Born in London in 1979, Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee was formally trained from the age of fifteen in the Naqshbandiyya-Mujaddidiyya Sufi Order by his father, Sufi Master Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee. In 2014, he was given Adhikara (permission to teach) and after his fathers retirement from public teaching in 2018, he became his authorized successor. Emmanuel is an author and an Emmy and Peabody nominated filmmaker who has directed over twenty documentary films including: Taste of the Land, The Last Ice Age, Aloha Aina, The Nightingale’s Song, Earthrise, Sanctuaries of Silence, and Elemental, among others. He is the founder, executive editor, and podcast host of Emergence Magazine, an award-winning publication exploring the threads connecting ecology, culture and spirituality. His first book, Remembering Earth: A Spiritual Ecology, is forthcoming from Shambhala in Summer 2026. He teaches retreats on Sufism and Spiritual Ecology worldwide.
