air filled with light

"The union between humans and God in Eden was like air filled with light. Air does not possess its own luminosity when light is present. Air has not been given its own luminosity, but it becomes lustrous. In much the same way, human beings are filled with light when God is present to them; if God is absent, darkness falls on them. Such separation is not caused by distance in space but by a turning away of the human will."

--Augustine (A Literal Commentary on Genesis)