) the theorist, and in the sense of recognizing the theory's worth and determining the limits of its strengths and weaknesses. In the first aspect, this theory represents a thoughtful endeavor in religious inquiry and is itself a response to a fundamental necessity in understanding the prevalent religious beliefs in our society and world, and for this reason, it is worthy of appreciation and even welcome. In the second aspect, no theory is immune to error and deserves to be placed on the scales of evaluation. Every evaluated theory, with both its strengths and weaknesses, paves the way for the growth of thought.
   2. Theories can be evaluated from at least two perspectives: coherence and correctness. In the first aspect, the theory's power to bring coherence to fragments of thought, as well as the internal coherence of the theory itself, is considered. In the second aspect, what we desire are reasons that demonstrate the theory's correctness and its access to truth. In what follows, we will examine the theory of the prophetic dream (henceforth referred to as "the theory" for brevity) from these two perspectives.
2. The (Coherence-giving) Coherence of the Theory: In terms of coherence, it seems that the theorist himself considers the theory's power to bring coherence to the concepts of the Quran as its most important achievement; meaning that the idea of the dream can well resolve or dissolve the Quran's theological discontinuities, its existing scientific problems, the terrifying images of hell's punishment, and so on. However, the theory's coherence-giving power, as well as its internal coherence, face the following doubts:
   1. Considering the concept of the dream, if, as has been stated, the dream pertains to the human dimension of the Prophet, then in this regard, the theory must remain committed to the human nature of the dream. Freud (1913), as the most prominent contemporary psychologist in dream analysis, has mentioned characteristics for dreams. Among them is that the dream does not follow rational laws (such as the law of non-contradiction). Thus, in a dream, one might accompany one's own corpse. Another is that the dream is wish-fulfillment; meaning that unattainable wishes in waking life are formulated in the dream. How does the theory of the prophetic dream commit to these two characteristics of the dream?
   2. The theory adheres to the first characteristic, as the duality of speech and speaker in the Quran (sometimes from the tongue of God and sometimes from the tongue of the Prophet) is considered to result from the dream-like nature of revelation, and the disharmonious arrangements in the Quran's content are also considered a sign of it. However, this characteristic faces difficulty in providing coherence in the Quran because one of the Quran's claims is that there is no discrepancy or contradiction in it (Had it been from other than God, they would have found within it much contradiction. An-Nisa: 82). How is it possible for a work to both claim the absence of contradiction and contain contradiction? Unless it is said in defense of the theory that the Prophet sometimes dreamed of non-contradiction and sometimes dreamed of contradiction, and this, on the whole, indicates contradiction and confirms the first characteristic of the dream. In that case, one must ask: what difference remains between rambling and revelation?
   3. Regarding the second characteristic of dreams, namely wish-fulfillment, what is the theory's position? This characteristic appears not to have been considered in the theory, because it speaks of the Messenger giving form to the formless truths he received. Whereas wish-fulfillment is a reaction arising from lack, the formulation of received truths is an overflow arising from possession and abundance. If this understanding is correct—that the theory has not welcomed this characteristic—the reason is probably that accepting the fulfillment of repressed and unfulfilled wishes is incompatible with the acceptance of revelation (even as the Prophet's dream), because with that assumption, no validity remains for the Prophet's words; for in this case, his words would be a reflection of "not having" rather than "having" shares of the truth. But one must ask: why is the theory not committed to all the characteristics of dreams? If the Prophet's dream is his human aspect, understanding and explaining this aspect without resorting to and committing to the characteristics of dreams leads nowhere. It might be said in response that Freud's theory is only accepted in parts. This itself indicates that without having a robust theory of dreams, one cannot formulate a theory of the prophetic dream; that is, the realization and validity of this theory is contingent upon a theory that does not yet exist; because Freud's view cannot be considered the final explanation of dreams. Therefore, the claim of the dream theory that it explains "the unknown revelation with the known dream" (Soroush, BBC Persian website) is not acceptable, because the nature of the dream itself is not yet "known."
   4. In addition to the inconsistency arising from the key concept of the dream in the theory, this theory also faces incoherence in terms of its fundamental assumptions. On the one hand, the theory is committed to prophethood, meaning that someone is supposed to convey a truth-laden message from God to humanity. But on the other hand, this assumption is violated because it is said that the Prophet, due to his temporal and earthly limitations, did not grasp all of the divine truth, such that if those limitations did not exist and he, for example, had lived longer, he would have come to us with fuller handfuls of the truth. If speaking of the Prophet's limitation meant that a descent (in meaning and rank) inevitably occurs in revelation due to the difference in rank between God and humanity, the majority of Quranic commentators have had and still have no doubt in accepting it. But if the intention is that God's message, due to an accidental matter—namely the specific existence of a particular prophet at a point on earth and in time—has been subjected to (avoidable) limitation, then the problem lies in God's management, as to why He did not place the mission in conditions free from those limitations (Allah knows best where to place His message. Al-An'am: 124). In other words, the assumption is that God intends to convey a message to humanity, and presumably it is feasible that He has considered such a thing. It is expected that God, taking into account the limitations of the Prophet and his audience, would devise a solution so that His message reaches people as much as possible. Now the question is: Did the Prophet of Islam, despite his linguistic and temporal limitations, receive and convey the main messages of revelation to people, or did he, due to those same limitations, fail to do so, even if partially? If the theory expresses the latter state (which it apparently does), it violates its own fundamental assumption, namely prophethood; in the sense that God has failed to convey His message to the people, even as much as possible.
3. Validity of the Theory: After examining the theory's coherence, it is time to consider its validity. Is the dream theory correct? What reasons exist for this? It is clear that the internal coherence of a theory and its power to provide coherence is a necessary but insufficient element for its acceptance. It must be specified what evidence exists for the theory's validity. One could also propose other theories that are seriously questionable in terms of validity but equal to the dream theory in terms of their power to provide coherence. For example, for the sake of argument and by introducing counterfactual hypotheses, and with apologies to the noble Prophet of Islam (PBUH), someone might propose the theory that the Prophet had particular mental or psychological problems or characteristics, and for this reason, disruptions occurred in his reception of revelation, or that he had a concrete and image-oriented mind, and for this reason, he received revelation in the form of images. Such theories are equal to the dream theory in terms of resolving the apparent problems of the Quran, but their validity is a matter of reflection. Now, given the equivalence of such theories with the dream theory, how can one judge the superiority of this theory? Should one not provide reasons beyond ensuring coherence for the theory's validity? In response to this question, it has been stated: "The explanatory power of this theory and its 'coverage' of the Quranic data is such that it makes it more probable and more successful than rival hypotheses. It is precisely this comprehensiveness of the data that is the very reason for the correctness or confirmation of the hypothesis, and critics who demand reasons should look at this data and evaluate the success of other hypotheses in covering them." (Soroush, BBC Persian website) It seems that in this response, the power to provide coherence ("coverage") of the theory is considered a reason for its validity. The question is, if other theories also have the same power to provide coherence, how can one speak of the validity of one of them? Regardless of this question, we can now consider the dream theory alongside its rival theory in terms of capability.
4. Comparison with the Rival Theory: Is the dream theory more capable than its rival, namely the theory of interpretation? A dream requires interpretation, and revelation requires exegesis. For what reason is dream interpretation in a better position than exegesis? In a comparative examination, it is not clear that the dream theory is better than the theory of interpretation. In this regard, three points are noteworthy.
   1. First, the dream theory itself also leads to strange results, while the emergence of such results has been considered a problem for the theory of interpretation. For example, if God is described as seeing and hearing in the Quran, according to the dream theory, one must assume that the Prophet saw God in the world of dreams with two eyes and two ears, because the language of dreams is the language of imagination and imagery.
   2. Second, the dream theory makes the understanding of the Quran dependent on dream interpretation. The task of interpreting a dream is far more difficult than exegesis because it requires deciphering the images of the Quran. But how can one provide a lengthy table of decipherments? It is true that it is not the task of the dream theorist to provide such a table, but rather the task of exegetes, but the assumption of such a condition is part of the dream theory, and since this condition is a kind of referral to the unknown, it casts the fate of the theory itself into obscurity. To understand the difficulty of dream interpretation, let us consider this example. In the interpretation of the dream recounted by the Prophet Joseph (AS) in the Quran (which, according to the dream theory, would itself indicate another strange result, such as the assumption of a double dream in the Quran), the devouring of seven cows by seven other cows was deciphered as meaning there would be seven years of economic prosperity and seven other years of drought. It is evident that finding a path from that image to this interpretation is a far more difficult task than the task of the rival theory, namely exegesis with the help of linguistic rules. In fact, this kind of dream interpretation is so difficult that it would require the sending of another prophet to interpret the Quran, and this itself indicates the failure to fulfill the purpose of the prophethood of the Prophet of Islam (PBUH).
   3. The third point is that in the dream theory, the Prophet is considered passive before prophethood and active after it, as stated: "God composed Muhammad, and Muhammad composed the Quran" (ibid.). However, it seems the matter should be reversed. That is, the Prophet must strive and be active to attain the station of prophethood, and when he becomes worthy of this degree, then, as a reward, he is chosen to be shown magnificent truths, and he passively sits to behold them (And thus did We show Abraham the kingdom of the heavens and the earth. Al-An'am: 75). Although activity and passivity are intertwined to varying degrees, seeing is more passive than active. To consider seeing as active and creative, as the dream theory necessitates, is to confuse the realms of vision and imagination. We see "something" that exists independently of us; the expression "creative seeing," when it seeks to negate the passive dimension of seeing, is, like "purple scream," a contradictory and meaningless expression. Unless it is said that the Prophet's activity in the station of prophethood, considering his passivity in the prior station, is ultimately reducible to passivity, in which case, activity will ultimately no longer be activity, and the fundamentally passive characteristic of prophethood will be revealed. This is the very characteristic considered for prophethood in the rival theory, and thus, it must be said that the dream theory concedes to the strength of the rival theory. In the rival theory, preserving this characteristic for prophethood is necessary so that the concept of prophethood can maintain its logical presuppositions of bringing God's message to the people. Considering the nature of a dream for revelation, at least regarding some prophets, is not unprecedented, as some commentators hold that Abraham (PBUH) received revelation in sleep, and this is clear in the case of the dream of sacrificing Ishmael. What exposes the dream theory to challenge is precisely this considering the Prophet as active in the station of the dream and substituting vision with imagination.
5. Conclusion: It seems that the dream theory, to the extent that, and only to the extent that, it involves the Prophet's interpretation of revelation, can be an acceptable theory (among other acceptable theories) and, in its own right, a solver of some difficulties. Of course, the requirement for accepting the interpretation of revelation is that the active role of the Prophet in the dream theory changes to a passive role, and it is held that the Prophet receives the main themes of revelation, i.e., God's message, passively but expresses them in his own words, without altering the themes of the message. The Prophet's activity here is only in the realm of re-expression, but as far as the message is concerned, he is passive and receptive. Just as seen in cases of human message delivery, someone may convey a person's message to another, while not using their exact words but conveying the main themes of their message. This is also observed in indirect quotation (paraphrase), which is inevitably used abundantly in research today because one cannot always copy the exact words of previous researchers. Professional researchers are capable in this matter and can correctly express an author's intent in other words. This part of the dream theory, considering the condition of interpretation, is its strength and can resolve some problems in understanding the Quran by showing the influence of the Prophet's temporal and spatial conditions on his expression, as required by interpretation. In contrast, modeling based on the dream is the theory's weakness because this model, due to characteristics such as the use of the contradictory language of dreams, casts doubt on the theory in terms of (partial) coherence and correctness.

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A Reflection on Dr. Abdolkarim Soroush's Theory of the Prophetic Dream

Khosrow Bagheri Noaparast; Professor at the University of Tehran

June 2016

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References:

• The Holy Quran

• Soroush, Abdolkarim (n.d.). What a charming dream, better than wakefulness. BBC Persian website.

Freud, Sigmund (1913). The interpretation of dreams, Third Edition. Trans. by A. A. Brill. New York: The MacMillan Company.

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