City Imagery
In "The Political Regime," Alfarabi uses the image of a city to represent the human soul (much like Plato does in the Republic). In describing this city, he uses much imagery that corresponds to the different parts of the city and the workers inhabiting it to represent different parts of the soul. He also uses the imagery of different types of governmental regimes in the city to correspond to different states of the human soul.
Physician Imagery
In "Selected Aphorisms," Alfarabi uses the imagery of a physician and the health of the body as an analogue to the role of a statesman and the health of the soul. In order to convey a sense of the responsibilities of the statesman and the nature of soul health, he uses lots of imagery in the medical field, such as medical books, the imbalance of chemicals, and various injuries that correspond to illnesses of the soul.
Platonic Imagery
Throughout his corpus, Alfarabi uses lots of imagery from the works of Plato to get his points across. For example, the image of the city as a representation of the soul in "The Political Regime" is taken from Plato's Republic, as well as the types of regimes representing different orderings of the soul. Imagery reminiscent of Plato is evident in most of his other works as well, usually in the capacity of seeing the Good as a morally absolute entity as well as the darkness/light imagery referring to the state of a soul's enlightenment.
Aristotelian Imagery
Although less obvious than Platonic imagery, Alfarabi also uses some imagery that is evocative of Aristotle's works. For example, his approach in dissecting and examining the different branches of science in "Enumeration of the Sciences" parallels the biological approach of Aristotle in his examination of everything from ethics to politics to even biology itself. Alfarabi also uses the Aristotelian idea of eudaimonia as the ultimate end of mankind (although without using such terminology).
