SLEEP, Sleeping, Slumbering, is taken either for the Sleep or Repose of the Body, or for the Sleep of the Soul which is Supineness, Indolence, Stupidity, or for the Sleep of Death.
You shall sleep with your Fathers, you shall die as they are dead. And Jeremiah Dan. xii. 2.li. 39. Dormiam somnum sempiternum. And Daniel says; Qui dormiunt in terræ John xi. 11.pulvere: Those that sleep in the Dust of the Grave. Lazarus our Friend sleepeth; let us go and awake him: He is dead, let us go and raise him up. Awake thou that sleepest, and arise from the Dead, and Christ shall Ephes. 4. 14. 2 Pet. ii. 3.give thee Light. He speaks to those that were dead in Sin and Infidelity. Saint Peter says of the Wicked, their Damnation slumbereth not. God is not asleep, he will not forget to punish them in his own due Time. And Solomon says, Prov. xxiii. 21. Vestietur pannis dormitatio. The Slumberer shall be cloathed with Rags, the Slothful shall live in Poverty.
Isaiah speaks of a superstitious Practice among the Pagans, who went to sleep in the Temples of their Idols, to obtain Isa. lxv. 4. בנצורים ילינוProphetick Dreams: Qui habitant in Sepulchris, & in delubro idolorum dormiunt. He speaks of the superstitious and idolatrous Jews, who, in Contempt of the Prophets and of the Temple of the Lord, went into the Tombs and Temples of Idols, to sleep there, and to have Dreams that might discover future Events to them. The Pagans for this Purpose us’d to lie upon the Skins of the sacrificed Victims.
Virgil. Æneid. 7.—— Cæsarum ovium sub nocte silenti Pellibus incubuit stratis, somnosque petivit.
The Hebrew Passage that we have quoted from Isaiah may be thus translated; They remained in the Sepulchres, and passed the Night among the Monuments, or in deserted Strab. l. 16. P. 523.Places. Strabo says, that the Jews slept in their Temples, and there expected Prophetick Dreams, both for themselves and for others; but that God sends none but only to such as live in Purity and Justice. To sleep, is also taken for the Commerce between the Sexes. Thus Gen. xix. 33. The Daughters of Lot slept with their Fathers.