Sleeping is an expression of rest and peace of mind. When man gets tired after a day of hard work he sleeps at night for rest and peace. Then his soul separates from his physical body and wanders the angelic realm. It is also called the realm of metaphorical forms where only souls exist and not the physical body. If someone is close to Allah, he can go beyond the angelic realm and into the realm of power and the realm of Divinity. This is why normal people and special people have different types of dreams.

Self’s Thoughts

Dreams have different types. One of which is the self’s thoughts.

Man’s brain is occupied by many different thoughts all day. These thoughts may be related to his desires, needs, goals or day to day life circumstances. Man does not need to pay attention to these thoughts because they get stored in the unconscious along with the consciousness. For example if someone wants to buy a mobile phone, he will constantly think about what model he should buy, how expensive it should be, how will he arrange the money, etc. Sometimes thoughts dominate the consciousness so much that the person’s dreams are about what he was thinking while awake. In short, the person dreams about things he is busy with, thinks about the most or dominate his heart and mind. These are meaningless dreams.

Nightmares

Most people are frightened by these dreams or overthink about dangers and constantly worry. Such dreams are meaningless, uninterpretable and should not be explained to anyone. The Holy Prophet says about such dreams:

Glad Tidings

The third type is one in which the person gets glad tidings from Allah or premonition. He sees pleasant things, gardens, heaven, etc. He gets happiness, hope and zeal from these and he obeys Allah more diligently. Moreover, some special people also observe the Divine light and theophany. Some have even seen Prophets and Saints. Only such dreams are interpretable and useful.

Normal people’s dreams are pointless and based on desires whereas special people’s dreams are based upon spiritual rank and insight.

Sayings of Al-Ghawth Al-Azam

Types of Dreams

Al-Ghawth al-Azam says about types of dreams in Sirr Al-Asrar:

• Know that there are two types of dreams. Spiritual or related to desires. Each one has two further categories.

Dreams related to desires: These are due to either good morals or bad morals. The dreams due to good morals include seeing heaven and its blessings such as houris, palaces, serving youths, white angelic plains or Sun, Moon, Stars and other related objects. These are related to the level of the self. Dreams in which one sees eaten meat of animals or birds, relates to the self at peace because these are the sustenance of the self at peace in heaven.

And dreams due to bad morals are related to to the inciting, repenting and inspiring self. So if animals like cheetah, lion, wolf, bear, dog, pig or other animals these  like rabbit, fox, cat, leopard or snake, scorpion and sheep or other dangerous animals appear (in a dream), these are bad attributes that should be avoided. Thus it is necessary to remove them from the soul’s path.

Spiritual Dreams: The first type is glad tidings and the second type is one in which the person converses with a beardless young man (in dream). In the second type, Divine light will shine upon the person as all people of paradise with be like that man. A hadith goes:

Types of Seekers

Just as there are three types of seekers: seekers of the world, seekers of the hereafter and seekers of Allah, dreams are also different based on their desires.

Dreams of people trapped in their self and seekers of the world are scary nightmares whereas those of seekers of hereafter and seekers of Allah are pleasant. Pious people’s dreams especially Saints’ were based on various signs and glad tidings due to Divine closeness. Many Saints even saw Allah in their dreams. Imam Abu Hanifa and Imam Ahmad bin Hanbal have said that they have seen Allah in a dream. Actually, the former said he has seen Allah 100 times in his dreams. When Allah’s beloved people sleep, they enter Divine observation.

Sultan Bahoo says:

At one side are the seekers of Allah whose inwards have become vivified and alive by Ism-e-Allah Zaat. They have not only enlightened their inwards but have also inhabited the plain of their inward with the love and vision of the spiritual guide. Though apparently, they may seem to sleep at times but their inwards are awake all the time. On the other hand are the imperfect seekers who are unaware of the reality of Ism-e-Allah Zaat and are trying to attain Divine gnosis by physical endeavours. Even if they are awake physically, their souls are sleepings. These unfortunates are unaware of the Reality. (Abyat-e-Bahoo Kamil)

This means that Al-Ghawth Al-Azam’s sleep will not be like normal people rather he will observe Allah.

Dear readers! If you want your dreams to not be disturbing and frightening, to see Saints, the Holy Prophet and Allah in your dreams, then all this is possible by invocation and contemplation of Ism-e-Allah Zaat. Present Shaikh of the Sarwari Qadri Order Sultan-ul-Ashiqeen has made accessible Ism-e-Allah Zaat, also called king of invocations, without discrimination. Visit Khanqah Sultan-ul-Ashiqeen village Rangilpur Sharif, via Sundar Adda, Multan Road, Lahore to attain Ism-e-Allah Zaat.

This blog is English translation of an Urdu article of the magazine “Mahnama Sultan-ul-Faqr Lahore” for the month of November, 2024. The title of the Urdu article is:

Khwabon ki Aqsaam (خوابوں کی اقسام).

Originally penned by Sultan Mohammad Ahsan Ali Sarwari Qadri from Lahore is presently in English by Mohammad Bin Moghees Sarwari Qadri, exclusively for websites.