Theophanic

Within the depth-psychology and philosophical corpus assembled in the Seba library, ‘theophanic’ functions as one of the most densely articulated technical terms, emerging almost exclusively through Henry Corbin’s sustained engagement with the Sufi metaphysics of Ibn ‘Arabi. Corbin deploys the adjective to designate a quality intrinsic to Imagination itself: the Active Imagination is not merely productive or representational but ontologically theophanic — it is the very organ through which the Divine Being discloses Himself to Himself in and through creaturely forms. This position reframes Creation as an inherently theophanic act (tajalli), collapsing the distance between cosmology, epistemology, and mystical praxis. Theophanic Imagination is thus distinguished rigorously from ‘fantasy’ or the merely imaginary: it participates in an absolute theophanic Imagination (takhayyul mutlaq) of which individual human imagining is a moment. Prayer, vision, and hermeneutics (ta’wil) are each inflected as theophanic operations. A persistent tension in the corpus runs between the orthodox literalist reading, which resists the theophanic mode of thought, and the gnostic-theosophical reading, for which every created form is a mazhar — a site of divine self-disclosure. Corbin’s treatment is indispensable for understanding how depth psychology’s interest in image, symbol, and the numinous inherits — whether directly or structurally — a metaphysics of theophanic mediation.

In the library 20 passages

the Creation is essentially a theophany (tajalli). As such, creation is an act of the divine imaginative power: this divine creative imagination is essentially a theophanic Imagination. The Active Imagination in the gnostic is likewise a theophanic Imagination

This passage states the axiomatic core: Creation, divine imagination, and the mystic’s Active Imagination are all equally theophanic, making the term constitutive of the entire cosmology.

Corbin, Henry, Alone with the Alone: Creative Imagination in the Sufism of Ibn Arabi, 1969thesis

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the Creation is essentially a theophany (tajallī). As such, creation is an act of the divine imaginative power: this divine creative imagination is essentially a theophanic Imagination. The Active Imagination in the gnostic is likewise a theophanic Imagination

A parallel statement from the companion volume affirming that theophanic Imagination is the ontological ground linking divine creativity and human imaginative activity.

Corbin, Henry, Creative Imagination in the Sufism of Ibn Arabi, 1969thesis

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when the Divine Being manifests Himself in this existence whose being is theophanic Imagination, He is manifested not as He would be in Himself, in His Ipseity, but in a manner conforming with the theophanic Imagination.

This passage articulates the structural law of theophanic disclosure: manifestation is always conditioned by the receptacle, making theophanic Imagination both the medium and the limit of divine self-revelation.

Corbin, Henry, Alone with the Alone: Creative Imagination in the Sufism of Ibn Arabi, 1969thesis

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The Active Imagination is essentially the organ of theophanies, because it is the organ of Creation and because Creation is essentially theophany.

Corbin fuses cosmology and psychology by declaring the Active Imagination the indispensable organ of theophanies, anchoring the concept in the metaphysics of auto-revelation.

Corbin, Henry, Creative Imagination in the Sufism of Ibn Arabi, 1969thesis

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our Active Imagination is a moment, an instant, of the Divine Imagination that is the universe, which is itself total theophany. Each of our imaginations is an instant among theophanic instants, and it is in this sense that we call it ‘creative.’

Every act of human imagination is situated within an encompassing total theophany, such that the creativity of human imagining is derivative of, and participatory in, the theophanic structure of the universe.

Corbin, Henry, Creative Imagination in the Sufism of Ibn Arabi, 1969thesis

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Prayer as theophanic, that is, creative, Prayer. It alone surmounts in actual practice the paradox of a theosophy which, though thoroughly imbued with the sentiment that God is hidden, nevertheless summons us to a concrete vision of ‘the Form of God.’

Theophanic prayer is identified as the practical resolution of the theological paradox between divine hiddenness and concrete visionary experience.

Corbin, Henry, Creative Imagination in the Sufism of Ibn Arabi, 1969thesis

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Each theophany is a new creation; theophanies are discontinuous; their history is that of psychological individuality and has nothing to do with the sequence or causality of outward facts.

Theophanies are discontinuous, subjective events constituting a ‘history’ of inner individuation irreducible to external historical causality — a claim with direct implications for depth psychology’s own temporal categories.

Corbin, Henry, Creative Imagination in the Sufism of Ibn Arabi, 1969supporting

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it is this sharing, this mutual guarantee, which is the work of theophanic prayer, itself ‘creative’ in the same way as the theophanic Imagination because in every instance it brings about a recurrence of Creation.

Theophanic prayer and theophanic Imagination are structurally equivalent insofar as both enact a recurrence of Creation through the mutual responsiveness of Lord and vassal.

Corbin, Henry, Alone with the Alone: Creative Imagination in the Sufism of Ibn Arabi, 1969supporting

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Let him put the method of theophanic prayer into practice.

Corbin presents theophanic prayer not as abstract doctrine but as a practical method — a discipline of imaginative presence that activates the reciprocal divine-human dialogue.

Corbin, Henry, Creative Imagination in the Sufism of Ibn Arabi, 1969supporting

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to invest each being, each faith, with a theophanic function—that is an essentially personal experience, which cannot be regulated by the norms common to the collectivity.

The mystic’s capacity to perceive theophanic function in every being is individuated and non-normative, distinguishing the personal theophanic encounter from collective religious conformity.

Corbin, Henry, Creative Imagination in the Sufism of Ibn Arabi, 1969supporting

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the theophany (ẓukūr, tajallī) takes the dimension of the receptacle that receives it (maẓhar), the receptacle in which He discloses Himself.

The form of every theophany is determined by the capacity of its receptacle — a hermeneutical principle that correlates divine self-disclosure with the structure of the receiving consciousness.

Corbin, Henry, Creative Imagination in the Sufism of Ibn Arabi, 1969supporting

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what is Other than the Divine Being is not absolutely other (a no without a yes), but is the very form of the theophany (maẓhar), the reflection or shadow of the being who is revealed in it.

Parallel to the preceding passage, this formulation insists that the theophany as mazhar is not illusory otherness but the necessary reflective surface for divine self-knowledge.

Corbin, Henry, Creative Imagination in the Sufism of Ibn Arabi, 1969supporting

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he has no idea of the theophanism professed by Ibn ‘Arabī. On the other hand, a disciple of Ibn ‘Arabī … analyzes it as a coincidentia oppositorum which imposes upon us a homologation of the infinite in finite form, because such is the very law of being.

Corbin diagnoses the failure of orthodox theology to comprehend theophanism, contrasting it with the Akbarian doctrine in which theophanic form embodies the coincidentia oppositorum.

Corbin, Henry, Creative Imagination in the Sufism of Ibn Arabi, 1969supporting

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that precisely is the act of Creation. The secret psalmody of the Fātiḥa accomplishes the essential unity between the man who prays and the Lord who is ‘personalized’ for him.

The psalmody of theophanic prayer is described as a creative act re-enacting the primordial conjunction of Worshiper and Worshiped, implicating the act of Creation itself.

Corbin, Henry, Creative Imagination in the Sufism of Ibn Arabi, 1969supporting

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the spiritual child of the ‘Abraham of your being,’ the one being who is capable of assuming the theophanic function of pure mirror (‘specularity,’ mirā’iya).

In the context of subtle physiology, the theophanic function is assigned to the heart as pure mirror, connecting theophanic disclosure to the interior prophetic hierarchy of the mystic’s being.

Corbin, Henry, The Man of Light in Iranian Sufism, 1971supporting

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