Ibn Al Arabi

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Ibn Arabis Universal Tree and the Four Birds1

Beverly Mack

African and African American StudiesFaculty Tree of Life Colloquium

Spring 2008

Introduction

The Quran was the first book of Islamic culture, and continues to be the

foundation for the pursuit of knowledge among Muslims. But soon after its revelation and

the establishment of Islam (622 C.E.), Muslim scholars spent centuries engaged in what

may constitute Islams greatest contribution to Western civilization, the translation and

assimilation of the intellectual legacy of the ancient world. Muslim scholars not only

preserved Greek thought in sciences and philosophy, but built their culture on it, further

advancing the fields of medicine, geography, mathematics, astronomy, art, architecture,

and social sciences. During the golden Age of Islam (roughly 850-1050 C.E.) the known

world was one in which Muslim scholars works were sought after and assimilated by

Latinists who conveyed them to the West, translating them from Arabic. In that era,


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on the belief that the physical world is God made manifest, it is reasoned that the more

one knows, the closer one can move toward knowledge of God.2

Sufi scholar Ibn Arabi, (Abu Abd Allah Muhammad ibn al-Arabi at-TaI al-

Hatimi) (1165-1240 C.E.) became known as Muhyiddin, the Reviver of the Faith, and

remains known as the Shaykh al-Akbar (Greatest Master), reflecting his role as an

exemplar of esoteric knowledge. Born in Muslim Andalusia (in the town of Murcia), his

early education took place in the richness of a culture that revered learning. He wrote

over three hundred books, some in multi-volume sets, some brief pamphlets. The two

works for which he is best known are Bezels of Wisdom (Fusus al Hikam) and Meccan

Revelations (Futuhat al Makkiyya). The first encapsulates the metaphysical perspectives

he gained over a lifetime of study; the second is autobiographical, encyclopedic with

spiritual issues. These works remain of central importance to scholars of both IbnArabi

and the period.

Although many of Ibn Arabis works address the nature of manifestations of the


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treatise is in the mode of mystical ascent literature, which can be found in many traditions

throughout the world, but the obvious parallel in the Islamic context is to the ascent

(miraj) of the Prophet Muhammad (circa 620 C.E.) through seven heavens to the

presence of the Divine (alluded to in Quranic chapters 17:1 and 53:4-18, the latter of

which is also the basis for the image of the Universal Tree).

Imitation of the Prophet is a standard devotional feature of Islam; among the Sufi

mystics, the concept of the spiritual miraj was well established by 874 C.E., when the

spiritual miraj of Abu Yazid Bistami involved mystical, spiritual flight as a bird to the

Quranic Lote Tree of the Limit (53:14). This experience was much described by

subsequent Sufi scholars, including al-Junayd (d. 910 C.E.) and Al-Sarraj (d. 988 C.E.)

who experienced similar ecstatic spiritual experiences. The Quranic inspiration for the

nature of Abu Yazids ascent is the same source of inspiration as that of Ibn Arabi two

centuries later. Ibn Arabi undoubtedly knew the al-Junayd and al-Sarraj accounts, and

found the ascent mode a fitting context for exploration of the difficulties and benefits of

treading a spiritual path. His narrative reflects his esoteric exploration of the most


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thinkers like Avicenna3

and Attar4, both of whom also influenced Ibn Arabi. The Tree

of Unity is described in the Quran (53: 4-18) as the source of mans understanding of the

Divine. The process of reaching such a source involves flight of the soul, which is

effected through divine inspiration. Thus, Ibn ArabisIttihad describes birds as the

embodiments of basic elements of creation, perched in the arbor of their divine source,

the Tree of life.

Imagery in Ibn Arabis Universal Tree and the Four Birds

Ibn Arabis description of the Universal Tree and the Four Birds is heavy with

symbolic imagery. The work makes itself available to its audience on a multiplicity of

levels, depending on an individuals ability to understand from a variety of perspectives,

from hermeneutic to religious. Like the Quran, Gods own message to humanity, the

Universal Tree and the Four Birds offers a multiplicity of ways of understanding; in each

case a listener approaches the work circuitously, circumambulating the topic rather than

understanding it chronologically or in a linear fashion. The result is a prismatic collection

of ways of knowing, whose clarity depends on the acuity of related images. A listener


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Arabis details reflect directly Quranic commentary, embellishing suggestions in that

Divine Recitation.

The Universal Tree itself embodies concepts of unity, duality, ternarity, and

quarternity, accounting for all that exists in universal creation. The four birds in its

branches represent basic aspects of creation, from the spirit and intellect, to prime and

secondary matter, ultimately looping in a circle of unending being and continuous

transmutation. Ibn Arabis linguistic choices further reinforce the nature of his topics,

with poetic meter and rhyme forms that express mathematical/spiritual concepts

coordinate with the verses subject. For example, the Trees rhyme is the sound hamza,

the first pronounced utterance of the Arabic alphabet, which appears as a straight vertical

line, trunk-like. The Trees primacy is evident in this rhyme scheme, which is based on a

sound that often precedes the utterance of a word, and also commonly sits atop its

alphabetical successor, the alif, which itself echoes the image of a straight trunk, primary

prayer posture, and the first letter of the word for God (Allah). Ibn Arabis Universal

Tree and the Four Birds suggests that the divine secrets of creation are contained in a


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alludes to the Prophet Muhammads mystic ascension to heaven (miraj) and the vision

of a leafy tree that stands as metonymic of eternal paradise.

Early in the Quranic passage there is reference to the Arabian lote tree (sidr,

sidrah), noteworthy for its abundant leafy shade, a condition that would be most welcome

in a desert culture. A Muslim audience would surely be familiar with the lote tree as

symbolic of the shade i.e. the spiritual peace and fulfillment of Paradise5. This

image also appears in Islamic Traditions of the Prophet, the Sunna. Of further

importance to this study is the qualification that the tree is located at the utmost [or

farthest] limit (al-muntaha) (Asad, 813 fn 10). The limit alludes to not only a physical

barrier, but also the farthest extent of human knowledge, reminding the listener of the

ambit beyond which human capability cannot reach. The pursuit of knowledge is one of

the prime foundations of Islam, and scholarship of every type, from scientific to

philosophical, is revered as the most direct path to approaching union with the Divine. A

common saying among Muslims is The ink of the scholar is more sacred than the blood


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The Title: al-Ittihad al-kawni fi hadrat al-ishhad al-ayni bi-mahdur al-shajara al-

insaniyya wa-l-tuyur al-arbaa al-ruhaniyya

The full title of this work is frighteningly complex: Cosmic Unification in the

Presence of the Eye-witnessing through the Assembly of the Human Tree and the Four

Spiritual Birds (al-Ittihad al-kawni fi hadrat al-ishhad al-ayni bi-mahdur al-shajara al-

insaniyya wa-l-tuyur al-arbaa al-ruhaniyya). Ibn Arabi chose his words carefully for

precise semantic and symbolic import. This portion of the study will address only the

following terms:Ittihad, kawni, ishad, ayni. For Ibn Arabi, each of these terms contains

both an esoteric and exoteric sense, in keeping with the overall concept of hidden mystic

perceptions, acknowledging that one cannot know all the meaning contained therein. For

the purposes of this colloquium, we need to consider the value of spending time on the

meaning of the title. Ibn Arabis aim in this work is to create a metonymic image

through which his audience might better conceive of the human beings place in the

world. His task, explaining the meaning of human existence, relied on drawing from


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birds, but first we need to understand Ibn Arabis careful choice of words in his title,

which convey themselves the dual nature of his thesis.

The concept of unity is inherent in the first word of the title: Ittihad. Ittihadis a

verb which has a basic meaning of oneness, uniqueness, unity. In this work it is used in

its eighth verb form, conveying the sense of reciprocity. Jaffray notes: the first form

verb wahada, meaning to be one, unique, becomes in the eighth form ittahada,

meaning to unite, to make oneself and/or others one. As Ibn Arabi defines it, Ittihad

is that two essences become one, whether servant or Lord (Jaffray, p. 53). The resultant

concept of mystical union is central to the metaphysics of Sufi thought. But as is the case

with many perspectives in Sufi metaphysics, this is an insufficient perspective, because

its obverse also obtains, as Ibn Arabi notes, There can be no Ittihadother than with

respect to number and natureIn the case of numbers, one remains the essence of every

number; two, although it has a different name, is nothing but one plus one. The name

one has disappeared. In the case of nature, various names designate the many forms of


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mystic to declare oneness with God, which is attainable only through a two-step process:

first, the performance of obligatory prayers, and second, moving beyond these, by

engaging in supererogatory acts of worship that engage both will and creativity. This

second stage places the individual in a position of assuming attributes of the Real,

through which the individual can be subsumed into the Eternal: the Real becomes

manifest in the form of the servant and the servant becomes manifest in the form of the

Real (Jaffray, 57). Thus the possibility of annihilation into the Eternal becomes possible

only through the human beings active use of God-given abilities to attempt to replicate

the creative function of the Real. For those who understand, this presents a clear line

between merely playing God and a sincere attempt to move towards God. Presumably

only God can tell the difference, since only God knows what is in ones heart. 7

The adjective kawni is connected to the verbal noun kawn, or cosmos, creation,

but it can also refer to the individual as a creation. The Arabic root K-W-N includes a

range of meanings: to be, to create, to cause to exist. God commanded kun ! (Be !),


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Arabi describes the Perfect Human as the isthmus, connected to both sides of creation,

the divine and the cosmic, representing the tension between them (See Jaffray 59).

Ishadand ayni need to be discussed together (see Jaffray 59-60).Ashada is the

verb form that is the basis for ishad, its fourth-form verbal noun. The root SH-H-D

defines a range of meanings including seeing, or witnessing. The fourth form verbal noun

includes the causative aspect, to make see. Ibn Arabis sense of seeing as both esoteric

and exoteric is inherent in his assertion that the Real cannot be known, except to the

extent that it is manifested in the cosmos, in an infinity of self-disclosures. The Sufi

Gnostic undergoes annihilation of the self (fana) followed by subsistence in God (baqa)

(i.e. the drop joining the ocean) in order to understand that God is both Witness and

witnesser. Throughout the work, Ibn Arabi alludes to the full range of the adjective ayni,

whose root, -Y-N, expresses a wide range of meanings, including: eye, source, spring,

self, essence. Jaffray notes: What the author is being made to witness with the eye of

his inner vision is the Root of his existence and his very self. The title could easily read:

Cosmic Unification in the Presence of the I-Witnessing (60). Further, Ibn Arabi uses


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This Tree, exemplifying the Perfect Human (who straddles the line between the

terrestrial and the eternal), holds four birds, representing cosmic faculties: First Intellect,

Universal Soul, Prime Matter, and Universal Body. These are personified (avianified ?)

by the Ringdove, the Royal Eagle, the Strange anqa, and the Jet Black Crow. Each of

these addresses the author in turn8:

If you ask: what is the Tree ?, we answer: [It is] the Perfect Human Being who governs

the bodily temple (haykal) of the Crow.

The Tree represents the archetype of a Perfect Human, also known as the qutb, or

spiritual pole, around which everything turns.9

This concept also represents the liminal

figure personifying the threshold between earth and heaven. The Perfect Human is a

copy of the Divine, but not the Divine, burdened as he is with human features, even as he

synthesizes Divine names and Attributes. The tree presents two branches, signifying a

universal duality, but with the central axis running up through it. Thus, the addition of

two branches to the pole generates a ternary structure. A fourth structural element results

from the addition of leaves to the axis and the braches, rendering a circle, the quarternity.


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created by the addition of leaves, represent the four-fold nature of the cosmos. Finally,

the Tree

is described as the Likenessof the Real, whose root is firm and

whose branches are in the heavens[containing] both unity

represented by the well-rooted trunk and multiplicity, reflected

in the appearance of its branches, leaves, and fruits as well as in its

very name itself. One of the meanings of the Arabic root SH-J-R is

difference in opinion, dispute. (Jaffray 82)

The Trees poem is brief, its end rhyme hamza, that straight-up first letter of the Arabic

alphabet, swaying in rhyme.

Ringdove/Tablet/Spirit, Universal Soul/light and dark

The Dove is the Soul that is between Nature and the Intellect.10The Ringdove is

the first bird to speak. A dove is universally associated with peace and love, even

representing the pneuma, or spirit in Christian iconography (Jaffray 83). Ibn Arabi

chooses a less common term to describe the dove (not hamama but mutawwaqa warqa)


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Intellect because of its own dual nature: its focus is divided, not dedicated in one

direction. It has two faces, one turned toward God, the primary cause of its existence,

and the other turned toward the First Intellect, the secondary cause of its existence.

Another description of the Souls duality involves light and dark; its light face is turned

toward the Intellect, receiving light as the moon does from the sun, and its dark face is

turned toward the material world. In addition, the Soul embodies knowledge (ilm) and

hope (amal)12

, which respectively bring into being various forms of the cosmos: the

supra-sensible formssciences, knowledges, and desires pertaining to these and

sensory forms, or bodies and their sensible accidents (Jaffray 86). Ibn Arabi explains

that the Doves attribute of knowledge is a father, for it produces an effect, while the

attribute related to action is a mother, for it is the object of an effect (cited in Jaffray 86).

The Ringdove personifies the Divine Tablet, upon which the Supreme Pen writes

everything God wills for all time, as well as the Eve to the First Intellects Adam.

The Ringdoves poem is nineteen lines long, with multiple words related to the

consonantal root TH-N-Y, meaning two, reaffirming the Doves dual nature. The root


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scheme of the poem itself.13

Finally, the Dove calls herself the Second; in fact Ibn

Arabi cites the four birds as four spiritual beings in this order: Intellect, Soul, Prime

Matter, Body. But she speaks first;

why ?

Eagle/Pen/Intellect/Light

If you ask: What is the Eagle?, we answer: [It is] the Divine Spirit which the

Real breathed into the bodily temples as if they were their moving and quiescent spirits.14

The second speaker is the Eagle, who represents the First Intellect. Like the royalty they

often represent, eagles are inaccessible, living as they do in mountain eyries. Their

power allows them to dive powerfully, relying on acute vision to catch prey, and are

rumored to be bold enough to stare into the sun. Just as he does for the Dove, Ibn Arabi

chooses an unusual name for his Eagle. Instead of the common form nasr, Ibn Arabi

labels the Eagle uqab, emplying a consonantal root -Q-B that includes a long list of

meanings: heel, coming after, following, taking ones place, punishment,

consequence, result of an action, time or state of subsequence, recompense, offspring,


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The first revelation instructs Muhammad to read and recite, referring to God as

the one who taught mankind to use the pen, who taught mankind what it did not know

(96:1-5). Hadiths report that the Intellect was the first thing God created, drawing a

parallel between the Intellect and the Pen. The latter term is the Islamic association for

the Eagle the Supreme Pen. Ibn Arabi notes that The Essential Attribute connected to

the Intellect is Life.15

The Intellect is also imagined as the Primordial Light that is the

source of all other lights, the Intellect of all other intellects. The Intellects importance in

the hierarchy of existence is the focus of the Eagles poem. It draws parallels to the story

of Adams creation as Gods vice-regent on earth, being privileged to know all the names

of created things, unlike the angels, who ceded humans superiority on the basis of

possessing greater knowledge. Thus, the Intellects importance in creation is central to

the existence of life.

Anqa/Dust/Prime Matter/ Twilight

If you ask: What is the Anqa?, we answer: [It is] the Dust (haba) which is

neither existent nor non-existent, although it assumes form in the vision-event.16

At one


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the setting sun, west, strangeness, improbability, obscurity, and incomprehensibility

(Jaffray 92). This mythical bird is cited in folk proverbs that make the point of its

incredible nature: Rarer than the eggs of the anuq and it has a name but not a

body18

Ibn Arabi chose the ambiguity of the anqa intentionally. If it is phoenix-like,

then the birds classical relation to alchemic texts allows the implication of its

transformative capabilities. Even its color relates to its liminality; the birds name carries

connotations of moderate blackness, evoking twilight. The associations of this nebulous

color relate to the anqas role in this work.

Ibn Arabi understood the philosophical notion of the anqa as a metonym for

the concept of prime matter (from the Greekhyle, and the Arabic hayula)19 and he chose

to render it as Dust (haba), following Quranic precedent and the interpretations of his

predecessors.20

Haba refers to dust particles dancing in the sun, which concept was

understood by Arab alchemists as the material world in formation, sheer potentiality,

and the feminine principle.21 The anqa is feminine in this context, representing prime

matter that can take any form, and constituting the matrix of the universe. Yet despite its


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Universal Reality a reality called Dust.22

Ibn Arabi explains that such Dust is

present in all forms of nature, indivisible from those forms. It is the white in whiteness,

the forms essence.23

This understanding of Dust relates to the nature of knowledge,

which Ibn Arabi explains as neither eternal nor temporal on its own, but only in relation

to the entity in which it appears: in the Real, knowledge is eternal, in the creature,

knowledge is temporal. Thus, this ambiguous bird, whose every characteristic is

ephemeral, bears in it the possibility of existence, though its reality is not yet realized.

Crow/Secondary Matter/Universal Body/ Dark (engendering Light)

If you ask: What is the Crow?, we answer: [It is] the universal Body, which the Eagle

made appear by means of the Dove. The Jet Black Crow, often associated with the occult

and alchemy, ill-omen, and separation of the beloved from the lover. Its associations

with death and entombment may relate to its identity as round, or egg-shaped, in

imitation of the womb and the tomb, both of which are rounded in and of themselves: the

circle also represents the roundtrip journey from nothingness into being and back again.

Thus the Jet black Crow is associated in this work with the Universal Body, also known


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Body is a perfect round shape, and is moved by heat around a central axis, creating the

revolving celestial bodies as the first corporeal bodies deriving from the universal body.

Thus the Universal Body is distinct from the void. It is A corporeal sphere, it fills the

Void, and within it every corporeal thing in the cosmos takes shape.26

Ibn Arabis

view is that a three-part process occurs: the Void is first filled with Dust, after which the

Real manifests Himself through the quality of Divine Light, and finally the creation of

Great Man and Small Man occurs. The Great Man is the macrocosm (celestial spheres,

elements, generated beings), while the Small Man is the human, in which the Real and

the cosmos converge, creating the Perfect Human Being. With Abraham representing the

initial manifestation of a hidden God, Ibn Arabi explains in this passage the

inseparability of the corporeal and the spiritual in the human being. He demands an

appreciation of the material world, containing as it does the tangible expression of the

spiritual: Ifthe creature is considered the manifest and the Reality the Unmanifest

within him, then the Reality is in the hearing of the creature, as also in his sight, hand,

foot, and all his faculties, as declared in the Holy Tradition of the Prophet27

.


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cultural image, a source of darkness. Instead, he is actually the bright keeper of the secret

of origins.

The Relationship of the Four Birds

Ibn Arabi defines God as the First Father and thingness as the First Mother,

beyond which all created entities take turns in their roles as fathers and mothers,

depending on whether they have active or passive roles. The four birds presented here

are related in several ways. First, they belong in a hierarchy. The ability to breathe, and

thus engender life in beings, is a feature of the First Intellect/Eagle, brought into

existence by Divine Command. After the Real brings the Intellect/Eagle into existence,

he in turn gives birth to the Soul/Ringdove, according to the plan of the Real. They mate,

creating the Prime Matter/Anqa, who then gives birth to the Secondary Matter/Crow. In

other words, the Intellect, having been engendered by the Real, creates the Spirit, and the

two together, Intellect and Spirit, create Prime Matter, which transforms into Secondary

Matter. Thus, all created things in the universe come from the combination of Intellect

and Spirit which together activate potentiality, allowing it to result in materiality, which


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source and ultimate destination of all souls, his choice of a quotidian image, the tree with

birds, made such symbolism accessible to a wide audience on a most basic level. This

tree has unseen roots that give it stability, quite like humans primordial past; a trunk, the

visibly present portion of the tree, and a lofty arbor, so high as to be unknowable,

representing the future that reaches into the heavens. Birds are free souls, moving

between these realms. Each of these images contains multiple levels of meaning, so the

listener is able to understand according to his or her ability, as is recommended in the

Quran. For those well versed in Sufi mysticism, as Ibn Arabi was, any explanation of

life had to answer the questions, How did we get here ? Who will take us back ? What

does it mean to be alive ? For Sufis the vehicle of the physical self is mere ephemera,

and their belief is that the spark of humanity rejoins elements of the universe after our

brief sojourn on earth. Ones short time on earth is meant to allow us to learn about the

supra-Real, that which engenders the life force. For Ibn Arabi, the parable of the lote-

tree at the edge of known existence, and the birds who nest in it, was a succinct

exploration of the meaning of life.


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Ibn Al Arabi