Iyyun Circle, 13th century. MS JTSA Mic. 1822, fol. 7a

Jewish Mysticism
This is the power of the Presence that receives all the entities [i.e., the sefirot]; they enter into it without an image and emerge from it with matter, form, and an image. [The Presence] is the form of an image (to’ar demut) like a coin, seal, or instrument that fixes a form. There would be no divine matter without the Presence.

Translated by Elliot Wolfson in Through a Speculum that Shines- Vision and Imagination in Medieval Jewish Mysticism, Princeton- Princeton University Press, 1994.