Plato and Suhrawardi on Illuminations

As the first step of the dialectic of knowledge, sense perception is of paramount importance for Plato. But if one stops in this stage, no knowledge will be produced. According to him, when one leaves this stage and two other stages (i.e. opinion and reasoning) behind, truth will be illuminated for him, and it is this Illumination which forms real knowledge. Thus, truth is illuminated in the process of epistemological dialectical motion in a certain moment. For Suhrawardi, on the other hand, if there will be no veil between man’s soul and a thing, he will acquire knowledge of that thing, since Suhrawardi regards man’s soul as immaterial light. According to him, world and what is in it is lightened by Illumination of the Light of lights, and if the soul notices something, knowledge will be produced (of course, as regards to material things, if man’s eyes are sound; and as transcendent truths, if his soul is purified). In other words, unlike Plato, Suhrawardi thinks that even sense perception is a product of Illumination, and thus it is knowledge. In the present article, the author has tried to explain the two opinions concerning Illumination (while the latter is more general than the former).