Mixed symbols

Babies

The theme of this blog post would have to be the mixed imagery of dreams. It seems to me that when one really starts to get serious about the imagery and symbolism in dreams and indeed in everyday life there tends to be a lot of symbols that contain conflicting ideas and opposites. It is as though at the level of the symbol or the antecedent level before we come to language (as we know it) enantiodromia is alive in the very make up the language of symbols. The imagery of babies from me is a very good example of this. They are depicted in my dreams as these good, fragile and delicate things. Furthermore they are depicted as needing to be protected constantly from death. On the other hand the dead baby is a most grotesque and disturbing image. It exists as a corruption of nature a million miles away from the naturalness and innocence of the living baby. I am reminded of the death of the baby in the film trainspotting. The drug addicts in this film neglect their baby and it dies.



This image is particularly haunting for me and it is something that most definitely features in my dreams. There is something primeval and really back brain amygdalic about the death of a baby. It is a form of pure terror that seems to remind me of Waite's description of the crayfish on the moon tarot card. The crayfish represents those things deeper down that appear in dreams only as faceless demons.

The baby then for me is a mixed image. Indeed, a baby does not even have to be dead to represent this alien, grotesque image. A baby develops very much like a parasite in its mother and they sometimes appear in dreams as future dictators and malefic monsters. It does not seem accidental that in Dostoevsky's Brothers Karamazov a baby is included in the following proposition put to the  readers.


"Imagine that you are creating a fabric of human destiny with the object of making men happy in the end... but that it was essential and inevitable to torture to death only one tiny creature ... And to found that edifice on its unavenged tears: would you consent to be the architect on those conditions? Tell me, and tell me the truth!"

What is striking about this passage for me when looking at it in this context is the juxtaposition of the imagery. The case for utilitarianism is set against this great innocent but at the same time the baby is described as a 'creature'. The arranging of these contradictory elements though ends up producing an image that is actually more arresting and satisfying.

Lambs and Lions

My dreams also feature mixed imagery in the form of lions and lambs. I had a dream in which I was responsible for a lion eating lambs. This is an interesting reversal of the phrase lions for lambs. The normal phrase lions for lambs usually indicates that the brave are dying for the cowardly higher ups and this dream reverses that image.The interesting thing about the image of the lamb is that it is associated with innocence.

The lamb of God takes away the sins of the world in one hymn. The lamb in the other image represents the distant and cowardly political leader. This is strange that innocent lambs are also taken to represent the very worst and the most cowardly types of people. As if that wasn't enough of an imagery milkshake the lion and the lamb also reside in the same image at the same time. Augustine talked about a lion-like lamb that rises up to deliver victory after being slain. In 375  he discussed the lion/ lamb imagery as follows: -


 "Why a lamb in his passion? Because he underwent death without being guilty of any iniquity. Why a lion in his passion? Because in being slain, he slew death. Why a lamb in his resurrection? Because his innocence is everlasting. Why a lion in his resurrection? Because everlasting also is his might."


Further mixed images can be traced when we follow the baby imagery in terms of the name I have given a dream baby  before. In one dream I decided to call a baby something biblical. I muse at my own name. Daniel. This name means God is my judge or judged by God. In the dream I reach around my brain for a name and snatch Samuel as a name. Upon waking I wonder whether Samael is a feature of my picking of this name. I look up Samuel and I find the meaning of it as being either 'name of God' or 'god has heard'. I think to myself now that despite not knowing the root of the name either that calling a baby 'name of god' after trying to think of a biblical name is my brain's idea of a joke. Perhaps it is allowing the associative faculty to run wild on something that is already the product of hyper association. 


In any event the connection between babies and the other mixed image is contained within the name if it is taken as 'Samael'. Samael is an archangel in Talmudic lore. Wikipedia says that he is a figure who acts as an important figure who is an accuser, a seducer and a destroyer and has been regarded as both good and evil. Samael is depicted as being the angel of death and he is very close to both the flaming skeleton and cosmic intelligence skeletons of my dreams as well as the tarot card of Death.

Skeletons

The skeleton seems to represent a number of opposing ideas. It represents death and life. It represents degeneration and resurrection.


Shamans the world over try various techniques to see their skeletons and some remove skin to expose the bone. The death card in the Tarot also carried the symbol a white flower representing on a flag representing rebirth. It seems trite to say it but the death card symbolizes the death of an old way of living and the beginning of a new way of life.


There is another link between resurrection and bones that can be seen in the Christian image of one of the most famous resurrections. Jesus Christ is crucified on Golgotha, which means skull in Aramaic.  Interestingly if we look further at Christian language it talks about getting away from the sins of the flesh. The idea of bones represents the truth as bones are the only thing that remains after death. Again there is the flesh of illusion beside the bones of truth. Opposing images placed together to create an altogether richer image. 


Mark C Taylor points out the link between resurrection and skeletons and truth and skeletons in his Cabinet article 'Sacred Bones'. He discusses the scapulomancy that is practiced by the Montagnais-Naskapi on the North American Labradorean peninsula. They use bones for divination and some bones such as the shoulderblade of a caribou is held to be especially 'truthful'.