So many different superstitions have accumulated over the entire time of the existence of mankind that if an attempt had been made to systematize all superstitions, such work would never have been destined to be realized in view of the enormity of the problem.
Every day there are new superstitions. One of the new superstitions suggests that you can not take pictures of people who are sleeping. How this new superstition happened, why you can’t take pictures of sleeping people, is thoroughly unknown, but each of the superstitions existing today has some kind of historical justification that has been lost somewhere in the history of intelligent man.
Maybe this superstition has some new secret meaning, or is it just a new reading of the old superstition that you simply can’t wake a sleeping person? The fact is that people have long been interested in sleep problems. Our ancestors, trying to explain the somewhat incomprehensible state that a person falls into at times, believed that during sleep a person’s soul leaves his body and travels, and if he is woken up accidentally and quickly, then the soul may not have time to return, and then the person will not never wake up.
Thus, the ancestors believed that a sleeping person, especially a child, is vulnerable and defenseless during sleep. Perhaps it is on this basis that superstition is based that it is impossible to photograph sleeping people? It seems that the flash of the camera or the sound of the shutter can scare the Guardian Angel, so no one can protect this person’s sleep anymore?
Here another version is more likely: a sleeping person may just be very frightened by an unexpected outbreak, which with a high degree of probability will lead to the development of stuttering and fear of the dark.
There is another version of the explanation why you can not take pictures of sleeping. This is due to some "Books of the Dead" that came to Russia from Europe at the end of the 19th century. In this case, we are talking about a whole rite.
The deceased person was well dressed, put at the table and photographed him in a close circle of relatives at dinner, or the "reading" of the morning newspaper and other ordinary activities. This created the illusion that the person was still among the living, simply “blinked” while releasing the shutter.
Especially often the dead children were photographed like this, which, incidentally, completely unambiguously indicates a rather high infant mortality rate at that time. The child who died was dressed up and photographed among his favorite toys and flowers. Such pictures served as a consolation for parents and a reminder of the child at the same time. Later, photographs from the Book of the Dead became collectibles.
The sleeping person is somewhat reminiscent of the deceased, so this hypothesis may even be in favor of this new superstition that it is impossible to photograph people who are sleeping.
Another version explaining why you can’t take pictures of sleeping people. This is a widespread belief in the evil eye or corruption, which is sent at the request of enemies or envious sorcerers and magicians. Many are sure that the photograph shows not only the person himself, but also his biofield. And since in a dream a person, as the ancestral beliefs say, is vulnerable, it will be much easier for him to do some harm from the photograph.
It is possible that at least one of these hypotheses, explaining why it is impossible to photograph the sleeping, is true. Or maybe the root cause of the belief that you can’t take pictures of sleeping people was a certain fear of the camera? There are currently tribes in which it is believed that photographing takes part of the soul.
To believe or not to consider the new superstition considered is an individual question, and everyone can solve it for themselves as his heart tells him. Some in these superstitions sometimes go to the point of absurdity, ruthlessly deleting even those pictures in which a person turned out to have their eyes closed just because they blinked while releasing the shutter, while others did not hesitate to upload photos of their sleeping children to the Network - and nothing, “a whole generation has grown ”...
Well, in general, photographing a sleeping person without his permission is simply unethical.