Life is a Puzzle
Life is a puzzle of duality. The idea of opposites keeps us in an illusion. Seeing this to be the nature and character of life, the Sufi says that it is not very important to distinguish between two opposites; what is most important is to recognize that One which is hidden behind it all. Naturally when he comes to this realization, the Sufi climbs upward on that ladder which leads him to unity, to the idea of unity which comes through the synthesis of life, by seeing the One in all things and in all beings. One may believe that the world, that humanity, has always evolved, or one may believe that it has advanced and gone back again, or that it is going round and round in circles, or one may have some other belief; but in whatever age the wise were born, they have always believed the same thing: that behind all life is oneness, and that wisdom lies in the understanding of that oneness. When a person awakens to the spirit of unity and sees the oneness behind all things, his point of view becomes different, and his attitude changes thereby. He no longer says to his friend, ‘I love you because you are my friend.’ He says, ‘I love you because you are myself.’ He says, as a mystic would say, ‘Whether you have done wrong or whether I have done wrong does not matter. What matters is to right the wrong.’ Khan, Hazrat Inayat, The Sufi Message, Volume VIII, p. 100. England: Servire Publishing Co., 1963.