NUR & LUX

How the Sufi thinkers Ibn Arabi and Rumi wrote about light imagery

While both Ibn Arabi and Rumi placed light (Nur) at the absolute center of their worldviews, they wrote about it in drastically different styles. Ibn Arabi approached light as a metaphysical blueprint of reality, while Rumi approached it as an ecstatic, poetic expression of love and psychological transformation. 

Their writings on light perfectly illustrate how a single philosophical concept can be explored through both rigorous intellect and passionate art. 

Ibn Arabi: The Metaphysics of Refraction

Ibn Arabi (1165–1240), known as al-Shaykh al-Akbar (The Greatest Master), used light to explain his core philosophy of Wahdat al-Wujud (The Unity of Being). To him, existence itself is light, and the physical universe is merely the shadow or refraction of that light. 

The Universe as a Prism: Ibn Arabi argued that God is pure, non-delimited Light. The physical world is like a colored lens or a series of refractive screens. Creation isn't separate from the Divine; it is the pure light of God passing through the unique "opacities" and shapes of different creatures, revealing various divine attributes. 

The Hidden Light (Nur al-Khafi): He wrote extensively about a light hidden from ordinary sight but perceivable to the purified heart. He famously stated: "The light that is hidden in all things is the secret of their being; it is not seen by the eye, but the heart perceives it." 

Degrees of Illumination: In his technical works, he cataloged different vocabulary terms for spiritual light, differentiating between Nur (a divine inspiration that empties the heart of worldly attachments), Lawami (the sudden flashes of revelation), and Nur al-Anwar (The Light of lights), which represents absolute Truth that completely annihilates the individual ego (Fana) upon direct experience. 

Rumi: The Torch of the Heart

Jalal al-Din Rumi (1207–1273) took these exact same metaphysical concepts but transformed them into radical, deeply human love poetry. For Rumi, light was not something to be systematically categorized; it was something to be caught on fire by. 

The Unity of the Source: Rumi used the metaphor of lanterns to explain how different religions, philosophies, and human beings are ultimately interconnected. In a famous line, he wrote: "The lamps are different, but the Light is the same." He meant that while external human structures (the "glass" of the lamp) vary wildly across history and culture, the underlying divine essence within them is singular and universal.

The Portal of Suffering: Rumi’s most famous usage of light imagery concerns human brokenness. He wrote, "The wound is the place where the Light enters you." To Rumi, psychological pain, grief, or crisis shatters the hard shell of the human ego. The "wound" creates a crack in our defensive armor, allowing divine consciousness and transformation to finally penetrate the soul. 

The Internal Dance: For Rumi, the ultimate realization is that the seeker is looking for a light they already possess. He writes about the Divine dancing inside his chest where no one else can see. The goal of his poetry was to make the reader realize: "You are the light of the universe; never dim your shine." 

Direct Comparison: How They Map to The Blog Concept

For using light, lanterns, and the journey into darkness as the core imagery for a study of Western philosophy, these two thinkers offer two beautiful templates for your content:

Thinker	Paradigm of Light	How It Applies to Writing Philosophy
Ibn Arabi	The Prism / Lens	Analytical & Structural: Mapping how the "pure light" of truth gets refracted into different philosophical movements (Stoicism, Rationalism, Existentialism) across history.
Rumi	The Fire / Wound	Experiential & Existential: Writing about how philosophy helps us navigate our darkest personal and historical moments—using ideas as candles to face the abyss.

Friar Roger Bacon's Treatise On Light, his Opus Magus, 

also explores Light in both these senses

This is the absolute historical cornerstone of Western "light philosophy." The 13th-century English Franciscan friar Roger Bacon is the ultimate bridge between the two worlds we have been discussing. 

In his massive masterpiece, the Opus Majus (1267) alongside his deeply tied companion treatise, De Multiplicatione Specierum ("On the Multiplication of Species") Bacon unified physical optics (how light actually bounces and bends) with spiritual illumination (how divine truth reaches the human mind). 

Bacon proved that you do not have to separate the structural, mathematical approach of Ibn Arabi from the transformative, mystical approach of Rumi. He argued they are governed by the exact same universal law.

Here is How Bacon explored Light in both of those senses

The Physical Sense: Geometry and Optics

Bacon was obsessed with the physics of light, heavily drawing from Arabic scholars like Alhazen (Ibn al-Haytham) and Al-Kindi. In Part 5 of the Opus Majus, he mapped out the anatomy of the eye, reflection, refraction, and the mathematics of lenses. 

The Law of Spreading Light: Bacon created a theory called the "multiplication of species". He argued that every object in the universe radiates "species" (invisible forces or images of itself) outward in straight lines, much like a candle radiates light. 

The Lens Metaphor: He realized that by using glass lenses, you could bend light rays to amplify sight. To Bacon, physics was the study of how light cuts through the darkness of physical space. 

The Metaphysical Sense: Divine Illumination

For Bacon, the physical behavior of light was not just cold science; it was a literal, material map of how God's grace works. 

The Spiritual Lens: Bacon argued that human intellect is fundamentally blind and trapped in darkness due to human error and sin. Divine Grace is a spiritual light emitted by God. Just as a glass lens focuses scattered sunlight to create a burning fire, the study of philosophy and mathematics functions as a lens for the soul, focusing the scattered light of divine wisdom into the human heart.

The Light of Truth: He believed that because God created the universe using light, understanding physical optics was a mandatory prerequisite to understanding theology. If you want to understand how God's truth penetrates a darkened world, you must study how a sunbeam penetrates a stained-glass window. 

Why "Roger Bacon" is the Perfect Patron Saint for This Blog

For charting the lineages of European thought, Roger Bacon is a spectacular structural anchor. He is a medieval friar who wore the robes of the Church, practiced Arabic-style alchemy, anticipated the modern scientific method, and treated the physical lantern as an absolute mirror to the spiritual soul. 

We study the mechanics of the lantern so that we can better hold its flame against the dark.