“La ilaha il’Allah: there is no god but God. This is the fundamental essence of the way of the Sufis. This is the seed. Out of this seed has grown the bodhi tree of Sufism. In this small proclamation, all that is valuable in all the religions is contained: God is and only God is.

     “This statement makes God synonymous with existence. God is the very isness of all that is. God is not separate from his creation. The creator is in his creation; there is no duality, there is no distance, so whatever you come across is God. The trees and the rivers and the mountains, all are manifestations of God. You and the people you love, and the people you hate, all are manifestations of God.

     “This small statement can transform your whole life. It can change the very gestalt of your vision. The moment one recognizes that all is one, love arises on its own accord. And love is Sufism.

     “Sufism is not concerned with knowledge. Its whole concern is love, intense, passionate love: how to fall in love with the whole, how to be in tune with the whole, how to bridge the distance between the creation and the creator.

     “The so-called organized religions of the world teach a kind of duality – that the creator is separate from the creation; that the creator is higher than the creation; that there is something wrong with creation, it has to be renounced. Sufis don’t renounce, they rejoice. That’s what I am teaching you here: rejoice!”