Al-Tilimsānī had also led astray an ascetic, devout shaykh in Jerusalem named Abū Ya‘qūb al-Maghribī al-Mubtalā (the Afflicted), to the point that he would say:

“Existence is one, and it is Allah; yet I do not see the One, nor do I see Allah.”

He would also say:

“The Quran and the Sunnah speak of a duality of existence, yet existence is one, with no duality in it.”

He made these words his formula of glorification, reciting them as one recites words glorifying Allah.

As for the poet’s words:

“When the yearning lover reaches perfection in love,
And loses awareness of the One remembered in remembrance’s overwhelming force,
It is truly witnessed, when love beholds him,
That the prayers of those who know Allah are unbelief.”

These words, besides being unbelief, are the words of an ignorant person who does not understand what he is saying. For annihilation and loss of awareness consist in becoming so absorbed in the One remembered that one loses awareness of remembrance, so absorbed in the One known that one loses awareness of knowing, and so absorbed in the One worshipped that one loses awareness of worship—until that which once did not exist vanishes from awareness, and He who has always existed remains. This is the station of annihilation that befalls many who tread the spiritual path because they cannot attain complete spiritual perception corresponding to reality.

By contrast, annihilation sanctioned by the revealed law consists in being so devoted to worshipping Him that one abandons worship of anything besides Him; so devoted to loving Him that one abandons love of anything besides Him; so devoted to fearing Him that one abandons fear of anything besides Him; and so devoted to obeying Him that one abandons obedience to anything besides Him. This is the realization of monotheism and faith.

As for the third kind of annihilation—losing awareness of the existence of anything other than Allah, to the point of regarding the Creator’s existence as the very existence of creation—this is the doctrine of these heretics who profess the unity of existence.