The Duality of Time Theory

Another important example of the symbolic analogy between the metaphysical process and figures of the “macrocosm” and more human realities is the hierarchy of the spirits of the prophets and saints, a central theme that runs throughout the Meccan Revelations as well. To summarize the cosmological aspect of that theme, Ibn al-Arabi presents the lower realms of the cosmos as being ruled by a complex spiritual hierarchy, largely “invisible” to most human beings, though not to the elite spiritual saints. Among others, this hierarchy includes the spiritual “Pole”, the two Imams, the four Pillars, the seven Substitutes, the eight Nobles, and the twelve Chiefs, in addition to other lesser known groups. Each of these groups and figures has a special corresponding spiritual responsibility, some of which have to do with maintaining the wider cosmic order. Those pure spirits also have an ongoing series of living human “representatives” or “agents” amongst us [II.6.6].

Some of these members of the celestial spiritual hierarchy, as Ibn al-Arabi presents them in scattered passages of the Meccan Revelations, are assigned cosmological functions symbolically related, for example, to the twelve zodiacal signs, the seven heavens, and the seven geographical regions, the four cardinal points, or even the four corners of the Kaaba [II.13]. In particular, the highest level of the Pole, in this hierarchy, is the figure who apparently corresponds to the lofty metaphysical position of the Single Monad, which Ibn al-Arabi often pointedly refers to simply as “the Reality of Muhammad”.