39 pages • 1 hour read
Ibn TufaylHayy Ibn Yaqzan: A Philosophical Tale
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1177A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Summary
Background
Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Character Analysis
Themes
Symbols & Motifs
Important Quotes
Essay Topics
Tools
BetaSymbols & Motifs
Sunlight
Sunlight in Hayy Ibn Yaqzān symbolizes the influence of God and how the creator’s presence can be felt in the material world. Ibn Tufayl compares the light of the sun to the spirit of God, indicating how that light either passes through or reflects from objects on the earth. The text asserts that “it should be clear that this spirit emanates continuously from God—glory be to Him. It is analogous to the sunlight that constantly floods the earth” (107). This concept of emanation is partially borrowed from Neoplatonism, a philosophical school that postulated that the world was not created from nothing, but rather flowed out from a divine being who was undiminished by the act, in the same way that the sun is not dimmed by shining onto the earth.
Later in the narrative, Hayy’s vision of God during his ecstatic state returns to the image of sunlight to describe divine power. Although Ibn Tufayl reminds the reader that the experience cannot be captured in words, he attempts to relate the concepts that Hayy discovers through metaphor. Hayy sees a series of spheres like the heavens, and “for each sphere he witnessed a transcendent immaterial subject, neither identical with nor distinct from those above, like the form of the sun reflected from mirror to mirror with the descending order of spheres” (152). This vision of sunlight reflecting down through the spheres of the heavens metaphorically suggests the process of emanation. God’s power reaches humanity in the same way that sunlight reflects onto objects on the earth, indicating the way that a human soul is deeply connected to the divine.
Mirrors
In Hayy Ibn Yaqzān, mirrors are used to symbolize the human soul. Coupled with the symbol of sunlight as analogous to the light of God, the human soul as a mirror suggests the reason why humans have a special and exceptional relationship to the divine when compared to other animals.
To explain the exceptional qualities of the human soul, Ibn Tufayl uses the metaphor of a mirror compared to a transparent substance. While inanimate objects are like transparent substances, unable to reflect any light, he claims that
the most reflective body, far out-shining all others, is the one that mirrors in itself the image and pattern of the sun. In the same way with animals, the one that best takes on the spirit in himself and is formed and modelled in its pattern is man (107).
By showing how human souls are able to reflect more of God’s light than other creatures, the text is able to explain why humans can achieve salvation.
Similarly, when Hayy has an ecstatic experience, he sees human souls as mirrors and, in particular, he sees corrupt humans as tarnished and less-reflective mirrors. When he understands God as a light in the heavens, he notices that God is surrounded by brilliant shining mirrors, representing the souls of the blessed. However, “he also saw many disembodied identities, more like tarnished mirrors, covered with rust, their faces averted and their backs to the brilliant mirrors which shone the image of the sun” (153). By explaining that the mirrors are less reflective, Hayy’s vision associates moral depravity and lack of faith with a form of dirtiness or impurity. Like a tarnished, rusted mirror, a human soul that does not follow God is unable to reflect divine glory.
Unworthiness
A recurring motif throughout Hayy Ibn Yaqzān is the unworthiness of many humans to attain ecstatic union with God. Although the text is purportedly a guide to achieving this state, Ibn Tufayl repeatedly mentions how most people are unfit to do so and should instead rely on literal interpretations of the Prophet’s word to achieve salvation.
At the beginning of the narrative, the author relates how many unwise people who reach ecstasy commit spiritual errors when they try to describe their experience, some going so far as to claim that they themselves are divine. He relates that
the lightheadedness, expansiveness, and joy which seize him force him to blurt it out in some sweeping generality, for to capture it precisely is impossible. If he be the sort whose mind has not been sharpened by intellectual pursuits, he may speak unwisely (95).
This sets up the entire philosophical tale as a somewhat risky endeavor, teaching a skill that many may not be wise enough to properly use.
Later in the narrative, Hayy’s contact with the people of the neighboring island teaches him this same lesson. While Hayy has gained great wisdom through meditation, deduction, scientific study, and ecstatic visions, his attempt to teach other followers of the Islamic faith does not succeed. His teachings are rejected by those who interpret holy texts literally, and Hayy eventually decides to give up on educating them. He returns to his birthplace alone, telling the people he attempted to teach that he was wrong and they should return to their previous belief. However, Hayy does not truly believe that his teachings were wrong; he instead has learned that most people are unworthy of his knowledge.
The text concludes that if these unworthy men
were ever to venture beyond their present level to the vantage point of insight, what they had would be shattered, and even so they would be unable to reach the level of the blessed […] But if they went along as they were until overtaken by death, they would win salvation and come to sit on the right (165).
This recurring motif of unworthiness helps to explain why the text takes the form of a philosophical tale, cloaking its teachings in allegory, and why no previous scholars have ever sought to write about the topic of ecstasy.
