"Last night Chuang Chou dreamed he was a butterfly, spirits soaring he was a butterfly (is it that in showing what he was suited his own fancy?), and did not know about Chou. When all of a sudden he awoke, he was Chou with all his wits about him. He does not know whether he is Chou who dream he is a butterfly or a butterfly who dreams he is Chou. Between Chou and the butterfly there was necessarily a dividing; just this is what is meant by the transformation of things."When I was nine years old, I distinctly remember dreaming of eating cotton candy. I could see the pink, fluffy material and taste the sweetness of the treat. When I woke up, I realized I actually was chewing on something, only it was my teddy bear. But did I really chew on a stuffed animal, dreaming it was cotton candy, or was I eating cotton candy and dreamed it turned into a teddy bear?
[...] While sleeping, he dreams that a ladder connects earth and heaven, and when he climbs to the top, he comes face to face with God. When they meet, God affirms that he will always be with Jacob and that he will eventually bring Jacob back to the land where he currently sleeps and his people will flourish there. Even though this is a story about Judaism, the same Taoist element of truth in dreams and the play on real vs. unreal that occurs in Bao-yu's dream can be applied to Jacob's dream. [...]
[...] Without the truth in his dreams and his belief that they were real, Harry would never have been able to navigate through the Department of Mysteries. Like Cao Xueqin, J.K. Rowling blurs the line between Harry's dreaming and waking states and makes it difficult to see which is real and which is unreal. Bao-yu's Return to the Land of Illusion and the “enlightenment” of Harry and Jacob Just as Harry eventually finds himself in the place he had dreaming about, Bao-yu finds himself back in the Land of Illusion towards the end of the novel, when the monk takes his spirit there. [...]
[...] He says that he senses God in the land and aptly renames the area Bethel (literally “House of Prior to the dream, he did not think the place he slept had any special significance, but after the dream, he has a new outlook. His ability to change his perception from the dream and carry on God's message raises the question of how something Western philosophy considers unreal dream) can have an influence on reality. Roger Kamenetz, a Jewish-American, explains the power of Jacob's dream in his book The History of Last Night's Dream as follows: dream asserts through powerful images a reality more than the ground on which Jacob rests That reality challenges the ordinary sense of what is real by making vivid the existence of another realm of consciousness.”[19] If the dream were completely false, it should not be able to have an impact on his waking life, yet the two realms blend together much like how Bao- yu's dream merges into his waking sexual encounter with Aroma. [...]
[...] Story of the Stone Vol. Ch p tr. by David Hawkes. Penguin Graham, A.C. Chuang-tzu: The Inner Chapters from “Courseinfo” p Li, Chiancheng Fiction of Enlightenment from “Courseinfo” p Gu, Ming Dong Chinese Theories of Fiction from “Courseinfo” p.169 Xueqin, Cao. Story of the Stone Vol Ch p tr. by David Hawkes. Penguin Xueqin, Cao. Story of the Stone Vol Ch p tr. by David Hawkes. Penguin Graham, A.C. Chuang-tzu: The Inner Chapters from “Courseinfo” pp. 59- 60 Xueqin, Cao. [...]
[...] How ridiculous!”[38] Instead of focusing on success and failure, Harry, Jacob, and Bao-yu all redefine their focus and stop worrying what others think and other typical earthly problems.Cao Xueqin clearly believed in the power of dreams as evident by the rich examples in the text. He even frames the origin of the stone through a dream by Zhen Shi-yin. Dreams can be powerful truth-bearers and illuminate a higher reality. With an open mind, a dreamer can see the truth in dreams and realize the falsity of our earthly realm. [...]
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