Chapter I – Reality and Dream

How do you know that the reality you woke up into is the real one?

"The higher a person rises in his awareness of truth, the more he discovers that the reality he lived in before was a kind of dream."

What is a dream and what is reality?
Is the reality of my life real? Or am I in a dream that is hard to wake up from?

One of the beautiful understandings arising from the film is the recognition that reality is made of layers upon layers. The Sages called this structure "One higher than the high watches over" (גבוה מעל גבוה שומר). Meaning – the world is built in a graded form, a kind of reality on top of reality, from the most material level up to the complete infinite unity. Every reality in itself has its own laws, logic and rules. Correspondingly, the human soul also has parts that are parallel to the different levels existing in the world. A person who is connected to the different parts of his soul can "live" in an active way on the different layers of existence.

A nice expression of this complexity is shown at the beginning of the first film, where Neo passes in one sequence through a number of layers of existence:
1. He wakes up into a strange reality that at first seems to him like a dream but turns out to be ordinary.
2. He wakes up again (late) into the reality of his life, which seems very routine and rational but becomes entangled in imaginary and frightening dimensions, until he finally wakes up from it and is relieved to discover that it was only a dream.
3. The ringing of the phone and the ride that follows it wake him back to the recognition that the dream was real – too real.
4. Finally, the meeting with Morpheus confronts him with the question of questions: How do you know whether the reality you woke up into is the true reality? Maybe the reality you live in is also a dream? At this point Neo reaches the right maturity to break out of the world of dreams – to the reality beyond the Matrix, beyond the illusion.

The film tries to give us the message that the ordinary reality of our lives (relative to the true reality) is also a kind of dream, and the dream (relative to the true reality) is no less real than what we call being awake.

As a person rises in his awareness of the truth, he discovers that the previous reality he lived in was a kind of dream. In the Hassidic books it is said that the more the mind grows, the shorter time becomes, and they bring the example of the dream. In a dream a person can feel as if a whole lifetime has passed, but when he wakes up and his mind returns to him, he discovers that only a quarter of an hour has passed. So too, when a greater mind is revealed in the world, everyone will wake up to discover that their previous lives were a kind of dream. "When the Lord returned the captivity of Zion, we were like dreamers" (בשוב ה' את שיבת ציון היינו כחולמים).

The Sages taught us that what hides the true spiritual reality is the material body. The more a person is controlled by and identifies with his material body, the more, in direct proportion, his spiritual essence is hidden from him. This is why in sleep, when the bodily, material consciousness weakens, there is a better chance to touch and know the spiritual components of existence. The Sages defined sleep as "one sixtieth of death", and the dream as "one sixtieth of prophecy". In a dream a person has the possibility to touch his spiritual root. This is why many inventors say that their invention came to them precisely in a dream.

There is a story about the holy Ari (one of the greatest Kabbalists): once, during an afternoon nap on Shabbat, one of his disciples saw him murmuring in his sleep. The disciple wanted to listen, and so he brought his ear closer. The Ari immediately woke up and asked him what he wanted. He replied that he wanted to hear what he was saying in his sleep. The Ari answered that in his sleep he had gone up to the "Yeshiva shel Ma'ala" – the Heavenly Academy (a reality on a higher level) – and studied there. The disciple asked him to teach him as well. The Ari answered that what he had learned above, in the higher spiritual reality, in a few minutes, would take him more than eighty years to teach below, in the ordinary world.

A good example of this we see in the dreams of Joseph and of Jacob. The soul sends a person messages that manage to penetrate and get through at a time when the body is still and the ordinary rational consciousness is at rest. A person's greatness is measured by his ability to filter, remember and internalize these messages in order to grow stronger and advance toward that place which lies beyond the world of dreams. Of course there is also a lot of static dream noise, reflecting the upheavals of the material world, but behind the random noise deep and important messages are hidden.

The very essence of sleep stems from the inability of the soul to hold out for too long inside the "Matrix". The husks (klipot) of the material world stick to it and dim its light. This is why a person must sleep. In sleep the soul is released from the material chains of the body and rises to be renewed and strengthened in the upper world – to remember its role, which became blurred as a result of the encounter with the agents of this world. The first words that come out of the mouth of the warriors of Zion are: "I thank You, living and eternal King, for You have returned my soul within me with compassion; great is Your faithfulness (in me)" (מודה אני לפניך מלך חי וקיים שהחזרת בי נשמתי בחמלה, רבה אמונתך). Dreaming is the impressions that manage to return to our simple mind after the spiritual journey of the soul in the upper worlds. This is why it is so important to sleep well. The soul must be renewed in order to receive strength for another day of war in the "Matrix".

The subject of imagination – or, as it is called in the language of the Sages, the imaginative faculty (koach ha-medameh) – is an unparalleled tool in spiritual work, and at the same time a tremendous risk, being one of the main tools of the agents of illusion. The agents use imagination in order to seduce a person with false presentations that try to convince him that surrendering to sensual pleasures is what will bring the longed-for satisfaction. With a simple observation one can notice that the physical pleasure derived from the five senses, in its various forms, usually lasts a limited number of seconds, if not a few moments. Most of the world invests the best of its time and energy in an irrational chase.

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