manuscripts, and is almost certainly what Augustine actually dictated, or wrote, while no doubt
488 The Literal Meaning ofGenesis bodily realities l was seeing from real bodies, in the way we habitually do when thinking about them even with our eyes closed or when we are standing in the dark.
If it is in the brain, through which the mind tries to direct its attention to things in the outer world, that something occurs to divert it elsewhere, then it does indeed know that it is perceiving the likenesses ofbodies, not bodies themselves; or if it is less sophisticated and does regard them as being actual bodies, it at least senses that it is seeing them with the spirit, not the body. But this is very different from the awareness with which it is present to its own body, as when it comes to the sense outlets and finds them closed. Thus the blind in their turn know that they are awake when they distinguish with full knowledge and certitude the like nesses ofbodies they are thinking about from the bodies they are unable to see.
Whatever their cause, the nature ofspiritual visions is always the same
21, 44. But sometimes, though the body is in good health and the senses are not stilled in sleep, the soul is snatched away by some hidden spiritual operation to the vision ofthings which are like bodies; but this does not mean, just because the manner is different, that the nature of the vision is different, since there are of course differences even in the causes that stem from the body. Thus it is not by being asleep that those who are delirious have the sensory channels disturbed in the head, so that they see the same as dreamers see, when their attention is diverted by sleep from their waking senses to seeing these other things. So while it happens through sleep in one instance and in another not, still in each case the things seen are of no other kind but of the nature of spirit, from which or in which the likenesses of bodies are constructed.
Thus while the attention is being alienated by a different cause when the soul is snatched away by some hidden spiritual power from someone who is awake and in good health, so that instead ofbodies it sees in spirit the express likenesses ofbodily realities, the nature of the visions is still the same. Nor can it be said that when the cause is in the body, then the soul is just churning out of itself the images of bodies, as it is also in the habit of doing when just thinking, without any presentiment of future events, while when it is snatched away in the spirit to see them, it is then being shown things by God. Scripture quite openly says, after all: / willpour outfrom my spirit upon allflesh, andyoung men shall see visions, and oldmen shall dream dreams (Jl 2:28), attributing each to the divine activity; and: The angel of the Lord appeared to the man31 in dreams, saying: Do not be
37. The Maurist editors very naturally put "to Joseph" instead of homini: but this latter is in all the manuscripts, and is almost certainly what Augustine actually dictated, or wrote, while no doubt meaning to say or write Joseph.