Genesis dreams: Using a private, psychological event as a cultural, political declaration

The article examines the role of the 13 dreams in the book of Genesis. The dreams are first shortly described (following Gnuse, 1984, and Oppenheim, 1 956) in their historical context: the Near-East of over 3000 years ago. The structure of some of the dreams is then discussed and compared to dreams f rom another historical period, that of modern Jewish Moroccan pilgrims (Bil u & Abramovitch, 1985), whose faith is based largely on the Bible. Followin g this discussion of the structure, the message of the dreams, regarding bo th the near future, and the remote, national future, is described. The arti cle discusses the argument that all these dreams serve the purpose of estab lishing a common national identity, which has been historically the basis o f Jewish faith. Possible reasons for using dreams in conveying the message are then discussed The article ends with a discussion on the declining impo rtance of the dream in the post-Genesis Bible.