Henry Corbin was a French philosopher and scholar of Persian and Islamic thought whose work gave the word imaginal a particular philosophical depth.
In the traditions he studied, the imaginal wasn’t simply a private fantasy or a decorative picture. It concerned an intermediate order of reality encountered through imagination. That is a historical and philosophical claim, not a finding from brain science.
"Only imagined" can dismiss a great deal.
An image of a childhood room can move you. An imagined meeting can reveal a tenderness you couldn’t reach through argument. The experience matters without becoming proof that the scene happened outside you.
I AWAKE uses imaginal language for its own guided encounters with image, sensation and meaning. Corbin helps explain part of the word’s history. You aren’t asked to adopt his metaphysics before opening a book.
The useful connection is taking imaginative experience seriously enough to explore, rather than deciding it must be either a literal fact or nothing at all.
Imaginal explains the word in use. Imaginal field introduces the inner setting of an I AWAKE practice, which should remain distinct from Corbin’s account.
Daryush Shayegan’s account of Henry Corbin in Encyclopaedia Iranica introduces Corbin’s life, scholarship and philosophical concerns. It is a stronger starting point than modern slogans that detach imaginal from the traditions he studied.