Sufism

The Muhammadan Reality (al-Haqiqa al-Muhammadiyya) is the first light from which all creation unfolds

Before there was a historical prophet named Muhammad, Ibn Arabi holds, there was a metaphysical principle by that name from which the entire universe takes its shape.

In chapter 27 of Fusus al-Hikam, Ibn Arabi presents al-Haqiqa al-Muhammadiyya, the Muhammadan Reality, as the first individuation of the Divine - the initial light or principle through which undifferentiated Divine Being begins to unfold into the multiplicity of creation. This is distinct from the historical, embodied prophet who lived in seventh-century Arabia; rather, it is a cosmological principle drawing on earlier Islamic traditions of the Muhammadan Light said to have existed before creation. Everything else that exists - every creature, every form of knowledge, every prophetic revelation - is, in Ibn Arabi's system, an unfolding of this single originating reality. The concept places Muhammad, in this cosmic sense, at the structural center of Ibn Arabi's entire metaphysics, not merely as history's final messenger but as the template underlying all created existence.

Fusus al-Hikam