A Dream of Transmigration

In this dream I am reading a book about the life of Aristotle.  There is a passage concerning the development of the theory of transmigration of souls in Greek thought.  In the passage, Plato is didactically questioning Aristotle.  Aristotle seems to be at a philosophical impasse, unable to progress.  Suddenly, Plato grabs a brass urn filled with water, and strikes Aristotle roughly on the head, and shouts, “Ask a question!”  Aristotle is stunned into a briefly altered state, and shouts out, “What is the transmigration of souls?”  By this time the dream's point of view has begun fluctuating between first person as a reader of past events, and first person as Aristotle himself.

Plato is delighted with Aristotle's question;  the phrase “transmigration of souls” is a new one in the philosophy of the time.  Together, teacher and pupil analyze the phrase etymologically.  They decide that “transmigration” must refer to a movement that is beyond migration.  It is a crossing of borders that is so emphatic that it causes the borders themselves to cease to exist.  The philosophers then turn to the word “soul.”  they are using the Greek word “psyche.”  In the dream, this word is consistently pronounced in its Greek form:  “soo-kay,” as opposed to the Anglicized “sy-kee,” because the Anglicized pronunciation is steeped in reductionistic associations of Western psychological thought (psychosis, psychosomatic, psychoanalysis, etc.).  Maintaining the Greek pronunciation holds the word in a more multidimensional, nearly trans-verbal connotation.

Still in the dream, I reflect on the tension between the Western and Eastern elements of the story.  Plato and Aristotle, the most quintessentially Western of philosophers, are engaged in a teaching method that is decidedly Zen:  Bringing the student to an impasse, then inducing satori through a sudden strike.  Whereas a Zen master would have struck with a staff, Aristotle uses an object more appropriate to his cultural milieu:  a brass urn.  Why filled with water?  Is that a Taoist reference?  And also the tension between the pronunciations of “psyche,”  which suggests a tension between the ancient, mystical roots of Greek culture (the world of the Delphic Oracle and the Pythagorean Rites), with the modernized, Anglo/Germanized philosophy that became its later development.

Holding these questions and tensions, I awaken.

Discussing the dream with T., I find myself reminded of another dream I had about twenty-five years ago, in which I overcome fear to enter a haunted house.  In the haunted house I discover an ancient brass urn, richly engraved, and compelling in its appearance.  I reach out and touch the urn, and suddenly a huge ball of light and energy bursts forth from the urn and slams into the side of my head, entering me.  It is the spirit of another person.  I am not afraid, but elated and ecstatic.  A testimony to the power of this dream is that I have carried it with me for so long.  It is a memory as clear as any significant event in my waking life.

So.  The brass urn full of water is a vessel that contains a soul.  It is that with which Plato strikes Aristotle in the side of the head, just as I was struck before.  And the transmigration of souls is a movement so complete that it erases prior boundaries.