Dream: a word that drifts between joy and revelation

‘Having been warned in a dream not to go back to Herod, they returned to their country by another route.’

Dream is a word with a history as unexpected as the dreams within Scripture. In Old English it meant joy and music before it ever referred to the visions of the night. Over time the meaning shifted, shaped by Norse, Latin, and Greek influences, until it came to describe both the pictures seen in sleep and the hopes held while awake.

In Matthew’s Gospel the word translated as ‘dream’ is ‘onar’, a Greek term used only for dreams sent from God. Its echoes reach back through the Greek translation of the Old Testament, linking the ancient dreams of Joseph and Pharaoh with the messages given to Joseph in the New Testament.

Each word card set begins with an image that captures the theme of the word. The following cards trace its story: a main word card (or two, if extended), a junior version with a paler border, an etymological breakdown showing how the word travelled through time, and a list of sources. Some sets also include cards for related words or translations across other languages. Together they show where each word came from, how it changed, and what it still carries with it.