A Comparative Study of the Western and Islamic Philosophical Vision on Divine Illumination from the Philosophical Perspective

The relationship between light and philosophy is one of the oldest issues in the scope of epistemology. In philosophy, presence of light has been manifested as the mystic- philosopher intuition and specific ontological model. The Islamic philosophers have emphasized the divine nature of light. The western philosophers have stressed on the centrality of rationalism besides metaphysical source of knowledge of the universe concurrent with divine reason that manifested in the presence of light. The research method was based on analysis of the philosophical texts of the western and eastern philosophers. The research statistical sample was chosen by analysis of the contents of the opinions of thirty five western philosophers and thirty two Islamic philosophers. The most common components with philosophical nature were three components of divine nature, active intellect and beauty. Two components of divine light manifestation and truth in the western philosophers’ opinions and three components of cognition, necessary being and reveled intellect had the most philosophical nature on the light in the Islamic philosophers’ opinions.