Genesis in Shakespeare

Gen 28 vrs 17-18 (pgs.34-5)
And Jacob awoke out of his sleep, and he said, 'Surely the LORD is in this place, and I knew it not'. And he was afraid and said, 'How dreadful is this place? this is no other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven'.

(think of the storyteller motioning towards the dream a.k.a. the house of God, and then towards the gates of heaven a.k.a. Earth)

vrs. 20
And Jacob vowed a vow, saying, 'If God will be with me, and will keep me in this way that I go, and will give me bread to eat, and raiment to put on, so that I come again to my father's house in peace: then shall the LORD by my God.

Now Shakespeare:

The Tempest Act 3. sc. 2 vrs 148-56

Be not afeard. The isle is full of noises,
Sounds and sweet airs that give delight and hurt not.
Sometimes a thousand twangling instruments
Will hum about mine ears, and sometimes voices
That, if I then had waked after long sleep,
Will make me sleep again; and then, in dreaming,
The clouds methought would open, and show riches
Ready to drop upon me, that when I waked
I cried to dream again. -Caliban


With some food for thought....

Take this kiss upon the brow!
And, in parting from you now,
Thus much let me avow-
You are not wrong, who deem
That my days have been a dream;
Yet if hope has flown away
In a night, or in a day,
In a vision, or in none,
Is it therefore the less gone?
All that we see or seem
Is but a dream within a dream.

I stand amid the roar
Of a surf-tormented shore,
And I hold within my hand
Grains of the golden sand-
How few! yet how they creep
Through my fingers to the deep,
While I weep--While I weep!
O God! can I not grasp
Them with a tighter clasp?
O God! can I not save
One from the pitiless wave?
Is all that we see or seem
But a dream within a dream? -E.A. Poe's A Dream Within A Dream

Additional note.- Everyone should probably go checkout Inception. Way better and more important that 2012.

p.p.s. Go watch Jacob's Ladder with Tim Robbins. It's a psychological thriller based upon....Well Jacob's Ladder.