Why can't you take a picture of a sleepy person. Why can't you take a picture of a sleeping person? What are the superstitions about photographing sleeping people can be found

If you ask photographers if you can photograph sleeping people, then nine out of ten will answer that this is not recommended. At the same time, not everyone will be able to explain why it is impossible to do this. They've heard about it somewhere, it's a word of mouth superstition, a bad omen. Let's see what lies behind these prejudices and find the answer for ourselves.

No one remembers when and why people began to believe that it was impossible to photograph sleeping people. In the 19th century, when photography was in its infancy, most families could not afford this luxury. The purpose of the photographs was to leave a piece of myself and some kind of reminder to the descendants. In those distant times, people began to capture the dead. Only here such photos differed from today's. The deceased was dressed in the best outfit, seated on a chair or at a table with relatives and photographed as if he were alive.

When asked why the eyes were closed, they usually answered: “I blinked, but it’s very expensive to retake the picture.” Wealthy families even had special albums with photographs, which depicted relatives who had passed away at the time of photographing.

At that time photography became almost an association with the word "death". Much later, at the beginning of the 20th century, photographing sleeping people began to be considered a bad omen. After all, the person in such a photo will also have his eyes closed. People began to believe that a photograph of a sleeping person could bring the day of his death closer or bring illness to him.

People also believed that if you put a photograph of a sleeping person near his head in a coffin, then the soul of the deceased will turn into a photograph and will live in it forever.

Once, in a village, a woman in labor and a baby died during childbirth. To keep them in memory, the head of the family ordered their photograph with him. Less than a week after the funeral, he died of an unknown cause. Superstitious people began to believe that two biofields, the living and the dead, mixed up in the photograph. Since the photo showed two dead, their biofield won.

There was also another story. An old woman died in the village. When her son arrived at the funeral, he asked to take a picture of his mother, as if she were sitting at the table with him alive. When the woman was photographed, she woke up from the flash of the camera. It turned out that she fell into a lethargic sleep, and during the flash of consecration, she came to her senses. After this incident, for several years they again began to photograph the dead in hope. Hoping they will come to life. But history did not know a second case.

Can sleeping children be photographed?

People at all times believed that there is always a guardian angel next to a person. For the first forty days of life, it is customary not to show babies to any stranger until baptism has passed. At the time of baptism, it was believed that the child acquires his guardian angel. Until the rite of baptism was completed, the children were not photographed at all. Now, in almost every family, parents try to capture both the moment of discharge from the hospital and the first days of the child.

Well, how not to photograph the cute face of a baby while sleeping? But after all, when a child has not yet been baptized, the guardian angel cannot protect him from evil. People also believed that small children in a dream can play with their angel and at that moment they are not protected. Representatives of the older generation believed that at the moment of photographing a child, his guardian angel flies away from fear. Therefore, the baby is left without protection and is exposed to the forces of evil.

There is another version. It was believed that the sleeping children in the photographs do not have protection from the forces of sorcerers and are more prone to damage and the evil eye than other people. From here, pictures of children were recommended to be stored in family albums and kept away from prying eyes.
Nowadays, parents do not believe in this sign and post photos of babies and sleeping babies, and newborns on social networks.
There is a sign about the damage to the photograph with the image of a sleeping child. The baby in a dream is with his eyes closed, becoming like a dead one. If you spoil, tear or burn such a photo, then you can call trouble on the child. To believe or not to believe this kind of prejudice, of course, only parents decide. But it is always better to foresee the onset of danger than to deal with it later.

Why can't photos with a sleeping person be shown to outsiders?

On the one hand, if you can’t photograph sleeping people, then, accordingly, you can’t show such photographs either. But what if there are such photos and they are part of a family album? Many magicians, fortune-tellers and clairvoyants promise to carry out all sorts of rituals based on photographs. At the same time, people at all times believed that a sleeping person is the most vulnerable. This means that a ceremony performed with a photograph of a sleeping person will bring the greatest efficiency. When people look at pictures, their thoughts are mostly out of control. Thinking badly about a person, you can call trouble on him. Once upon a time, people believed that you could even jinx it from a photograph. Some hold this view even today. Old women in villages, when looking at photo albums, can often tell what the future holds for a person. Or, having nothing bad in your thoughts, somehow think wrong about a person. And as you know, thoughts can come true. Therefore, it is not recommended to be taken lightly and photograph sleeping people. In order not to invite trouble on them, you should not show such photos to strangers. After all, a person in a dream is weak and not protected, which means that such a photograph may be most susceptible to the evil eye.

What superstitions about photographing sleeping people can be found?

• The human soul is not always in the body, during sleep it flies away. If you take a picture of a person sleeping, then the photograph captures the body without a soul. And there is no soul only in the dead.
• Any look at a photograph can change the fate of a person. When looking at a photograph of a sleeping person, something bad can happen to him. Often people do not think when looking at a photo they say that a person has something better than others, how strong and beautiful he is. But in this way they can deprive him of precisely this distinctive feature.
• If the photo was taken in a dark room, in a destroyed building, or next to dead people, then it may not have the best effect on the health and well-being of the person being photographed.
• Pregnant women love to be photographed. Moreover, if you photograph a sleeping woman in a position, then the child will not be born. This statement is not supported by any medical facts, but pregnant women are the most superstitious.
• You can not tear photos of people, spoil them. Otherwise, the people who are depicted on them cannot escape death or deterioration in health. However, there is another side to this assertion. Many people believe that if you burn a photograph of a person who is suffering from an illness, the illness will go away, because it will be burned by fire.
• If the sleeping person turned out to be fuzzy in the photo, then he will die soon.

There is also another side of the coin. A long time ago, people performed various kinds of rituals, piercing a person’s eyes in a photograph. At the same time, it was believed that closed eyes could not be pierced. So the person will be protected. In houses where this was believed, people in the photographs deliberately closed their eyes, pretending to be asleep.

Superstitions associated with the ban on photographing sleeping people are rooted in the distant past. True or false - everyone decides for himself. But it is better not to test them for yourself and avoid photographing while sleeping.

There are several reasons that they try to explain why it is impossible to photograph a sleeping person:

• so you can steal fate or health;
• the person being photographed may not wake up;
• suddenly waking up, a person can be very frightened;
• the person being photographed will have a bad rest or will not get enough sleep;
• the person depicted in the photograph sleeping resembles a dead man;
• in a photograph, a sleeping person may turn out badly;
• according to the photograph of the sleeping person, it is easy to cause damage or the evil eye;
• you can scare the guardian angel and he will leave the sleeping man forever;
• associations with post-mortem photography and the tradition of photographing the dead;
• images and photographs of people are forbidden by the religion.

Let's divide them into groups and analyze in more detail.

mystical reasons

Unexpected health problems

There is an opinion that it is impossible to photograph a sleeping person, because the energy field of a sleeping person is somehow similar to the energy field of a dead person. Therefore, by photographing a sleeping person, this state can be confirmed in reality, after which a person may suddenly fall ill or die.

Sudden death

Another, more common opinion says that the soul of a person who is in a dream goes to another dimension, and during awakening returns to the body. Therefore, if a person suddenly wakes up from the clicks of the shutter or the flash of the camera, then the soul may not have time to return and the human body will die.

There is also an opinion that in photographs the facial expressions and closed eyes of sleeping children or adults may outwardly resemble the faces of the dead. It is because of these associations that some superstitious people believe that the picture can bring death to the sleeping person depicted on it.

Evil eye or damage

Magicians, healers and bioenergy therapists claim that the photo shows the ego energy field along with the person. And since during sleep this field is considered weaker than during wakefulness, this means that it will be easier for an ill-wisher or sorcerer to put damage, evil eye or other curses on the photographed person from a photograph of a sleeping person.

For the same reason, it is believed that it is impossible to photograph sleeping children, especially small ones, because their biofield is much weaker than that of adults, so they are more susceptible to the "evil eye". There is an opinion that a baby can be jinxed even just by admiring him sleeping in the cradle.

Loss of a guardian angel

There is also a religious belief that explains why sleeping people cannot be photographed. It is believed that in this way you can scare away the Guardian Angel, and he can leave the sleeping one forever.

Religious reasons

Followers of Islam argue that it is forbidden to photograph sleeping people because the creation of sculptures and images of people and animals (which includes photography) is prohibited by Sharia. This is explained by the fact that by creating a man-made image, a person is trying to become like Allah, which is a sin and which is followed by severe punishment and torment in Hell.

Another reason for the ban is that man-made images and sculptures can lead to polytheism. Also, according to Islam, the creation of images can be interpreted as disbelief in Allah.

More realistic explanations

Fright due to abrupt awakening

The most understandable and logical explanation, according to which it is not advised to photograph sleeping people, and especially children, is a possible strong fright in a suddenly awakened person or child.

Sleep disturbance

There is also an explanation from the point of view of biology, which claims that melatonin is synthesized in the human body during sleep, which regulates circadian rhythms. For the proper production of this hormone, complete darkness is necessary, so camera flashes can interfere with the full recovery of the body during sleep and, upon waking up, a person will feel sleepy or overwhelmed.

Appearance in the photo

In addition, a person who was photographed sleeping may come out unattractive and remain unhappy with their picture. This situation may occur because during sleep, the human face and body are usually relaxed, and the position in which a person sleeps is sometimes not quite suitable for shooting.

Some note the similarity of the photographs, which depict sleeping people, with photographs in the medieval style "post-mortem", which are hunted by collectors today. The appearance of this style in the middle of the nineteenth century was associated with the invention and development of photography, which made it possible to take photographs in memory of a deceased relative. The people in the post-mortem photographs turned out to be very realistic, really like they were alive.

To take a picture, it was necessary to spend about 30 minutes in a stationary state, which was quite difficult for living people, and especially for children, so they photographed mostly the dead, and the deceased was seated or laid down in such an environment as if he were alive, and just sleeping or , for example, reading a newspaper over a cup of tea. Later, in the USSR, there was also a tradition of photographing the dead as a keepsake, which lasted until the 60s of the 20th century.

And since for a long time images of a person with his eyes closed have been strongly associated with photographs of the dead, some superstitious people argue that it is impossible to photograph sleeping children and adults in order to avoid such associations, because such thoughts, even involuntarily appearing, can materialize and cause harm.

Throughout our lives, we spend about 30 years in a state of sleep, and about 11 years of dreaming.

Where did the belief come from, Why is it impossible to photograph a sleeping person?

This belief originated in ancient times. In prosperous European families in the 19th century, there was a tradition to photograph dead people. They dressed the deceased in ceremonial clothes and, as he looked like a sleeping person, photographed in order to leave a memory of him.

Thus they expressed their respect for him. Not many, at that, a long time ago, had the opportunity to take pictures, so after death, relatives invited a photographer. They could sit the deceased at the table or in the family circle and take pictures with him. Hence the superstition that the person in the photograph with his eyes closed was considered dead.

With the development of society, this tradition ceased to exist. But superstitious people still continued to believe that if you capture a sleeping person on film, then his life becomes shorter. Such photographs can bring trouble and even death.

• During sleep, the soul of a person leaves the body and he becomes more vulnerable. Such a picture can attract illness and failure. It is dangerous to scream or scare a person in a dream. He must wake up gradually so that the soul has time to return. During sleep, the soul of a person travels in other worlds, so a person in a dream often sees something that he has not yet seen. So the soul shares memories from the past.
• There are different fables about babies. One of them reports that photographing a dozing baby can serve as a reason for this, that his angel of God will get scared and leave the baby. This, in turn, can cause diseases. Another says that the baby is able to become fearful and restless, simply frightened by noise or flash.

A photo stores a very large amount of data. There is nothing good in this fact, since magicians read the data from the photograph well and have the opportunity to use the photo in order to harm the person captured in the picture.

It should be noted that the protection of the older generation is stronger than that of infants. Therefore, their photographs should be kept in secluded places and protected from prying eyes.

If we discard everything irrational, then the first argument against photographing sleeping people is the fact that a person can be very frightened, especially if photographed with a flash. And this is fraught with stress, especially for a child.

Photographing can also disrupt sleep. During sleep, our body synthesizes the hormone melatonin, which helps regulate circadian rhythms. But it only happens in the dark. The same flash can lead to a failure in the production of melatonin, as a result, a person will not be able to fully sleep and will get up broken.

Finally, do not photograph sleeping people, as the picture may not turn out too good. When we are photographed in the waking state, we can take a more advantageous pose. When we sleep, our body is usually relaxed and this position is not very suitable for shooting. As a result, the "sitter" will remain dissatisfied with the photo, and this can cause conflict and bad mood. Therefore, it is best to photograph people in the waking state and always with their permission.