Eckhart TolleNYT Bestselling author of the Power of Now

Eckhart Tolle: The Greatest Sentence in the Bible

28 Sept 2026 · 1 min

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1:17

In this brief teaching, Eckhart Tolle asserts that the biblical phrase "I am" is the greatest sentence in the Bible, embodying God’s definition of Himself. He references the prophet’s encounter with God on the mountain and Jesus’ declaration in the Gospel of John, emphasizing that "I am" represents a timeless, eternal state of pure being. Tolle explains that this state is not a belief but can be directly realized in the present moment by temporarily ceasing the stream of thought. When thinking stops, a sense of "nothing"—not a thing but the ground of all manifestation—arises, which can be sensed at any moment and serve as the backdrop for one’s entire life.

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I am is perhaps the greatest sentence in the Bible, is God's definition of him, her, itself. When the prophet asks— meets God on the top of the mountain and asks, what's your name? And God says, I am. And Jesus said in the Gospel of John, before Abraham was, I am. It is a timeless, eternal, Beingness of you. The wonderful thing is it's not just— it's not a belief. It's something that can be realized immediately, here and now. All that is required is a temporary cessation of the stream of thinking, and something else opens up, which at first looks like nothing. But it's only nothing in the sense that it is not a thing. No thing. Ultimately, one could say it is everything prior to manifestation. That's the I Am. This pure beingness can be easily sensed at any moment, and it can become the backdrop or the background to, to the rest of your life.