(Excerpts from "The One Alone," a treatise by 13th-century Sufi master
Muhyiddin Ibn 'Arabi. >>

Know that He is never in anything, nor is anything in Him. He
is neither inside nor outside of anything. None can see Him,
whether with the eyes of the head or with the inner eye; nor
can any conceive Him with senses, knowledge, mind,
intelligence or imagination. Only He can see Himself; only He
can conceive Himself. None can know Him; only He can know
Himself. He sees Himself by Himself; He conceives Himself by
Himself; He knows Himself by Himself. None other than He
can see Him. None other than He can know Him. That which
hides Him is His oneness. None but Himself can hide Him. The
veil that hides Him is His own being.
He is not within you; nor are you in Him. He does not exclude
you, nor are you excluded from Him. When you are addressed
as you, do not think that you exist, with an essence and
qualities and attributes; for you never existed, nor do exist, nor
ever will exist. You have not entered into Him, nor He into
you. Without being, your essence is with Him and in Him.
Without having any identity, you are Him and He is you. If you
know yourself as nothing, then you truly know your Lord.
Otherwise, you truly know Him not.

That is why the utterance became permissible for Mansur Al-
Hallaj when the words, "I am the Truth!" came from his lips;
and for Abu Yazid Al-Bistami when he cried, "Praise be to Me,
the essence, absolved of all defect!" These are not people who
have annihilated themselves in Allah; nor have they come to be
in Allah. They are eternal. They never ceased to be, for they
never were, since there is only Allah's self, Allah's essence.

So if someone says, "I am the Truth!," do not hear it from any
other than from the Truth Himself; for it is not a man who says
it, it is the word of Allah. That man who utters these words is
nothing but an image reflected in an empty mirror, one of the
infinite attributes of Allah. The reflection is the same as that
which is being reflected, and the words of the image are the
reflected words of the Real One.