The Man of Light in Iranian Sufism

If you are interested in the permeation of the Persian cosmological archetypal personality in Islam, this is an excellent book.

In the Sufism of ancient Iran, according to Corbin’s Man of Light, the quest for the dawning of light in the cosmic North (“the heavenly pole and Orient of immaterial Light”) symbolizes the mystic’s search for realization. In this spiritual journey, the light arising in man’s inner darkness – the Northern Light or Midnight Sun – represents the impartial but brilliant light of Truth, that which sets us free from egotism and from slavery to material existence. Corbin’s primary focus is on Shaikh al-Ishraq’ Suhrawardi (“Master of Illumination”) (1154-1191), the founder of the Iranian School of Illuminationism, which drew upon Zoroastrian and Platonic ideas. Suhrawardi thought of himself as a reviver of the ancient tradition of Persian wisdom, of Mazdeism, Manicheism, Hermetism and particularly Iranian Sufism. Orientation, the quest for the Orient, is a primary phenomenon of our presence in the world, especially for the Sufi. The man of light is held captive by Darkness and struggling to free himself from Darkness. The light, the point of orientation was not the sun rising in the east, but the heavenly north, the pole star, the aurora borealis (“Northern Lights”), the supersensory, mystical Orient, the place of the Origin and the Return. In truth, the light was inner light, the “Sun of the heart,” the Sun of the mystery,” the “Sun of the Spirit,” the “initiatic light.” For Suhrawardi, the quest culminated in the visio smaragdina, the outburst of emerald light heralding ‘the secret of the mystery of Mysteries.’ The emerald light is described in Revelation: “round [God’s] throne was a rainbow that looked like an emerald.” It is the Emerald Tablet for Thoth-Hermes.This reascent of light to light, the ascent of the ‘column of Light,’ this mystical experience fills a function of cosmic salvation. “To attain fully to this Illumination is salvation.” Corbin emphasizes that “the terms light and darkness, clarity and obscurity, are neither metaphor nor comparisons. The mystic really and actually sees light and darkness, by a kind of vision that depends on an organ other than the physical organ of sight.” The means of reaching this aim is dhikr – “continuous prayer.” The practice of dhikr includes also a whole system of techniques: movements of the head, control of breathing, certain postures, possibly revealing "Taoist" [Tantric] influence. This can also be compared with kundalini awakening and the hesychast experience of the Divine Light of the Transfiguration.

Henri Corbin was a renowned scholar of Persian Sufism, but a scholar who approached the study of sufism with great sympathy and insight- although he never converted to Islam, he regarded the 12th century Sufi Suhrawardi as his `Shaykh', or spiritual master. In this slim but highly informative volume, Corbin reveals and discusses many obscure aspects of Sufism which will be of great interest to students of both Sufism and western esoterism. The Persian Sufis that Corbin describes were remarkable spiritual beings, their aim was to restore the perennial wisdom tradition- they regarded the pre-Socratic philosopher Empedocles as a holy sage, and they avidly studied the works of Hermes Trismegistus and alchemy in addition to the Koran. Ironically they preserved, in the world of Islam, many of the wisdom traditions of the west, long after they had been forgotten in their original home.Some key themes in the book:1) The symbolism of the Pole in Persian Sufism, (the pole star and associated stars of the Great Bear). Orientation of the seeker, or Man of Light, towards the cosmic north and away from the illusory world of the ego and material existence eventually leads to the discovery of his Perfect Nature- union with his higher self, or Daemon. Perfect Nature is like a celestial twin, or gaurdian angel, ultimately identical with the Man of Light but not incarnate within the material world.2) The Sufi mystic experiences a `shamanic flight' towards the pole. The path involves seven stages of transformation, each of which is associated with light of certain colour, and also with one of the seven major prophets of Islam. The penultimate stage is associated with a dazzling darkness, a mystical black light, and in the final stage God is revealed in an intensely beautiful emerald green light.The book may not be an easy read, however it is a unique work and well worth persevering with- it requires careful study to reveal its true riches. I would recommend reading some of Tom Cheetham's books on Henri Corbin by way of general introduction.

I've read parts or all of the majority of Corbins books, and he is the most difficult of the four writers I sometimes group together in my reviews (the other 3 are Scholem, Jonas and Eliade.) I can't comment on the accuracy or authenticity of Corbins interpretation and presentation of Sufism, or Islam. Very, very few would be qualified to do so, and I would suspect that most who are well enough versed in Middle Eastern literature would be unqualified to appraise the esoteric areas of study in which Corbin truly excels. All I can do is analyze the text that we here have:As everyone says, its very good and rewarding, but difficult. I don't find the connections between Iranian and Hellenistic philosophy and Christian theosophy challenging, having studied a little bit of Arabic and Greek philosophy being one of my specialties. I think the trouble I have is in Corbin drawing all of the above into an over-arching programme of Phenomenology that I'm not sure was within the original authors respective intentions.What we end up with then is a maze of Zoroastrian, Manichaean and Sufi neologisms that in some respects resembles a modern version of Jacob Boehme. But whereas the writing of Boehme is circular in form and endlessly self-referential, drawing in Paracelsian alchemy and Kabbalah by several removes, Corbin reinterprets the Persian and Muslim figures to explicate his own Phenomenological system.A typical structure that both use goes something like this: 1 corresponds to A. 2 corresponds to A. 3 corresponds to A. 4 corresponds to A. But 4 is also an aspect of 1 and A is also a reference to B...Rewarding reading on the original authors, exponentially moreso, when we consider Corbin as a philosopher in his own right and as a scholar who preserves the thought of others but also systematizes and elaborates. I for one just am unsure where to sketch the dichotomy where one tendency ends and the other begins. Thank you.

Profound