Christian Interpretation of Dreams

"Our dreams are a second life. I have been able to penetrate without a shudder those ivory and horned gates which separate us from the invisible world." - Gérard de Nerval

Dreams are believed as being the manifestations of the mind's process of working on your worries and fears. What does the Bible say about dreams? Dreams are the reflections of the stress in your life. Some believe that Satan could be sending you intimidating messages in the form of dreams. But, there is little evidence in the Bible scriptures that the Satan can do so. The Bible tells you to trust in God, submit yourself to Him and rest assured that He will solve all the problems in your life. Here we look at the interpretation of dreams in the religion Christianity.

Biblical Interpretation of Dreams

Over the centuries, many civilizations around the world have used dreams or rather their interpretation to control the functioning of the community. Dreams and their interpretations were a part of various religions including Christianity. In olden days, a priest of high order interpreted the dreams. However, there is no evidence to prove whether realistic interpretation was given to dreams.

The old testament of the Bible reveals God would communicate through dreams and visions. This is found in Num 12.6: "And He said, "Hear now my words: If there be a prophet among you, I the LORD will make myself known unto him in a vision, and will speak unto him in a dream".

Spiritual Dreams

Like other religions of the world, Christianity gives significant importance to biblical dreams. There are mainly two types of dreams - Prophetic dreams and Warning dreams.

Prophetic Dreams: The prophetic dreams concern with the things of direct relevance to the dreamer. The Bible says anyone could have a prophetic dream from God. The meanings of a prophetic dream are not clear and would require an interpretation. The Bible calls the prophetic dreams "dark sayings" and these dreams belong to God (Genesis 40:8). In the Old Testament, for instance, "My servant Moses is not so, who is faithful in all mine house. With him I will speak mouth to mouth, even apparently, and not in dark speeches".

Christians around the world believe God helps people to interpret their dreams and this is most evident in one of the biblical stories. King Nebuchadnezzar, has a dream concerning the future of his country and he forgets about it. Later, he asks his wise men to tell him about the dream and its meaning. Remember, the only other person who knew about the dream is the God. Later, it is the God who reveals it to one of the wise men - Daniel.

Warning Dreams: Christianity interprets warning dreams as the ones which warns the dreamer. It is believed these dreams are God-send and implies what would happen in the near future. For instance, the Angel of the Lord appeared in the dream of Joseph (father of Jesus Christ) and said: "Arise, and take the young child and his mother, and flee into Egypt, and be thou there until I bring thee word: for Herod will seek the young child to destroy him".

Christianity interprets the dreams concerning the will of God as the warning dreams. Later, when Herod is dead, an angel reappears unto Joseph and says "Arise, and take the young child and his mother, and go into the land of Israel: for they are dead which sought the young child's life".

Dream Symbols Interpreted by Christianity

Symbols are nothing but icons or images that have sacred significance in religious interpretation of dreams. These symbols are known as dream symbols. The origin and the ancient traditions of these symbols date back to pre-historic era when majority of people were not able to read or write. They used symbols and pictures to convey the meaning. Some of the dream symbols interpreted by Christianity are "Angel", "Ant", "Apple", "Halo", "Harp" and so on. Each and every symbol has its own interpretation and relevance in Christianity.