The Quran

Preface

۞ اللَّهُ نورُ السَّماواتِ وَالأَرضِ ۚ مَثَلُ نورِهِ كَمِشكاةٍ فيها مِصباحٌ ۖ المِصباحُ في زُجاجَةٍ ۖ الزُّجاجَةُ كَأَنَّها كَوكَبٌ دُرِّيٌّ يوقَدُ مِن شَجَرَةٍ مُبارَكَةٍ زَيتونَةٍ لا شَرقِيَّةٍ وَلا غَربِيَّةٍ يَكادُ زَيتُها يُضيءُ وَلَو لَم تَمسَسهُ نارٌ ۚ نورٌ عَلىٰ نورٍ ۗ يَهدِي اللَّهُ لِنورِهِ مَن يَشاءُ ۚ وَيَضرِبُ اللَّهُ الأَمثالَ لِلنّاسِ ۗ وَاللَّهُ بِكُلِّ شَيءٍ عَليمٌ

Ahmed Ali

God is the light of the heavens and the earth. The semblance of His light is that of a niche in which is a lamp, the flame within a glass, the glass a glittering star as it were, lit with the oil of a blessed tree, the olive, neither of the East nor of the West, whose oil appears to light up even though fire touches it not, – light upon light.¹ God guides to His light whom He will. So does God advance precepts of wisdom for men, for God has knowledge of everything.

This is the celebrated verse from which Islamic mysticism has derived much gnosis and illumination. Mansur Al-Hallaj in his Ta-Sin of the Prophetic Lamp identifies the lamp with the person of the Prophet in section I: “A Lamp appeared from the Light of the Unseen. It appeared and returned, and it surpassed the other lamps. It was the ruling moon, manifesting itself radiantly among the other moons. It was a star whose astrological house is in the empyrean…”
It is significant that the Surah itself is entitled Light and begins with light on etiquette in personal modesty and conduct, and ends on light on etiquette in public affairs, centring round the Prophet, with the glorification of God’s Light and His majesty as its central theme.
The words noor and naar have the same root, naar being the intense heat of fire, and noor its most refined element, light. The quality of light is high-lighted here by its purity. It is well protected in a niche, and is identifiable with the Qur’an, the niche being the place where books were kept in the East, and is preserved by the chimney of glass, the person of the Prophet, and is lit by the oil of the olive, universal symbol (‘neither of the East nor the West’) of peace, and guidance – here symbolically the tranquil heart.