The Oneness of Life...

All names and forms are the garbs and covers under which the one life is hidden.

Bowl of Saki, by Hazrat Inayat Khan
Commentary by Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan:

The real understanding of religion is not in disputing over the diversity of the forms, saying. 'Your religion is worse and my religion is better.' The true religion is in recognizing the one life in all.

The divisions of one into many are caused by light and shade, and if we looked keenly into life, both within and without, we should realize clearly that it is one life, one light, which appears divided and made into many by different shades.

When one observes keenly the nature of this life of variety, one finds that behind the world of variety there is one life, the source and goal of all things. It is that life which may be called the blood of the universe circulating through the veins of the universe. It is substance or spirit or life: something out of which all that is seen and all intelligence is molded, kept alive and in working order. ...

This gives a logical explanation of the law of cause and effect. A wrongdoer may escape earthly witness, but he cannot escape this one life in which he lives and moves and has his being. A person who has done good to another may never see that other again, yet good must return to him because there is one body and one life. Just as with the circulation in the physical body all we eat is absorbed as essence in the blood, so our every thought, word and action affects the one life. ...

Real virtue only comes by understanding the oneness of life, binding man to friend or enemy. Jesus Christ teaches, 'Love your enemies'. While it is often difficult to love our friends, we are not able to love our enemies unless we realize the secret of the one life behind all.