Mundus Imaginalis
Henry Corbin’s vision of the mundus imaginalis offers perhaps the most subtle account of vigilance as a mode of dwelling in symbolic temporality. For Corbin, the imaginal is not the unreal but an ontological stratum where images and archetypes possess their own reality, neither reducible to fantasy nor to empirical fact.¹ To live vigilantly, then, is to perceive hours not merely as external units of measurement but as visionary events: occasions in which imaginal presences disclose themselves. A dawn may therefore be read not only meteorologically but angelologically, as an unveiling of meaning. The Vigilant, in Corbin’s sense, inhabits time as a hermeneutical field, alert to theophanies veiled in symbols. This protects against both positivist reduction and naïve literalism, insisting on a middle path where vigilance requires discernment in the imaginal mode.
Embodied Attention
Matthew Crawford, by contrast, situates vigilance firmly within embodied practice. His critique of contemporary distraction demonstrates how modern economies of attention fragment human consciousness, dispersing it across screens and advertising stimuli.² Against this, he calls for an ethic of skilled contact, where attention is reclaimed through the discipline of craft, music, or mechanics. In Crawford’s sense, vigilance is not abstract contemplation but tactile presence: being fully engaged with the resistant reality of wood, metal, or instrument. This grounds the Ompyrean Doctrine of Time in the concrete: hours become opportunities to exercise and refine perception through contact with the real. Where Corbin emphasizes symbolic interpretation, Crawford emphasizes bodily skill; together they remind us that vigilance is both imaginal and incarnate.
Sacred Tradition and the Eclipse of Transcendence
Seyyed Hossein Nasr deepens the picture by restoring vigilance to its sacred axis. In Knowledge and the Sacred, he diagnoses the modern condition as the eclipse of transcendence, whereby time has been stripped of its liturgical dimension and reduced to secular succession.³ For Nasr, vigilance means fidelity to Tradition (al-dīn in its most universal sense): to live hours as rites and sacraments that participate in eternal realities. The Vigilant thus orients himself not by the clock but by prayer, remembrance, and cosmic rhythm. This ensures that vigilance does not degenerate into mere psychological technique or artisanal focus; it remains fundamentally vertical, aligned with the axis mundi that links time to the eternal.
Time as Ayah
The Qur’an reinforces this sacral view by insisting that time itself is revelation. Day and night, sun and moon, and the succession of seasons are described as āyāt, signs of God (Q. 2:164; 10:6). To be Vigilant, therefore, is to live in remembrance (dhikr), perceiving each moment as a verse written into creation.⁴ In Qur’anic temporality, vigilance is continuous: whether standing, sitting, or reclining (Q. 3:191), one remembers God, and thus every hour becomes liturgy. The Doctrine absorbs this lesson by insisting that vigilance is not sporadic but rhythmic, woven into ordinary life as ceaseless attentiveness to signs.
Yugas and Dharma’s Rhythm
Sanātana Dharma extends the scope of vigilance to the macrocosmic scale. The doctrine of the four yugas (Satya, Treta, Dvāpara, Kali) portrays time as cyclical decline and renewal, situating individual hours within vast epochs.⁵ To be Vigilant here is to practice dharmic alignment: sustaining righteousness even in ages of decay. This eschatological vigilance prevents despair in the Kali Yuga, affirming that fidelity to dharma is meaningful precisely when the world appears hostile. Hours are not merely personal or liturgical; they are cosmic phases, demanding discernment about what practices suit the age. Thus the Doctrine of Time integrates not only microcosmic attention but also macrocosmic orientation.
Immediate Suchness
Finally, Ch’an Buddhism radicalizes vigilance by collapsing temporal projections altogether. The masters insist that awakening is not deferred to the future but realized in the immediacy of suchness. “Every day is a good day,” Yunmen declared, pointing to the paradox that vigilance is simply presence, nothing added.⁶ In this register, hours are not symbolic disclosures, artisanal engagements, or cosmic signs: they are pure presence, the unmediated now of chopping wood, carrying water. This teaching prevents vigilance from becoming overly esoteric or programmatic. It insists that the highest vigilance is the simplest: dwelling without obstruction in what is.
Synthesis
These six perspectives converge to form a polyphonic doctrine of vigilance. Corbin anchors vigilance in the imaginal, Crawford in embodied attention, Nasr in sacred Tradition, the Qur’an in remembrance, Sanātana Dharma in cosmic alignment, and Ch’an in immediacy. Each alone risks distortion: imagination without craft drifts into fantasy; craft without transcendence lapses into secularism; Tradition without immediacy calcifies into formalism; remembrance without dharma risks ahistoricity; dharmic vastness without presence may paralyze with fatalism. Only in their integration does vigilance become whole.
Thus our doctrine teaches: Imaginal time must be inhabited (Corbin); distracted time must be reclaimed through embodied craft (Crawford); profane time must be resacralized (Nasr); cyclical time must be read as sign (Qur’an, Sanātana Dharma); and ordinary time must be awakened as suchness (Ch’an). To be Vigilant is to inhabit images without delusion, to work with hands and mind united, to pray with fidelity, to remember God in the cycles, to align with dharma in decay, and to awaken to the suchness of every moment.
References
[1] Corbin, Henry. Mundus Imaginalis, or the Imaginary and the Imaginal (1964).
[2] Crawford, Matthew B. The World Beyond Your Head: On Becoming an Individual in an Age of Distraction (2015).
[3] Nasr, Seyyed Hossein. Knowledge and the Sacred (1981).
[4] The Qur’an, esp. 2:164; 3:191; 10:6.
[5] Bhagavata Purana, Book 12; Manusmṛti I.81–86 (on the yugas).
[6] Yunmen Wenyan, recorded in Blue Cliff Record (Case 6): “Every day is a good day.”