other “felt like I was radiating, like there were rays of light coming out of me.” In contemporary Therav da accounts (Sayadaw, 2010, p. 122), concentration directed toward the body is similarly associated with seeing “a smoky gray light [that will] become whiter like cotton wool, and then bright white, like clouds,” and furthermore with seeing the body “sparkle and emit light.” Experiences of light emanating from the meditator’s body are also associated with a calm mind and with a particular stage of insight called the “knowledge of arising and passing away” (Nanarama, 1983, p. 36), the significance which is discussed below.
…
Some Theravada Buddhist authors from contemporary Burmese lineages (Nanarama, 1983, p. 36; Sayadaw, 1994, p. 13–14) identify the arising of a “brilliant light,” a “flash of lightning,” a “lamplight in the distance,” or a “light [that] emanates from [the meditator’s] own body” as “illumination” experiences – one of 10 “imperfections of insight” that can arise during a stage of practice called the “knowledge of arising and passing away.” These light-related meditation experiences, while still taken as signs of a calm mind capable of carefully investigating present moment experience, are nevertheless treated as “corruptions” or “imperfections” because they are so enticing that they can lead the meditator astray from the practice instructions.