Does God speak through dreams? Or is prophecy biological?

I used to be a Christian. Then converted to atheism. As of now, I'm on the sidelines because I don't think the Bible (or any known religion) makes much sense, but neither does atheism make much sense to me either.And the reason I am on the sidelines is because a number of dreams that have come true (for myself). I don't expect anyone to take my word for it, as they are personal experiences and I don't talk about them much.But I am wondering if a God could speak to us through dreams. Or if prophecy is purely biological and our mind makes connections when we're asleep that we may not be able to do when we're awake. And some of these connections might come true because our mind has determined the inevitable outcome using our "primitive brain".I must be honest, its only ever happened when I was asleep.EDIT: Became a Christian shortly after this experience. I wanted to update this, so people would know my current stance. I also added a reply to this thread explaining this.Edited by xShinigamiEyesx, : Don't want to cause people to doubt unnecessarily.

Thread moved here from the Proposed New Topics forum.

There is no conversion. Then you are not an atheist. Sounds like spiritual mumbo-jumbo to me. You can have a god talk to you anyway you want.But honestly now. Look at it this way. It is the whole idea of coincidence. How many times do you have a dream that doesnt come true? For that matter how many times are you going to remember dreams at all? One and , lets say, a thousand dreams has some aspect of it that you can rationalize as "coming true"? What about the thousands of other times nothing comes true, or the dream has no relation whatsoever with your waking life?Coincidences are no proof of a spiritual world, or of a god or anything else. They are simply coincidences. The reason they stand out is because of the thousands of times you do the same exact thing and there is no coincidence. Now when you have a dream every night that comes true, then you have something. Then again you could probably qualify for the Amazing Randi's prize if you could show it to be true.

Hello Mr. xShinigamiEyesx, you seem to be having some interesting experiences. If you have any specific questions or quibbles, there are a lots of people here (including myself) who'd like to talk about such things. But this thread doesn't seem to be the place for it, try another thread like this one:
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(Strangely enough, no one ever really defended any problems) There are two ways I can handle your statement here. First, I can assume you're lying, this isn't much fun because then we're pretty much done and the conversation's over. My other choice is to assume that you're telling the truth, or at least, you're being as honest as you can. This side is much more interesting because it at least goes somewhere, so I have no problems in taking your word on such matters. For now, anyway.My first question is why do dreams coming true make you on the fence about atheism and Christianity? It doesn't make much sense to me. Sure, your dreams may be from some power-external-to-yourself. But that doesn't mean it's from a deity. What if the power is entirely natural and we just don't understand it yet? How is that against atheism? Even if it's from a deity, what makes you think it's from God, specifically? What if it's from some deity who does not care to identify itself? Or if they are puposefully tricking you?It seems to me that your atheism/Christianity inner battle is over something other than your dreams, that's all. However, I'll focus just on your dreams from here on: Sure, why not? A God should be able to do anything, right? Speaking to us through dreams doesn't seem so impossible for something that can "do anything." We should remember though, that no one has ever been able to link any dream-ability they claim to have with actual reality before. And we have lots and lots of people who dream of things that they think are predictions of the future. Would you care to share a specific prediction to look at? This is also possible. But watch your use of the word "or" here. There is not only 2 possibilities. Perhaps it is simply coincidence. Perhaps it's a non-purely biological function that has nothing to do with deities. This is another possibility. Perhaps you dream of things, and then when a similar situation actually occurs, you do the same as in your dream because it feels familiar. That wouldn't be prediction, that would simply be following-the-leader. Honesty is a good quality to have when you're looking for the truth about reality. Just remember that there's nothing honest about jumping to conclusions. I'm not saying you have... but that it's an easy thing to do, so it's something to watch out for.

Research has shown that some dreams are a product of our daily activities, sensations and the majority of dreams in some way reflect what has preoccupied our minds during the previous days. Sometimes dreams are a result of major trauma as can be seen by returned soldiers who often suffer from nightmares after they return from war.I dont think its God contacting you in your dream. Everyone dreams so your dreams are no more special then all the other billions of people on the planet. But our dreams are personal to us and even if they do seem to come true, its probably because your subconsciousness is anticipating certain future events based on current circumstances in your life.As an example, lets say i really want to buy the kids a new pet and i've been spending time researching breeds of dogs. I may start dreaming about dogs and one of those dreams may include a dog biting one of the kids. If i buy a dog and it happens to bite one of the kids does it mean that my dream came true? Or could it be simply that I subconsciously knew of the dangers dogs pose to small children?thats just an example to show that a persons dream may not be communication from a divine being but simply our own internal knowledge of something that could happen.

Thanks for your responses.Its happened on a few occasions. I will name two in particular.For example, the thing that had me think about this again was due to an experience with an ex-girlfriend. I was shown a dream where "God" (I presume) called her a "slut" and said she had flirted with several men. And that my experiences with her was to prepare me for "someone better".Six months later, she admitted to having flirted with several men with the intent of replacing me. I asked her if she went all the way and she said no. However, since I was a former Christian, I knew that the Bible says God is concerned as much about the heart as he is our actions. So I told her about my dream and how, according to the Bible, one can be a "slut" at heart and not in their actions.And "almost immediately" another girl contacted me who happened to be a Christian. We had a lot in common, but I had to question her motives as it seemed she was more interested in getting in my pants. XDThe thing that bothered me most about this dream was not so much "God" telling me that she was a "slut" (in the Bible, he calls Israel a "whore"), but that "he" was supposedly "preparing me for someone better". From a biblical standpoint, though, I'm no better than her, as I "played the whore" by leaving "God".Since having that dream, I have read these forums and feel that the Bible is too absurd for me to believe, dream experiences aside. My religious dreams began when I was in a religious cult for two years. I got out but occasionally they crop up.There was an incident in the cult, though, where I had a dream where a woman would assert authority over the cult leader. It "came true" the next day when he announced this woman had been leading him by the nose all along due to her own "prophecies".As an earlier poster said, though, I don't expect anyone to take my word here for anything, nor am I claiming any grand divine power. I'm just trying to understand this phenomenon. Are there cases where people have been able to have completely accurate dreams?The skeptic in me thinks that a lot of my "predictive" abilities must be coming from things I'm picking up while awake and my brain processes the likely outcome. I can also think of a number of dreams like it that haven't come true, it just seems the ones that have stand out the most.Edited by xShinigamiEyesx, : No reason given.Edited by xShinigamiEyesx, : No reason given.

1) If this god of yours is happy throwing around "pleasant" denigrations such as "slut" then he's a petty-minded chauvinistic twat.2) If this god of yours has the time to spend reporting to you about the sluttiness of your girlfriend, but not let this now-dead kid know that he should probably avoid going down the club tonight, then he has a fair bit to answer for in my book...If you're unhappy with atheism, I'm sure you can concoct a much more deserving deity for your attentions than the one described above.Edited by cavediver, : No reason given.

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1) If this god of yours is happy throwing around "pleasant" denigrations such as "slut" then he's a petty-minded chauvinistic twat.

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2) If this god of yours has the time to spend reporting to you about the sluttiness of your girlfriend, but not let this now-dead kid know that he should probably avoid going down the club tonight, then he has a fair bit to answer for in my book...

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Well, that was kind of my point, it wouldn't be out of character for "him". I just named two examples. Where I am more curious is to find out how the mind works when its asleep and if such deductions are possible.

This is most likely. For example, I'm engaged and have been with my, now, fiancee for a while, but occasionally I have a dream about her cheating on me (or dying, or getting hurt, etc). It comes from insecurities and worries that every sane person has about the unknown, the future in particular, and perhaps wondering how one would cope with that. In your case, unfortunately, your worries were proved accurate. I can't say, not being you, if there were signs and clues you might have been picking up on subconsciously, or if they were just the normal, every day, pseudo-paranoid concerns of a person in a relationship, but I find nothing unusual in your dream or the fact that it "came true."

Dreams come true all the time; what's that got to do with a god?

The mind works no different when asleep or when awake. The only thing different is that when you are awake your sensory inputs are active, but that only helps you when you are awake and interacting with your environment. When you are asleep you don't have these sensory inputs active, nor are you interacting with your environment, so you don't need it to be active anyways.Furthermore, when you are awake you can do the same type of "deduction" that you spoke of in your dream about future events, example would be "day dreaming". I can day dream about being hit by a car and one day get hit by a car. I can equally have a dream when asleep about being hit by a car and one day get hit by a car. As far as the brain itself goes, nothing different took place in either state that requires the meta-physical to be invoked.Hope this helped.- Oni

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The skeptic in me thinks that a lot of my "predictive" abilities must be coming from things I'm picking up while awake and my brain processes the likely outcome. I can also think of a number of dreams like it that haven't come true, it just seems the ones that have stand out the most.

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The brain is a magnificent machine. Our senses take in a lot of information that we may or may not acknowledge consciously, but it is stored.Your dreams may be a reflection of what is on your mind or stored within. Slut seems to be a term you use freely.Some people may be more sensitive to or able to access that stored information than others.A dream is a story and a story needs characters. Don't confuse the information with the character. As far as your girlfriend, odds are you saw the signs and the story formed. BTW, flirting does not make one a slut. Unlike ancient Bible times, in the United States marriages aren't arranged. A woman looks for the best mate. Just because you didn't turn out to be the winner, doesn't make her a slut.As far as preparing you for someone better, sounds like she wasn't your match either. Don't take dreams so literally. They are stories. Maybe your psyche knew she wasn't your cup of tea either.

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As an earlier poster said, though, I don't expect anyone to take my word here for anything, nor am I claiming any grand divine power. I'm just trying to understand this phenomenon. Are there cases where people have been able to have completely accurate dreams?

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Your posts, although few, come off self-depreciating and negative. Leaving a religion, doesn't make anyone a "whore."Personally, I think you need to learn to love yourself and not look to cults, religions, or others to define your reflection.

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"Peshat is what I say and derash is what you say." --Nehama Leibowitz

Not true. Most of it does not even get into short term memory; let alone long term memory.

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Your posts, although few, come off self-depreciating and negative. Leaving a religion, doesn't make anyone a "whore."

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Personally, I think you need to learn to love yourself and not look to cults, religions, or others to define your reflection.

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I'm using the word loosely, hence the quotes. What I am trying to say is that it doesn't make logical sense for the Christian god to be speaking to me anyway since I have abandoned faith in "him", which according to the Bible, makes one a "whore".Maybe its hard to read my irony. I apologize.But I am beginning to think this is largely just a case of self-reflection in the dream state. I remember reading a portion of a book (I forget the title) that said humans dream as a result of their "primitive brain", back to when they were hunters and gatherers. I think in some people, this "primitive brain" can be stronger than in other's. I was curious if anyone else had heard of this or knew about it. Hence a "biological basis" for prophecy.

I would have to agree that what you're experiencing here is entirely coincidence. You may have consciously or subconsciously noticed your girlfriend flirting (maybe subtly) with other men before you had this dream, which may have caused you to dream about this in the first place. (Forgive me if it seems as though I'm trying to put words in your mouth, I'm not. I'm just speculating.)I'm a strong believer that our experiences in our daily life influence what our dreams are like, and not the other way around.As such, things that have a tendency to occur more than once can appear in our dreams, then subsequently happen in real life again, leading one to believe that the dream "predicted it," when in fact the event happening in the past triggered the dream in the first place.For example: Let's say I fight with my friends a lot (I don't, this is just hypothetically speaking =P). I could have a fight with my friend one day, then that important experience in my life would result in my dreaming of it the following evening. If, in two days following, I had another fight with the same friend, I wouldn't consider the dream to have "foretold" the fight with my friend. It would be purely coincidence, and a probable one at that.