Dreams and Visions of Jesus

Syrjänen, Seppo.  In Search of Meaning and Identity: Conversion to Christianity in Pakistani Muslim Culture.  Finnish Society for Missiology and Ecumenics, Helsinki.  1984.  An academic missiology study built on interviews with 36 Pakistani converts, with source criticism of the testimonies.  Read in whole paragraphs on archive.org (item insearchofmeanin0000syrj, printdisabled) with bin/iapdsearch.py;  printed page = leaf − 4, checked at leaves 20, 133 and 200.  Copyright;  not stored.

1. 1a.

   Page 130:  “On the whole, supernatural events have been quite common among the interviewees. Fifteen out of the whole group reported some such experience”.  Pages 130–131:  “Ten of the interviewees report to have experienced some supernatural event before their decision to become a Christian or just before taking baptism. Four of those report about a dream, two about a vision and four about an audition. The remaining five mention about a supernatural experience at a later stage in their conversion.” ↩ ↩ ↩

2. 1b.

   Page 131, note 189:  “In a dream A/9 was led inside a church by an old man, clad in a white robe … C/3 saw Christ in a vision, opening a door before him and taking him inside … A/7 heard a voice telling him that the teaching which he was receiving from his Christian teachers, was the right one”. ↩

3. 1c.

   Page 132:  “Quite often the converts have been reading the Bible for some time. Then they experience dreams or hear words that somehow refer to the inner struggle they are having at that time. One of the interviewees, e.g., had a vision in the evening, which he reported with words and imagery that was taken from the Bible word by word (Rev. 1:12—20), without him recognizing it.” ↩ ↩

4. 1d.

   Page 130:  “In two cases (A/6 and A/10) I asked whether the interviewees had experienced any supernatural experiences and the answer was negative. Yet in other written statements which have come to me later on, they mention such experiences.” ↩

5. 1e.

   Page 171:  “In most cases the converts had had these experiences at a moment when they had been torn by severe doubts and uncertainty as to what would be the best course to take. These experiences have generally been the actualizing of a religious tradition, whether that tradition was Islamic or Christian.” ↩

6. 1f.

   Page 129:  “Dreams play so large a part in the thoughts of Persians in matters of duty and points of decision … that it is not to be wondered at that so many of the converts trace their resolution to follow Christ to the guidance which they believe they received in a dream”.  Syrjänen quoting Speer and Carter 1922, p. 422, a report on the Persia mission. ↩ ↩

Martyn, Sam.  “The Role of Pre-Conversion Dreams and Visions in Islamic Contexts: An Examination of the Evidence.”  Southeastern Theological Review 9(2):55–74.  2018.  A missionary writer, six years in Central Asia, in a Southern Baptist seminary journal;  sympathetic to the dreams.  A content analysis of published testimonies.  The PDF is laid out as two-page spreads with both page numbers in the running head.  Copyright.

1. 2a.

   Page 61:  “This writer examined more than 120 BMB conversion testimonies. Among these, forty-four testimonies included reports of pre-conversion dreams and visions. These testimonies were drawn from eleven different sources, including the writer's own newsletters. Roughly half of the testimonies are first-hand accounts, with the other half being second-hand accounts drawn directly from interviews with BMBs. Relying on previously published accounts rather than a methodical collection of testimonies is admittedly less than ideal.” ↩ ↩

2. 2b.

   Page 62:  “The most distinguishing characteristic of pre-conversion dreams and visions among BMBs is that these experiences occur subsequent to meeting Christian believers and to reading or hearing the Bible. In twenty-four of the forty-four documented cases surveyed by this writer, converts report having encountered both Christian believers and Scripture prior to their dream or vision experiences. In twelve of the cases, BMBs report having interacted with either Christian believers or Scripture prior to their experiences. In only two cases did it seem clear that no such interaction had occurred.”  Note 28:  “The remaining testimonies did not address this issue clearly.” ↩ ↩ ↩ ↩

3. 2c.

   Page 62:  “twenty-eight individuals report having read or heard part of the Bible, and most of those had received a copy of the Bible or the New Testament from a Christian contact.” ↩

4. 2d.

   Page 63:  “Jesus is present in the dreams and visions of twenty-eight of the testimonies surveyed. His physical appearance across these experiences is relatively consistent. He is usually robed in white and illuminated with white light.” ↩ ↩

5. 2e.

   Page 62:  “Themes of creation, fall, redemption, and restoration are generally absent from these experiences. There is no allusion to sin and the just penalty for rebellion and little reference to salvation and justification by faith.” ↩

6. 2f.

   Page 64:  “Anthony Greenham observes that even among converts to Christianity who had experienced dreams or visions, many do not mention them in their spiritual testimonies unless prompted to do so.”  Citing Greenham 2004, p. 210, a study of Palestinian converts. ↩

7. 2g.

   Page 62:  “a missionary to Bangladesh for fifteen years, … observes that all those he interacted with who claimed to have dreams about Jesus had previously had contact with Christians, the gospel, or the Bible.”  William Barrick, as relayed by Martyn from Dennis McBride, "An Evaluation of Muslim Dreams and Visions of Isa (Jesus)," p. 18 (Martyn's note 29;  note 38 cites the same page for the fabrication claim).  Second-hand twice over;  McBride's paper was not read. ↩

8. 2h.

   Page 64:  “Dennis McBride, who is suspicious of BMB dreams of Jesus, cites missionary William Barrick who reports that many dreams and visions of Jesus are fabricated so BMBs will have "a viable [in their opinion] response to those who accuse them of abandoning Islam." Because dreams are considered authoritative in Islamic contexts, claiming a dream as a reason for conversion could mitigate a convert's persecution. This theory has merit but requires further investigation.” ↩

9. 2i.

   Page 63, note 32:  Cites C. E. Padwick, "Dream and Vision:  Some Notes from a Diary," International Review of Missions, 1939, for 1930s reports of the same white-robed figure.  Padwick's article was not obtained. ↩

Doyle, Tom, and Greg Webster.  Dreams and Visions: Is Jesus Awakening the Muslim World?  Thomas Nelson, Nashville.  2012.  An American missionary to the Middle East, writing the stories as dramatised scenes.  Not on archive.org;  read through Google Books search-inside snippets, which carry printed page numbers, recorded in the source library as doyle-2012.  The p. 127 passage is stitched from four overlapping snippets.  Copyright;  not stored.

1. 3a.

   Page 127:  “About a decade ago, those of us who work in Muslim outreach started to hear about something new in the world of Islam. God was opening the closed hearts of Muslims by giving them spectacular dreams and visions.” ↩ ↩

2. 3b.

   Page 127:  “We find that about one out of every three Muslim-background believers has had a dream or vision prior to their salvation experience. Some more precise surveys are a bit more conservative and suggest a little over 25 percent of Muslims had a dream or a vision before becoming disciples of Jesus.”  “they are just the door opener for most Muslims, the starting point for conversion to overcome the substantial obstacles between Muslims and Jesus.” ↩ ↩

3. 3c.

   Page 134:  “No one says a dream recipient goes to sleep a Muslim and wakes up a Christian.” ↩

4. 3d.

   Page 181:  “number one reason Muslims come to faith in Christ is because of love. In surveys of Muslim-background believers, the love they see between believers and the love offered to them topped the list of reasons they became Jesus followers.” ↩

Miller, Duane Alexander, and Patrick Johnstone.  “Believers in Christ from a Muslim Background: A Global Census.”  Interdisciplinary Journal of Research on Religion 11:1–19.  2015.  Article 10 of the volume.  Miller is at St. Mary's University, San Antonio;  Johnstone edited six editions of the missions handbook Operation World.  Not a survey:  a compilation of mission databases and reports for about 2010.  The journal site is dead;  read from the Wayback PDF, printed page = PDF page.  Copyright.

1. 4a.

   Page 4:  “via e-mail, exchanged at conferences, or downloaded from secure websites”.  The sources of the unpublished mission documents.  The per-country spreadsheet "may be made available to researchers who contact the authors by e-mail" (p. 5 n. 5). ↩

2. 4b.

   Page 10:  “This clearly shows an increase from fewer than 200,000 BMBs globally in 1960 to nearly ten million today. We also estimated a maximum value and a minimum value for each country for 2010 and assumed, for the sake of the research, that this was proportionately applicable to each estimated point back to 1960. In other words, the figures cannot be precise. For instance, what researcher can really count the secret believers in a country such as Saudi Arabia?” ↩ ↩

3. 4c.

   Page 5:  “On the side of overreporting, or at least using overly optimistic figures, the most obvious reason is related to fund-raising.” ↩

4. 4d.

   Page 6:  “most MBBs, within five years of their declaration of faith in Christ … have been baptized and re-baptized three to five times … the number of annual baptisms of MBBs is significantly inflated as MBBs are baptized time and time again within different mission bodies.”  Quoting Ripken and Stricker 2006, p. 6. ↩

5. 4e.

   Page 16, note 32:  “Willis (1977) estimated that beginning in the mid-1960s, around two million Muslims became Christians. This figure includes their children and the first converts, some of whom are now dead.”  Table 1, pages 14–17:  The 90 country rows sum to 9,779,100, of which Indonesia is 6,500,000. ↩ ↩

6. 4f.

   Table 1, pages 14–17:  Nigeria 600,000;  United States 450,000;  Ethiopia 400,000;  Algeria 380,000;  Burkina Faso 200,000;  Tanzania 180,000;  Bangladesh 130,000;  Iran 100,000.  The Arab-country rows sum to 504,700.  Page 8:  “Worldwide, we estimate 180,000 Iranian BMBs in the West and Middle East and between 100,00 [sic] and 500,000 in Iran.” ↩

7. 4g.

   Page 10:  “at the time of the 1979 revolution, there were estimated to be fewer than 500 BMBs in the country … There may be over half a million BMBs among Iranians today.”  Page 16, note 33:  “The original figure that Johnstone had was 50,000, but that is almost certainly too low. Well-informed sources indicate 100,000 as a conservative estimate.” ↩

8. 4h.

   Pages 5–6:  “In an interview on Al Jazeera in 2000, Sheikh Ahmad al Katani stated the rather surprising conclusion that in Africa, "[b]ecause of the Christian missionaries every hour Islam loses 667 Muslims [who] convert to Christianity, every day 16,000, [and] every year six million" (Abdallah 2000) He reasoned that because of this, Muslims should support his efforts at da'wah in Africa.”  Filed by the authors under overcalculation by Muslims.  The Africa episode itself was not found;  the 3 December 2000 Asia episode with the same guest refers back to it (abdallah-2000 in the source library). ↩

9. 4i.

   Page 5:  “Someone abroad asked me whether 10,000 mosques have been converted into Christian Churches in Dhaka. I had to answer that I know of none.”  Edward Ayub, a Bangladeshi pastor from a Muslim background, quoted from Ayub 2009, p. 25. ↩

Garrison, David.  A Wind in the House of Islam: How God Is Drawing Muslims Around the World to Faith in Jesus Christ.  WIGTake Resources, Monument, CO.  2014.  A Southern Baptist missiologist's study from more than 1,000 interviews in 45 movements.  Read in whole paragraphs on archive.org (item windinhouseofisl0000garr, printdisabled) with bin/iapdsearch.py;  printed page = leaf − 18, checked at leaves 23, 150 and 270.  Numbered endnotes are not returned by that route.  Copyright;  not stored.

1. 5a.

   Page 32:  “The combined number of baptisms in all 82 movements totals no more than two to seven million, or less than one-half of one percent of the Muslim world's population, hardly a cause to gloat.” ↩ ↩ ↩

2. 5b.

   Page 232:  “the total number of Muslims who have come to faith in Christ is statistically almost insignificant. Only a tiny portion of the Muslim world, less than one-half of one percent of Islam's 1.6 billion adherents, has turned to follow Christ.” ↩

3. 5c.

   Page 138:  “even conservative estimates place the number at more than 100,000 Iranian Muslim-background followers of Christ in the country. Data from interviews with Iranian Christian refugees, and the number of correspondents to satellite Christian television programs give reason to believe the figure could be as high as a few million.” ↩

4. 5d.

   Page 132:  “International Antioch Ministries alone estimated in 2008 that "3,000 (persons) a month are turning to Christ just through their broadcasts."” ↩

5. 5e.

   Page 239:  “A colleague has been serving God among Muslims long enough to have heard countless testimonies of dreams in which a "being who shone bright as light" appeared to them”. ↩

6. 5f.

   Page 238:  “God is visiting these Muslims through dreams, visions, and answered prayers in the name of Jesus.”  The OCR reads "these. Muslims". ↩

7. 5g.

   Pages 251–252:  “Even the prevalence of Jesus dreams may not be new. It is possible that Muslims have had dreams of a "Being as bright as the sun" for centuries. What was different in the past is that these Muslims were left with no solution to the enigma of the dreams that haunted them.” ↩

8. 5h.

   Page 168:  “After experiencing repeated dreams that drew her toward Christ, Fatima determined to seek out Christians to help her understand.”  Page 93:  “Radio broadcasts, the first satellite TV programming, and the JESUS Film (the life of Jesus) in the Berber language played a powerful role”.  Page 187:  “I returned to my village, and for a year I studied the Bible, while Ted studied the Qur'an. In between, we would write to each other.”  Leaf 205 by bin/iapdsearch.py, printed page = leaf − 18;  the OCR reads "|" for "I".  The whole story runs pp. 175–188;  Ted Moore and Jason Hanson are pseudonyms for Nasir's Western friends, who "were not Jews;  they were Christians" (p. 185).  Baptised 1998. ↩

Woodberry, J. Dudley et al.  “Why Muslims Follow Jesus.”  Christianity Today 51(10):80–85.  Oct 2007.  A written questionnaire prepared at Fuller Theological Seminary's School of Intercultural Studies, filled in 1991–2007 by about 750 converts from 30 countries.  Read from the web page;  located by paragraph counted from the first body paragraph, which begins "It was the best of times" and sits above the newsletter box.  Copyright.

1. 6a.

   Paragraph 5:  “the survey, prepared at Fuller Theological Seminary's School of Intercultural Studies, does not claim scientific precision”. ↩

2. 6b.

   Paragraph 14:  “More than one in four respondents, 27 percent, noted dreams and visions before their decision for Christ, 40 percent at the time of conversion, and 45 percent afterward.”  The three figures overlap and cannot be added. ↩ ↩ ↩

3. 6c.

   Paragraph 15:  “Many Muslims view dreams as links between the seen and unseen worlds, and pre-conversion visions and dreams often lead Muslims to consult a Christian or the Bible. Frequently a person in the vision, understood to be Jesus, radiates light or wears white (one respondent, though, said Jesus appeared in green, a color sometimes associated with Islamic holy persons).” ↩ ↩

4. 6d.

   Paragraph 15:  “An Algerian woman had a vision that her Muslim grandmother came into her room and said, "Jesus is not dead; he is here." In Israel, an Arab dreamed that his deceased father said, "Follow the pastor. He will show you the right way."” ↩

5. 6e.

   Paragraph 6:  “respondents ranked the lifestyle of Christians as the most important influence in their decision to follow Christ”.  Paragraph 8:  “The next most important influence was the power of God in answered prayers and healing”.  Paragraph 12:  “The third biggest influence listed by respondents was dissatisfaction with the type of Islam they had experienced”. ↩ ↩

Gilley, Gary E.  “Dreams and Visions, Is Jesus Awakening the Muslim World?”  Think on These Things Ministries.  Aug 20, 2014.  A pastor's review of Doyle's book.  The library key carries the book's year, 2012.  The page's own metadata dates the posting 20 August 2014 (modified 18 November 2025);  the earliest Wayback capture is 2019, and no earlier print date was found.  Copyright.

1. 7a.

   Paragraph on Doyle's thesis:  “He is convinced that one-third of all Muslims come to Christ as a result of dreams (p. 127). Still, Doyle thinks that the number one reason Muslims come to salvation is because of Christians showing them love, not dreams (p. 181).” ↩ ↩

Baylor University Institute for Studies of Religion.  Baylor Religion Survey, Wave I (2005).  Association of Religion Data Archives.  2005.  A national US sample of 1,721 adults, fieldwork by the Gallup Organization.  Item wordings from the ARDA codebook;  the weighted rate and the breakdown by tradition are this project's computation from the ARDA data file with the survey's WGT variable.  Wave II (2007, n = 1,648) dropped the waking-vision item.  Licence unknown.

1. 8a.

   Section Q28:  “Please indicate whether or not you have ever had any of the following experiences...d. I personally had a vision of a religious figure while awake.”  Yes 98 of 1,651 answering, 5.9% unweighted, 6.0% weighted;  by tradition (weighted, n answering):  Black Protestant 10.0% (36), Evangelical Protestant 7.7% (490), Mainline Protestant 6.5% (422), Catholic 6.1% (367), Other 2.8% (81), Jewish 1.8% (45), None 1.0% (181).  Other Q28 items, unweighted:  "I had a dream of religious significance" 23.2%;  "I heard the voice of God speaking to me" 14.6% (19.1% in Wave II, 2007, Q26). ↩ ↩

Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life.  “Many Americans Mix Multiple Faiths: Eastern, New Age Beliefs Widespread.”  Pew Research Center.  Dec 9, 2009.  Telephone survey of 4,013 US adults in August 2009;  the experience item was asked of one half-sample (n = 2,003).  Copyright.

1. 9a.

   Page 12:  “In response to a separate question, half of Americans (49%) say they have had 'a religious or mystical experience – that is, a moment of religious or spiritual awakening.'”  “In 1962, only 22% of Americans reported having had such an experience, which grew to about a third in 1976 (31%) and 1994 (33%).”  Page 19:  Topline Q.290 wording:  "Would you say that you have ever had a 'religious or mystical experience'-- that is, a moment of sudden religious insight or awakening?"  Report p. 12 by group:  white evangelicals 70%, black Protestants 71%, mainline Protestants 40%, Catholics 37%, unaffiliated about 30%.  Printed page = PDF page − 1 (PDF p. 13 prints folio 12). ↩ ↩

Pew Research Center.  “Spiritual experiences (chapter 4 of Spirituality Among Americans).”  Pew Research Center.  Dec 7, 2023.  American Trends Panel Wave 132, online, 31 July to 6 August 2023, n = 11,201.  Copyright.

1. 10a.

   Section chapter introduction, paragraph 3:  “Almost half of U.S. adults (45%) report ever having had a sudden feeling of connection with something from beyond this world, while three-in-ten say they have personally encountered a spirit or unseen spiritual force.”  Section Communication from the deceased:  “53% of U.S. adults said they had ever been visited by a dead family member in a dream or other form.”  The 53% is from a separate spring 2023 Pew survey cited in the chapter. ↩ ↩

Ibn Sirin, Muhammad.  Tafsir al-Ahlam al-Kabir (The Great Book of Dream Interpretation).  n.d.  Attributed to Ibn Sirin (d. 728);  the attribution is almost certainly false (Lamoreaux 2002), which does not matter here, since the question is what manual Muslims consult and this is the one sold under his name.  An unpaginated Arabic digital edition of 310 PDF pages;  locators are PDF pages found by string search.  The translations are this project's, literal, and should be checked by an Arabic reader.  Licence unknown.

1. 11a.

   Page 24:  “Whoever sees Jesus, peace be upon him, his dream shows that he is a beneficial, blessed man, of much good and much travel, and he will be honoured with the knowledge of medicine and other sciences.”  Arabic:  ومن رأى عيسى عليه السلام دلت رؤياه على أنه رجل نفاع مبارك كثير الخير كثير السفر ويكرم بعلم الطب وبغير ذلك من العلوم.  PDF page, chapter on seeing the prophets.  Translation this project's, checked against the Arabic of the library PDF by the verifier;  دلت رؤياه على is literally "his dream indicates". ↩

2. 11b.

   Pages 24–25:  “I saw Jesus son of Mary, peace be upon him, in sleep, and said, 'O Spirit of God, I want to engrave my ring;  what shall I engrave on it?'  He said, 'Engrave on it:  There is no god but God, the King, the Truth, the Manifest,' for it takes away worry and grief.”  A story with an isnad ending in al-Hasan ibn 'Ali.  Arabic:  رأيت عيسى ابن مريم عليه السلام في النوم فقلت يا روح الله إني أريد أن أنقش على خاتمي فما أنقش عليه قال انقش عليه لا إله إلا الله الملك الحق المبين فإنه يذهب الهم والغم.  The isnad starts on PDF p. 24 and the saying runs onto p. 25.  Translation this project's. ↩

3. 11c.

   Page 237:  “If he sees that he has turned Christian, he is ungrateful for God's blessings and describes Him by what He is far above.”  Arabic:  فان رأى كأنه تحول نصرانيا فانه يكفر نعم الله تعالى ويصفه بما هو منزه عنه متقدس.  PDF page, chapter on religions and unbelief.  Translation this project's;  يكفر نعم الله is "is ungrateful for (denies) God's blessings". ↩ ↩

Miles, Jonathan.  “Mideast Leaders Falsified Ministry Reports.”  Christianity Today.  Sep 11, 1995.  An evangelical magazine's on-the-ground check of Gerald Derstine's Gospel Crusade (Bradenton, Florida) and its 1993 book Fire Over Israel.  Located by section and paragraph.  Copyright.

1. 12a.

   Section Pattern of misrepresentation, paragraph 1:  “Recent visits to several of the Arab villages featured in 'Fire Over Israel' confirmed a pattern of misrepresentation and staging of events for Derstine and his tour groups.”  The ministry raised $2.8 million in 1994 alone;  the United Christian Council in Israel had said in November 1994 it could not "affirm or endorse" it. ↩ ↩

Streeter, B. H., and A. J. Appasamy.  The Sadhu: A Study in Mysticism and Practical Religion.  Macmillan, London.  1921.  Streeter was the Oxford New Testament scholar of the four-source hypothesis.  The authors interviewed Sundar Singh at Oxford and print his own account from his Kandy addresses.  Read from the archive.org OCR text in the source library;  pages from the running heads.  Public domain.

1. 13a.

   Page 6:  “I heard a voice saying in Hindustani, 'How long will you persecute me? I have come to save you; you were praying to know the right way. Why do you not take it?'” ↩

Montefiore, Hugh.  Oh God, What Next?  Hodder & Stoughton, London.  1995.  Autobiography.  Montefiore (1920–2005) was a Cambridge New Testament scholar and Bishop of Birmingham, from a leading Anglo-Jewish family.  Read in whole paragraphs on archive.org (item ohgodwhatnext0000mont, printdisabled) with bin/iapdsearch.py;  printed page = leaf − 10 for the early pages, anchored at leaves 11, 20 and 100.  Copyright;  not stored.

1. 14a.

   Page 1:  “I suddenly became aware of a figure in white whom I saw clearly in my mind's eye. I use this expression because I am pretty sure that a photograph would have showed nothing special on it.”  "about 5 pm one dark wintry afternoon in 1936", in his study at Rugby School, aged 16;  he heard the words "Follow me". ↩ ↩

Esther, Gulshan, and Thelma Sangster.  The Torn Veil: The Story of Sister Gulshan Esther.  Marshalls, Basingstoke.  1984.  The best-known named Muslim woman's vision of Jesus in print, co-written with a British writer.  Read in whole paragraphs on archive.org (item tornveil0000unse, printdisabled) with bin/iapdsearch.py;  printed page = leaf − 2, anchored at leaves 9, 14, 63 and 100.  Copyright;  not stored.

1. 15a.

   Page 61:  “Suddenly a voice said, 'Get up. This is the path you have been seeking. I am Jesus Son of Mary, to whom you have been praying, and now I am standing in front of you.'”  Page 59:  “Gradually, my praying changed until I was praying over and over between prayer times, on each bead, 'Oh Jesus, Son of Maryam, heal me.'”  Page 60:  Alone in her room at 3 a.m.;  twelve robed figures in a row and a thirteenth, larger and brighter, in the middle. ↩

Straehler, Reinhold.  Conversions from Islam to Christianity in the Sudan.  University of South Africa, MTh dissertation in missiology.  Nov 2005.  Semi-structured interviews with six converts of northern Sudanese background.  Read from the Wayback PDF, pages from the printed footers.  Copyright.  Its literature review is the only route found to Greenlee 1996, Maurer 1999 and Gaudeul 1999, which were not obtained.

1. 16a.

   Table 8, page 54:  "dreams or visions":  some 1, much 2, not at all 3.  Page 61:  “three had a dream or vision which gave them some particular message at a crucial time during their conversion process. None reported anything related to a power encounter.”  Page 62:  “None of the Sudanese converts reported a dream in which Christ appeared. Dreams seem to be exceptional and not the normal experiences.” ↩ ↩

2. 16b.

   Page 61:  “Greenlee (1996:132-136) found that in Morocco dreams played a role in just under half the cases, whereas power encounters were only marginally observed.”  Pages 61–62:  “He also observed that dreams tend to occur at the introductory stage of the conversion process, not at a later stage of confirmation or validation of the decision of the convert. This is in line with the dreams or visions reported by Convert 3 and Convert 6, but not with the experience of Convert 4 who had the decisive dreams between his conversion and the announcement of his conversion to Christians. For converts to the Christian faith in South Africa supernatural encounters happened towards the end of their conversion process and constituted usually the 'final stepping stone' which convinced them to make a commitment to Christianity (Maurer 1999:220).” ↩ ↩

3. 16c.

   Page 62:  “Muslim converts to Christianity often speak of their religious experience in terms of visions, dreams, voices. Why is that so frequent? There may be two explanations. First, God's call is being repressed and pushed back into the subconscious. … Secondly, the cultural background of most converts is very similar to that of the Bible where such phenomena are considered as normal.”  Strähler quoting Gaudeul 1999, p. 222. ↩

Miller, Duane Alexander.  Living Among the Breakage: Contextual Theology-Making and Ex-Muslim Christians.  University of Edinburgh, School of Divinity, PhD thesis.  2014.  Chapter 6 reports a questionnaire answered by 30 hand-picked missionaries and ministers;  "The sample is not representative in any way" (p. 90).  Pages from the footers.  The repository's terms forbid extensive quotation, so the article quotes briefly.  Copyright.

1. 17a.

   Page 97:  “An increase in dreams and visions was noted by seven respondents, but one missionary felt that the change was not more dreams and visions, but rather that in the past they had gone unreported”. ↩

2. 17b.

   Page 97:  “…it is a known fact that God is revealing Himself to Muslims through dreams and visions. However, they [the Muslims] think this would draw ridicule, so they don't tell anyone. Yet when we ask them [if they have had such a dream], they can't believe we know that they had dreams. This opens doors.”  A Western minister in the Arab world, quoted by Miller. ↩

3. 17c.

   Pages 97–98:  “One missionary complained to me that so many women were having dreams of Mary, too Catholic for her liking.” ↩

4. 17d.

   Page 98:  “For decades, a well-documented phenomenon has been occurring in the Muslim world—men and women who, without knowledge of the gospel, or contact among Christians in their community, have experienced dreams and visions of Jesus Christ.”  Miller quoting the ministry More than Dreams in Lausanne World Pulse, January 2007. ↩

Woodberry, J. Dudley, and Russell G. Shubin.  “Muslims Tell … 'Why I Chose Jesus'.”  Mission Frontiers, 28–33.  Mar 2001.  An earlier report from the same Fuller questionnaire:  120 of about 600 forms, some filled in by "those who knew them well".  The live page no longer carries the text;  read from the Wayback capture, located by section heading.  Copyright.

1. 18a.

   Section I have had a dream:  “Though dreams may play an insignificant role in the conversion decisions of most Westerners, over one-fourth of those surveyed state quite emphatically that dreams and visions were key in drawing them to Christ and sustaining them through difficult times.” ↩

2. 18b.

   Section I have had a dream:  “The great majority of dreams seem to fall into one of two broad categories. The first could be considered the preparatory dream. Like Christ appearing in a white robe, the vision confirms thoughts or conversations one has been having about Christ or the Christian faith. The second could be called the empowering dream. Here the dream or vision commonly gives the believer strength in the face of persecution.” ↩ ↩

3. 18c.

   Section closing section:  “Dreams and visions may have been used by God in part because there is a dearth of flesh-and-blood witnesses for Christ willing to articulate and demonstrate the power of the Gospel in person.” ↩

Iwarsson, Jonas.  “A Moslem Mass Movement toward Christianity in Abyssinia.”  The Moslem World 14(3):286–289.  Translated by N. Rodén.  Jul 1924.  A Swedish Evangelical Mission missionary in Asmara, the mission that supplied Zakaryas's Bible;  translated from Svensk Missionstidskrift 1924, no. 1.  Read from the archive.org OCR of the whole issue in the source library;  pages from the running heads.  Public domain.

1. 19a.

   Page 286:  “Because of a vision which Sheikh Zakarias had about twenty years ago, he began earnestly to seek after truth.”  The OCR reads "seck".  The vision's content is not described.  Garrison (p. 15) and the Dictionary of African Christian Biography date it to 1892;  Crummey 1972 in the Journal of Ethiopian Studies would settle it and was not read. ↩

Pew Research Center.  “Around the World, Many People Are Leaving Their Childhood Religions.”  Pew Research Center.  Mar 26, 2025.  By Kirsten Lesage, Kelsey Starr and William Miner.  Nationally representative surveys of 41,503 adults in 35 countries, January to May 2024, plus the US Religious Landscape Study;  about 1,200 per country.  Printed page = PDF page − 1.  Copyright.

1. 20a.

   Page 44:  “For instance, in Indonesia, the share of adults who currently identify as Muslim is equal to the share who say they were raised Muslim (93%). Fewer than 1% of all adults surveyed in Indonesia say they have left or entered Islam.” ↩

2. 20b.

   Page 46:  “In addition, a modest number of U.S. adults who were raised Muslim now identify as Christians (6%). The same is true in Kenya (8%) and Ghana (6%).”  Page 45:  Table:  of those raised Muslim, still Muslim:  Bangladesh, Indonesia, Israel, Malaysia, Sri Lanka and Tunisia 100%;  India 99;  Nigeria 98;  Singapore 97;  Turkey 96;  Kenya 92;  Ghana 91;  United States 77.  The Kenyan 8% rests on roughly 130 raised-Muslim respondents. ↩ ↩

3. 20c.

   Page 45, note 16:  “In several countries, the retention rate among Muslims rounds to 100%. This survey-based estimate does not necessarily mean there are no people who have switched out of Islam in those countries.” ↩

Miller and Johnstone's Table 1 rows (pp. 14–17) sum to 9,779,100 in this project's addition;  the printed regional block (p. 17) adds to 10,284,200 because its "Arab world" line re-counts states already inside the Asia and Africa rows, so the regional lines are not added.  Indonesia is 6,500,000;  the remainder is 3,279,100.  Figure 1 (p. 11, read by eye, no printed values) gives for 2010 a minimum of about 6.7 million, a moderate of about 10 million and a maximum of about 17 million, that is ratios of about 0.67 and 1.7 to the moderate figure;  Figure 2 gives about 3.3 million excluding Indonesia.  Applying the same ratios to 3.3 million gives about 2.2 to 5.7 million.  The article rounds to 2 to 6 million, which also brackets Garrison's independent 2 to 7 million.⁵⁴ ↩

Pew Research Center.  “How the Global Religious Landscape Changed From 2010 to 2020.”  Pew Research Center.  Jun 9, 2025.  Read from the report PDF in the source library;  printed page numbers, PDF page = printed + 1.  Copyright.

1. 22a.

   Page 53:  Table:  Muslims 1,675,800,000 in 2010 and 2,022,590,000 in 2020. ↩

2. 22b.

   Page 39:  “Muslims and Hindus have been the least likely to gain or lose adherents from religious switching. About one in every 100 adults raised Muslim (or Hindu) has left their childhood religion, and a similar number from a different religious category have switched into Islam (or Hinduism).”  Page 143:  Methodology table:  of all adults 18–54 in the pooled sample, 22.5% were raised Muslim, 0.3 left and 0.3 entered;  0.3 / 22.5 is 1.3 leavers per 100 raised Muslim. ↩

3. 22c.

   Page 142:  “For the 84 countries where religious switching data is not available, we applied the assumption of no switching between any religious groups (i.e., by assigning the share of people who left or entered as 0% for all religions). For instance, in Saudi Arabia, where switching data is not available, we assumed no switching”.  Page 162:  The data-sources table marks switching data unavailable for Iran, Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Yemen, Libya and Sudan. ↩

4. 22d.

   Pages 148–149:  “GAMAAN's findings have not yet been replicated by other research organizations. Some of the most anomalous results, such as a relatively large share of Zoroastrians, have led scholars to wonder whether "participating in surveys beyond the government's control" gave discontented Iranians an opportunity for "performing alternative identity aspirations."” ↩

Maleki, Ammar, and Pooyan Tamimi Arab.  Iranians' Attitudes Toward Religion: A 2020 Survey Report.  GAMAAN (Group for Analyzing and Measuring Attitudes in Iran).  Aug 2020.  Maleki is at Tilburg University, Tamimi Arab at Utrecht;  funded by the Abdorrahman Boroumand Center for Human Rights in Iran.  No church or mission involved.  Printed page = PDF page − 2.  Copyright.

1. 23a.

   Page 3:  “multiple chain-referral sampling (or multiple virtual snowball sampling) through social media (Telegram, Instagram, WhatsApp, Twitter, and Facebook)”.  Page 4:  39,981 respondents inside Iran over 19;  target population literate residents above 19, about 47 million.  Page 16:  “an effective sample size of 1,911 was estimated”. ↩

2. 23b.

   Figure 2, page 6:  "Which of the following is closer to your beliefs and faith?":  Shi'ite Muslim 32.2%, None 22.2%, Atheist 8.8%, Zoroastrian 7.7%, Spiritual 7.1%, Agnostic 5.8%, Sunni Muslim 5.0%, Others 3.3%, Mystical (Sufi) 3.2%, Humanist 2.7%, Christian 1.5%, Baha'i 0.5%, Jewish 0.1%.  Read from a rendered image of the page. ↩ ↩

3. 23c.

   Page 15:  “These shortcomings include the so-called network effect, which means that the survey is more likely to reach respondents who hold beliefs similar to those held by the organizers, as well as self-selection, which means that those with a special interest in the survey topic are more likely to participate.” ↩

Statistical Centre of Iran.  Selected Findings of the 2016 National Population and Housing Census.  Plan and Budget Organization, Tehran.  2018.  The live amar.org.ir address no longer answers;  read from the Wayback PDF.  Page anchored by the table of contents and the next page's running head.

1. 24a.

   Table 3, page 20:  2016:  total 79,926,270;  Muslim 79,598,054;  Christian 130,158;  Jewish 9,826;  Zoroastrian 23,109;  Others 40,551;  Not stated 124,572.  The 2011 Christian count was 117,704. ↩ ↩

GAMAAN's target population is literate Iranian residents over 19, about 47 million (p. 4).  1.5% of 47 million is about 705,000.  Sampling error alone on the effective n of 1,911 is √(0.015 × 0.985 / 1,911) = 0.0028, so a 95% interval of about 0.95% to 2.05%, or 450,000 to 960,000.  The 2016 census counted 130,158 Christians of the recognised kinds in 79,926,270 people, 0.16%;  scaled to the 47 million target population that is about 77,000, leaving a convert-identified share near 1.3 to 1.4%, about 630,000, with a sampling interval of roughly 380,000 to 880,000.  None of this corrects for the snowball's reach into Christian online networks.  GAMAAN told Article18 that its figure implied 750,000 to 950,000 Christians in the whole country.²⁴²³²⁶ ↩

Article18.  “Survey supports claims of nearly 1 million Christians in Iran.”  Article18.  Aug 27, 2020.  A Christian advocacy group for religious freedom in Iran.  Located by paragraph.  Copyright.

1. 26a.

   Paragraph 8:  “given that converts to Christianity are routinely harassed and arrested, previous estimations by Christian organisations have been based only on extrapolations of the small known number of conversions – largely based on contact with Christian satellite television channels.” ↩

2. 26b.

   Paragraph 6:  “We do not regard it as remotely plausible that there are as many as 1 million people secretly practising Christianity in Iran today.”  A UK asylum tribunal decision of 2019, quoted by Article18;  the decision itself was not traced. ↩

3. 26c.

   Paragraph 1–3:  “There are approximately 300,000 Christians of Armenian and Assyrian origin in Iran, thereby suggesting an additional 450,000-650,000 converts.” ↩ ↩

Straehler, Reinhold Immanuel.  Coming to Faith in Christ: Case Studies of Muslims in Kenya.  University of South Africa, DTh thesis in missiology.  Nov 2009.  In-depth interviews with 17 urban Kenyan converts (9 men, 8 women), grounded-theory analysis, plus a factor questionnaire rated 2, 1 or 0.  Every interviewee was asked directly about dreams.  The title page spells the name Strähler;  his 2005 dissertation spells it Straehler.  The UNISA repository was down;  read from the Wayback PDF, pages from the printed footers.  Copyright.

1. 27a.

   Table 29, page 137:  "dreams or visions":  men 4 much, 0 some, 5 none;  women 2 much, 2 some, 4 none.  So 8 of 17 (47%) at least some, 6 of 17 (35%) much.  Table 30, page 138:  "dream / vision" ranked seventh (score 14), behind personal witness by Christians (25), attractive lifestyle of Christians (24), love and friendship shown by Christians (24), reading the Bible (23), dissatisfaction with the practice of Islam (22), evangelistic meetings and answered prayer (20 each), and reading literature (18). ↩

2. 27b.

   Page 137:  “The three most frequent factors have all to do with Christians, with their personal witness, their attractive lifestyle as well as the love and friendship they show to Muslims.” ↩

3. 27c.

   Page 211:  “The significant factor that occurred most often during the time of awareness (phase 2) and that apparently acted strongly as catalyst for creating this awareness of the Christian faith was the 'lifestyle and behaviour of Christians' (43x).”  Page 212:  “Supernatural factors also acted as catalysts, be they 'communicative' (18x) or 'experiential' (17x).”  Page 204:  "Communicative" experiences are defined as "being enlightened, having a dream or vision, or God speaking directly", so these counts are not dream counts alone. ↩

Low:  2,000,000 × 0.05 = 100,000.  Central:  3,300,000 × 0.18 ≈ 600,000.  High:  6,000,000 × 0.30 = 1,800,000.  Iran:  the GAMAAN sampling interval of 380,000 to 880,000 converts times the same shares gives about 20,000 (380,000 × 0.05), 110,000 (630,000 × 0.18) and 260,000 (880,000 × 0.30).  No prior contact:  the three totals times Martyn's 2 of 38, using the interval's ends and centre (1.5%, 5%, 17%), give about 1,500, 30,000 and 300,000.  The central p of 18% takes Martyn's 28 Jesus-dreams among "more than 120" published testimonies (23%) and discounts it for selection toward striking stories;  the low p takes Syrjänen's 6 of 36 pre-decision dreams or visions (17%) and assumes about a third show Christ;  the high p takes Woodberry's 27 to 40% times Martyn's 64% Jesus share, which also matches Kenya's 47% times 64%.¹⁶² ↩

Carlson, Darren.  “When Muslims Dream of Jesus.”  The Gospel Coalition.  May 31, 2018.  Copyright.  Located by paragraph.

1. 29a.

   Paragraph 2–3:  “In 2007, Dudley Woodberry and others published a study that recounted interviews with 750 former Muslims who had converted to evangelical Christianity.”  “These study results aren't isolated. Mission Frontiers magazine has reported that out of 600 Muslim converts, 25 percent experienced a dream that led to their conversion.” ↩

The Tide.  “Global Muslim Awakening Part 1: Dreams and Visions.”  The Tide.  Jun 10, 2024.  A radio ministry's web article.  Copyright.

1. 30a.

   “in the past few decades, as David Garrison and many others have reported, millions of Muslims around the world have embraced Jesus!”  “there are reports that over a million former Muslims in Iran have come to faith in Jesus in the 21st century.” ↩

Denison Forum.  “How dreams and visions of "Isa" are awakening the Islamic world.”  Denison Forum.  Sep 8, 2021.  By Mark Legg, per the stored page's metadata, which also gives the title.  The url first written in this footnote returned 404.  Copyright.

1. 31a.

   “Garrison's book is a wake-up call more than a triumphal account of Christianity's victory over Islam, for these awakenings, or "movements," at most still only accounted for less than 0.5 percent of Muslims across the world. … Hormoz Shariat outlines this in Iran's Great Awakening, speculating that between one and five million have started following Jesus in the past decade.” ↩

United States Department of State.  “2023 Report on International Religious Freedom: Iran.”  Office of International Religious Freedom.  2024.  Public domain.  Section I, "Religious Demography", located by paragraph.  It misdates the census:  117,700 is the 2011 count;  2016 is 130,158.

1. 32a.

   Section I. Religious Demography, paragraph 3–4:  “According to Boston University's 2020 World Religion Database, there are approximately 579,000 Christians. The Christian advocacy NGO Article 18 estimates there are 500,000 to 800,000 Christians in the country, while the Christian advocacy NGO Open Doors International estimates the number is 1.24 million.” ↩

2. 32b.

   Section I. Religious Demography, paragraph 4:  “Estimates by the Assyrian Church of the total Assyrian and Chaldean Christian population put their combined number at 7,000. The Assyrian Policy Institute estimates there are fewer than 50,000 Assyrian Christians … According to recent estimates from Armenian Christians … their current numbers range from 20,000 to 50,000.” ↩

Open Doors.  World Watch List 2026: Iran Country Dossier.  Open Doors International.  Dec 2025.  The PDF is dated 8 December 2025.  Copyright.

1. 33a.

   Page 2:  “NUMBER OF CHRISTIANS 800,000 (Open Doors estimate)”.  Population 90,411,000;  0.9%.  Footnote 1 attributes the religion table to the World Christian Database "adapted to incorporate OD-estimate".  No method is given. ↩

667 an hour × 24 hours = 16,008 a day;  × 365 = 5.84 million a year, so the three figures are one figure restated.  Pew counted 139,184,000 Muslims in sub-Saharan Africa in 1990 and 242,544,000 in 2010, a 74% rise, so six million leavers a year from 2000 to 2010 would be 60 million, a quarter of the 2010 total.⁷³  Pew's 2024 face-to-face surveys find that in Nigeria, Kenya and Ghana 1 to 2% of all adults have left Islam over their whole lives and about as many have joined.²⁰  Miller and Johnstone's moderate count for all of Africa is 2,161,000 (p. 17). ↩

Two "no contact" cases in 38 with a stated order gives a point estimate of 5.3%.  The Wilson 95% score interval for 2 of 38 runs from about 1.5% to 17%.  Martyn's six cases that "did not address this issue clearly" are excluded from the denominator.² ↩

Qureshi, Nabeel.  Seeking Allah, Finding Jesus: A Devout Muslim Encounters Christianity.  Zondervan, Grand Rapids.  2014.  Qureshi (1983–2017), an American Ahmadi Muslim, later an apologist with Ravi Zacharias International Ministries.  Read in whole paragraphs on archive.org (item seekingallahfind0000qure_m0l1, printdisabled) with bin/iapdsearch.py;  printed page = leaf − 2, checked at leaves 67, 140 and 300 and against the contents page.  Copyright;  not stored.

1. 36a.

   Page 65:  “In our culture, dreams are carefully considered because, as a well-known hadith teaches, "The dreams of the faithful are prophetic." In fact, dreams are the only means I know of by which the average Muslim expects to hear directly from God.” ↩

2. 36b.

   Page 18:  “To portray the immense inner struggle of Muslims grappling with the gospel, including sacrifices and doubts. As you will see in parts nine and ten, it is in the midst of this struggle that God is known to reach people directly through visions and dreams.” ↩

3. 36c.

   Page 254:  “The edifice of my worldview, all I had ever known, had slowly been dismantled over the past few years.” ↩

4. 36d.

   Page 257:  “What I saw instead was a field with hundreds of crosses. They were glowing, in bright contrast to the darkness around them.”  Pages 256–258:  The vision is dated on or after "DECEMBER 19, 2004", in an Orlando hotel room. ↩

5. 36e.

   Page 258:  “God, that doesn't count! I don't know if that was really what I thought it was. I could subconsciously want to become a Christian, and my mind could be deceiving me. So, I'm sorry I asked for a vision. Please give me a dream, and if the dream confirms the vision, I will become Christian.” ↩

6. 36f.

   Page 268:  “On the morning of March 11, 2005, I had a new dream to scrawl onto paper.”  “I asked him, 'I thought we were going to eat together?' And he said, without removing his eyes from the front of the room, 'You never responded.'”  Page 271:  “I HAD ASKED FOR THREE DREAMS, though”.  Pages 271–272:  The third dream, "In the early hours of April 24, 2005":  "a flight of white stairs in a masjid" with the imam "wearing white" seated behind him. ↩

7. 36g.

   Page 269:  “Instead of Abba's King James Version, I turned to a study Bible that David had given me the previous year as a gift. … When I arrived at the passage, in big, bold letters, the section heading read: "The Narrow Door."” ↩

8. 36h.

   Page 267:  “I shared the dream with Ammi, who told me she did not know exactly how all the symbols fit together, but it was a sign from Allah that ought to confirm my confidence in Islam.” ↩

9. 36i.

   Page 274:  “THROUGH THE SUMMER OF 2005, I continued resisting the gospel. … trying desperately to overturn what I had learned over the past four years, to no avail. All the while, I begged God for more dreams, but He gave me none.”  Page 278:  Conversion "On August 24, 2005, at three o'clock in the morning". ↩

10. 36j.

    Page 263:  “Ammi sometimes referred to a dream interpretation book, written by ancient dream interpreter, Ibn Sirin.”  Page 272:  “Using Ibn Sirin once more, she said the stairs represented a rise in my status both in this world and the hereafter”.  Leaves 265 and 274 by bin/iapdsearch.py, printed page = leaf − 2.  The book does not name which Ibn Sirin title she used. ↩

SAT-7.  “New survey shows record number of SAT-7 viewers.”  SAT-7.  Nov 25, 2016.  A press release by the broadcaster about a survey it commissioned from IPSOS;  questionnaire, sampling and weighting unpublished.  Copyright.

1. 37a.

   Paragraph 3:  “The survey was carried out by the global market research company IPSOS between April and July 2016. The independent research group asked 27,000 people in ten Arab countries about their viewership. ... they now have a combined viewership of 21.5 million. More than 10 million of these people watch daily or at least once a week.” ↩

Cole, Ethan.  “Survey: Millions of Non-Christian Iraqis Watch Christian TV.”  The Christian Post.  Mar 22, 2009.  Reporting an InterMedia survey commissioned by SAT-7;  method unpublished.  Copyright.

1. 38a.

   Paragraph 3:  “Data collected in the recent nationwide study conducted by Intermedia, an independent audience research firm, found that 97 percent of Iraqis have access to satellite television, and 18.8 percent watch SAT-7. The study also found that 2.6 million are watching on a regular daily or weekly basis.” ↩

McGrath, John J. et al.  “Psychotic Experiences in the General Population: A Cross-National Analysis Based on 31,261 Respondents From 18 Countries.”  JAMA Psychiatry 72(7):697–705.  2015.  WHO World Mental Health Surveys, household probability samples, including Iraq (n = 4,329) and Lebanon (n = 1,029).  Read from the PMC author manuscript.  Copyright.  Mirror:  PMC

1. 39a.

   Section Results:  “Lifetime prevalence (se) of at least 1 PE was reported by 5.8% (0.2) of the 31 261 respondents. Lifetime prevalence of any HE was 5.2% (0.2) and of any DE 1.3% (0.1).”  Table 2:  Lifetime any hallucinatory experience:  Iraq 1.1% (SE 0.2), Lebanon 1.6% (0.4), United States 8.2% (0.9), Netherlands 10.1%, São Paulo 13.3%.  Section Methods:  “to determine if the reported PEs ever occurred when the person was 'not dreaming, not half-asleep, or not under the influence of alcohol or drugs'. Only responses of the latter type are considered here.” ↩ ↩

Wiebe, Phillip H.  Visions of Jesus: Direct Encounters from the New Testament to Today.  Oxford University Press, New York.  1997.  A Christian philosopher (Trinity Western University) who interviewed 28 people reporting a visual encounter with Jesus, 1988–1993, recruited mostly by advertisement.  Read in whole paragraphs on archive.org (item visionsofjesusdi0000wieb, printdisabled) with bin/iapdsearch.py;  printed page = leaf − 12, anchored at leaves 50, 200 and 280 and against the book's index.  Copyright;  not stored.

1. 40a.

   Page 210:  “the percipients that I interviewed did not fit the profile of people diagnosed with schizophrenia, for they were well integrated into society, often held down responsible positions, and so on. They fit the profile of normal people who have aberrant perceptions.” ↩

2. 40b.

   Page 79:  “this incident shows how paranormal claims often (nearly) evaporate under critical scrutiny”.  Page 82:  “Perhaps nothing can be established beyond reasonable doubt concerning the Oakland experience, in view of the unavailability of the film for critical scrutiny”. ↩

Bukhari, Muhammad ibn Isma'il.  “Sahih al-Bukhari.”  sunnah.com.  Translated by Muhammad Muhsin Khan.  c. 846.  Retrieved Sep 29, 2026.  Hadith numbers are sunnah.com's (Fath al-Bari numbering).  Book 91 is Kitab al-Ta'bir, the interpretation of dreams;  Book 60 is the prophets.  Read from sunnah.com with the Arabic beside the English;  not mirrored, per the site's terms.

1. 41a.

   Book 91, section hadith 6983:  “A good dream (that comes true) of a righteous man is one of forty-six parts of prophetism.” ↩

2. 41b.

   Book 91, section hadith 6984:  “A true good dream is from Allah, and a bad dream is from Satan.” ↩

3. 41c.

   Book 91, section hadith 6985:  “If anyone of you sees a dream that he likes, then it is from Allah, and he should thank Allah for it and narrate it to others; but if he sees something else, i.e., a dream that he dislikes, then it is from Satan, and he should seek refuge with Allah from its evil, and he should not mention it to anybody, for it will not harm him.” ↩

4. 41d.

   Book 91, section hadith 6994:  “Whoever has seen me in a dream, then no doubt, he has seen me, for Satan cannot imitate my shape.”  Section hadith 6993:  “Whoever sees me in a dream will see me in his wakefulness, and Satan cannot imitate me in shape." Abu `Abdullah said, "Ibn Seereen said, 'Only if he sees the Prophet (ﷺ) in his (real) shape.'” ↩ ↩

5. 41e.

   Book 60, section hadith 3439–3440:  “I saw in my dream a man of brown color the best one can see amongst brown color and his hair was long that it fell between his shoulders. His hair was lank and water was dribbling from his head and he was placing his hands on the shoulders of two men while circumambulating the Ka`ba. I asked, 'Who is this?' They replied, 'This is Jesus, son of Mary.'”  Book 91, section hadith 7026:  The same dream told more briefly, under the chapter "Tawaf around the Ka'bah in a dream". ↩

Muslim ibn al-Hajjaj.  “Sahih Muslim.”  sunnah.com.  Translated by Abdul Hamid Siddiqui.  c. 875.  Retrieved Sep 29, 2026.  Book 42 is Kitab al-Ru'ya, the book of dreams;  numbering is 'Abd al-Baqi's with sunnah.com's letter suffixes (2263a is in-book Book 42, Hadith 9;  USC-MSA Book 29, Hadith 5621).  Read from sunnah.com;  not mirrored.

1. 42a.

   Book 42, section hadith 2263a:  “When the time draws near (when the Resurrection is near) a believer's dream can hardly be false. And the truest vision will be of one who is himself the most truthful in speech, for the vision of a Muslim is the forty-fifth part of Prophecy, and dreams are of three types: one good dream which is a sort of good tidings from Allah; the evil dream which causes pain is from the satan; and the third one is a suggestion of one's own mind”.  The narrator adds that he does not know whether the last part is the hadith or the words of Ibn Sirin. ↩

Saheeh International.  The Qur'an: English Meanings.  Abul-Qasim Publishing House, Jeddah.  1997.  Retrieved Sep 29, 2026.  Saheeh International translation, pulled as JSON from api.quran.com v4 (translation id 20).  Square brackets are the translators' own.  The site's Islam hub and its article on the Qur'an and Christianity treat these verses at length.

1. 43a.

   Chapter 3, verse 45:  “Allāh gives you good tidings of a word from Him, whose name will be the Messiah, Jesus, the son of Mary - distinguished in this world and the Hereafter and among those brought near [to Allāh].” ↩

2. 43b.

   Chapter 4, verse 157–158:  “And they did not kill him, nor did they crucify him; but [another] was made to resemble him to them. ... Rather, Allāh raised him to Himself.”  Chapter 4, verse 171:  “The Messiah, Jesus the son of Mary, was but a messenger of Allāh and His word which He directed to Mary and a soul [created at a command] from Him.” ↩

3. 43c.

   Chapter 43, verse 61:  “And indeed, he [i.e., Jesus] will be [a sign for] knowledge of the Hour”.  Bukhari 3448 has Jesus descend to "break the Cross and kill the pigs". ↩

Ibn Sirin, Muhammad.  Dreams and Interpretations.  Translated by Muhammad Rafeeq ibn Moulana Ahmad Hathurani.  n.d.  An abridged English manual in circulation among English-speaking Muslims, attributed to Ibn Sirin.  Read from the archive.org OCR text;  located by section from the contents list.  Licence unknown.

1. 44a.

   Section 3, Embracing Judaism, Christianity or Fire-Worship:  “Seeing oneself embracing Judaism, Christianity or the religion of the Fire-worshippers indicates that despite their love and affection for him, he will still oppose and refute them.” ↩

Salem, Mohamed O. et al.  “Significance of Dreams among United Arab Emirates University Students.”  International Journal of Dream Research 2(1):29–32.  2009.  A questionnaire to 350 students at UAE University, 2006–07, a convenience sample.  The journal's bot wall refuses curl;  the PDF was fetched in a browser with a desktop user agent.  Pages from the printed footers.  Licence not stated.

1. 45a.

   Page 31, section 3.3:  “25% of male and 26% of female students made decisions in their social life in response to some dreams. Such decisions included important personal matters like marriage, buying an expensive product and other financial affairs.”  Section 3.5:  “30% of male and 41% of female students (P< 0.034) had dreams with religious themes. Such religious content included hearing certain verses of the Qur'an with some references to their personal affairs, or hinting to some options to their problems. Other reported religious themes included: angles, Jinn, Lailatu Al-Kader (One Valued Night in the month of Ramadan), and the afterlife.”  Section 3.7:  “66% of female and 39% of male students (p< 0.001) reported that they were keen to get an interpretation of their dreams regularly.”  Of these, "a specialized book (47% males and 56% females)". ↩

Salem, Mohamed O. et al.  “Spiritual and religious imagery in dreams: A cross cultural analysis.”  International Journal of Dream Research 6(2):94–97.  2013.  One recent dream each from 100 female psychology students at UAE University and 100 at Trent University, Ontario, scored in eleven religious-imagery categories.  Pages from the printed footers.  Licence not stated.

1. 46a.

   Page 96, section 2.2:  “there was a significant difference between the UAE Students' dreams (M = 3.49, SD = 1.75) and the Canadian students' dreams (M = 0.07, SD = 0.33) in terms of total religious/spiritual imagery, t(99) = -19.16, p < .001.”  “The UAE dream sample contained frequencies greater than 0.20 (or 20% of dreams) for religious places, Satan, God, prophets, the afterlife, and religious figures (i.e. 20% of dreams contained these images).”  Section 3:  “Of the UAE participants, 98.2% reported considering themselves religious/spiritual. Within the Canadian sample, only 15% of participants considered themselves religious/spiritual.” ↩

Edgar, Iain R.  “The Dreams of Islamic State.”  Perspectives on Terrorism 9(4):72–84.  Aug 2015.  An anthropologist of Muslim dreaming (Durham), from fieldwork in Pakistan, Turkey, Bosnia, Northern Cyprus and the UK.  Pages from the printed footers.  Licence not stated.

1. 47a.

   Page 73:  “My anthropological research over many years across four continents has shown that istikhara, the ritual of incubating night dreams for guidance, is widespread in many if not most Islamic countries. During my fieldwork research, especially in Pakistan, Turkey, Bosnia and the UK, I rarely met a Muslim who didn't relate to his night dreams as a potential portal to the divine.” ↩

2. 47b.

   Page 74:  “Of course, not all Muslims who believe they have true dreams about jihad or martyrdom, become militants. For some radicalized individuals, however, a dream or series of dreams can be a catalyst for taking up arms. A short or long period of contemplation can be followed by a vivid command or message dream”.  Page 78:  Cites David Cook's database of "some 5,000 dream accounts from throughout Islamic history". ↩

Mittermaier, Amira.  Dreams That Matter: Egyptian Landscapes of the Imagination.  University of California Press, Berkeley.  2011.  An anthropologist's ethnography of dreaming in Cairo in the 2000s.  Read in whole paragraphs on archive.org (item dreamsthatmatter0000mitt, printdisabled) with bin/iapdsearch.py;  printed page = leaf − 18, anchored at leaves 20 and 274 and by the running head on leaf 176.  Copyright;  not stored.

1. 48a.

   Pages 157–158:  “In spite of growing tensions between Christians and Muslims in Egypt, dreams can incite Muslims to visit Christian saints, and it supposedly used to also be more common for Christians to visit Muslim saints.”  “had seen a lot of light and in it an angelic shape. She figured that she was being visited by either the Virgin Mary or Saint Theresa, and she decided to visit the latter, as she would not have known where to visit the Virgin.”  A veiled Muslim woman at Saint Theresa's church in Shubra. ↩

2. 48b.

   Page 158:  “Not only spatial, but also denominational crossings can be triggered by visitational dreams. Conversion stories told by Copts often involve the Virgin's or a Christian saint's visit to a Muslim, an incident of miraculous healing, the Muslim's conversion to Christianity, and a subsequent life in danger or escape abroad to evade repercussions.”  Her example is told to her by two Christian friends about a third person, hearsay at two removes. ↩

3. 48c.

   Page 123:  “(in his sleep and later also while awake) not only by the Prophet but also by other prophets (David, Jacob, Jesus)”.  Page 126:  Dream-visions "show the shaykh talking on the phone with Jesus".  Shaykh Qusi, a Sufi. ↩

4. 48d.

   Page 9:  “One of the most famous apparitions of the Virgin Mary worldwide took place in the Cairo neighborhood of Zaytoun in 1968. Two Muslim mechanics sighted the Virgin over the church's dome from across the street, at first mistaking her for a young woman about to commit suicide. Subsequently millions of Egyptians and foreigners came to Zaytoun to see the Virgin, the Coptic Church officially confirmed the apparitions, and the Arab Socialist Union took control, organized parking around the church, and charged an entrance fee (Nelson 1973).”  Page 254, note 25:  “Most people I spoke to leaned toward the latter option and emphasized that the first to notice the Virgin in Zaytoun were not Christians but Muslims.” ↩

Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life.  “Tolerance and Tension: Islam and Christianity in Sub-Saharan Africa.”  Pew Research Center.  Apr 2010.  Face-to-face interviews with more than 25,000 people in 19 countries, December 2008 to April 2009.  Page from the printed footer.

1. 49a.

   Page 213:  Q67c, "Have you ever ... received a direct revelation from God?", yes by religion:  Nigeria Christian 44%, Muslim 21%;  Ghana 43 / 18;  Liberia 46 / 26;  Cameroon 36 / 16;  Kenya 36 / 22;  Uganda 27 / 16;  Tanzania 23 / 6;  Mozambique 24 / 18;  Chad 25 / 18;  DR Congo 43 / 32;  Ethiopia 28 / 26;  Guinea Bissau 47 / 49.  Senegal (Muslim) 7%, Mali 14%, Djibouti 19%.  Columns:  yes, no, don't know or refused, total.  “Nigeria Total 32 66 1 100 Christian 44 54 1 100 Muslim 21 77 2 100”. ↩

Bulkeley, Kelly.  “The Religious Content of Dreams: A New Scientific Foundation.”  Pastoral Psychology 58:93–106.  2009.  Blind word searches of two long dream journals, "Merri" (316 dreams) and "Barb Sanders" (over 3,000).  Read from the author's copy;  pages from the running heads.  Copyright.

1. 50a.

   Page 95:  “Jesus appeared in non-oath form in seven dreams (2.2%)”.  Page 100:  “Jesus yielded seven dreams (0.2%), almost all of them involving Jesus at a distance, i.e., in a story, as a doll, as an image, never as a distinct character with whom she personally interacts.” ↩

Schredl, Michael, and Jan-Hendrik Mönch.  “Dreaming of God and the Role of Faith in Everyday Life: An Empirical Study.”  Pastoral Psychology 72:469–478.  2023.  452 German respondents, many theology students and clergy.  Springer's bot challenge refused curl;  the article text was saved from a headless browser.  CC BY 4.0.  Located by section.

1. 51a.

   Section Abstract:  “About 20% of the participants reported having dreams about encountering God, which was related to their waking life religiosity.”  Section Results:  “The mean percentage of dreams about encounters with God was 1.99% ± 7.73% (n = 356); that is, on average 2% of the remembered dreams included this topic.”  Section Discussion:  “Therefore, the percentage of about 20% of persons reporting dreams about encounters with God would be much lower in the general population.” ↩

Luhrmann, T. M. et al.  “Sensing the presence of gods and spirits across cultures and faiths.”  Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 118(5):e2016649118.  2021.  Four studies, over 2,000 people, in the United States, Ghana, Thailand, China and Vanuatu;  no Muslim sample.  Read from the Europe PMC full text;  located by section.  CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.  Mirror:  PMC

1. 52a.

   Section Significance:  “two key factors—cultural models of the mind and personal orientations toward the mind—explain why some people are more likely than others to report vivid experiences of gods and spirits.”  Section Results, Study 1:  “both Porosity Vignettes scores (β = 0.24 [95% confidence interval: 0.14, 0.35], P < 0.001) and Absorption scores (β = 0.22 [0.13, 0.32], P < 0.001) were significant predictors of Spiritual Events scores.”  Study 2 Porosity Scale β = 0.65 [0.47, 0.83];  study 3 absorption β = 0.40;  study 4 (preregistered) β = 0.29, 0.41 and 0.22. ↩

2. 52b.

   Section Results, Variability:  “participants in relatively more secular settings (e.g., the United States, urban China) reported fewer spiritual presence events, while participants in less secular settings (e.g., Ghana, Vanuatu) reported more—as did charismatic evangelical Christians in all countries”. ↩

Luhrmann, T. M.  When God Talks Back: Understanding the American Evangelical Relationship with God.  Vintage Books, New York.  2012.  A Stanford anthropologist's study of Vineyard evangelicals, including a randomised month-long trial of three prayer disciplines.  Read in whole paragraphs on archive.org (item whengodtalksback0000luhr, printdisabled) with bin/iapdsearch.py;  printed page = leaf − 30, anchored at leaves 40 and 381.  Copyright;  not stored.

1. 53a.

   Page 209:  “The first finding about sensory overrides is how remarkably common they are. Our initial questionnaires asked our subjects a simple question: 'Have you ever heard an audible voice when you were alone, or a voice that no one else present could hear, like someone calling your name?' Nearly half of them said yes.”  “those who had the kataphatic discipline reported more sensory overrides on return than those with the study discipline.”  Page 203:  The three arms:  centering prayer, guided imagination on the Gospels, and intellectual study of the Gospels. ↩

2. 53b.

   Page 221:  “We know that Buddhists have visions of Buddha and Hindus have visions of Krishna.” ↩

Ohayon, Maurice M. et al.  “Hypnagogic and hypnopompic hallucinations: pathological phenomena?”  British Journal of Psychiatry 169(4):459–467.  1996.  Telephone interviews with a representative sample of 4,972 people in the UK aged 15 to 100.  Abstract only, from the Europe PMC API;  the full text is paywalled.

1. 54a.

   Section Abstract, Results:  “Thirty-seven per cent of the sample reported experiencing hypnagogic hallucinations and 12.5% reported hypnopompic hallucinations.” ↩

Sharpless, Brian A., and Jacques P. Barber.  “Lifetime prevalence rates of sleep paralysis: a systematic review.”  Sleep Medicine Reviews 15(5):311–315.  2011.  35 studies, 36,533 people.  Read from the PMC author manuscript.  Copyright.  Mirror:  PMC

1. 55a.

   Section Abstract:  “Aggregating across studies (total N = 36533), 7.6% of the general population, 28.3% of students, and 31.9% of psychiatric patients experienced at least one episode of sleep paralysis.”  Section Introduction:  “Unnatural involuntary movements (e.g., levitation), autoscopy, the presence of malevolent intruders in the bedroom, and physical/sexual assaults are common SP hallucination themes”. ↩

Jalal, Baland et al.  “Explanations of sleep paralysis among Egyptian college students and the general population in Egypt and Denmark.”  Transcultural Psychiatry 51(2):158–175.  2014.  Abstract only, from the Europe PMC API;  full text paywalled.  With Jalal and Hinton, "Sleep Paralysis Among Egyptian College Students:  Association With Anxiety Symptoms," Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease 203(11):  871–875, 2015, doi 10.1097/nmd.0000000000000382, also abstract only.  Samples:  89 general population, 44 university students and 59 Danes (2014);  100 students (2015).

1. 56a.

   Section 2014 abstract:  “We found that nearly half (48%) of the participants from the general Egyptian population believed their SP to be caused by the Jinn, a spirit-like creature with roots in Islamic tradition, which constitutes a culturally bound interpretation of the phenomenology of SP in this region of the world.” ↩

2. 56b.

   Section 2015 abstract:  “SP rates were high; 43% of participants reported at least one lifetime episode of SP, and 24% of those who reported at least one lifetime episode had experienced four or more episodes during the previous year.” ↩

Jalal, Baland et al.  “Beliefs about sleep paralysis in Turkey: Karabasan attack.”  Transcultural Psychiatry 58(3):414–426.  2021.  Read from the Europe PMC full text;  its introduction restates the Egyptian figures.  CC BY 4.0.  Mirror:  PMC

1. 57a.

   Section Introduction:  “A study conducted on the phenomenology of SP in Egypt, a Muslim majority country, found that the vast majority of experiencers (71%) interpreted their SP as a supernatural event.”  “many SP experiencers in Egypt (41%) resorted to 'Islamic medicine' (ruqyah, a form of traditional healing) to prevent future attacks by the Jinn”. ↩

Rees, W. Dewi.  “The Hallucinations of Widowhood.”  British Medical Journal 4(5778):37–41.  1971.  293 widowed people in mid-Wales.  Read from the library's text extraction of the PMC scan, two-column.  Copyright.  Mirror:  PMC

1. 58a.

   Page 38:  “Of the 293 people interviewed 137 (46.7%) had post-bereavement hallucinations.”  Table 1:  Sees deceased 41 of 293, 14.0%;  felt the presence 39.2%. ↩

Rambo, Lewis R.  Understanding Religious Conversion.  Yale University Press, New Haven.  1993.  The standard stage model of conversion.  Read in whole paragraphs on archive.org (item understandingrel0000ramb, printdisabled) with bin/iapdsearch.py;  printed page = leaf − 24, anchored at leaves 30 and 250 and by the index entry for biographical reconstruction.  Copyright;  not stored.

1. 59a.

   Page 138:  “James Beckford and Brian Taylor have found that religious groups may require that people learn to tell their conversion story to the satisfaction of the group. The convert learns what is expected by listening to other testimonies and gradually begins to see his or her life within the common perspective.”  “in religious conversion there is often an implicit or explicit requirement to reinterpret one's life, to gain a new vision of its meaning, with new metaphors, new images, new stories.” ↩

Stromberg, Peter G.  Language and Self-Transformation: A Study of the Christian Conversion Narrative.  Cambridge University Press.  1993.  From interviews with American evangelicals.  Read in whole paragraphs on archive.org (item languageselftran0000stro, printdisabled) with bin/iapdsearch.py;  printed page = leaf − 20, anchored at leaves 25 and 150.  Copyright;  not stored.

1. 60a.

   Page 3:  “Jim's conversion narrative is not only or even primarily an account of events from the past, it is a creation of a particular situation in the moment of its telling.” ↩

Christianity Today.  “Bearing True Witness: Why We Are Tempted to Embellish Conversion Stories.”  Christianity Today.  Jun 28, 2010.  An editorial in the July 2010 issue, after Liberty University removed Ergun Caner as seminary dean.  Copyright.

1. 61a.

   Section Grace Before, Grace After:  “We are a conversion-focused people who love stories. With such an emphasis, it's no wonder so many of us are tempted to embellish our testimonies, to describe the time before making 'a decision for Christ' as worse than it was and the afterward as too blissful.”  “Testimony envy may be part of any community, but we evangelicals seem to have a particular bent toward narrative one-upmanship.”  Caner told a Florida church in November 2001 "Until I was 15 years old, I was in the Islamic youth jihad";  "But divorce documents say Caner was born in Sweden, moved to the United States at age 4, and was raised by his non-Muslim mother". ↩

Fisher, Richard.  “Don't You Believe It.”  Personal Freedom Outreach Journal, March 2008;  reprinted in Think on These Things 14, no. 11 (October 2008).  Mar 2008.  A cessationist pastor's case that the dream stories are unverified.  Read from the Wayback capture.  Used only for its observation on retelling and its two traced cases;  its unsupported generalisation about "Arab culture" is not used.  Copyright.

1. 62a.

   Paragraph after the Egypt story:  “With those who are more Evangelical, the stories circulate with the general theme of the vision directing the Muslim to a missionary or a Gospel presentation.”  Paragraph next:  “Evangelicals commit to the stories not because they have hard evidence, but because they sound more plausible compared to the more Charismatic way of telling them.” ↩

Davis, Patricia M., and Lewis Rambo.  “Conversion Dreams in Christianity and Islam.”  Dreaming in Christianity and Islam: Culture, Conflict, and Creativity, 175–187.  Rutgers University Press, New Brunswick.  Edited by Kelly Bulkeley, Kate Adams and Patricia M. Davis.  2009.  Four case studies:  two Christian (Oswald, Caedmon) and two Islamic (Samau'al al-Maghribi, "Kathleen").  Read in whole paragraphs on archive.org (item dreaminginchrist0000unse, printdisabled) with bin/iapdsearch.py;  printed page = leaf − 18, anchored by the running heads on leaves 197 and 205.  Copyright;  not stored.

1. 63a.

   Page 179:  “One of the Islamic conversion dream accounts concerns Samau'al al-Maghribi, the son of a Jewish rabbi in twelfth-century Iraq. Samau'al had been deeply conflicted between his desire to convert to Islam and his reluctance to hurt his father.”  “In the first dream, Samau'al encounters his namesake the Prophet Samuel sitting beneath a mighty tree. The prophet greets him and passes him the Torah from which he reads the following passage: 'I will raise them up a prophet from among their brethren like unto thee; in him they shall believe' (Deut. 18:15).”  Page 180:  “When I entered and saw him, he turned to me, saw me, and came toward me smiling and benevolent.” ↩

2. 63b.

   Page 181:  “I woke up at six o'clock in the morning and I heard the adhan (call to prayer) in X where there is no mosque around. So that was it. I said, 'This is for me, this is a sign.'” ↩

3. 63c.

   Page 185:  “For Christian conversions, the dreamer experiences a Christian holy person and relationship to Christian scripture. For Islamic conversions, the dreamer experiences an Islamic holy person and relationship to Islamic scripture.”  “all the dreams selected for this study were experienced by the dreamers as profoundly different from ordinary dreams, had the direct experience of a holy person providing leadership toward the new religion, and are related to the holy scriptures of the religion.” ↩

Köse, Ali.  Conversion to Islam: A Study of Native British Converts.  Kegan Paul International, London.  1996.  Interviews with 70 native British converts to Islam, classified by the Lofland-Skonovd motifs.  Read in whole paragraphs on archive.org (item conversiontoisla0000kose, printdisabled) with bin/iapdsearch.py;  printed page = leaf − 16, anchored at leaves 20 and 215.  Copyright;  not stored.

1. 64a.

   Page 104:  “Ten (14%) converts (9 men and 1 woman) reported having a mystical experience before they decided to embrace Islam.”  Page 109:  “8 (35%) Sufis as against 2 (4%) non-Sufis underwent mystical motif. Since Sufis also have a higher record of reported drug-use before their conversion, this may prove the influence of psychedelic drugs in having a mystical experience.” ↩

2. 64b.

   Page 104:  “Kathleen, who converted one year after she married her Muslim husband had a mystical experience which made her feel 'complete'.”  Leaf 120 by bin/iapdsearch.py, printed page = leaf − 16 (the dossier's anchoring).  Checked by the verifier. ↩

3. 64c.

   Table 3.7, page 109:  “Spiritual, mystical aspect, or inexplicable religious 18 (26%) experience”.  The most motivating factor;  "Religious doctrines and teachings" 19 (27%). ↩

4. 64d.

   Page 170:  “In the dream I was Muslim and I went to a house. ... That was the dream, but it was very clear. It was not vague or weird. When I woke up I thought about it and I said, "I don't have any intention of being Muslim. Come on, I am not going to be a Muslim!"” ↩

Poston, Larry.  Islamic Da'wah in the West: Muslim Missionary Activity and the Dynamics of Conversion to Islam.  Oxford University Press, New York.  1992.  72 published testimonies of Western converts to Islam plus a questionnaire.  Read in whole paragraphs on archive.org (item islamicdawahinwe0000post, printdisabled) with bin/iapdsearch.py;  printed page = leaf − 14, anchored at leaves 20 and 230 and by the running head on leaf 184.  Copyright;  not stored.

1. 65a.

   Page 170:  “Of the seventy-two testimonies under consideration only three reported what may be called 'supernatural experiences.' Abd al-Karim Germanus of Hungary wrote that the prophet Muhammad appeared to him in a dream and that he felt a vivid fear upon seeing and hearing this personage. Jim Olson, a British military officer, also wrote of a dream in which he saw smoke rising from the earth to heaven, out of which shone 'a marvelous light.'”  Page 169:  “seventy-one of the seventy-two conversions under investigation must be categorized as 'process' as opposed to 'spontaneous' experiences.” ↩

2. 65b.

   Page 170:  “And Luzita Fatima Aitken awoke one morning to find at the foot of her bed a 'dazzling bright light like a great star,' out of which came the 'beautiful voice of a young man.' This voice quoted two verses from the Christian Gospel of John but Aitken believed that the contents were an indication that Jesus desired her to convert to Islam.” ↩

Osis, Karlis, and Erlendur Haraldsson.  At the Hour of Death.  Hastings House.  1977.  Read in the third edition (Hastings House, 1997).  Surveys of physicians and nurses in the United States and India on deathbed apparitions.  Read in whole paragraphs on archive.org (item athourofdeath00osis, printdisabled) with bin/iapdsearch.py;  printed page = leaf − 22, anchored at leaves 30 and 250.  Copyright;  not stored.  The near-death experiences article uses the same book in full.

1. 66a.

   Page 66:  “For our combined sample, the second largest category was that of religious figures. On the whole, Christians tended to hallucinate angels, Jesus, or the Virgin Mary, whereas Hindus would most usually see Yama (the god of death), one of his messengers, Krishna, or some other deity.”  Page 39:  “If a patient sees a radiant man clad in white who induces in him an inexplicable experience of harmony and peace, he might interpret the apparition in various ways: as an angel, Jesus, or God; or if he is a Hindu, Krishna, Shiva, or Deva.” ↩

Larøi, Frank et al.  “Culture and hallucinations: overview and future directions.”  Schizophrenia Bulletin 40(Suppl 4):S213–S220.  2014.  A review.  Read from the Europe PMC full text;  located by section.  CC BY 3.0.  Mirror:  PMC

1. 67a.

   Section Hallucinations Are Often Culturally Meaningful:  “To become available as plausible experiences of the divine, such hallucinations must conform to local cultural expectations.”  Section Different Patterns of Hallucinations:  “Depending on the way the question is asked, 10%–15% or more of the population report them. They are even more common among the bereaved.” ↩

Trousdale, Jerry.  Miraculous Movements: How Hundreds of Thousands of Muslims Are Falling in Love with Jesus.  Thomas Nelson, Nashville.  2012.  Stories gathered from more than 130 leaders, mostly of Muslim background, over three months in several countries.  Not on archive.org;  read through Google Books search-inside snippets, which carry printed page numbers.  Copyright;  not stored.

1. 68a.

   Page 12:  “names changed, their locations masked, and some details of their stories adjusted to protect their identities.” ↩

Fairmont Daily Sentinel.  “Center Creek Girl, Cripple Four Years, Is Instantly Healed: Betty Baxter, Fifteen, Almost Bent Double, Straightens, Lumps On Back Fade As Family, Neighbors Pray—Normal Now.”  Fairmont Daily Sentinel (Fairmont, Minnesota), front page.  Sep 3, 1941.  With the sidebar "Notes On The Baxter Case".  Read from the scan posted on the Baxter family's site, by eye and by OCR;  the posted scan is cropped mid-sentence, and the site says the full story is in its book.  The family site's home page is quoted for the modern description.  Licence unknown.

1. 69a.

   Section sidebar, Notes On The Baxter Case:  “I would not say such a miracle as you have related is impossible," he said. "In fact, it is wholly probable. I examined Betty, and found no serious organic trouble. Her heart action was normal. She suffered, however, from a highly nervous disorder. I advised she go to Rochester for examination. One in her condition, I imagine, would respond to faith healing.”  The Fairmont physician who had examined her "As recently as last month", interviewed with Betty's and her mother's consent;  not named in the visible text.  OCR errors "Belly", "fdurd", "Hec" corrected from the image. ↩

Mikkelson, Barbara.  “Were Muslim Girls Buried Alive by Their Father, Then Fed and Comforted by Jesus?”  Snopes.  Aug 17, 2007.  Rated False.  Located by paragraph.  Copyright.

1. 70a.

   Paragraph 2:  “we found no news reports from Egypt about a man's murdering his wife and burying her along with his two still-alive daughters”.  Paragraph 1:  “We first encountered this story in April 2004 when it began to land in the snopes.com inbox. It has since come to us labeled 'News from Egypt,' 'Miracle in Egypt,' and 'Murder Miracle in Egypt!'” ↩

The King James Version of the Bible.  Project Gutenberg.  2024.

1. 71a.

   Book Numbers, chapter 12, verse 6:  “If there be a prophet among you, I the LORD will make myself known unto him in a vision, and will speak unto him in a dream.” ↩

2. 71b.

   Book Joel, chapter 2, verse 28:  “And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men shall see visions:”. ↩

3. 71c.

   Book Acts, chapter 2, verse 17:  “And it shall come to pass in the last days, saith God, I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh: and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams:”. ↩

4. 71d.

   Book Matthew, chapter 2, verse 12:  “And being warned of God in a dream that they should not return to Herod, they departed into their own country another way.” ↩

5. 71e.

   Book Acts, chapter 16, verse 9–10:  “And a vision appeared to Paul in the night; There stood a man of Macedonia, and prayed him, saying, Come over into Macedonia, and help us. And after he had seen the vision, immediately we endeavoured to go into Macedonia, assuredly gathering that the Lord had called us for to preach the gospel unto them.” ↩

6. 71f.

   Book Acts, chapter 9, verse 3–6:  “And as he journeyed, he came near Damascus: and suddenly there shined round about him a light from heaven: And he fell to the earth, and heard a voice saying unto him, Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me? And he said, Who art thou, Lord? And the Lord said, I am Jesus whom thou persecutest: it is hard for thee to kick against the pricks. And he trembling and astonished said, Lord, what wilt thou have me to do? And the Lord said unto him, Arise, and go into the city, and it shall be told thee what thou must do.” ↩

7. 71g.

   Book Acts, chapter 10, verse 3–6:  “He saw in a vision evidently about the ninth hour of the day an angel of God coming in to him, and saying unto him, Cornelius. And when he looked on him, he was afraid, and said, What is it, Lord? And he said unto him, Thy prayers and thine alms are come up for a memorial before God. And now send men to Joppa, and call for one Simon, whose surname is Peter: He lodgeth with one Simon a tanner, whose house is by the sea side: he shall tell thee what thou oughtest to do.” ↩

8. 71h.

   Book Romans, chapter 10, verse 14:  “How then shall they call on him in whom they have not believed? and how shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard? and how shall they hear without a preacher?” ↩

9. 71i.

   Book Deuteronomy, chapter 13, verse 1–3:  “If there arise among you a prophet, or a dreamer of dreams, and giveth thee a sign or a wonder, And the sign or the wonder come to pass, whereof he spake unto thee, saying, Let us go after other gods, which thou hast not known, and let us serve them; Thou shalt not hearken unto the words of that prophet, or that dreamer of dreams: for the LORD your God proveth you, to know whether ye love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul.” ↩

10. 71j.

    Book Jeremiah, chapter 23, verse 25–28:  “I have heard what the prophets said, that prophesy lies in my name, saying, I have dreamed, I have dreamed. How long shall this be in the heart of the prophets that prophesy lies? yea, they are prophets of the deceit of their own heart; Which think to cause my people to forget my name by their dreams which they tell every man to his neighbour, as their fathers have forgotten my name for Baal. The prophet that hath a dream, let him tell a dream; and he that hath my word, let him speak my word faithfully. What is the chaff to the wheat? saith the LORD.”  Verse 32:  “Behold, I am against them that prophesy false dreams, saith the LORD, and do tell them, and cause my people to err by their lies, and by their lightness; yet I sent them not, nor commanded them: therefore they shall not profit this people at all, saith the LORD.” ↩

11. 71k.

    Book Galatians, chapter 1, verse 8:  “But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed.” ↩

12. 71l.

    Book 1 John, chapter 4, verse 1:  “Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world.” ↩

MacArthur, John, and Tim Challies.  “John MacArthur Responds To His Strange Fire Critics (Part 2).”  challies.com.  Nov 11, 2013.  An interview;  reposted by Grace to You on 12 November 2013.  The leading cessationist's position in his own words.  Copyright.

1. 72a.

   Section answer to the Muslim-visions question:  “Do I believe that people in the Muslim world are actually seeing Jesus Christ? No, I do not. Paul stated in 1 Corinthians 15:8 that he was 'the last of all' to see the risen Christ.” ↩

2. 72b.

   Section answer to the Muslim-visions question, paragraph last:  “for reasons that come from the study of Scripture, I do not believe anyone today is genuinely experiencing supernatural visions or revelatory dreams.” ↩

3. 72c.

   Section answer to the Muslim-visions question:  “can God providentially work in such a way as to use people's thoughts and impressions to draw them to faith in Jesus Christ?”  “Yes, I believe that's possible”.  He calls such a working "neither revelatory nor miraculous". ↩

Pew Research Center's Forum on Religion & Public Life.  “The Future of the Global Muslim Population: Projections for 2010-2030.”  Pew Research Center.  Jan 27, 2011.  Read from the library PDF.  Copyright.

1. 73a.

   Page 108, tables Sub-Saharan Africa: Estimated Number of Muslims, 1990–2030:  139,184,000 in 1990;  242,544,000 in 2010. ↩