Imâm Abū al-Hasan Bakrī on the Nūr of Sayyidunā RasûlAllâh ŚallAllāhu álayhi wa sallam

Bakrī (Sayyid Abū al-Hasan Ahmad ibn `Abd Allâh, d. 3rd c.) in his book al-Anwar fi Mawlid al-Nabī Muhammad `alayhi al-salat wa al-salâm (p. 5 of the Najaf edition) cites the following Hadīth from `Alī:

Allâh was and there was nothing with Him, and the first thing which He created was the light of His Beloved, before He created water, or the Throne, or the Footstool, or the Tablet, or the Pen, or Paradise, or the Fire, or the Veils and the Clouds, or Adam and Eve, by four thousand years.