of perception in their visual faculty so that they may see him directly. Reason, proof
and instruction are of no consideration in the eyes of the People of Truth...It is for
this reason that Umar said,“My heart saw the Lord.”^43
Like Suhrawardi, ibn Arabi employs lightning as a metaphor for insight,
uprooting him from his native Andalusia and leading him to journey east.
He saw the lightningflash
and yearned toward the East.
If it hadflashed in the West,
west he would have turned.
I burn for the lightning
and itsflash,
not for this or that
some piece of ground.
The East Wind told me
a tradition about them, from
the wreck of my heart,
from ecstasy, sorrow, my disarray,
This lightning becomes the balm for all that he sought in activities such as
drinking, studying, and worldly love.
From drunkenness, reason,
longing, the wound of love,
from tears, my eyelids,
thefire, my heart.
Through this lightning, he discovers that the object of desire is God,
located“between your ribs”–in the heart.
He whom you desire
is between your ribs,
turned side to side
in the heat of your sigh.
I told them to tell him
he’s the one
who kindled thefire
blazing in my heart.
It is extinguished only
in our coming together.
(^43) Suhrawardi, 1982 : 90.
Perception and the Quran 117