Sleep

Sleep is one of the most profound metaphors. First, it is part of the moral imagination of every person living for we all sleep. Whether rich or poor, whether we possess a bed or lie on a dirt floor, we all sleep. We see (or hear) others sleeping. Its significance, however, is not something we usually consider sweet; its significance is death.

Let's begin with the Bible itself. Both the ancient Hebrew and classic Greek used sleep as an euphemism for death. Just as all people sleep, so all people die.

One of the greatest insights into this truth is the evening hymn set to Tallis' Canon, "All Praise to Thee, My God this Night." Note the third verse:

Teach me to live so I may dread
The grave as little as my bed.
Teach me to die so that I may
Rise victorious on that aweful day.

At the end of a long day, we wearily drop into our beds anticipating the rest which is to come. Do we stop to consider that we may not wake? The little child's prayer is full of meaning, "Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep. If I die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take."

2 points of interest about sleep: first, all people sleep for all people die. Notice the biblical references to God not sleeping. In fact, it is a metaphysical impossibility for God to sleep because God cannot die.

Second, if sleep is a metaphor for death, than awaking is a subsequent metaphor for resurrection.

More later, I'm going to bed...