THE RAYS (2)

The Thirteenth Ray

[The light-scattering, highly valuable letters Ustad Bediuzzaman Said Nursi sent his students while in Denizli Prison, which illustrate in brilliant fashion the great exertions of the Risale-i Nur.]
In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
I congratulate you with all my being on the Night of Power which has passed and the coming festival, and I entrust you to the unity and mercy of the Most Merciful of the Merciful. Although in accordance with the meaning of “he who believes in Divine Determining is saved from unhappiness,” I do not consider you to be in need of consolation, I say that I received from the allusive meaning of the verse,
Now await in patience the command of your Sustainer, for verily you are in Our eyes, and glorify with praise your Sustainer,1
all the solace the verse affords. It was like this:
While thinking of passing Ramadan tranquilly, in forgetfulness of the world, this unimaginable and completely unendurable episode befell us, yet I observed that it was pure grace both for me, and for the Risale-i Nur, and for you and our Ramadan, and our brotherhood. I shall describe only two or three of its many benefits for myself.
One of them: The intense excitement, seriousness, entreating and seeking refuge with God I experienced overcame a serious illness, and made me work in Ramadan.
The Second: I had a powerful desire to see all of you this year and be near you. I would have agreed to the difficulties I have suffered to see only one of you and to come to Isparta.
The Third: In an extraordinary way, all the painful circumstances both in Kastamonu, and on the way here, and here, suddenly change, and contrary to what I hoped and desired a hand of grace is apparent, making one exclaim: “Good is in what God chooses.” What made me realize this most was that the most heedless and high-ranking persons are being made to read the Risale-i Nur with careful attention, opening up new fields for its triumphs. I was suffering all the pains and regrets of everyone else as well as my own, but then since this calamity increased the hundred merits of each hour’s worship to a thousand —for the blessed month of Ramadan makes each hour the equivalent of a hundred hours— my pity and sorrow for sincere people like you who have learnt thoroughly the lessons of the Risale-i Nur, so know that this is a fleeting place of trade, who sacrifice everything for their belief and lives in the hereafter, and believe that the transient hardships of this ‘School of Joseph’2 will produce everlasting pleasures and benefits, —my pity and sorrow for you were transformed into congratulations and appreciation and applause at your steadfastness. I declared: “All praise and thanks be to God for all circum-stances other than unbelief and misguidance!”
I am of the opinion that in this respect there are such benefits both for myself, and for our brotherhood, and for the Risale-i Nur, and for our Ramadans, and for you, that if the veil was drawn back, it would make us declare: “Thanks be to You, O God! This Divine Decree and Determining are an instance of Your grace for us.”
Do not blame those who were the cause of this affair. The far-reaching and fearful plans for this calamity had long since been laid, and in the event we have got off lightly. God willing, it will pass quickly. In accordance with the meaning of the verse, It may be that you hate a thing, and it is good for you,3 do not be grieved.
S a i d N u r s i
* * *
My Dear Brothers!
I am very happy to be close to you. From time to time I converse with you in imagination and am consoled. Know that if it had been possible, I would proudly and happily have endured all your difficulties. Because of you, I love Isparta and its environs down to its very stones and soil. I declare even, and I shall say so officially, if the Isparta authorities were to inflict some penalty on me and another province was to acquit me, I would still choose here.
Yes, I am from Isparta in three respects. I cannot prove it genealogically, but I have the conviction that the forebears of Said, who came into the world in the sub-district of Isparit, went there from here. And the province of Isparta has given me such true brothers that I would be happy to sacrifice not Abdülmecid4 and Abdurrahman,5 but Said [myself] for each one of them.
It is my guess that there is no one on earth at this time who suffers less —in their hearts, spirits, and minds— than the Risale-i Nur students. For due to the lights of certain, verified belief,6 their hearts, spirits, and minds do not suffer distress. As for physical hardships, they know from the teachings of the Risale-i Nur, that they are both transitory, and unimportant, and yield reward, and are a means by which the service of belief unfolds in other channels, and so meet them with thanks and patience. They prove through their states of mind that certain, verified belief leads to happiness in this world too. Yes, they say “Let’s see what God does, whatever He does, it is good,” and steadfastly work to transform these transient difficulties into permanent instances of mercy.
May the Most Merciful of the Merciful increase the numbers of those like them, make them the cause of pride and happiness for this country, and grant them eternal happiness in Paradise. Amen!
S a i d N u r s i
* * *
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
In regard to this Divinely ordained event from the point of view of the justice of Divine Determining: because some of the new students sought worldly things by means of the Risale-i Nur, which were not in keeping with the true meaning of sincerity, they found themselves confronted by self-seeking rivals, and obtaining from somewhere a long way off from me the Fifth Ray, the original of which was written twenty-five years ago and in the past eight years copies of which have only twice come into my possession and were then mislaid, a number of jealous people like that corrupt hoja aroused the suspicions of the judiciary with it. At the same time, The Supreme Sign (Âyetü’l-Kübra) was printed without my agreement instead of The Key to Belief (Miftahü’l-Iman Mecmuasi), which I wanted printed in the new letters; on the arrival of copies of it, it was reported to the Government, and the two matters were confused. Suggesting the Fifth Ray had been printed in opposition to the Civil Code, some malicious people made a mountain out of a molehill and had us put away in this place of penitence. Nevertheless, Divine Determining drove us here for our own good; it called us again to the ‘School of Joseph,’ where, being far more meritorious than the places of ordeal of former times, we could receive a thorough lesson in sincerity and rectify our attachment to the affairs of this world, which in truth are valueless.
We say in the face of the unfounded suspicions of the worldly: from beginning to end the Seventh Ray (The Supreme Sign) is about belief; you have been deceived; it is completely different to the Fifth Ray, which has been held strictly private and was not found in my possession in any of the scrupulous searches, and was originally written twenty years ago. We did not agree to show it to anyone at the present time, let alone have it printed; it nevertheless is a verified prediction, and does not contest anything.
* * *
In His Name, be He glorified!
I again congratulate you on the festival; do not be sorry that we could not meet in person. In truth we are always together, and God willing this togetherness will continue on the road to eternity. It is my opinion that the eternal merits, and the virtues and joys of the spirit and heart that you obtain in serving belief reduce to nothing the present temporary, passing sorrows and hardships. Up to now, there has been no one who has suffered as few difficulties as the Risale-i Nur students in such sacred service. Yes, Paradise is not cheap. To save others from absolute disbelief, which destroys the life of both this world and the hereafter, is of the very greatest importance at this time. If there is a little hardship, it should be met with enthusiasm, thanks, and patience. Since our Creator, Who employs us, is All-Compassionate and Wise, we should rely on His mercy and wisdom and meet everything with resignation and joy.
An heroic brother of ours has assumed all responsibility for The Supreme Sign affair. He has shown how much he deserves the extraordinary honour and merit pertaining to the hereafter he has gained through his pen and the Hizb al-Qur’an7 and Hizb al-Nuri,8 and made me weep at the deep joy I felt. There is much wisdom in The Supreme Sign, the Seventh Ray, attracting attention to itself, and preparing the ground for the future triumphs it deserves: its temporary confiscation will not nullify the work and expenses of that brother and his wife; God willing, it will make them shine even more. This we await from Divine mercy.
From your brother who, through the use of the first person plural in all his supplications, such as: “Deliver us; have mercy on us; preserve us,” includes all of you in them without exception; who works in accordance with the principle of our partnership of the spirit, as though we were numerous bodies and a single spirit and is more concerned with your distress than you are yourselves; and who, from your collective personality awaits strength, assistance, constancy, steadfastness, and intercession.
S a i d N u r s i
* * *
At a time when, under the effects of this event, I determined to completely resign myself to sacrificing myself for my innocent brothers and was seeking for a solution, I read Jaljalutiya.9 It suddenly occurred to me that Imam ‘Ali (May God be pleased with him) prayed: “O God! Deliver us!”; God willing, you shall be delivered through the meaning of his supplication.
Yes, in his Qasidat al-Jaljalutiya, Imam ‘Ali (May God be pleased with him) gave news of the Risale-i Nur in two ways, and alluded to The Supreme Sign with the lines “And through the Supreme Sign, secure me from sudden disaster.” Through this allusion, he is indicating that due to The Supreme Sign, a disaster of significant proportions will be visited on the Risale-i Nur students and is beseeching God to deliver the students from the calamity for the sake of The Supreme Sign; he is making the treatise and its source an intercessor. Yes, the printing of The Supreme Sign was made the pretext for the calamity that occurred, and confirmed exactly that sign of the Unseen.
Also, on the opposite page in the qasida, it says at the end of the allusions to the important parts of the Risale-i Nur and their arrangement, in meaning:
These letters of light, gather together their properties;
And study their meanings, for through them good is fulfilled.
That is: “The words and letters of the Risale-i Nur, which we alluded to; collect their properties and study their meanings, for all good and happiness is achieved through them.” It may be inferred from the phrase “Study the meanings of the letters” that it refers not to the letters, which express no meaning, but to the treatises called Sözler, which means The Words.
Our Sustainer! Do not call us to task if we forget or do wrong.10 * None knows the Unseen save God.
S a i d N u r s i
* * *
My Dear, Loyal Brother, Re’fet Bey!
I cannot meet with indifference your learned questions since they are the keys to important truths contained in the part of the Risale-i Nur called Mektûbat (Letters). A short answer is as follows:
Since the Qur’an is a pre-eternal address and speaks with all the classes of humanity and all the groups of worshippers, it has to possess numerous meanings conformable with them, and numerous levels of the universal meanings. Some commentators choose only the most general or the most explicit meaning, or one which expresses an obligatory act or a confirmed practice of the Prophet (PBUH). For example, for the verse, And in the night glorify God11 they mention an important sunna, the two rak‘as of the tahajjud prayer, and for the verse the flight of the stars12 the early morning Fajr sunna, which is a confirmed Practice of the Prophet (PBUH). And there are numerous other constituents of the former meaning. My brother! Speaking with you does not cease.
* * *
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
I have just performed the noon prayer and it occurred to me when I was reciting the tesbihat that you were all probably sad at thinking of yourselves and your relations at home. It suddenly came to mind that if those of former times who chose the hereafter over this world and passed their lives mortifying the flesh in caves and other places of ordeal with the intention of being saved from the sins of society and of working sincerely for the hereafter, had lived now, they would have been Risale-i Nur students. Certainly, those living under the conditions of these times are ten times more needy than they were and gain ten times more merit, and are ten times more comfortable.
* * *
My Dear, Blessed Brothers!
Very many greetings... In former times in my native region, we used to recite Sura al-Ikhlas a thousand times on the Day of ‘Arafa.13 Now, I am able to recite five hundred on the day before, and five hundred on the Day of ‘Arafa. Those who are confident may recite them all at once. I cannot see you and cannot speak with you all personally, but most of the time I can converse with you all while praying, sometimes by name.
* * *
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
I reckon that up to now two leaders of the main group of the Light (Nur) Factory circle have been saved. That circle, that group, has truly accomplished the triumphs of twenty to thirty years in six or seven; as though it was a souvenir of their shining pens, their service does not cease; it causes merits to be recorded in the books of their deeds in their places. In fact, the Hizb-i Nuri has achieved such overwhelming conquests and entered such important places that it is as if those who published it are continuously working. I supposed that like the first person, Hafiz Mustafa, who has worked so hard and is so hardworking, was outside, then I heard that he is here too. Thinking it was perhaps another Mustafa, I found consolation.
* * *
My Dear Brothers!
This morning while reciting the tesbihat, I pitied Hafiz Tevfik.14 I recalled that it is the second time he has suffered this trouble. Then it suddenly occurred to me: Congratulate him! With needless caution, he wanted to withdraw himself a little from his important position and his large share in the Risale-i Nur. But the vastness and sacredness of his service again awarded him a large share and vast merit. One should not flee from spiritual honour such as that due to a little distress and fleeting hardship.
Yes, my brothers! Everything departs, and after it has gone, if it was pleasure and enjoyment, it goes for nothing, while if it was distress and hardship, it yields such pleasurable benefits, both in this world and in the hereafter, and from the point of view of being sacred service, that it reduces the trouble to nothing. With the exception of one of you, I am the most elderly and it is I who suffers the most troubles, yet I assure you that by practising total patience, offering thanks, and endurance, I am happy at my situation. Thanks in the face of disaster is for the reward to be had from disaster, and for the benefits in this world and the next.
* * *
My Dear Brothers!
With the disappearance of the things preventing the completion of the ‘Topics’ of The Fruits of Belief, writing will recommence, God willing. One of these was the cold, the other was the fright the Masons took at its power. I think of this calamity from the angle of Divine Determining, and my difficulties are transformed into mercy. Yes, as is explained in the Treatise On Divine Determining, there are two causes for every event: one is apparent; people base their judgements on this and frequently act unjustly. The other is reality, according to which Divine Determining judges; it acts with justice in the events in which man acted unjustly.
For example, a man is sent to prison for a theft he did not commit. Divine Determining also sentences him to imprisonment, but for a secret crime, and acts justly within the human injustice. Thus, there are two causes for our having been set this severe trial, the purpose of which is to separate out the diamonds from the pieces of glass, the veracious devotees from the inconstant waverers, and the purely sincere from those unable to give up their egotism and self-interest:
The First is a powerful solidarity and a sincere and remarkable service of religion which aroused the suspicions of the worldly and the politicians; human injustice looks to this.
The Second: Since not everyone on their own could demonstrate their worthiness of this sacred service through complete sincerity and total solidarity, Divine Determining looked to this too. But that Determining is now pure mercy for us within the pure justice, for it brought together brothers who greatly missed each other, and transformed their hardships into worship and their losses into alms-giving. It is also pure mercy in many other respects, like attracting attention from all quarters to the treatises the brothers have written out; and not allowing worldly possessions and children and comfort, which are temporary, fleeting and which one day they will be bound to leave behind when they enter the grave, to damage their lives in the hereafter; and making them accustomed to patient endurance; and their being heroic models for the believers of the future, and even their leaders. But there is one aspect that caused me some thought, which is that if a finger is wounded, the eye, mind, and heart neglect their important duties and become preoccupied with it. Similarly, our lives, which reach this pitch of distress, busy our hearts and spirits with their wounds. Then just when I should be forgetting the world, the situation took me to the Masons’ council, and busied me with dealing them blows. I was consoled by the possibility that Almighty God might accept this state of heedlessness as a sort of intellectual striving.
I received the greetings of Ali Gül, the brother of Hafiz Mehmed, the Risale-i Nur’s esteemed teacher. I send greetings and prayers both to him, and to all his fellow villagers, and to all the people of Sava,15 both living and dead.
* * *
In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Your constancy and steadfastness foil all the plans of the Masons and dissemblers. Yes, my brothers, there is no need to hide it, those atheists draw comparisons between the Risale-i Nur and its students, and the sufi orders and particularly the Naqshbandi Order, and with the idea of refuting us and scattering us, attack us with the schemes with which they defeated the sufis.
Firstly: To intimidate and scare, and show up the abuses of the sufi way.
And secondly: To publicize the faults of its leaders and followers.
And thirdly: To corrupt them with the enticing vices and stupefying, pleasurable poisons of materialist philosophy and civilization; and destroy their solidarity; and disparage their leaders with treacherous lies; and discredit their ways with some of the principles of science and philosophy. They attacked us with the same weapons they used against the Naqshbandis and sufis, but they were deceived. For since the essence of the Risale-i Nur’s way is complete sincerity, and the giving up of egotism, and to search out and perceive the mercy within difficulties and the permanent pleasures within pains, and to point out the grievous pains within fleeting dissolute pleasures, and that belief is the means to innumerable pleasures in this world too, and to teach the points and truths that the hand of no philosophy can reach, God willing it will make all their plans come to nothing, and showing that no comparison can be made between the way of the Risale-i Nur and the sufi orders, it will silence them utterly.
A Subtle Point
This morning someone called me from the gendarmes’ ward next to me and I went to the window. He said: “Our door has closed by itself and whatever we do we can’t open it.” So I told him: “It is a sign for you that among the people you guard and keep behind bars, are those who are innocent like yourselves. They even insulted me on the pretext of my seeing one of my brothers I had not seen for ten years, and on another pretext, closed the second of our outer doors. As a punishment, your door closed too.”
S a i d N u r s i
* * *
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
There are three further points concerning the subtle point I wrote to you yesterday:
The First: As a representative of the collective personality of a blessed group that will be formed in the future, through the blessings of that collective personality, the bolted door opened of its own accord; again, they were angry with a representative of a blessed group which is now in existence meeting with me for half a minute, after ten years. I too was angered, and again said: “Let the doors close!” The following morning —it had never happened before— the guards’ doors closed, and did not open for two hours.
Second Elegant Point: I sent a note to the public prosecutor by means of the prison governor. I said in it: “I am being kept in isolation and I can’t meet with anyone. Even if I was to, I do not know anyone in this town. ... with someone from the town council here... and so on.” Later the prosecutor asked if I was in solitary confinement. The prison governor said: “No.” Both of them objected to my note. The same day, a distant and half crazy relation came and visited me for half a minute, and it was portrayed in such a way as to show that I had never been in solitary confinement. Their objections rebounded on themselves.
The Third: The noise of the troublesome youths next door to me between the evening and night prayers disturbed me, but not too much. It was that day that they found an excuse and shut the door. The foul stench also grew worse in my cell, and the din the youths made by my door disturbed me excessively. I again said: “Let the doors close! Why are they doing this?” That morning, the incident occurred.
* * *
My Brothers!
The two Topics you have written in the new letters have had a tremendous effect. It will be excellent if the First, Second, and Third Topics are written out as well. But I find it worrying if it is Husrev and Tahiri who do this since their pens are particularly suited to the Qur’an and the Qur’anic script, and are charged with it. It will better if others write them.
* * *
My Dear Brothers!
For the past year I have been using an amount, that is, around a kilo, of vermicelli and rice. I have no doubt that they are a means of plenty. But you do not leave them with me now so that I can cook them. So I give them to you as a gift, as a means to blessings and plenty. On one occasion, I saw a wondrous increase in the star-shaped vermicelli. I used to dry the pieces after cooking them. I myself and others saw that one single piece was ten times larger than normal.
* * *
My Dear Brothers!
Last night while I was reciting my invocations, the guards and others could hear me. I wondered anxiously to myself if such a display did not decrease the merit. Then I remembered a famous saying of Hujjat al-Islam Imam Ghazali: “Sometimes doing something openly is better than concealing it.” That is, in many ways it may be far more meritorious to do something openly, for others may benefit from it, or copy it, or be aroused from heedlessness; or it may be display the marks of Islam in the face of those who persist in misguidance or vice, and preserve the dignity of religion. Especially at this time and if done by those who have learnt thoroughly the lessons of sincerity, and no hidden artificiality intervenes. I thought of this and was consoled.
* * *
Two days ago, the examining magistrate summoned me, and when wondering how I could defend my brothers, I opened the Hizb al-Masun of Imam Ghazali. These verses struck my eye:
Verily God will defend [from ill] those who believe.16 * ...how their light runs forward before them and by their right hands.17 * God watches over them.18 * For those... is [every] blessedness.19
I saw that if the doubling and madda (long a) are not counted —the waw is also a madda— according to abjad and jafr reckoning, it makes one thousand three hundred and sixty-two, which is exactly this year’s date; both its meaning and number coincide with the time we resolved to defend our believing brothers. All praise be to God, I said, this leaves no need for my defence. Then the thought “I wonder how it will turn out” occurred to me. I was curious. I saw that according to jafr reckoning, on condition the tanwin is counted, the two phrases God watches over them and Tuba (blessedness) make exactly one thousand three hundred and sixty-two. If one madda is not counted, it makes two, and if it is counted, three. Coinciding exactly —at this time we are so needy for Divine preservation— with this year’s date, and with next year’s date, it consoles us with the assurance that we shall be preserved, despite an awesome assault against us which has been prepared over the last year on a grand scale and over a wide field. The Risale-i Nur’s making more brilliant conquests in ruling circles due to this episode means that its temporary arrest does not and should not cause us to despair. Also I consider The Supreme Sign’s being confiscated due to its printing to be a proclamation, attracting attention from all quarters to its shining station. I have just read the verse,
O our Sustainer! Perfect our light for us, and grant us forgiveness.20
The phrase grant us forgiveness makes exactly one thousand three hundred and sixty-two. It coincides exactly with this year’s date, and summons us and orders us to constantly seek forgiveness so that our light may be completed and the Risale-i Nur too not remain deficient.
* * *
In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
It is my opinion that those who are not shaken by the severe ordeal of these two ‘Schools of Joseph,’21 the former and the present, and do not abandon its lessons, and do not give up being its students although their mouths have been burnt by the scalding soup, and whose morale is not broken despite all this aggression, will be applauded by the people of reality and coming generations; just as the angels and spirit beings applaud them. However, since among you are some who are ill, delicate, or poor, the physical distress is excessive. But thinking of the others of you consoling them and being perfect examples in patience and good conduct, and compassionate brothers offering solidarity and kind attention, and intelligent companions in discussing lessons, and mirrors reflecting fine moral qualities, thus reducing the physical hardships to nothing, my concern for you, whom I love more than my own spirit, was allayed.
One day, I shall send you Mawlana Khalid’s jubba,22 which is one hundred and twenty years old. I invest each of you with it in his name, in the same way that he invested me with it. Whenever you want it, I shall send it.
When we first arrived, the doctor gave me a chickenpox vaccination. It formed a boil and my arm swelled up. The swelling has moved down my arm; it does not let me sleep and makes it difficult to take ablutions. I wonder if I can’t take vaccinations, or if it has some other meaning! Twenty years ago they vaccinated me in Ankara, and it still suppurates from time to time and causes me pain. I thought of this and hoped the new one would not be the same; how are yours?
S a i d N u r s i
* * *
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
One reason for the justice of Divine Determining driving us to the Denizli School of Joseph is both its prisoners, and its people, and perhaps also its officials and judiciary being in greater need of the Risale-i Nur and its students than people anywhere else. It is because of this that we have been put to this arduous test, with a task pertaining to belief and the hereafter. Only one or two prisoners out of twenty to thirty performed the obligatory prayers as they should be performed; but following the Risale-i Nur students, forty to fifty without exception have begun to perform them perfectly; this is such instruction and guidance through the tongue of disposition and action, that it reduces to nothing the distress and hardship; indeed, it makes one love it. We hope from Divine mercy and grace that just as the students have taught this through their actions, so through the powerful true belief in their hearts, they will become like a fortress of steel, delivering the believers from the doubts and suspicions of the people of misguidance.
The worldly here preventing us from speaking and having contact causes no harm. The tongue of disposition is more powerful and effective than verbal speech. Since imprisonment is for training and education, if they love the nation, they should allow the prisoners to meet with the Risale-i Nur students so that in one month or even a day, they may receive more training and education than they would otherwise receive in a year, and may all become persons beneficial both to the nation and country, and useful for their own futures and their lives in the hereafter. It would have been very useful if we had had A Guide For Youth here. God willing, it will be brought in.
S a i d N u r s i
* * *
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Today I recalled the conversation between my elder brother, Molla Abdullah, and Hazret-i Ziyaeddin, which you know about. Then I thought of you and said to myself: if the Unseen was to be revealed, if each of these sincerely religious and earnest Muslims who display such constancy in these inconstant times, not being shaken by these tortuous, testing circumstances, were to appear to be saints or even spiritual poles, the importance they have in my view, and my concern for them, would increase very little; or if they were to appear to be commonplace and ordinary, the value I attach to them would in no way diminish. For the task of saving belief under such extremely severe conditions is of greater worth than everything. In such stormy, unstable conditions, the virtues afforded by personal ranks and the good opinions of others dissolve when those good opinions are destroyed, and their love lessens. The one possessing the virtues then feels himself obliged to adopt artificial manners, empty formalities, and a burdensome dignity in order to preserve his position in their eyes. Endless thanks be to God, we have no need for cold artificiality such as that.
S a i d N u r s i
* * *
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
I congratulate you with all my spirit, heart, and mind on your ‘ten nights,’ and beseech Divine mercy that they will bring great gains to our spiritual partnership. Last night I dreamt that I had come to you and awoke when I was about to lead the prayers as imam. When, according to my experience, the dream was going to be interpreted, two of our brothers from among the heroes of Sava and Homa arrived in the name of all you to interpret it. I was overjoyed, as though I had seen all of you.
My Brothers! Certainly, the situation has caused some officials and others to withdraw from the Risale-i Nur, and has scared them, but it has aroused the attention of, and a longing in, all opponents and religiously minded people and officials connected with the business. Do not worry, these lights shall shine out!23
* * *
According to Sabri’s interpretation, in conformity with the allusion of Sura Wa’l-‘Asr, the Risale-i Nur is a means of preserving Anatolia, and Isparta and Kastamonu, from heavenly and earthly calamities, like the ark on Mount Judi; they should not therefore interfere with it, or the expected disasters will shortly be visited on them. They should come to their senses. I say again what I said shortly before the disaster, and before those letters had been sent to you. According to news I have now received, Kastamonu and its surroundings and citadel are weeping as though mourning the Risale-i Nur; it has caught a fever and is shaking with earthquakes; God willing, it will be reunited with the Risale-i Nur, and will laugh again and offer thanks.
I wrote to you the other day about my two important gains. In the second I said, offering supplications and glorifications with hundreds of tongues... till the end. Some is missing here, it should be: Each one of us, according to his degree, offers... with hundreds of tongues... and so on.
Also, a venerable elderly man from the village of Sava, to which I am very attached, was handcuffed to me and we came together; it pleased me greatly and I understood from it the village’s strong attachment to me. I send special greetings to that brother.
* * *
My Dear Brother!
The verse,
And even thus did the rejecters of God perish [utterly]24
indicates the allusion of
By [the token of] time [through the ages], * Verily man is in loss,25
that all the wars and destruction of the infidels have caused untold damage and loss. There is also an indication in the phrase Wa’l-‘Asr (By [the token of] time) which points to the date 1360 according to the Rumi calendar, in which year dissemblers and disbelievers would attack the Risale-i Nur, but they would be the losers. For the Risale-i Nur is a cause of calamities like earthquake and war abating. It may be a concealed sign that its ceasing from activity attracts disaster.
S a i d N u r s i
* * *
My Dear Brothers!
It is my guess that our final and true defence will be the short treatise that is the fruit of Denizli Prison. For the extensive plots hatched against us over the past year, originally due to unfounded suspicions, are the following: they attacked us on baseless pretexts such as founding a sufi order, establishing a secret society, being a tool of external forces, exploiting religious feelings for political ends, working against the Republic, meddling in government and breaching public security. Thanks be to Almighty God, their plans failed. Other than the truths of belief and the Qur’an, study of the hereafter, and working for everlasting bliss, they found nothing, even over such an extensive area, among hundreds of students, in hundreds of treatises, in the letters and books written over a period of eighteen years. They began to seek out anything at all to make a pretext of, in order to conceal their plots. But I think that in the face of a fearsome, covert atheistic organization which has deceived some leaders of the Government, turning them against us, possibly attacking us directly on behalf of absolute disbelief, we were made to write the treatise of The Fruits of Belief, which is as clear as the sun and dispels all doubts and is as firm and unshakeable as a mountain, as the most powerful defence against them and to silence them.
S a i d N u r s i
* * *
My Brothers!
Your place is very constricted, but the expansiveness of your hearts does not allow this to distress you; it is also relatively freer than my place. Know that our firmest strength and support is solidarity. Beware! Do not let irritability caused by these tribulations make you find fault with one another. Complaining and blaming each other and saying “If such-and-such had not happened it would not have been like this” is the equivalent of complaining about fate and Divine Determining; do not do this. I have realized that there was no way we could have been saved from their assaults, whatever we did they would have attacked us. For the short time till Divine grace comes to our assistance, we must respond with patience and thanks, and resignation towards the Divine Decree and submission to Divine Determining, and try to gain plentiful reward and merit with few acts.
I pray for the well-being of our brothers there.
S a i d N u r s i
* * *
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
A significant solace in the face of the swift changes of this worldly life and its decline, and its fleeting, fruitless pleasures, and its blows of separation, is meeting with true friends. Yes, sometimes one travels for twenty days and spends a hundred liras to see a single friend for an hour or two. So now in these strange, friendless times, our seeing forty to fifty friends all together for one or two months and our speaking together for God’s sake and receiving and giving true consolation, make these difficulties and financial losses that have befallen us extremely cheap and unimportant. I myself would have accepted this hardship to see only one of my brothers here after having been parted from them for ten years. Complaint is criticism of Divine Determining, while thanks is submission to it.
* * *
I assure you that if the appointed hour was to come now and I was to die, I would meet it with perfect ease of heart. For I know that among you are many strong, steadfast young Said’s who will ‘own,’ ‘inherit,’ and protect the Risale-i Nur far more effectively than this wretched, elderly, ill and debilitated Said. I felt very grateful and happy at those whose names are written in Nazif’s note, who effectively strengthen morale. I had anyway guessed that they would be thus. May Almighty God give them success and make them good examples to others. Amen.
* * *
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Since you have attached yourselves to the Risale-i Nur for the hereafter, and for good works, and worship and reward, and for belief and your lives in the hereafter, it is surely necessary to offer thanks for your being here to meet your fate and eat the sustenance appointed to you and earn reward for it. These have been determined by Divine Determining in this School of Joseph, an arena of trial in which each hour in its severe conditions is the equivalent of twenty hours’ worship. Since those twenty hours are a striving in the service of the Qur’an and belief, they have the value of a hundred hours. And those hundred hours consist of meeting with true brothers, who are striving on God’s way, each of which have the importance of a hundred people, and to pledging your brotherhood, and strengthening them and receiving strength, and consoling them and receiving consolation, and steadfastly persisting in this sacred service in true solidarity, and profiting from their fine qualities, and acquiring worthiness to be students of the Medresetü’z-Zehra. It is necessary to think of all these benefits in the face of all the hardships, and to respond to them with patient endurance.
S a i d N u r s i
* * *
My Brothers!
I sincerely hoped that resolute heroes like those of Isparta and its environs (like the Husrev’s and Hafiz Ali’s), strong as steel, would appear here from Kastamonu as well. Endless thanks be to God that that province fulfilled my hopes, sending numerous heroes to our assistance. I send greetings to all my self-sacrificing brothers who are with you, who are always present in my imagination but whose names I cannot write, and I pray for their well-being.
* * *
My Dear, Loyal, Constant, and Faithful Brothers!
I am describing some of my circumstances here, not to sadden you or to take any physical measures, but so that I might profit more from your shared prayers, and you might practise greater self-restraint, caution, patience, and forbearance, and earnestly perserve your solidarity. The torment and distress I suffer here in one day is more than I suffered in a month in Eskishehir Prison. The ghastly Masons have inflicted one of their unfeeling fellows on me so that out of anger I should lose patience in the face of their torments, and they could then use it as a pretext and make it the reason for their cruel aggression, and so conceal their lies. As a wondrous mark of Divine grace, I merely offer thanks in patience and I am resolved to continue to do so.
Since we have submitted to Divine Determining and in accordance with the meaning of “The best of matters are the most difficult,”26 and we know these difficulties to be a Divine bounty through which we may gain greater merit; and since we have the absolutely certain conviction, at the degree of ‘absolute certainty,’ that we have dedicated our lives to a truth more brilliant than the sun, as beautiful as Paradise and sweet as eternal happiness; certainly, knowing that we are carrying out this immaterial struggle in God’s way, proudly and offering thanks, despite the distressing conditions, we should not complain.
* * *
My Dear Brothers!
My first and last advice to you is to preserve your solidarity; avoid egotism, selfishness, and rivalry, to preserve your composure, and be cautious.
S a i d N u r s i
* * *
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
It is understood from the public prosecutor’s indictment that the plans of the covert atheists who deceived some of the leaders of the Government, prompting them to move against us, have come to nothing and turned out to be false. They are now trying to conceal their lies by accusing us of forming a political society and a secret revolutionary committee, and as a result of this, they do not allow me to have contact with anyone. As though all those who have contact with us join us. High officials too are careful to avoid us, and they try to curry favour with their superiors by harassing us. I was going to add the below passage to the end of my objections, but I had an idea that did not allow me to. The passage was this:
Yes, we are a society and we are a society that every century has three hundred and fifty million27 members. Every day through the five obligatory prayers, its members demonstrate with complete veneration their attachment to the principles of that sacred society. Through the sacred programme of The believers are indeed a single brotherhood,28 they hasten to assist one another with their prayers and spiritual gains. We are members of that sacred, vast society, and our particular duty is to teach the believers in certain, verified fashion the Qur’anic truths of belief, and save them and ourselves from eternal annihilation and everlasting solitary confinement in the Intermediate Realm. We have absolutely no connection with any worldly, political, or intriguing society or clandestine group, or the baseless, meaningless secret societies concerning which we have been charged; we do not condescend to such things.
* * *
My Dear and Loyal Brothers!
Before dawn today I felt real pity for all of you. Then I remembered the Treatise For The Sick (Hastalar Risalesi ), and it consoled me.
Yes, this calamity is a sort of social sickness. Most of the remedies connected with belief in that treatise are in this too. As I told that blessed sick person in Erzurum, the pain of all past tribulations has passed; what remains of it is its good, and its benefits that look to this world, the hereafter, belief, and the Qur’an. That means the single transitory tribulation has been transformed into numerous permanent bounties. As for the future, since it is non-existent at the present, the tribulations that will continue in it give no pain now. To suffer pain due to delusions is to lack confidence in Divine mercy and Determining.
Secondly: Most of mankind on the earth now are afflicted with calamities, physical and non-physical, and in their hearts, spirits, and minds. Compared with theirs, our calamity is both extremely light, and profitable. There are pleasures for the heart and spirit, springing from belief, good health, and well-being.
Thirdly: If we had not entered here amid these storms, due to our contact with suspicious officials, this slight calamity would have been even severer, and there would have been the calamity of having to toady to them and flatter them.
Fourthly: Seeing with very little expense true friends more compassionate than brothers, and brothers of the hereafter like spiritual guides, here in the workless, compounded physical and spiritual winter of this School of Joseph, which is a department of the Medresetü’-Zehra; and visiting them, profiting from their personal qualities, and receiving strength from their fine characteristics, which like light are diffused through transparent objects, and from their spiritual assistance, joy, and consolation; all changes the form of this calamity, making it a sort of veil to Divine grace. Yes, a subtle facet of this hidden grace is that all the Risale-i Nur students here are called “Hoja;” they are spoken of respectfully as “the hojas... the hojas.” There is a further subtle allusion in this, that just as this prison has turned into a medrese (religious school), so the Risale-i Nur students have all become teachers, and thanks to these hojas the other prisons will also all become schools, God willing.
* * *
My Brothers!
If the short letters written before to console you, like this one, are read and studied together with the last parts of The Fruits of Belief, and any matters of the Risale-i Nur that occur to you are discussed, God willing it will gain for you the honour of being ‘students of the religious sciences.’ Pre-eminent figures like Imam Shafi‘i (May his mystery be sanctified) attached the greatest importance to this, saying “the sleep even of students of the sciences is counted as worship.” If at this time of no religious schools, a hundred difficulties are suffered in these places of torment due to being such elevated students, no importance should be given to them, or else, saying “The best matters are the most difficult,” we should smile happily at those hardships. As for the families of our needy friends and their having enough to live on, in consequence of the rule of the Qur’an, belief, and the Risale-i Nur, which is to look at those worse hit by disaster than oneself and at those in greater deprivation, they are better off than eighty per cent of people. They have no right to complain; their right, their obligation, is to offer eighty degrees of thanks. Divine Determining ordained that we meet our fate here and eat the food appointed for us. The justice of Divine mercy gathered us together here; the families have been entrusted to their true Provider, relieving those brothers temporarily of their duties of supervision. Just as one day they will be relieved of them entirely and dismissed... Since the reality is this, we should say For us God suffices, and He is the Best Disposer of Affairs,29 and offer thanks.
* * *
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
For sure I can’t meet with you in person, but I am happy and thankful that I am close to you in the same building. It came to me involuntarily that some necessary precautions should be taken. One of these: a prisoner was sent to the ward next to mine by the Masons who is both a liar and a spy. Since destruction is easy, especially among idle youths such as those, I knew from the scoundrel’s excessive harassment of me and his corrupting the youths, that atheism is attempting to corrupt their morals in the face of our guiding and reforming them. Extreme caution is necessary in this situation, and it is absolutely essential as far as is possible not to be offended by the old prisoners nor to offend them and not to allow any disagreements, and to keep cool and put up with things, and as far as is possible for our brothers to strengthen their brotherhood and solidarity through humility and modesty and giving up egotism. It pains me to concern myself with worldly matters, so having confidence in your perceptiveness, I do not consider them so long as it is not essential.
S a i d N u r s i
* * *
My Brothers!
Against all eventualities, I have to explain a matter that was imparted to me this morning. Asking: “I wonder what atheist philosophers can say to this, and with what will they support themselves?”, for twenty years my soul and my satan have investigated whether or not the truths we have taken from the Qur’an leave any room for doubt or hesitation, and if they are as clear as daylight. They could find no fault in any nook or cranny, and fell silent. I reckon that a truth which silences my soul and devil, which are extremely sensitive and involved in the matter, will silence also even the most obdurate of them. Since we are working for the sake of and on the way of a truth which is thus unshakeable, elevated, vast, and important, and is of inestimable value, and if the whole world and a person’s life was given as its price, it would still be cheap; we should certainly respond with complete steadfastness to all the tribulations, distress, and enemies. They have also confronted us with a number of deceived or hoodwinked hojas, shaykhs, and apparently pious people. We must preserve our unity and solidarity in the face of them, and not bother with them or argue with them.
S a i d N u r s i
* * *
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
It was disclosed to me this morning before dawn that the real reason for this extensive and significant aggression against us is not the Fifth Ray, but the Hizb al-Nuri, and The Key To Belief, and Hüccetü’l-Baliga (The Eloquent Proof).30 I read part of the Hizb al-Nuri carefully, and thought of The Key To Belief, and I understood that the atheists had put forward the Fifth Ray, which has a slight connection with politics, as the apparent reason, because they could not defend their way of absolute disbelief against the blows of these two keen swords. So they deceived the Government, making it move against us. It occurred to me at the same time that if some of our weak brothers temporarily give up, they might be able to save themselves from this calamity, and I wanted to give them permission. Suddenly it was imparted to me that those who are closely concerned and have twice been put to this test and in return have suffered so much hardship, would not then give it up in a heartfelt way that was both harmful and without benefit, but might possibly apparently hold back just to deceive them. It would otherwise cause harm both to himself, and to us, and to our sacred way, and as a penalty, the person would receive a blow contrary to his intentions.
* * *
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Certainly according to the degree of their being the cause of this imprisonment, which is more distressing and colder than other places, those who are suffering its hardships will feel inclined to escape them. But since the certain, verified belief that the Risale-i Nur —its apparent cause— gains for those who suffer these hardships, and the happy death its gains through the certain, verified belief, and the good works of a hundred men it gains through the spiritual partnership, all transform the bitter hardship into sweet mercy, then the price of these two results is unshakeable fidelity and steadfastness. To be regretful and give it up would therefore be a great loss. For those of the students who have no connection with the world, or very little, this imprisonment is preferable to freedom, and in one respect is a place of freedom. While since for those who are connected and who are well-off, the money spent becomes multiple almsgiving, and the hours spent are transformed into multiple worship, they should offer thanks rather than complaining. As for those who are impecunious and needy, their lives outside afford them merits that are without benefit and hardships for which they are responsible, while the hardships here produce many merits and much reward and entail no responsibility, and are alleviated by the solace of their companions; this demands that they offer thanks.
* * *
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
A pious person in Kastamonu said by way of complaint: “I have declined; I have lost my former spiritual state, lights, and illuminations.” I told him:
“Perhaps you have progressed so that you have left behind your illuminations and revelations, which flatter the ego, give a taste of the fruits of the hereafter while still in this world, and encourage self-centredness. By giving up egotism and not seeking fleeting pleasures and through self-abasement, you have perhaps flown to a higher station.” Yes, an important Divine bounty is not making the person who has given up his egotism perceive the bounty so that he does not become proud and conceited.
My brothers! In consequence of this truth, those who think similarly to that person or who take into account the brilliant stations that the good opinions of others give, look at you, and among you see the students who appear in the garment of humility and self-abasement and service, to be common, ordinary people, and they say: “Are these the heroes of reality who challenge the whole world? Alas! Who are these? Where are the people who are striving to perform this sacred service, before which even the saints are impotent at this time?” If they are friends, they experience disappointment, and if opponents, find their opposition justified.
S a i d N u r s i
* * *
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
In my view your prison fruits31 are as agreeable and valuable as fruits of Paradise. They confirm the great hopes I had for you and what I had claimed, as well as demonstrating beautifully the power of solidarity. As when three or four ‘alifs’32 are put side by side, those blessed pens uniting while suffering severe oppression showed a value of three or four hundred. The state of mind which preserves your unity in these confused conditions proves what I said yesterday. Yes —there is no error in the comparison— just as according to the Sunnis the position of a great saint regarding service of Islam is lesser than that of a Companion of the Prophet (PBUH), so a sincere brother who forgoes the pleasures of the soul in serving belief at this time and practising humility preserves solidarity and unity, is afforded a position higher than that of a saint. This was the conclusion I came to and you confirm it constantly. May God be eternally pleased with you. Amen!
* * *
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
The Fruits of Belief is most important and very valuable. It is my hope that in time it will achieve great triumphs. It seems you have thoroughly understood its value, for you have not left this place of study without lessons. On my own account I say that if the fruit of all this trouble and expense is only this treatise and Müdâfaa Risalesi (The Defence Speeches), and being together with you in the same place, it reduces to nothing the expense and the trouble, and even if I were to suffer this calamity ten times over, it would still be cheap.
Due to many experiences and especially in this distressing, restricted prison, I have formed the firm conviction that being occupied with the Risale-i Nur, both reading it and writing it out, greatly lessens the distress and gives one a feeling of expansiveness. When I am not busy with it, the calamity doubles and I am upset by trifling things. Although I reckoned that for various reasons Husrev, Hafiz Ali and Tahiri would be suffering most, I saw that it was they and those with them who had the greatest composure and submission and ease of heart. I asked myself why. Now I have understood that they are carrying out their true duties; since they are not occupied with anything frivolous, and do not interfere in the functions of Divine Decree and Determining, and are not boastful, critical, or panicky, all of which spring from egotism, with their self-possession and their steadfastness and peace of mind, they have exonerated the Risale-i Nur students and demonstrated their moral strength in the face of atheism. May Almighty God make the true dignity and heroism within their utter humility and self-abasement spread to all our brothers. Amen!
* * *
My Brothers!
A fearful egotism arising from heedlessness and love of this world rules at this time. The people of reality, therefore, have to give up egotism and selfishness, even if it is in a licit form. Since the Risale-i Nur students dissolve their egotism, which is an ice-block, in the joint pool of their collective personality, they will not be shaken by this storm, God willing. Yes, a well-tried method of the dissemblers is to collect together people who are all like officers and judges, concerning some common question in constraining places which make them stand-offish, and irritable and critical of each other; stirring them up so they fight among themselves, they destroy their morale. The dissemblers then easily deal blows at those who have lost their strength, and kill them. Since the Risale-i Nur students have taken the way of love and brotherhood and ‘annihilation in the brothers,’ God willing, they will foil this well-tried, divisive stratagem.
* * *
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
One time, a shaykh had so many followers the Government became anxious regarding its political implications and wanted to scatter his community. The shaykh told the Government: “I only have one and a half followers. No others. If you like we can put it to the test.” So he had a tent pitched somewhere and gathered together all his thousands of followers there. He told them: “I am going to put you to the test. Whoever is my disciple and complies with my command will go to heaven.” He summoned them into the tent one by one. He had a sheep slaughtered secretly, as though he had killed his favourite disciple and sent him to Paradise. When the thousands of followers saw the blood, they no longer obeyed the shaykh and started to denounce him. Only one man said “May I be sacrificed for you,” and went to him. Then a woman went to him too, and the rest dispersed. The shaykh told the government men: “Now you have seen for yourselves that I only have one and a half followers.”
Endless thanks be to Almighty God that in the test and trial of Eskishehir, the Risale-i Nur lost only one and a half of its students. Through the efforts of the heroes of Isparta and its surroundings, in their place ten thousand were added, just the opposite to the shaykh. God willing, in this ordeal too, through the efforts of the heroes of both the east and the west, few will be lost, and ten will come in place of any one that goes.
* * *
One time, someone who was not a Muslim found a way of succeeding to the leadership of a sufi order and began to give guidance. The disciples under his training began to advance, then one of them saw through a revelation that their guide had suffered a serious decline. With his insight, the guide told his disciple: “So you have understood.” But the disciple said: “Since it was with your guidance that I rose to this station, I shall follow you even closer from now on.” He beseeched Almighty God and saved his unhappy shaykh, who all of a sudden advanced, and outflanking all his disciples, again became their true guide. This means that sometimes a disciple becomes the shaykh’s shaykh. But the true skill is that when one sees his brother in a bad situation, he does not abandon him, but strengthens their brotherhood and tries to reform him. This is the mark of the loyal and faithful. Because the dissemblers want to destroy the solidarity of brothers in such situations and spoil their good opinions of each other, they say: “See, those you think so highly of are common, ordinary people.” Anyway, we have suffered much in this calamity, but since it is a matter concerning the whole world of Islam, it is very cheap and of high value. Due to their being politics of religion or for other reasons, similar events have not been of concern for the whole Islamic world.
* * *
Since the strange signature at the beginning of the printed edition of the Old Said’s work Lemeât coincides with little change with my present circumstances and exactly with my seventy-second year, I have included it here. If you consider it suitable, you can add it to the end of the defences in place of a signature, and to the Fruits and the short letters. That strange signature consists of the following three and a half lines:
The Supplicant
My demolished grave in which are heaped up sixty-nine dead Said’s with his sins and sorrows.
The seventieth is a gravestone to a grave; altogether they weep at Islam’s decline.
I have hope that the skies of the future and Asia will together surrender to Islam’s clean, shining hand,
For it promises the prosperity of belief; it affords peace and security to mankind.
* * *
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
The reason for the supreme importance I give your solidarity is not only because of its advantages for us and the Risale-i Nur, but for the mass of believers who are not within the sphere of certain, verified belief, and are much need of a point of support and a truth which a community unshaken by events finds certain. Since it is an authority, a guide, a proof, which is unfearing, unflinching, incorruptible, and undeceiving in the face of the currents of misguidance, one who sees your powerful solidarity forms the conviction that there is a truth that may be sacrificed for nothing, that does not bow before the people of misguidance, nor is it defeated; his morale and belief are strengthened, and he is saved from joining the worldly and their vice.
* * *
In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Beware! Do not dispute among yourselves, spying ears will take advantage of it. Right or wrong, those who argue in our situation are wrong. Even if they are right to one degree, by disputing they could cause us untold harm.
I shall repeat a story I once told my irritable brothers in Eskishehir Prison. During the Great War, I was being held as a prisoner together with ninety officers in a long dormitory in northern Russia. Since they had a regard for me far higher than was my due, through my advice to them, I did not allow any noise or trouble. But then, irascibility arising from the constraints and irritations began to give rise to violent rows. I told three or four of them that whenever they heard a noisy dispute, to go and help those in the wrong. They did this, and the damaging rows ceased. They asked me why I had taken such unjust precautions, and I told them:
“A person who is in the right, is fair; he will sacrifice his one ‘dirhem’s’ worth of right for the general peace, which is worth a hundred ‘dirhems.’ Those in the wrong are mostly egotistical; they will sacrifice nothing, so the din increases.”
* * *
My Brothers!
You should repeatedly and carefully read the pieces in the treatise containing the short letters, which are a means of consolation and enjoin forbearance and patient endurance. I am the weakest of you and I have the greatest share of this distressing calamity. Thanks be to God, I am enduring it and I have not been vexed by those who have piled all the blame on me, nor annoyed at those who because it is the same matter have defended themselves alone, and implying we have formed a political association, put the blame on me. I request that since we are brothers, you imitate me in this patience.
* * *
In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers and Friends in this Hostel of the World!
I thought tonight of our being led handcuffed together to the court by soldiers with bayonets fixed. The Old Said’s proud vein of temperament made me feel exceedingly angry. But it was suddenly imparted to me that we should respond to this situation not with anger, but with pride, thanks, and joy, for in the eyes of the intelligent, and of incalculable numbers of angels and spirit beings and the people of reality and those among men with consciences and certain, verified belief, we appear as a caravan of heroes on the way of truth, reality, the Qur’an, and belief, challenging this century. In the face of their elevated regard, applause, and appreciation, which is indicative of dominical acceptance and Divine mercy, the insulting looks of a limited number of dissolute layabouts, can be of no importance. One day, even, when I went by car because of illness, I felt a constrictedness. But then when I went together with you with my hands bound, I felt an expansiveness and joy of the spirit. That is to say, my state of mind arose from this meaning.
I have said it many times and I shall repeat it: none have been seen in history who have performed as great service on the way of truth and have earned so much reward while suffering so little difficulty, as the Risale-i Nur students. However much hardship we suffer, it is still not costly.
* * *
In His Name, be He glorified!
And there is nothing but it glorifies Him with praise.
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Our escaping from this calamity and being saved from it is impossible in two respects:
The First: Since Divine Determining appointed that we should meet part of our fate here, we would anyway have come here. This way is therefore the best.
The Second: We found no way of being saved from the plots that were being hatched against us. I perceived them, but there was no way out. The unfortunate late Shaykh Abdülhakim, and Shaykh Abdülbaki could find no way to save themselves. This means that to complain about one another in this calamity is both unjust, and meaningless, and harmful, and is to feel a sort of offence at the Risale-i Nur. Beware! To consider some of the activities of the leading students to be the cause of this calamity and to feel indignant at them, is to withdraw from the Risale-i Nur and regret having learnt the truths of belief. This is a far greater calamity than the material calamity. I swear that although my share of this calamity is twenty or thirty times greater than each of yours, because they have acted with a pure intention, I would not be annoyed at them even if the calamity, which occurred due to lack of caution, was ten times greater. It is also meaningless to object to things that are past, because they cannot be repaired.
My Brothers! Anxiety doubles the calamity; it also roots the physical calamity in the heart; it also suggests objection to and criticism of Divine Determining and accusation against Divine mercy. Since everything has a good side and in everything is a manifestation of Divine mercy, and Divine Determining works with justice and wisdom; we are surely bound not to give importance to any slight trouble we may suffer as a result of the sacred task we are performing which concerns the whole Islamic world at this time.
* * *
[An unimportant, commonplace condition of mine necessitated that I write this to you.]
My Brothers!
I have formed the firm conviction that the evil eye affects me severely and makes me ill. I have experienced it on numerous occasions. I want with all my heart and soul to be a companion to you in all circumstances, but in accordance with the famous rule, “The evil eye puts the camel in the cooking-pot and man into his grave,”33 the evil eye has an effect on me. For those who look at me, do so with either violent hatred, or appreciation. Both these are present in the looks of some people who possess the ability to affect with the evil eye. I have formed the intention therefore that if it is possible and they do not force me, I shall not always accompany you while going to the court.
* * *
In His Name, be He glorified!
And there is nothing but it glorifies Him with praise.
My Dear Brothers!
This morning before dawn a piece was suddenly imparted to me. Yes, I confirm the wonder (keramet) of the Risale-i Nur concerning the earthquake what Husrev wrote in detail; what I thought also centred on that. For just as the coinciding of the four occasions of severe aggression against the Risale-i Nur and its students and the four occasions of the assaults of earthquakes were not chance, so the exact coincidence of the two centres of the Risale-i Nur’s dissemination, Isparta and Kastamonu, being preserved from disaster relative to other places; and as alluded to by Sura al-‘Asr, since the means of salvation from the Second World War —mankind’s greatest ‘loss’ at the end of time— is belief and good works; it cannot be mere chance that the Risale-i Nur has spread certain, verified belief all over Anatolia, and Anatolia was saved from the great losses of war in extraordinary fashion. Also, just as the exact coinciding of those who impede the Risale-i Nur’s service or those who err in that service receiving blows either of compassion or wrath, cannot be mere chance —of which there have been hundreds of incidents; so too the thousands of incidents of, almost without exception, all those who serve the Risale-i Nur well experiencing plenty in their livelihoods and ease of mind and happiness, cannot be mere chance.
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
According to the inner meanings of “good is in what God chooses,” and,
It may be that you hate a thing and it is good for you,34
the most confidential pieces of the Risale-i Nur have emerged from behind the veil of “sirran tenevveret”35 so as to come into the possession of the most undesirable people, to strike the arrogant, and show up the errors of those at the top. They wanted to make the matter appear unimportant, but somehow or other they understood that it has great importance, and attracting attention to it in a big way, leads to shining triumphs for the Risale-i Nur and its enemies being made to read it in wonderment. In fact, it illuminated many hesitant, bewildered, and needy people during the Eskishehir trials, and saved them, transforming our hardships into mercy. God willing, on this occasion it will perform that sacred service on a wider scale, in many courts and centres. Yes, those who see the Risale-i Nur’s style and explanations cannot remain indifferent to it. It not only makes the mind and heart submit like other works, it also conquers the soul and emotions.
Your being released causes no harm to this fact, but my acquittal would be detrimental. Even my soul agrees to sacrifice for a truth that concerns the whole Islamic world not only the life of this world but if necessary that of the next, and to sacrifice through the Risale-i Nur my own happiness for that of the people of belief.
* * *
[Included here is the continuation of the earthquake incident from Husrev’s letter; the beginning is not included.]
I later saw in another newspaper, the following amazing, complementary facts: before the earthquake, the cats and dogs gathered together in groups of four or five. They silently sat down together looking at each other pensively and blankly, then dispersed. None of these animals was to be seen either during the earthquake, or immediately before it, or after it; they disappeared into the countryside away from the towns. Another strange thing they write is that these animals gave news of the coming disaster, which resulted from our sins, through the tongue of disposition, and they did not understand it and are amazed.
Among the hundreds of things that for years Bediuzzaman has predicted in the Risale-i Nur, is that the atheists should avoid interfering with the Risale-i Nur and its students, for if harm comes to them, the disasters waiting in the offing will make them regret it a hundred time over. The earthquake verified this with its signature, then four more disasters occurred... May Almighty God bestow belief on our hearts and on the hearts of those who attack the Risale-i Nur, and give them minds that will recognize the truth, and save us from these dungeons and them from disasters. Amen.
H u s r e v
* * *
My Dear, Loyal Brothers and Companions in Disaster!
There being blessed scholars, good organizers, and sincerely devoted students among you, I felt firmly confident that you would preserve your unity and solidarity in the face of our powerful, cunning, and numerous enemies. I felt easy and was not preoccupied with you. But it has now become necessary to explain a number of matters.
The First: I was not going to send anything to Ankara, lest it delay your release. But since the court mixed up the treatises that are confidential and those which are not and the old letters and the new, and sent them to Ankara, it was essential to send to those departments Müdafaat Risalesi (The Defences), which supplies extremely powerful replies concerning the confidential treatises, especially the Sufyan and Islamic Dajjal (Antichrist) in the Fifth Ray, and The Fruits of Belief, which smashes the arrogant disbelief arising from Naturalist philosophy and its insolent attacks on belief, so that the committee of experts there would not base their judgements on those confidential treatises and rule against us like the first committee.
The Second Point: My Dear Brothers! While writing the reply to your important letter, they gave me the same letter. I had begun the Second Point and it remained unfinished. Now I am completing it, so take note of it. If this idea is given currency by your useless lawyer, it is doubtless a plan of those who are seeking our conviction, so that like the committee of experts here, the committe in Ankara will take as basic the unpublished confidential treatises, and especially the Fifth Ray, extend them to the whole Risale-i Nur then confiscate it, and inferring that the matters discussed in the Fifth Ray are what all the wretched students study who read the Risale-i Nur, have them all convicted due to my crime. The prison governor and assistant prosecutor’s making difficulties for me by preventing me from speaking and confiscating what I have written is a powerful sign that the intention is for Ankara to make the ruling against us before the irrefutable replies of the defences reach there.
The Third Point: In fact, the Chairman of the Court said that day that he was going to send the books, documents, and defences of importance, which would prolong the case, to Ankara. These have certainly arrived by now. If my two well-set-out and explicatory defence speeches are sent, they may solve the case quickly; it would not be prolonged but expedited, and those with families released. But myself and those like me who have no one, we should not be released, but remain in prison, for it is the best place to defend the truths of belief against the atheists and apostates.
Fourth Point: If the Risale-i Nur is not acquitted and my defence is not taken into consideration, your apparent denial will not save you; because of its all being the same question, we are all bound together. Only a very few of our friends who have a slight connection might be saved. Eskishehir Court demonstrated this in fact. For the past year they have planted spies among us who carefully record the disclosures of simple-minded and rash students, and have employed every means to wreck us and make us regret our way, and have even mobilized Shaykh Abdülhakim against us. But they have ruined him the same as they have ruined us and Shaykh Abdülbaki and Shaykh Süleyman, who has objected to me from time to time, so your denials to them and your running away will make absolutely no difference to what they think, and what they call “discretionary conviction,” just as it made no difference in Eskishehir.
Fifth Point: We have understood certainly through our experiences of both here and Eskishehir that due to it all being the same case, our greatest need is for complete solidarity. Taking offence and being irritable and critical due to the hardships doubles the wretchedness of our plight. Regretably, it was you that I had the most confidence in and trusted most. Sometimes when I feel a twinge of anxiety, I think of Kamil Hoja and Siddik Hoja from Istanbul and the people in the province of Kastamonu who have displayed an extraordinary loyalty, and my anxiety evaporates. Be careful that the secret organization that supports absolute disbelief does not infiltrate you. It infiltrated the ward next to me and caused me indescribable torment. Discuss this among yourselves now without argument; I shall accept your decision. But if in your discussions you take into consideration the possibility that if my defence goes to Ankara and is studied there the court here may come to a decision about those whose release is possible; and the possibility that those who struggle against us, and exiled Abdülbaki, Abdülhakim, and Haji Süleyman, and made Yesil Semsi remain here after he had been officially released, will not release those like Hafiz Mehmed and Seyyid Sefik, with their firm adherence to religion and refusal to bow before the dead leader and his picture, and their demonstrating their lack of support for atheism and innovations. You should also take into consideration that it is of the greatest importance that the Risale-i Nur emerges from obscurity and in a momentous general question at a time they are contesting themselves in their centres, the hesitant and bewildered people of belief can find the students behind them and by not running away it can be shown to them that the students are bound to an unshakeable and invincible truth. Beware! Take no notice of each other’s faults; have respect instead of feeling angry, and help each other rather than being critical.
* * *
My Dear, Loyal, Faithful Brothers!
For the past few days I have changed the form of my supplications. I no longer say “faithful” in the phrase “faithful students of the Risale-i Nur” when repeating perhaps a hundred times “forgive us” or “give us success.” Then those of our brothers who feel themselves obliged to act as though they have dispensations, or due to the anxiety and despair caused by distress, act contrarily to resolution and fidelity by apparently denying or holding back, are not left out of those prayers.
* * *
In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear Brother Hafiz Ali!36
Do not worry about your illness. My Almighty God grant you healing. Amen! You are making a high profit since one hour’s worship in prison is the equivalent of twelve hours’ worship. If you want some medicine, I have some here; I can send them to you. Anyway there is a slight illness doing the rounds. I am certain to be ill the day I attend the court. Perhaps you have taken on a little of my illness in order to help me, like those of former times who with extraordinary self-sacrifice, were ill and died in each other’s places.
* * *
[A perfectly apt obituary]
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Who say when afflicted by calamity: To God do we belong and to Him is our return.37
I offer my condolences to myself, to you, and to the Risale-i Nur, and I congratulate Hafiz Ali and the Denizli graveyard. That heroic brother of ours who knew with ‘knowledge of certainty’ the truths of The Fruits of Belief, has left his body behind in his grave to ascend to the stations of ‘vision of certainty’ and ‘absolute certainty,’ to journey round the stars and the world of spirits like the angels. Having carried out his duty to the letter, he has been discharged to take his rest. May the Most Merciful of the Merciful write merits in the book of his good deeds to the number of the letters of the Risale-i Nur, both written and read. Amen! And may He pour down blessings onto his spirit to their number. Amen! And may He make the Qur’an and the Risale-i Nur pleasant, friendly companions to him in his grave. Amen! And may He bestow ten heroes to take his place in the Light Factory,38 and make them work. Amen. Amen. Amen.
Remember him in your prayers like me. I beseech Divine mercy that a thousand tongues will be employed in place of his single tongue and he will gain a thousand lives in place of the single life and tongue he lost.
* * *
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Endless thanks be to the Most Merciful of the Merciful that in these extraordinary times and strange place, He permitted us by means of you to win the honour of being students of the religious sciences and to perform important services. It has been seen on numerous occasions by those who divine the state of people in their graves that like martyrs, in their graves, some enthusiastic and serious students of the religious sciences who die when busy with their studies suppose themselves to be alive and still studying. Indeed, while observing a student who died when studying grammar and syntax, one such diviner of graves was curious what answer the student would give to Munkar and Nakir in his grave, and he heard that when the questioning angel asked him: “Who is your Sustainer?”, the student replied: “‘Who’ is the subject, and ‘your Sustainer’ is its predicate.” He gave a grammatical answer, supposing himself to be in his medrese. Thus, like that incident, I know the late Hafiz Ali to be a student of the religious sciences working at the Risale-i Nur, the highest of the sciences, at the degree of martyrs and at their level of life. With that conviction, in some of my supplications I pray for him, and like him for Mehmed Zühdü and Hafiz Mehmed: “O God! Busy them in perfect happiness and contentment till the resurrection of the dead with the truths of belief and mysteries of the Qur’an in the guise of the Risale-i Nur. Amen!
* * *
In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear and Loyal Brothers!
I cannot forget the late Hafiz Ali; his suffering upsets me terribly. In earlier times, self-sacrificing persons would sometimes die in place of their friends; I reckon he departed in my place. If those like you who follow his system were not performing his supreme service, it would have been a terrible loss for Islam. My pain subsides when I think of you, his heirs, and I feel cheered up. It is astonishing but his departing with his spiritual life, indeed, with his physical life, to the Intermediate Realm, has aroused in me a longing to go to that world, and one veil more has been folded back in my spirit. Just as we send greetings to our brothers in Isparta from here and converse with them and exchange news, so the Intermediate Realm, where Hafiz Ali now dwells, has become like Isparta or Kastamonu in my view. I heard, even, that someone from here was sent there last night. I felt even sorrier; why had I not sent Hafiz Ali greetings with him? Then it occurred to me that no means are needed to send greetings; his powerful connection is like a telephone. Also, he would come and receive them. That great martyr has caused me to love Denizli, I do not want to leave here now. He and Mehmed Zühdü and Hafiz Mehmed are continuing their tasks serving belief and the Risale-i Nur which they carried out in their lives. They watch from very close by, and even help. With their taking their places, due to the valuable service they performed, in the sphere of the great saints, I mention the names of those two, together with Hafiz Mehmed, together with those of the spiritual poles in my ‘chain,’ and bequeath my gifts.
* * *
My Dear and Loyal Brothers!
Your sincerity, loyalty, and steadfastness are sufficient reason to disregard one another’s faults in the present trying circumstances, and to hide them. For the powerful brotherhood within the Risale-i Nur is such a good act it causes one to forgive a thousand evils. Since at the Last Judgement when good deeds will preponderate over evils, Divine justice will forgive, you too, seeing that good deeds preponderate, should act with love and forgiveness. For to become angry due to a single bad deed, and exasperated in harmful manner out of irritability, and upset because of the difficulties, is to be wrong in two respects. God willing, you will assist one another in joy and consolation, and will reduce the hardship to nothing.
* * *
My Loyal, Blessed Brothers!
The reason I have not spoken with you for a few days is a severe illness resulting from poison, the like of which I have never experienced. On account of the Risale-i Nur, I shall be proud till the end of my days of my steadfast, staunch, unshakeable brothers in the ‘Light’ and ‘Rose’ areas,39 and the devoted brothers of Kastamonu, and I find them a powerful support and effective solace in the face of the afflictions of all the tyrants. If I was to die now, I would meet my death happily seeing that they are there.
The worldly cast me into prison due to their groundless fears that I was opposing them, but Divine Determining imprisoned me because I did not speak with them and did not try to reform them. If I remain in prison with only a few friends, I shall seek an open trial which will arouse the interest of all the Islamic world, and I shall open proceedings against the departments of government in Ankara, and have numerous copies made in the new letters of The Fruits of Belief and the defence speeches, and shall send them to the important departments, God willing.
* * *
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Hadiths of this sort are allegorical. They are not particular and do not look to general places. As for others, of the religious differences that would afflict the Umma, they point out a single time, citing the Hijaz and Iraq as examples. Anyway in the ‘Abbasid period, numerous misguided sects came into being which harmed Islam, like the Mu‘tazila, the Rawafid, Jabariyya, and atheists and heretics under various guises. At a time there were serious upheavals regarding the Shari‘a and tenets of belief, numerous leading figures of Islam like Bukhari, Muslim, Imam-i A‘zam, Imam Shafi‘i, Imam Malik, Imam Ahmad ibn Hanbal, Imam Ghazali, Gawth al-A‘zam, and Junayd al-Baghdadi, emerged and quelled the religious dissension. The victory continued for around three hundred years, but the sects of the people of misguidance covertly, by way of politics, brought down on the Muslims the dissension of Hulagu and Jenghiz. Both Hadiths, and Imam ‘Ali (May God be pleased with him) explicitly indicate this dissension together with its date. Then since the dissension of the present time is one of the most serious, both numerous Hadiths, and numerous Qur’anic allusions give news of it, together with the date. Making an analogy with this, when a Hadith mentions in general fashion the stages the Umma will pass through, it sometimes points out the date of a particular event within the generality, by way of an example. Various parts of the Risale-i Nur have made certain interpretations of allegorical Hadiths such as these, the meanings of which are not completely understood. The Twenty-Fourth Word and Fifth Ray elucidate this truth by means of principles.
* * *
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
It was imparted to me that I should explain a truth so that you do not accuse one another of egotism or disloyalty.
At one time I observed that some of the great saints who had given up egotism and none of whose evil-commanding souls remained, complained bitterly about them and I was astonished. I later understood perfectly that on the death of the evil-commanding soul, its implements are handed over to veins of temperament and emotions, so that the striving of the soul can continue to the end of the person’s life; and the exertion does continue. Those great saints, then, complain of this second enemy and heir of the soul. Moreover, spiritual worth, station, and virtue do not look to this world so that they should make themselves felt. In fact, since some of those at the highest station do not perceive the great Divine favours bestowed on them, they consider themselves to be more wretched and bankrupt than everyone, which shows that the wonder-workings, unfoldings, illuminations, and lights which the mass of people consider to be spiritual perfection, cannot be the means to and touchstone for that spiritual worth and those stations. This is proved by the fact that although one hour of the Companions of the Prophet (PBUH) had the worth of a day of other saints, or perhaps forty days’ ordeal, all the Companions experienced the same wondrous illuminations and states as the saints.
My brothers, be careful! Do not let your evil-commanding souls deceive you by comparing others to yourselves and thinking ill of them; do not allow them to make you doubt the Risale-i Nur’s ability to train.
In His Name, be He glorified!
[The unruly youths themselves confirm that nine slaps they received related to the five matters in the Risale-i Nur’s Guide For Youth and Fruits of Belief are a subtle instance of the Risale-i Nur’s wonder-working.]
The First is Feyzi, who sometimes assists me. At the start I told him: You have attended a reading of The Fruits, so don’t get into trouble. He did get into trouble, and received a slap: he could not use his hand for a week.
Yes, it’s true,
Feyzi
The Second is Ali Riza, who assists me and writes out The Fruits. One day I was going to teach him about what he had written. Out of laziness, he made an excuse about cooking the food and did not come. He suddenly received a slap: although his saucepan was in good shape, the bottom suddenly fell out together with the food.
Yes, it’s true,
Ali Riza
The Third is Ziya. He wrote out the topics about youth and the obligatory prayers from The Fruits for himself, and began to perform the prayers. But then he became lazy and gave up praying and writing. He suddenly received a slap: for no reason and in extraordinary fashion, his basket and the clothes in it, which were beside him, caught fire. No one among that crowd being aware of this until they had burnt shows that it was an intended ‘compassionate slap.’
Yes, it’s true,
Ziya
The Fourth is Mahmud. I read him the topics about youth and the prayers from The Fruits and I told him not to gamble and to perform the prayers. He agreed. But he was overcome by laziness, and did not pray and did gamble. He suddenly received ‘an angry slap:’ while gambling, he lost three or four times, and despite his poverty, had to hand over forty liras, his sack coat and his trousers to his opponent, and he still has not come to his senses
Yes, it’s true,
Mahmud
The Fifth: A boy of fourteen called Süleyman was always causing trouble and at the same time egging others on. I told him to behave himself and perform the prayers, or his conduct would get him into big trouble and put him into danger. He began to perform the prayers, but then he gave them up and began making trouble again. He suddenly received a slap; he caught scabies and had to remain in bed for three weeks.
Yes, it’s true,
Süleyman
The Sixth is Ömer, who at the beginning assisted me; he began to perform the prayers and gave up singing. Then one evening, a song reached my ears which was being sung close to my door; it disturbed me as I was reciting my supplications. I was angry, went out and saw that unusually, it was Ömer. And unusually for me, I dealt him a slap. Then, unusually, the following morning, he was sent to another prison.
The Seventh: A sixteen year old called Hamza, who because he had a good voice, used to sing songs, also whetting the appetites of others and upsetting things. I told him not to do it or he would receive a slap. Then suddenly two days later his hand was dislocated and he suffered torments for two weeks.
Yes, it’s true,
Hamza
There are other slaps like these, but the paper is finished and so is the meaning.
* * *
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
An education minister raised the veil from his face and revealed absolute disbelief in another guise. He must have written that manifesto on some other prompting, before receiving the defences we last sent. I was not thinking of sending them to that department, but this has shown that it is both appropriate and necessary to send them there too, with my brothers’ approval. For most likely a deputy so bigotted in atheism would not be indifferent towards the documents and confidential treatises sent to Ankara. He was suddenly hit on the head by the irrefutable defences; it was excellent. God willing, it will give rise to a powerful movement in favour of the Risale-i Nur in that department too.
My Brothers! Since some people are like that, to submit to them is a sort of suicide; it is to regret Islam, or even to shake off religion. For they are so bigotted in atheism that they are not content with people like us only submitting or pretending to submit; they tell us: “Give up your hearts and consciences, and work for this world alone.” In such a situation, there is no solution other than relying on dominical grace, trusting in God in patience and fortitude, sending four crates of copies of the Risale-i Nur to that centre, and praying that with their powerful truths, they will be victorious. Our experience up to now has shown that avoiding one another and being upset, and dissociating oneself from the Risale-i Nur, and submitting to them and even joining them, is of no benefit. Also, in no way be anxious. That deputy’s blustering alarm shows his weakness and fear, and that he is compelled not to attack, but to defend himself.
* * *
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Sami Bey told me that one of our brothers from Homa, a student called Ali, died around the same time as Hafiz Ali. Mehmed Ali, one of heroes of Homa, also wrote and told me. So in many of my prayers I have made that Ali a companion to the great martyr Ali.
Recently, a lady who is connected with us dreamt that three of our brothers had died. Its interpretation is that these two Ali’s and Mustafa, who in prison wanted to become a follower of the Risale-i Nur and was hanged, went to the hereafter in place of all of us, and were sacrificed for our well-being.
* * *
In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal, Unshakeable Brothers, who know the true nature and meaning of reliance on God!
Although for twenty years I have not had the curiosity to either read or ask about any newspaper, with much regret I today saw, only for the sake of some of our weak brothers, a newspaper article. I understood from it that covertly and openly a number of important movements are playing false parts. Since we appear in the public eye, it is supposed we are connected with those movements. God willing, the four boxes of powerful, irrefutable treatises and notebooks of decisive defences will produce good results for both us, and belief and the Qur’an, and Islam. We have not meddled in their worlds and they have in no way established that we are going to meddle. Ankara was compelled to request the whole Risale-i Nur in order to scrutinize it.
Since this is the fact and since up to now in the service of the Risale-i Nur we have witnessed the manifestation of dominical grace to an undeniable degree — we have all experienced this, particular and universal; and since many of the movements of politics and the world are mustering forces against each other; and since we can do nothing except be content with the Divine Decree and submit to Divine Determining, and receive the vast and sacred consolation arising from the service of belief and the Qur’an and the Risale-i Nur; certainly, what we have to do before anything else is not be alarmed and not to despair and strengthen each other’s morale and not to be frightened and to meet this calamity trusting in God, and recognize the mountains which the inane, clamorous journalists who make mountains out of molehills to be molehills, and to give them no importance. The life of this world, especially at this time and under these conditions, is without value. Whatever happens to one, one should meet it contentedly.
* * *
In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Two or three of my brothers have a good way of consoling themselves. They say this:
Some of our new brothers in this prison are enduring patiently one or two or perhaps ten years of this calamity because of one or two hours illicit activity. Some of them even offer thanks, saying that they have been saved from other sins. They say: Why should we complain about six or seven months of beneficial hardship, since we are employed in the most licit activity and are serving belief through the Risale-i Nur? I congratulate them. Yes, to suffer difficulties for five or ten months because of performing for five or ten years an enjoyable, pleasant, beneficial, sacred service and elevated worship and reflection with the intention of saving both one’s own belief and that of others, is a cause of pride and thanks. In a Hadith it says: “For one person to come to believe through you is better for you than a plainful of red sheep and goats.”40 You should think therefore of all the people here, in the court, and in Ankara, whose belief has been saved, and will be saved, from ghastly doubts through your writings and your service, and offer thanks in patience and with resignation.
If the Republican People’s Party, which governs in Ankara, obstinately opposes the powerful parts of the Risale-i Nur which go there, and does not attempt to protect it with the intention of being conciliatory, the most comfortable place for us is prison. It is a sign that the atheists have combined communism and atheism, and the Government is obliged to heed them. In which case, the Risale-i Nur would draw back and halt, and calamities, material and immaterial, would begin their onslaught.
* * *
In His Name, be He glorified!
In the Name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate.
O assembly of jinns and men! Came there not unto you messengers from among you?41
[Although these verses state that prophets were sent from the jinns, the following is Üstad’s answer to a question aimed at solving this difficulty.]
My Dear Brothers!
Truly this question of yours holds much importance, but since the Risale-i Nur’s chief function is saving mankind from misguidance and absolute disbelief, it has no place for matters of this sort and does not discuss them. The leading figures of the first generations of Islam also did not discuss them much. For such unseen, invisible matters are open to exploitation. Fraudulent persons also may exploit them for their own ends, just as spiritualists nowadays perform their charlatanry under the name of ‘calling up spirits [jinns].’ It should not be much discussed therefore since they exploit it to harm religion. Also, no prophets have been sent from the jinns after the Seal of the Prophets (PBUH). Also, the Risale-i Nur has tried to prove the existence of jinns and spirit beings with incontrovertible proofs in order to refute the ideas of materialism, which plagues humanity at this time. It has put the matter in third place and has left detailed discussion of it to others. God willing, a student of the Risale-i Nur may expound Sura al-Rahman in the future and solve the question.
* * *
In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Who say when afflicted by calamity: To God do we belong, and to Him is our return.42
The deaths of Hafiz Ali, Hafiz Mehmed, and Mehmed Zühdü were truly a great loss not only for us, but for Isparta, and even for this country and the Islamic world. But up to now, as a manifestation of Divine grace, whenever a Risale-i Nur student has been lost, two or three have immediately appeared who follow the same system. I have powerful hopes therefore that serious students will emerge who will carry out those students’ duties in another form. Anyway, those three blessed people performed a hundred years’ worth of duties serving the cause of belief in a short period. May the Most Merciful of the Merciful grant them mercy to the number of the letters of the Risale-i Nur that they wrote, published, and read. Amen!
Offer my condolences to Hafiz Mehmed’s relations and his blessed village for me. I have made him the companion to Hafiz Ali and Mehmed Zühdü, and included the names of the three of them among the names of those of my masters who were spiritual poles. And I have made Hafiz Akif the companion of Asim and Lütfi.
* * *
In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
In accordance with an inner meaning of “Good is in what God chooses,” it is good this matter of ours has been delayed. For love of that dreadful dead man was being inculcated in all the schools, government departments, and in the people. This situation would have had a grievous and painful effect on the Islamic world and the future. The Risale-i Nur, which demonstrates with decisive proofs his true nature, now passing —outside our wills— into the hands of those at the top and those most closely connected with him and those who would be last to give him up, and its being carefully and curiously studied, is such an event that if thousands of people like us were to be sent to prison, and even to be executed, it would still be cheap with regard to the religion of Islam. At the very least, it will save to a degree the most obdurate of them from absolute disbelief and apostasy, lead them into ‘doubting’ disbelief, and moderate their arrogant and insolent aggression. We have claimed with the final words we said to their faces in court, “Let our heads too be sacrificed for a sacred truth for which millions of heroic heads have been sacrificed!”, that we shall hold out to the very end. This cause may not be renounced. I hope that there is no one among you who would give it up. Since you have patiently endured it up to now, say: “Our fates and duties have not yet been fulfilled,” and continue to endure it. Certainly, they will not obstinately oppose the Risale-i Nur in order to defend their way, which is undeniably proved in The Fruits to consist of eternal annihilation and everlasting solitary confinement; they will rather seek ways of coming to terms or making a truce. Patience is the key to happiness and joy.43
* * *
In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
In the First Ray, the allusions have been elucidated of the verse,
Can he who was dead, to whom We gave life, and a light whereby he can walk amongst men...?44
to both the Risale-i Nur, and with the word dead, with three powerful signs and connections, to these unhappy Risale-i Nur students. Now, in the present events, one of those signs is being realized. For, holding up life, civilization, and pleasure, those who oppress us accuse us of giving no importance to that style of life; they make charges against us, and even want to have us imprisoned with heavy labour, or executed. But they can find no legal sanction for this. As for us, we hold up death, the introduction to eternal life and its veil, and hit them over the heads with it to bring them to their senses, and work with all our strength to save them from true conviction, eternal execution, and everlasting solitary confinement. Even if I am given the severest penalties because of the vehement treatises that were sent to Ankara, and those who mete out the penalties are saved through the treatises from the execution of death, both my heart and my soul would consent to it. That is to say, we want them to have life in both worlds and this is what we are seeking, while they want us to die and they are seeking pretexts for this. But we are not defeated before them, because the reality of death and thirty thousand human corpses daily display as clearly and visibly as the sun the proclamations and decrees for thirty thousand eternal executions and thirty thousand solitary confinements for the people of misguidance. Let them do what they want. According to jafr and abjad reckoning, the verse,
It is the fellowship of God that must triumph45
has given us the good news, even in the twelve years of our most bitter defeat, of our victory together with its date. Since the reality is this, we shall from now on say the following, both to the court, and to the people:
We are trying to be saved from death’s eternal execution, which awaits us ever before our eyes, and from the everlasting darkness of the solitary confinement of the grave, which opens its door to us and summons us ineluctably. We are helping you to be saved from that awesome, inevitable calamity. The questions of politics and this world, which in your view are the most momentous, in our view and in that of reality have little value, and for those not directly concerned, are meaningless, unimportant, and worthless. Whereas the essential human duties with which we are occupied have a genuine connection with everyone all the time. Those who do not like this task of ours and want to put a stop to it, should put a stop to death and shut up the grave!
The third and fourth points have not been written for now.
* * *
In His Name, be He glorified!
It is one of the wonders of the Risale-i Nur that for ten years Üstad Bediuzzaman has repeatedly said: “Atheists and apostates! Don’t interfere with the Risale-i Nur! It is a means of repulsing disasters, like almsgiving, so attacks on it, or its ceasing from activity, weakens its defence against disaster. If you molest it, the calamities that are waiting in the offing will rain down on you in floods.” There are numerous disasters we have witnessed in this connection. Whenever in the past four years the Risale-i Nur and its students have been attacked, a disaster or calamity has followed, demonstrating the Risale-i Nur’s importance and that it is a means of repulsing disaster. Among the hundreds of events Bediuzzaman predicted through the Risale-i Nur, disasters have put their signatures to their correctness with the hand of earthquakes; the four disasters which followed them showed how that the Risale-i Nur is a means of repulsing calamities. May Almighty God bestow belief on the hearts of those who attack us and the Risale-i Nur, and minds and eyes in their heads that will see the truth; and may He save us from these dungeons and them from those disasters. Amen!
H u s r e v
In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
It is a manifestation of dominical grace that while expecting the Education Minister to erupt and attack us, although he had not seen our defences, documents, and books, and had only sensed them; and although the highest government departments had studied our most vehement confidential treatises like the Fifth Ray and Addendum to The Six Attacks (Hücumat-i Sitte’nin Zeyli) in order to criticize them; and our defences’ bold, harsh and serious blows at absolute disbelief should have led Ankara to act severely against us; they adopted a very lenient, and even conciliatory, position relative to the importance of the question. One reason for this manifestation of Divine grace is this: the Risale-i Nur’s being read with care and attention in all the country, which as a result of the interest has become a large dershane or place of study, and by all the important departments of government. Yes, such elevated teachings being studied at this time on such a comprehensive and universal scale is certainly a significant instance of Divine favour and is a powerful sign that it has smashed absolute disbelief.
My Brothers! Supposing that there may be an excuse for some weak family men who have suffered much hardship and loss to withdraw a little from the Risale-i Nur and from us, or even to give us up, I say in consequence of the possibility that they may change after having been released: it would be a serious loss for those who have paid this price, material and non-material, for goods of such value, and have suffered much torment, to forgo those goods. And if they suddenly give up the Risale-i Nur and its parts, and their attachment to it, and stop protecting us and helping and serving us, it would be an unnecessary loss both for them and for us. For this reason, in addition to being cautious, it is necessary not to change their loyalty, ties, and service.
* * *
In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
It is a manifestation of dominical favour and instance of Divine preservation that as I have heard, the experts’ committee in Ankara has been defeated in the face of the Risale-i Nur’s truths, and while there are numerous reasons for its criticizing it and objecting to it strongly, it has quite simply supplied the decision for its acquittal. However, the harsh expressions in the confidential treatises and the challenging words in the defences, and the fiery attacks of the Education Minister, and there being two materialist philosophers attached to the Ministry of Education on the experts’ committee and a prominent scholar who supports the new measures, and for the past year a covert atheistic organization has been inciting the People’s Party and Ministry of Education against us, all led us to expect violent objections and crushing penalties from the experts’ committee. But then the preservation and grace of the Most Merciful came to our assistance, and pointing out to them the Risale-i Nur’s high station, induced them to forgo their violent criticisms. Even, with the idea of saving us from being convicted, and so that, because of the Eskishehir affair and famous Thirty-First of March Incident I should not be regarded as having been previously convicted of political crimes, and show that we act solely for religion and belief and have no political aims, they said: “Said Nursi has long claimed to be an heir of the Prophet. He adopts the position of a regenerator in serving the Qur’an and belief; that is, he is sometimes overcome by a sort of ecstasy, and gets carried away.” With this passage and the irreligious expressions of the philosophers, they are saying to those who support religion, whoever they are: he is carrying out this duty, having inherited it from the regenerators of religion. They have used those irreligious philosophical terms in order to both criticize the excessively good opinions of me of some of our brothers, which are higher than my due; and by calling me an ecstatic, together with my vehemence, to exonerate me from political involvement and being convicted of it; and to flatter to an extent those who object to us and are hostile; and to show that the Qur’anic allusions, and wondrous indications of Imam ‘Ali, and the truths of Gawth al-A‘zam, are all powerful; and to smash the ambition, egotism, and conceit which by comparison with others they reckon is certainly present in me. From beginning to end, the Risale-i Nur furnishes a reply to those words as brilliant as the sun. And since our way is brotherhood and the giving up of egotism, and since we have not made any self-advertising ecstatic utterances, the New Said’s humble life in the time of the Risale-i Nur and his disregarding the excessively good opinions of him of his blessed brothers and moderating them with his instruction, completely refute the implications of those expressions, and dismiss them.
* * *
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
I am not sending you the committee of experts’ unanimous decisions for the moment so that no harm comes to those who informed on us. This last experts’ committee has evidently done all it can to save us and preserve us from the evil of the people of misguidance and innovation, and has exonerated us from all the charges made against us. They give the feeling that they have grasped thoroughly what the Risale-i Nur teaches, and have unanimously decided that the greater part of its scholarly parts about belief are written knowledgeably, that Said explains his views both sincerely and seriously, and that the power and strength in it are not to contest the government, but only to teach the needy the truths of the Qur’an. And they inferred about the confidential treatises, which they call “unscholarly:” “He sometimes goes into ecstasy and suffers emotional disturbance and mental storms, and should not therefore be held responsible.” And concerning the terms “the Old Said” and “the New Said,” they said there are two personalities, and inferred that in the second are an extraordinary strength of belief and knowledge of the Qur’anic truths, and for the sake of the philosophers said that “there is the possibility of a sort of ecstasy and mental disturbance,” while to save us from being charged concerning a certain violence of expression and to flatter our opponents, they said: “the possibility may be noted of an illness affecting hearing and sight which results in hallucinations.” The treatises of the Risale-i Nur, which are superior to other products of the mind, form sufficient answer to the suggestion of this possibility, refuting it totally. They have these in their possession, and the treatises containing the defence speeches and The Fruits of Belief, which have left all the lawyers in amazement. I offer many thanks that due to this possibility the allusion of a Hadith was imparted to me. Also, the experts’ committee have completely acquitted all my brothers and myself. They said, “They adhere to Said’s scholarly and knowledgeable works for their belief and their lives in the hereafter; we found nothing explicit or implicit in either their correspondence, or their books or treatises, suggesting any sort of conspiracy against the government.” They gave their decision unanimously, and put their signatures, philosopher Necati, (scholar) Yusuf Ziya, and philosopher Yusuf.
It is a subtle coincidence that while for ourselves, we call this prison a School of Joseph (Medrese-i Yusufiye) and The Fruits of Belief, its fruit, these two other Yusuf’s have said secretly through their tongues of disposition “we also have shared in the lessons of that School of Joseph.” Moreover, their subtle evidence for the possibility of ecstasy and hallucinations are phrases like “The Thirty-Third Word” and “The Thirty-Third Letter Containing Thirty-Three Windows,” and “his hearing his cat reciting the Divine Names ‘Ya Rahim! Ya Rahim! (O Most Compassionate One!’,” and “his seeing himself as a gravestone.”
S a i d N u r s i
* * *
In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Since according to numerous signs, we are under Divine protection, and since in the face of numerous inequitable enemies, the Risale-i Nur has not been defeated, and has silenced to a degree the Education Minister and People’s Party, and since those who, greatly exaggerating the extent and breadth of our question, have caused alarm to the Government are sure to try to conceal their slander and lies with various trumped up excuses; what we must do is to retain our patience and composure in perfect submission, and particularly not to feel disillusioned, and not to despair when sometimes the opposite of what we hoped occurs, and not to be shaken by passing storms! Yes, disillusionment may destroy the morale and enthusiasm of the worldly, but for the Risale-i Nur students, who see beneath the hardship, striving and distress, the favours of Divine mercy, disillusionment is necessary to strengthen their efforts, their progress, and their seriousness. Forty years ago the politicians sent me to a lunatic asylum saying I was suffering from a temporary madness. I told them: I consider most of what you call sanity to be insanity; I resign from that sort of sanity. I observe in you the rule, “Everyone is mad, but their madness differs according to their caprices.” Now with the idea of saving myself and my brothers from serious charges, I repeat the same words to those who ascribe occasional ecstasy or a temporary insanity to me because of the confidential treatise, and I am grateful in two respects:
The First: In a sound Hadith, it says: “The ordinary people deeming, because they are beyond their understanding, the elevated states of one who has attained perfect belief to be madness, point to the perfection of his belief.”46
The Second Respect: I would agree with complete pride and joy, not only to be called mad, but to sacrifice my mind completely, and my life, for the well-being and salvation of my brothers in this prison and for them to be delivered from darkness. If you think it suitable, even, let someone write a letter of thanks to those three persons, and tell them that we are allowing them to share in our spiritual gains.
* * *
My Dear, Loyal Brothers, and Sincere Friends in the Service of the Qur’an and Belief, and My Inseparable Companions on the Way of Truth and Reality and the Intermediate Realm and the Hereafter!
With the time drawing close for us to part from one another, because of the faults and tensions arising from annoyances, the principles of the Treatise On Sincerity have not been preserved. It is therefore absolutely essential that you wholely forgive each other. You are brothers closer to each other than the most devoted blood brother, and a brother conceals his brother’s faults, and forgives and forgets. I do not attribute your uncustomary differences and egotism here to your evil-commanding souls, and I cannot reconcile it with the Risale-i Nur students; I rather consider it to be a sort of temporary egotism found even in saints who have given up their souls. So on your part, do not spoil my good opinion through obstinacy, and make peace with each other.
* * *
My Brothers!
It is understood from the report of the experts’ committee that the Risale-i Nur defeats all the groups opposing us, for by repeating The Eloquent Proof (Hüccetullahü’l-Bâliga), and the Treatise For The Elderly and Treatise On Sincerity, they are attracting attention to them. Moreover, the purpose of their extremely superficial and pseudo-bigotted hoja-like criticisms, the answers to which are quite plain; and their saying, without grasping which matters are completely unrelated and which are in truth conformable, that “there is a contradiction between them;” and their unhesitatingly affirming and appreciating ninety per cent of the treatises despite the vehement refutations in the addendum to The Six Attacks (Hücumat-i Sitte) of those who have issued the fatwas for the innovations, and the attacks on them, is only to justify themselves. Moreover, their sufficing with pointing out that my saying that persecuted, religious Christians who are killed by the enemies of religion may at the end of time be sorts of martyrs is contradictory to the Addendum’s severe attacks on performing the prayers with uncovered head and making the call to prayer in Turkish, gives one the conviction that they have most definitely been defeated by the Risale-i Nur.
S a i d N u r s i
* * *
FOOTNOTES
1. Qur’an, 52:48.
2. See, page 478, footnote 63.
3. Qur’an, 2:216.
4. Abdülmecid (d.1967) was Bediuzzaman’s younger brother. He was a teacher of the religious sciences, then a Mufti. He translated parts of the Risale-i Nur into Arabic, and others from Arabic into Turkish. [Tr.]
5. Abdurrahman (1903-1928) was the son of Bediuzzaman’s elder brother, Abdullah. He was Bediuzzaman’s “spiritual son, student, and assistant,” and joined his uncle in Istanbul after the First World War. He published a short biography of Bediuzzaman at that time. [Tr.]
6. For ‘certain, verified belief,’ see, page 569, footnote 1.
7. Hizb al-Qur’an: A collection of Qur’anic verses, many of which form the basis of, and are expounded in, the Risale-i Nur. [Tr.]
8. Hizb al-Nuri: A long supplication. See also, page 505 footnote 78. [Tr.]
9. A qasida written in Syriac and Arabic, which is attributed to ‘Ali b. Abi Talib. [Tr.]
10. Qur’an, 2:286.
11. Qur’an, 52:49.
12. Qur’an, 52:49.
13. Hafiz Tevfik (1887-1965): one of the first Risale-i Nur students, and one of its most important ‘scribes.’ He was also called ‘Shamli’ as he spent part of his youth in Damascus, where his father served as an army officer. He served terms in the prisons of Eskishehir and Denizli together with Bediuzzaman. [Tr.]
14. The eve of the Feast of Sacrifices (‘Id al-Adha). [Tr.]
15. Sava or Sav: A village close to the town of Isparta and some 50 k. from Barla, the village where Bediuzzaman was exiled between 1926-1934. All the inhabitants of Sav, young and old, men and women, voluntarily assisted in the writing out and dissemination of the Risale-i Nur.
16. Qur’an, 22:38.
17. Qur’an, 57:12.
18. Qur’an, 42:6.
19. Qur’an, 13:29.
20. Qur’an, 66:8.
21. That is, the prisons of Eskishehir (1935-6) and Denizli (1943-4). [Tr.]
22. Mawlana Khalid al-Baghdadi (1193/1779-1242/1826-7). One of the most brilliant scholars of his age, who was known as the ‘Regenerator’ (Mujaddid) of his age. His ‘jubba’ or gown was given to Bediuzzaman in Kastamonu around 1940 by Asiye Hanim, the descendant of one of his ‘khalifas.’ [Tr.]
23. Brother, please note! In Denizli Prison, when everything was apparently against him, and the prosecution was even seeking his execution, Üstad said: “Don’t worry, my brothers. These Lights shall shine out.” See how his words have turned out to be true!
Signed, His Students.
24. Qur’an, 40:85.
25. Qur’an, 103:1-2.
26. al-‘Ajluni, Kashf al-Khafa, i, 155.
27. Now one and a half thousand million. [Tr.]
28. Qur’an, 49:10.
29. Qur’an, 3:173.
30. The second part of the collection from the Risale-i Nur called Âsâ-yi Musâ (The Staff of Moses). It consists of 11 pieces proving the fundamentals of belief. [Tr.]
31. That is, the treatises they had written out, particularly The Fruits of Belief. [Tr.]
32. Alif: the first letter of the Arabic alphabet, written as a vertical stroke, the numerical value of which is one. [Tr.]
33. al-‘Ajluni, Kashf al-Khafa, ii, 76; al-Maghribi, Jami’ al-Shaml, ii, 49; al-Munawi, Fayd al-Qadir, no: 5748.
34. Qur’an, 2:216.
35. A phrase quoted from the qasida ‘al-Jaljalutiya’. See, footnote 9 above.
36. Hafiz Ali: A leading Risale-i Nur student in the Isparta area. He was from the village of Islamkoy, many of whose inhabitants he led in serving the Risale-i Nur. He fell ill and died in Denizli Prison in 1944.
37. Qur’an, 2:156.
38. That is, the village of Islâmköy.
39. That is, Islâmköy (led by Hafiz Ali) and Isparta (led by Husrev) respectively.
40. Bukhari, Jihad, 102; Abu Da’ud, ‘Ilm, 10; Darimi, ‘IIm, 10; al-Munawi, Fayd al-Qadir, vi, 359, No: 9609.
41. Qur’an, 6:130.
42. Qur’an, 2:156.
43. al-Munawi, Fayd al-Qadir, vi, 298; al-‘Ajluni, Kashf al-Khafa, ii, 22.
44. Qur’an, 6:122.
45. Qur’an, 5:56.
46. Musnad, iii, 86; al-Hakim, al-Mustadrak, i, 499.




The Fourteenth Ray

A Short Addendum to My Statement
I say this to Afyon Court:
As is said in my statement, which has been presented to you and been put before the law and its justice: to raid my house three times illegally, summon me for questioning, and arrest me has violated the dignity of three high courts and cast aspersions on their justice, indeed insulted it. For three courts and three ‘committees of experts’ have scrutinized closely over two years my books and letters of twenty years, and both we have been acquitted, and our books and letters returned. Moreover, living in complete seclusion under the most rigorous surveillance for three years after having been acquitted, I was able to write only one harmless letter a week to some of my friends. It was as though all my relations with the world had been cut, for although I had been given my freedom, I could not return to my native region. It tramples the honour of those three courts to bring up the same question again now, as though completely disregarding their just decisions. I make a plea to your court to preserve the honour of those courts, which acted justly towards me. You should find some matter with which to blame me other than “the Risale-i Nur,” “organizing a political society,” “founding a sufi order,” and “the possibility of breaching security and disturbing public order,” for they constitute the same case! I have many faults. I have decided to help you concerning my blameworthiness, for I have suffered far more outside prison than inside it. I would find more comfort now in either the grave or prison. Truly I am fed up with life. Enough now of these twenty years of torment in solitary confinement, intolerable surveillance and humiliation. It will provoke Divine wrath. It will put this country to shame. I am reminding you. Our firmest refuge and shield is:
For us God suffices, and He is the Best Disposer of Affairs.1 * God suffices me, there is no god but He; in Him do I place my trust — He the Sustainer of the Throne [of Glory] Supreme!2
***


In the Name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate.
And from Him do we seek help
[This petition, which after eighteen years’ silence I am compelled to present to the court and a copy of which I am sending to Ankara, comprises my written objections concerning the indictment, which I am obliged to put forward.]
This is a summary of a short defence speech: it should be known that it is exactly what I twice told the public prosecutor and police inspector, and on the third occasion the police chief and six or seven inspectors and police, who three times came to search my house in Kastamonu; and what I said in reply to the questions of the public prosecutor in Isparta, and the Courts of Denizli and Afyon. It is like this:
I told them: I have been living alone for eighteen to twenty years. I lived for eight years in Kastamonu opposite the police station, and in other places for twenty years, under constant surveillance and supervision, and the place where I was staying was searched on several occasions, but not the slightest hint or sign of anything related to this world or politics was found. If there had been anything irregular on my part and the police and judiciary did not know, or they did know but ignored it, then surely they are answerable to a greater extent than me. And if not, why, although nowhere in the world recluses are bothered who are preoccupied with their lives of the hereafter, do you bother me unnecessarily to this extent, to the detriment of the country and nation?
We students of the Risale-i Nur do not make the Risale-i Nur a tool of worldly currents, nor even of the whole universe. Furthermore, the Qur’an severely prohibits us from politics. For the Risale-i Nur’s duty is to serve the Qur’an through the truths of belief and through extremely powerful and decisive proofs, which in the face of absolute unbelief —which destroys eternal life and also transforms the life of this world into a ghastly poison— induce even the most obdurate atheist philosophers to believe. Therefore we may not make the Risale-i Nur a tool of anything.
Firstly: In order not to reduce to the value of fragments of glass in the view of the heedless, the diamond-like truths of the Qur’an by giving the false idea of political propaganda, and not to betray those precious truths.
Secondly: Compassion, truth and right, and conscience, the fundamental way of the Risale-i Nur, severely prohibit us from politics and from interfering in government. For dependent on one or two irreligious people fallen into absolute unbelief and deserving of slaps and calamities are seven or eight innocents — children, the sick and the elderly. If slaps and calamities are visited on the one or two, those unfortunates suffer also. Therefore, since the result is doubtful, we have been severely prohibited from interfering in the life of society by way of politics, to the harm of government and public order.
Thirdly: Five principles are necessary, essential, at this strange time in order to save the social life of this country and nation from anarchy: respect, compassion, refraining from what is prohibited (haram), security, the giving up of lawlessness and being obedient to authority. The evidence that when the Risale-i Nur looks to the life of society it establishes and strengthens these five principles in a powerful and sacred fashion and preserves the foundation-stone of public order, is that over the last twenty years the Risale-i Nur has made one hundred thousand people into harmless, beneficial members of this nation and country. The provinces of Isparta and Kastamonu testify to this. This means that knowingly or unknowingly the great majority of those who try to hamper the Risale-i Nur are betraying the country and nation and dominance of Islam on account of anarchy. The great good and benefit for this country of the one hundred and thirty treatises of the Risale-i Nur cannot be refuted by the imaginary harms of two or three of its parts, which are fancied to be harmful in the superficial view of the deluded heedless. Anyone who refutes the former with the latter is an exceedingly unfair and tyrannical.
As for my own unimportant personal faults, I am unwillingly obliged to say, this: I am someone who has lived alone and in solitude in an exile resembling solitary confinement. During that time I have not gone once of my own will to the market and well-attended mosques. Despite suffering much persecution and distress, I have not once applied to the Government for my own comfort, unlike all my fellow exiles. In twenty years have not read a single newspaper, nor listened to one, nor been curious about one. As is testified to by all my close friends and those I met with, for a full two years in Kastamonu and seven years in other places I knew nothing of the conflicts and wars in the world, and whether or not peace had been declared, or who else was involved in the fighting, and was not curious about it and did not ask, and for nearly three years did not listen to the radio that was playing close by to me. But I triumphantly confronted with the Risale-i Nur absolute unbelief, which destroys eternal life and transforms the life of this world even into compounded pain and suffering; and with the Risale-i Nur, which issued from the Qur’an, have saved the belief of a hundred thousand such people, as has been attested by them, and for a hundred thousand people have transformed death into discharge papers. Is there any law demanding that such a person is harassed to this degree, and made to despair, and by making him weep to make hundreds of thousands of those innocent brothers of his weep too? What advantage is there in it? Is it not unprecedented tyranny in the name of justice? Is it not an unprecedented miscarriage of justice on account of the law?
If you accuse me like some of the officials who searched my house, saying: “You and one or two of your treatises oppose the regime and our principles...”
T h e A n s w e r , Firstly: These new principles of yours have absolutely no right to enter the retreats of recluses.
Secondly: To reject something is one thing, not to accept it wholeheartedly is something else, and not to act in accordance with it is something quite else. Those in authority look to the hand, not to the heart. All governments have vehement opponents who do not interfere in government and public order. In fact, the Christians who were under the Caliph ‘Umar’s (May God be pleased with him) rule were not interfered with although they rejected the law of the Shari‘a and the Qur’an. According to the principles of freedom of thought and conscience, so long as they do not upset the government, if some of the Risale-i Nur students do not accept the regime and your principles on scholarly grounds and act in opposition to them, and even if they are inimical to the regime’s chief, they may not be touched legally. As for the treatises, I said they were confidential and prevented their publication. In fact, in regard to the treatise that was the cause of this affair, only once or twice in eight years in Kastamonu did someone bring me a copy. The same day I put it away somewhere. Now you are forcibly publicizing it, and it has become famous.
It is well-known that if there is some fault in a letter, only the faulty words are censored, and the rest are permitted. As a result of the four months of close investigation in Eskishehir Court, only fifteen words were found in a hundred treatises of the Risale-i Nur that were the cause of criticism, and now on only two pages of the four-hundred-page Zülfikâr are explanations of Qur’anic verses about inheritance and the veiling of women, which were written thirty years ago and do not now conform to the Civil Code. This proves decisively that they have no worldly aim, and everyone is in need of them. The four-hundred-page Zülfikâr, which everyone has need of, may not be confiscated because of two pages. Those two pages should be excised and the collection returned to us; it is our right that it is returned.
If you say like those who suppose irreligion to be politics of a sort and in this episode have said: “You are spoiling our civilization and our pleasure with these treatises of yours...”
I reply: It is a universal principle accepted worldwide that no nation can continue in existence without religion. Particularly if it is absolute unbelief, it gives rise to torments more grievous in this world than Hell, as has been proved with complete certainty in A Guide For Youth. That treatise has now been printed officially. If, God forbid, a Muslim apostasizes, he falls into absolute disbelief; he cannot remain in a state of ‘doubting unbelief,’ which keeps him alive to an extent. He also cannot be like irreligious Europeans. And in respect of the pleasure of life, he falls infinitely lower than the animals, for they have no sense of the past and future. Because of his misguidance, the deaths of all past and future beings, and his being eternally separated from them, overwhelm his heart with continuous pain. If belief enters his heart and he comes to believe, those innumerable friends are suddenly raised to life. They say through the tongue of disposition: “We did not die and we were not annihilated,” transforming his hellish state into Paradise-like pleasure. Since the reality is this, I warn you: do not contest the Risale-i Nur, for it relies on the Qur’an. It cannot be defeated. It would be most regretable for this country.3 It would go somewhere else and illuminate there. Also, if I had heads to the number of the hairs on it and every day one was cut off, I would not bow this head, which is devoted to the Qur’an, to atheism and absolute disbelief, I would not and could not give up this service of belief and the Risale-i Nur.
Certainly, any faults in the statement of someone who has been a recluse for twenty years will be disregarded. He is defending the Risale-i Nur, so it cannot be said he deviated from the subject. Eskishehir Court found nothing after studying its hundred treatises, both confidential and otherwise, for four months, apart from one or two points touching on a subject necessitating a light penalty, and it gave six-month sentences to fifteen people out of one hundred and twenty. I served the sentence as well. And since a few years ago all the parts of the Risale-i Nur came into the hands of the Isparta authorities, who after studying them for several months, returned them to their owners; and since after serving that sentence, nothing was found to concern the police and judiciary during my eight years in Kastamonu despite the minute searches; and since during the last search in Kastamonu some of my treatises came to light, in a condition they could never have been published, having been hidden under piles of firewood several years previously, as was verified by the group of police; and since although the Kastamonu Police Chief and judiciary gave their certain word to return those harmless books of mine that had been hidden, I was moved on without receiving those trusts, since on the second day the order suddenly came from Isparta for my arrest; and since the courts of Denizli and Ankara acquitted us and returned all my treatises; certainly and without doubt, as a consequence of the above six facts, it is demanded by their positions that Afyon Court and its public prosecutor take into consideration this very important right of mine, as did Denizli Court and public prosecutor. I am hopeful that the public prosecutor, who defends the rights of the people, will also defend my personal rights, which due to my relation with the Risale-i Nur are like important public rights; and I await this from him.
The New Said has for twenty-two years withdrawn from social life, and does not know the present laws and how defences should be carried out, and is presenting to this new court the irrefutable hundred-page defence he presented to Eskishehir and Denizli Courts; he paid the penalty for his errors up to that time, and after that in Kastamonu and Emirdag lived in a sort of solitary confinement under constant surveillance; he is therefore now falling silent and leaving it to the Old Said to speak. And the Old Said says this:
Since the New Said has turned away from the world, he does not speak with ‘the worldly’ unless absolutely compelled to defend himself, and considers it unnecessary. But numerous innocent artisans and tradesmen being arrested in this affair due to some slight connection with me aroused my extreme sympathy, since at this busy time they have been unable to earn livelihoods for their families. It upset me deeply. I swear that if it had been possible, I would have taken all their difficulties upon myself. Anyway, if there is any fault, it is mine. They are innocent. Because of this grievous situation, I say, despite the New Said’s silence: since the wretched New Said answered the hundreds of unnecessary questions of the public prosecutors of Isparta, Denizli, and Afyon, it is my right to ask of the present Ministry of Justice, with the intention of defending my rights, the three questions I asked the Ministry of Home Affairs, and chiefly Kaya Shükrü, thirteen years ago.
The First: Which law states that one hundred and twenty people including myself should be arrested because of the merely verbal argument with a gendarme sergeant of a man from Egirdir, who though not a Risale-i Nur student was carrying an unimportant letter of mine? Then with the exception of fifteen, the innocence of all of them was established by their being acquitted after four months of investigation by the court. According to what principles is it to cite such possibilities instead of occurrences? According to what rule of justice is it to cause loss of thousands of liras to seventy unfortunates who had previously been acquitted by Denizli Court after nine months of investigations?
Second Question: According to the fundamental principle, No bearer of burdens can bear the burden of another,4 even a blood-brother cannot be held responsible for his brother’s faults, so under which law of justice was it to arrest me in Ramadan because of a short treatise whose publication I had prevented, which had passed into my hands once or twice in eight years, was originally written more than twenty-five years ago, saves believers from doubting a number of important points and prevents them denying some misunderstood allegorical Hadiths, —because this treatise was found on someone I did not know a long way away from me, and the wrong meaning was given to this, and an offensive letter was found in Kütahya and Balikesir; and to arrest now in this freezing cold numerous artisans and tradesmen for having in their possession some old, commonplace letter written by me, or for having driven me around in their carriage, or because of their friendship towards me, or for having read one of my books, and to ruin them, and cause them, and the country and nation, material loss and immaterial loss of thousands of liras,— what law demands this? Which article of which law necessitates it? I request to learn of these laws so I do not take any false step.
Yes, one reason for our arrests at both Denizli and Afyon was this: even if to suppose the impossible the Fifth Ray did look to this world and politics, —although it was written long ago while I was in the Darü’l-Hikmeti’l-Islâmiye,5 and the original was written even before that, with the idea of saving the belief of the ordinary people in the face of those who denied some Hadiths because they thought they were irrational, since they did not known how they should be interpreted— and even if it had been written at this time, since it was private, and was not found with me in the searches, and its predictions about the future turned out to be true, and it dispels doubts on questions of belief, and does not disturb public order, and is not confrontational, and only gives news of things, and does not specify any individuals, and sets out a scholarly truth in general form, — since this is the case, surely even if the Hadith’s meaning is seen to conform to certain persons at this time, and before it was exhibited and made public in the courts it had been held to be confidential in order not to give rise to dispute, it cannot in any way constitute a crime. I also do not consider it possible that in any court of law in the world it is considered a crime to say “to reject something is one thing, and not to accept it on scholarly grounds or not to act in accordance with it is something completely different. That treatise does not accept on scholarly grounds a regime that was going to emerge in the near future.”
In Short: The Risale-i Nur has for thirty years killed at the root absolute disbelief, which destroys eternal life, turns the life of this world into a ghastly poison, spoiling all its pleasures; it has successfully killed the atheistic ideas of the Naturalists; has proved brilliantly with wonderful arguments the principles that will bring happiness to this nation in both this life and the next; and is based on the Qur’an’s reality, from the Divine Throne. I claim, and am ready to prove it, that not one or two points of a short treatise such as that, but if it contained a thousand errors, its thousand significant good aspects would cause them to be forgiven.
Third Question: It is the rule that if in a letter of twenty words five are considered reprehensible, the five are censored and the rest are permitted. So since after scrutinizing it for four months Eskishehir Court could find only fifteen words out of a hundred thousand that to the superficial view were imagined to be harmful; and since the Cabinet questioned only the explanations of two Qur’anic verses, because they contravened the present law although they had been written thirty years previously, on two of the four hundred pages of Zülfikâr; and the Denizli and Ankara Committees of Experts questioned only fifteen errors; and since up to the present it has been the means of reforming the characters of hundreds of thousands of people, the Risale-i Nur has brought to pass a thousand things widely beneficial for this country and nation; —since this is so, which principle of the Government of the Republic does it conform to, to arrest in this work-season and bitter winter unfortunates like the Çaliskan’s who serve me seeking God’s pleasure, because they have performed some small service for the Risale-i Nur, or written out one of its treatises because it had saved their belief, and were brotherly towards me out of kindness because I was elderly and a stranger in Emirdag? Which of its laws would permit such a thing?
Since in accordance with the law of freedom of conscience the principles of the Republic do not interfere with those without religion, surely it necessitates that they do not interfere with religiously-minded people who are not involved in the world as far as it is possible, and do not dispute with the worldly, and strive usefully for their lives in the hereafter, their belief, and their country too. I know that the politicians who govern in Asia, where the prophets appeared, will not, and cannot, ban taqwa and good works, which for a thousand years have been as essential for this nation as food and medicine. Humanity demands that anything not conforming to the current view in the above questions is overlooked, since, having lived in solitude for twenty years, they were asked with the head of the Said of twenty years ago.
I consider it my patriotic duty to recall the following, for the benefit of the country, nation, and public security: to arrest and make resentful in this way because of some slight connection with me and the Risale-i Nur, may turn against the Government numerous people who are religiously beneficial for the country and its security, thus opening up the way to anarchy. Yes, there are far in excess of a hundred thousand people who have saved their belief through the Risale-i Nur and have become harmless and highly beneficial for the nation. With their moderation and usefulness, they are perhaps to be found in every large department of the Government of the Republic and in every level of society. It is essential that these people are not offended but protected.
I feel a strong anxiety that certain official persons who do not heed our complaints nor allow us to speak out, and repress us on various pretexts are opening up the way to anarchy to the harm of this country.
Also, for the good of the Government I say this: since the courts of both Denizli and Ankara scrutinized the Fifth Ray, and did not object to it but returned it to us, it is essential for the Government that proceedings are not reopened officially, giving rise to rumours and gossip. Just as I concealed the treatise before it passed into the hands of the courts and they publicized it, so the Afyon authorities and Court should not make it the object of question and answer. For it is powerful and irrefutable. It made predictions, and they turned out right. Moreover, its aim is not this world, at the most one of its many meanings fits a person who is dead and gone. For the sake of the country, nation, public order, and government, I am bound by conscience to warn against making those predictions and meanings official due to bigoted friendship for him, and further publicizing it by reprimanding us.
***


To the Afyon Public Prosecutor and the Chairman and Members of the Court
[I am presenting to you in order to protect my rights, exactly the same nine ‘Principles’ which I presented to the Denizli judicial authorities.]
Twenty years ago I abandoned social life, and especially official, refined, political life such as this. I do not know what position should be taken in such situations, and I do not think of it, and to think of it causes me acute distress. But I am compelled to present this disorganized defence and petition, which is the conclusion and summary of the answers I gave to the numerous, repetitious, and haphazard questions of an unfair member of another court of law. Perhaps it lacks order and contains irrelevant and unnecessary repetitions, vehement expressions which may act against me, and sentences opposed to the new laws, which I do not know. But since it proceeds on the truth, for the sake of the truth the faults should be disregarded. This petition and defence speech is based on nine ‘Principles’.
The First: Since in accordance with the Republic’s principle of freedom of conscience, the Government of the Republic does not interfere with the irreligious and dissipated, it certainly should not interfere with the religious and righteous; and since no irreligious nation can continue in existence, and with regard to religion Asia does not conform to Europe, and an irreligious Muslim does not resemble any other person without religion; and since no sort of progress or civilization can take the place of religion, or righteousness, or the learning of the truths of belief in particular, which are the innate need of the people of this country, who for a thousand years have illumined the world with their religion and heroically preserved their firmness of faith in the face of the assaults of the whole world, and cannot be made to forget that need; surely no government of this nation in this country can intervene in the Risale-i Nur in respect of justice and the law and public order.
Second Principle: Since it is one thing to reject something and something quite different not to act in accordance with it; and all governments have fierce opponents; and there were Muslims under Zoroastrian rule and Jews and Christians under the Islamic government of the Caliph ‘Umar; and all those who do not cause trouble to the government or disturb public order have personal freedom, and this may not be curtailed, and governments look to the hand and not to the heart; and since those who want to upset public order and the administration and interfere in politics will doubtless concern themselves with the newspapers and current affairs in order to learn about the movements, situations, and events that will assist them so they make no false moves; and since the Risale-i Nur so restrains its students that as my close friends know, for twenty-five years it has made me give up reading the newspapers and even asking about them or being curious and thinking about them; and since for ten years now I have withdrawn from social life to such an extent that apart from the German defeat and the spread of communism I have heard no news about what is happening in the world and the current situation; certainly and without doubt no one can attack me and my brothers like me on grounds of governmental wisdom, the laws of politics, and principles of justice; and if they do, it is bound to be due to delusions, or out of hatred or obduracy.
Third Principle: I am obliged to give the following lengthy details because of the meaningless and unnecessary objections of the public prosecutor of the former court, which he made due to a misunderstanding concerning not the law, but his bigoted love of a certain dead person.
Firstly: Before it fell into the hands of the Government, I treated the Fifth Ray as confidential. Moreover, it was not found in any of the searches. Also, its purpose was only to save the ordinary people from doubts concerning their beliefs and from denying allegorical Hadiths. It looks to worldly aspects of the Hadiths only indirectly, in third or fourth place. The predictions it makes are true. Moreover, it does not contest the politicians and worldly; it only makes predictions. Also, it does not specify anyone. It explains in general fashion a true meaning of a Hadith. But they applied that general truth to a fearsome person living in this century. They therefore objected to it, supposing it had been written in recent years. In fact, the original of the treatise was previous to the Darü’l-Hikmet. But it was set in order some time later, and included in the Risale-i Nur. It was like this:
Forty years ago, the year before the Proclamation of the Constitution,6 I came to Istanbul. The Commander-in-Chief of the Japanese army had asked some questions of the Istanbul ‘ulama at that time. The Istanbul hojas asked me about them. They asked me many things in that connection.
For instance, they asked me about a Hadith which says: “At the end of time, a fearsome individual will rise in the morning and on his forehead will be written: ‘This is an infidel.’”7 I told them: “This extraordinary person will come to lead this nation; he will rise in the morning, put a [brimmed] hat on his head, and make others wear it.”
After receiving this answer, they asked me: “Won’t those who wear it be infidels?” I said: “They will be made to wear the brimmed hat and be forbidden to prostrate in prayer. But the belief in the heads of those wearing the brimmed hat will make the hat prostrate, and God willing, will make it Muslim.”
They then said: “This person will drink water and his hand will be pierced, and it will be known through this that he is the Sufyan.” I said to them in reply: “It is commonly said about someone who is very extravagant that he has a hole in his hand. That is, he cannot hold onto anything; it flows from him and is lost. Thus, this fearsome man will be addicted to raki, it will make him ill, he will become excessively extravagant and accustom others to being the same.”
Then someone asked: “When he dies, Satan will proclaim loudly to the world from ‘Dikili Ta_’ in Istanbul that so-and-so has died.” So I said: “The news will be broadcast by telegraph.” However, I heard shortly afterwards that the radio had been invented, and I realized that my answer had not been completely accurate. Eight years later while in the Darü’l-Hikmet, I said: “Satan will broadcast it to the world by radio.”
They then asked me questions about the Barrier of Dhu’l-Qarnayn, Gog and Magog, the Beast (Dabbat al-Ard), the Antichrist (Dajjal), and the second coming of Jesus (Peace be upon him), and I replied to them. In fact the answers are written in part in my old treatises. Some time later, Mustafa Kemal twice summoned me to Ankara8 by code by means of the former governor of the province of Van, my old friend, Tahsin Bey, in recognition of my published work The Six Steps (Hutuvât-i Sitte). I went. Since Shaykh Sanusi9 did not know Kurdish, it was proposed I should take his place as ‘general preacher’ of the Eastern Provinces on a salary of three hundred liras. I was also offered a position as a deputy, and my former post together with the other members of the Darü’l-Hikmet within the Directorate of Religious Affairs. Moreover, being endorsed by one hundred and sixty-three out of two hundred deputies, one hundred and fifty thousand liras were allotted for the Medresetü’z-Zehra, my university in the East, the foundations of which I had laid in Van, and this was accepted. However, since I saw that the predictions of the original of the Fifth Ray were in part realized in a person there, I was compelled to forgo those most important duties. Telling myself that the person could not be opposed or confronted, I gave up the world, and politics, and the life of society, and dedicated all my time to saving religious belief. However, a number of tyrannical and unjust officials forced me to write two or three treatises which looked to the world.
Later, in connection with some questions asked by some persons about allegorical Hadiths which give news of the events at the end of time, I rearranged that old treatise. It received the name of the Fifth Ray. The Risale-i Nur is not numbered chronologically. For example, the Thirty-Third Letter was written before the First Letter, and the original of the Fifth Ray and some other parts were written previously to the Risale-i Nur itself. Anyway... the illegal, unnecessary, and inaccurate objections and questions of a public prosecutor, asked out of bigoted love of Mustafa Kemal, forced me to provide these explanations outside the subject. I am giving here as an example some of the entirely personal and unlawful things he said in the name of the law. He said:
“Aren’t you sincerely sorry that you insulted him in the Fifth Ray with expressions like ‘swilling down raki and wine like a water pump’?” I say in reply to the completely meaningless and mistaken bigotry arising from his love: “The victory and honour of the heroic army cannot be ascribed to him; he can have only a share of it. Like it would be tyrannical and an awesome injustice if the booty, possessions, and rations of an army were all given to its commander. Yes, just as he accused me of not loving that unjust and extremely faulty man, quite simply accusing me of being a traitor, so I accuse him of not loving the army, for he ascribes all its honour and moral booty to the man he loves, depriving the army of all glory. The reality is that positive things, and instances of good and virtue, should be distributed among the community and army, and the negative things, destruction, and faults ascribed to the chief. For the existence of ssomething is dependent on the existence of all its conditions and elements, and the commander is only one of the conditions. While the non-existence of the thing and its falling apart, occurs through the non-existence of one of its conditions and one of its elements being spoilt and destroyed. Instances of good and virtues for the most part are positive and pertain to existence. The leaders cannot lay claim to them. Instances of bad and faults are destructive and pertain to non-existence, and the leaders are answerable for them. While the reality is thus, just as if a tribe is mocked if, when it wins victories ‘Hasan Aga’ is applauded, and when it is defeated it is blamed, and this is judged to be the reverse of the truth; in just the same way, in the name of the court the public prosecutor imputed a fault to me that was completely the reverse of the truth and reality.
Similarly to his mistake, a little previously to the Great War while I was in Van, a number of religious, God-fearing persons came to me. They told me: “Some of the military commanders act contrarily to religion. Come and join us, we are going to rebel against them.”
I told them: “Bad conduct and irreligion like that is particular to commanders like them; the army cannot be held responsible for it. There are perhaps a hundred thousand saints in the Ottoman Army; I shall not draw my sword against it. I will not join you.” They left me, drew their swords, and the fruitless Bitlis Incident occurred. A short time later war broke out. The army took part in it in the name of religion; it entered the jihad, and a hundred thousand martyrs from it rose to the degree of sainthood. They confirmed what I had said, signing the decrees for their sainthood with their blood. Anyway... I was compelled to relate this at some length. The extraordinary attitude of a public prosecutor who acted derisively towards myself and the Risale-i Nur due to unimportant, mistaken feelings and partiality, in the name of justice, one incontrovertible mark of which is imperviousness to all feelings and outside influences, drove me to make this long statement.
Fourth Principle: After scrutinizing for four months hundreds of copies of treatises and letters, Eskishehir Court could only give sentences of six months to fifteen men out of one hundred and twenty, and one year to myself for fifteen words in one or two treatises out of a hundred. They acquitted us of founding a sufi order and organizing a political society and in the hat question. We anyway had served the sentence. Then in Kastamonu they found nothing in numerous searches. And a number of years ago in Isparta all the parts of the Risale-i Nur without exception, both confidential and otherwise, fell into the hands of the authorities. They were all returned to their owners after three months of scrutiny. A few years later, all the parts of the Risale-i Nur remained for two years in the Courts of Denizli and Ankara, then they were all returned to us. Since the fact is that, those who accuse myself and the Risale-i Nur students emotionally, maliciously, and unlawfully in the name of the law like him, are accusing before us both Eskishehir Court, and Denizli Court, and Ankara Criminal Court, making them partners in our crime, if there is one. For if we had been guilty, those three or four authorities did not see it despite their close scrutiny or they disregarded it, and two courts did not see it having studied it minutely for two years, or they disregarded it, which makes them more guilty than us. However, if we had had any desire to interfere in the world, it would not have been with the buzzing of a fly, it would have exploded and boomed like a cannon.
Yes, anyone who accuses of political intrigue a person who defended himself vehemently and without restraint in the Military Court after the Thirty-First of March Incident10 and in the Speaker’s Office in the face of Mustafa Kemal’s anger, saying he was hatching his schemes for eighteen years without allowing anyone to detect it, surely does so for some malicious purpose. We are hopeful that like the Denizli public prosecutor, the Afyon public prosecutor will save us from the malice and accusations of such people and demonstrate true justice.
Fifth Principle: A fundamental principle of the Risale-i Nur students is that as far as is possible they do not interfere in politics, or matters of administration, or government activities, because for them, working seriously for the Qur’an is worth everything, and is sufficient.
Also, no one who enters politics, among the overwhelming currents that now prevail, can preserve his independence and sincerity. He is bound to become subject to one of the currents, and it will exploit him for worldly ends. It will corrupt the sacredness of his duty. Also, in the material struggle, due to the utter tyranny and despotism that is the rule this century, he would have to crush numerous innocent supporters of a person because of the error that person had made. He would otherwise be defeated. It would also seem in the view of those who had given up their religion for the world, or who exploited it, that the Qur’an’s sacred truths, which can be the tool of nothing, were being exploited for political propaganda. Also, every class of people, supporters and opposers, officials and common people, should have a share of those truths and all are in need of them. The Risale-i Nur students have therefore to avoid politics and the material struggle completely, and not be in any way involved in them, so that they may remain completely impartial.
Sixth Principle: The Risale-i Nur should not be attacked in this matter because of my personal faults or those of some of my brothers. It is bound directly to the Qur’an, and the Qur’an is bound to the Supreme Throne. Who has the ability to stretch out his hand and unfasten it? Also, as is indicated by thirty-three Qur’anic verses, Imam ‘Ali’s (May God be pleased with him) three miraculous prophecies and the certain pronouncements of Gawth al-A‘zam (May his mystery be sanctified), the Risale-i Nur has performed an extraordinary service for this country and is a source of material plenty and spiritual effulgence for it, and cannot therefore be held responsible for our petty, personal faults, and it should not be held responsible. Otherwise both material and spiritual loss will be caused to this country which it will impossible to repair.
God willing, the assaults and diabolical machinations against the Risale-i Nur of the atheists hostile to us will be foiled, for its students cannot be compared with others, they cannot be scattered nor be made to give it up; through God’s grace, they will not be defeated. If the Qur’an had not prohibited them from physical defence... those students, who are everywhere and have won public favour, which is like the life-blood of this nation, would never get involved in petty and fruitless incidents like the Shaykh Said11 and Menemen incidents.12 If, God forbid, they were persecuted to the point they were compelled and the Risale-i Nur attacked, the atheists and dissemblers who deceive the Government would regret it a thousand times over.
In Short: Since we do not interfere in the worlds of the worldly, they should not interfere in our work for the hereafter and our service of religious belief.
[I am relating here by way of defence an old memory and pleasant anecdote which was not divulged in Eskishehir Court and was not written in the official records, nor has been included in my defence speeches.]
They asked me there: “What do you think about the Republic?” I replied: “As my biography which you have in your hands proves, I was a religious republican before any of you, with the exception of the Chairman of the Court, was born. A summary is this: like now, I was living at that time in seclusion in a remote tomb. They used to bring me soup, and I would give breadcrumbs to the ants. I used to eat my bread having dipped it in the soup. They asked me about it and I told them: the ant and bee nations are republicans. I give the breadcrumbs to the ants out of respect for their republicanism.”
Then they said to me: “You are opposing the righteous early generations of Islam.” I told them in reply: “The four Rightly-Guided Caliphs were both Caliphs and Presidents of the Republic. Abu Bakr the Veracious (May God be pleased with him), the Ten Promised Paradise, and the Companions of the Prophet were like presidents of the republic. But not as an empty name and title, they were heads of a religious republic which bore the meaning of true justice and freedom in accordance with the Shari‘a.”
I told them: Mr. Prosecutor and Members of the Court! You are accusing me of holding an idea opposite to that which I have held for fifty years. If you ask me about the secular republic, what I understand by it is that ‘secular’ (laic) means to be impartial; that is, a government which, in accordance with the principle of freedom of conscience, does not interfere with the religiously-minded and pious, the same as it does not interfere with the irreligious and dissipated. I withdrew from political and social life twenty-five years ago, and what form the Government of the Republic has taken, I do not know. If, I seek refuge with God, it has assumed a fearsome form whereby, on account of irreligion, it passes and accepts laws to incriminate those who work for their belief and lives in the hereafter, then I announce to you fearlessly and warn you that if I had a thousand lives, I would be ready to sacrifice all of them for belief and life in the hereafter. Do whatever you will! My last word is For us God suffices, and He is the Best Disposer of Affairs! In response to your wrongfully condemning me to capital punishment or hard labour, I say: as the Risale-i Nur has discovered and shown with absolute certainty, I am not being executed; I am being discharged and departing for the world of light and happiness. As for you, our covert enemies, wretches who oppress us on account of misguidance! Since I know you are condemned to eternal extinction and everlasting solitary confinement, and I have seen this, I have taken my revenge on you totally, and am ready to surrender up my spirit with a perfectly easy mind!
Seventh Principle: In consequence of superficial investigations held in other places, Afyon Court looked on us as a political society. My reply is this:
Firstly: As is testified to by all those who have befriended me, I have read no newspaper for nineteen years, nor listened to one, nor asked about one, and for the past ten years five months have received no news except about the German defeat and the terror of communism, and I have not been curious, and have not known. Such a person surely has no connection whatsoever with politics, and no relations with any political society.
Secondly: The one hundred and thirty parts of the Risale-i Nur are there for all to see. Understanding that they contained no worldly goal and no aim other than the truths of belief, Eskishehir Court did not object to them with the exception of one or two of the parts, and Denizli Court objected to none at all, and despite being under constant surveillance for eight years the large Kastamonu police force could find no one to charge apart from my two assistants and three others, and those charges were merely pretexts. This is a decisive proof that the students of the Risale-i Nur are in no way a political society. If what is intended by ‘society’ in the indictment is a community concerned with religious belief and the hereafter, in reply we say this:
If the name ‘community’ is given to university students and tradesmen, it may also be applied to us. But if you call us a community that is going to breach internal security by exploiting religious feelings, in response we say:
The facts that in no place over a period of twenty years in these stormy times Risale-i Nur students have breached internal security or disturbed public order, and no such incident has been recorded by either the Government or any court, refutes this accusation. If the name community is given meaning it might breach internal security in the future through strengthening religious feelings, we say this:
Firstly, foremost the Directorate of Religious Affairs, and all preachers, perform the same service.
Secondly, it is not disturbing the peace and breaching security, the students of the Risale-i Nur protect the nation from anarchy with all their strength and conviction, and maintain public order and guard security. The evidence for this has been cited in the First Principle.
Yes, we are a community, and our aim and programme is to save firstly ourselves and then our nation from eternal annihilation and everlasting solitary confinement in the Intermediate Realm, and to protect our compatriots from anarchy and lawlessness, and to protect ourselves with the firm truths of the Risale-i Nur against atheism, which is the means to destroying our lives in this world and in the next.
Eighth Principle: Saying its treatises contain some sharp expressions, they accuse us as a result of deficient and superficial study of the Risale-i Nur carried out in other places. In reply I say this: since our aim is belief and the hereafter, it is not confrontation with the worldly. And since the sharpness particular to these very insignificant one or two treatises was not intentional —we bumped against the worldly while advancing towards our goal— it certainly does not infer political prejudice. And since possibilities are one thing and occurrences are something else, and what we have been accused of is “possibly” disturbing public order, not having disturbed it, it is meaningless, for anyone may kill someone else. And since over a period of twenty years in their scrupulous investigations into twenty thousand people and thousands of copies and letters, and in their searches, neither Eskishehir, nor Kastamonu, nor Isparta, nor Denizli could find anything constituting a real crime, Eskishehir Court was compelled to find us guilty because of one short treatise under one article of an ‘elastic’ law, and could only give six-month sentences to fifteen people out of a hundred in such a way that they should have sentenced all who teach religion. I wonder if the twenty confidential letters one of your people had written over a year were scrutinized, wouldn’t they contain twenty incriminating sentences which would shame him? But the fact that in twenty thousand copies of the treatises and letters from twenty thousand people they could not find twenty truly incriminating sentences shows that the Risale-i Nur’s aim is solely the hereafter. It has no business with this world.
Ninth Principle: As with the matters which Denizli Court’s just prosecutor included in the indictment because of the unfair and superficial records of other places, so with Afyon Court —as indicated by what we experienced while being questioned— pretexts have been made so that we have been charged concerning the same matters, and undated letters, and correspondence over twenty, fifteen, and ten years, and the Fifth Ray —decisive answers about which are found in the Third Principle above and in the Second Question of my petition above— and four or five treatises out of the hundred and thirty of the Risale-i Nur, and a number of letters and treatises which were scrutinized by Eskishehir Court and for which the sentences were served, were later covered by the pardon and were acquitted by Denizli Court. Can it be said about someone who with a speech outside the War Ministry during the Thirty-First of March Incident brought to order eight battalions which had not heeded the Shaykh al-Islam and ‘ulama, that he strove for eight years —as stated by the police report— and only succeeded in deceiving twenty or thirty people? For instance, in the large town of Kastamonu he was able to hoodwink only five people? For during the Denizli affair, in Kastamonu they pulled out all my papers and books, both confidential and otherwise, from under the firewood, and after studying them for three months could find no one in that large town other than Feyzi, Emin, Hilmi, Tevfik, and Sâdik. Because Feyzi and the others had performed some personal services for me for God’s sake, they sent them to prison, together with the three brothers and three or four others they found in Emirdag, who had assisted me for three and a half years. If I had done what that superficial report stated, I would have deceived not five or ten people but five hundred or perhaps five thousand, or even five hundred thousand. As in Denizli Court I pointed out the many errors in the police reports, so too here I am pointing out one or two examples:
They accused us of “corrupting religion” because, following an Islamic custom practised since the age of the Prophet, I had compiled a Hizb al-Qur’ani like a large An‘am13 out of the hundreds of well-known verses which form the sources of the Risale-i Nur.
Also, they want to incriminate us by showing that the Treatise On Islamic Dress (Tesettür Risalesi) was written and published this year, whereas I have already served a year’s sentence for it, and I treated it as confidential, and as noted in the police report, it was pulled out from under piles of firewood. Also, although the well-known person did not respond and was silent in the face of the objections and harsh words I said to him in the Speaker’s Office in the Assembly in Ankara, with gross exaggeration the prosecution applied to him literally the natural, necessary, general, and confidential criticisms in my explanations of forty years previously concerning a Hadith which describes his errors, after his death, making it into an indictable offence for us. Can there be any comparison between the sake or memory of someone who is dead and gone and who no longer has any connection with the Government, and Almighty God’s laws of justice, which are a manifestation of His sovereignty?
Also, freedom of conscience which, of the principles adopted by the Government of the Republic, is the one we have most relied on and defended ourselves with, has been made something we have transgressed against, as though we are opposed to it.
Also, because I criticised the evils and faults of civilization, unimaginable things are ascribed to me in the police reports: as though I do not accept the use of the radio,14 aeroplane and railway, they accuse me of being opposed to modern progress.
Making a comparison with these examples, God willing, like the just and fair Denizli public prosecutor, Afyon Court will show how contrary to justice this treatment is, and will attach no importance to the delusions in those police reports.
The strangest error is this: in one place I said: although mankind should have responded with endless thanks to Almighty God’s supreme bounties of the aeroplane, railway, and radio, they did not respond in that way, so He rained down bombs on their heads from the ’planes. The radio is also a supreme bounty, and thanks for it may be shown by making it a universal reciter of the Qur’an with millions of tongues, allowing all the people on the face of the earth to listen to it. Also, I said when explaining in the Twentieth Word that the Qur’an makes predictions about the future wonders of civilization, that one of its verses indicates that the infidels will defeat the Islamic world with the railway. Although I had urged Islam to lay hold of these wonders, some of the prosecutors in previous courts, accused us of being against modern progress, and made the aeroplane, railway, and radio the basis of charges against us.
Also, although it is completely unrelated, someone said about the name ‘Risaletü’n-Nur,’ which is a second name of the Risale-i Nur, that “it is a message (risalet) from the light of the Qur’an, that is, it is inspired by it, and is an heir performing the function of Divine messengership, of the Shari‘a.” In another place in the indictment, it was given the wrong meaning and made the basis of other charges, as though I had said: “the Risale-i Nur is a Divine Messenger (resûl).”
I have also proved with decisive arguments in twenty places in my defence speeches that even if it was for the whole world, we would not exploit either religion, or the Qur’an, or the Risale-i Nur, and they may not be exploited, and that we would not change one of their truths for rule over the whole world, and that is how we are in fact. There have been thousands of indications of what I claim over the last twenty years. But from the way the interrogations at Afyon are going, and its indictment, we are being accused due to other police reports of expending all our efforts on worldly intrigues, and hastening to the hateful games of this world, and making religion the tool of lowly things and degrading its sacredness, and making these our aim. Since it is thus, with all my strength I say: For us God suffices, and He is the Best Disposer of Affairs!
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
An Addendum to My Written Objections to the Charges
Made Against Us by Afyon Court
[Those I address in this objection are not the Afyon Prosecutor and Court, but the spiteful and suspicious officials who due to the false and defective reports of public prosecutors in other places and informers and detectives, have turned against us the extraordinary situation here and in the office of the examining magistrate.]
Firstly: Just how far from justice it is to call the Risale-i Nur students, who are innocent and have no connection with politics, a political society, which is completely baseless and never even occurred to us, and to accuse the unfortunates who embraced the Risale-i Nur and have no aim other than belief and the hereafter, of publishing works for that society, or being active officers or members of it, or of reading the Risale-i Nur or teaching it to others, or of writing it out, thus deeming them guilty of some crime, and to send them to court — a proof of how far this is from justice is as follows:
In accordance with the principles of freedom of thought and freedom of scholarship, those who read the harmful works written to oppose the Qur’an by Doctor Dozy and other atheists are not considered to have committed crimes, yet those who have great need to learn the truths of the Qur’an and belief and long to do so, and read and write out the Risale-i Nur, which teaches those truths as clearly as daylight, are considered guilty of crimes. Also, they based their allegations on a few sentences in one or two treatises which we had treated as confidential before they were exhibited in court, so that among a hundred other treatises a wrong meaning should not be given them, and accusations were made concerning them. However, with the exception of one of those treatises, Eskishehir Court scrutinized them and objected only to one or two matters in Treatise On Islamic Dress, and the exception is replied to extremely decisively in both my petition and my objections to the indictment; and the fact that “we have light in our hands, not the club of politics” was proved conclusively from twenty angles in Eskishehir Court; and Denizli Court scrutinized all the treatises of the Risale-i Nur without exception and did not object to any of them. Nevertheless, those unfair prosecutors extended those three or four sentences to the whole Risale-i Nur, and just as they confiscated the four-hundred-page Zülfikâr because of two pages, so they stated those who read and write out the Risale-i Nur were guilty of a crime and accused myself of contesting the Government. I call on those close to me and the friends who meet with me to testify that for more than ten years, apart from two leaders, one deputy, and the Governor of Kastamonu, I have have not known who the leaders of the Government were, or who its ministers, commanders, officials, and deputies were, and I have not been curious to find out. However, one or two years ago, one or two persons displayed an interest in me and I learnt of five or six of the leading members of the Government. Is it in any way possible for someone not to know the people he is contesting, and to have no wish to know them, to attach no importance to learning whether they are friend or foe? It is understood from this that they dream up totally baseless pretexts to ruin me whatever happens.
Since that is the case, I say not to the court here but to those unjust people: I don’t give tuppence for your severest penalty; it has no importance whatsoever. For I am seventy-five years old and have one foot in the grave. To exchange one or two years of innocent life of persecution for the rank of martyrdom would be the greatest happiness for me. Thanks to the thousands of proofs of the Risale-i Nur, I believe with the utmost certainty that for us death is our discharge papers. Even if outwardly it is execution, for us one hour’s distress would be the key to eternal happiness and mercy. But as for you, covert, cruel enemies who confuse the judiciary on account of atheism and preoccupy the Government with us for no reason! Be certain of this and tremble! For you are being condemned to eternal annihilation and everlasting solitary confinement. We see that our revenge is being taken on you in compounded fashion. We pity you even. Yes, surely the reality of death, which has emptied this town a hundred times into the graveyard has demands greater than life. To find a way of being delivered from its certain execution is man’s greatest need, more important than anything. Those who on trite pretexts impute guilt to the Risale-i Nur students, who have found this way for themselves, and to the Risale-i Nur, which provides that way with thousands of proofs, —how guilty they are themselves in the eyes of truth and justice even lunatics would understand.
There are three matters which deceive these unjust people and give rise to the delusion of a political society, which is completely irrelevant:
The First: The fact that since early days my students have been fervently attached to me like brothers, has given rise to the erroneous impression of a society.
The Second: Some of the Risale-i Nur students have acted as though they were an Islamic group, such as is found everywhere and is permitted by the laws of the Republic and is not harassed by it, and this has been imagined to be a society. But those limited three or four students have not intended any sort of political society, only to serve belief together sincerely as brothers and to support each other in working for the hereafter.
The Third: Because those unfair people know themselves to be misguided and overcome by love of this world, and because they find some of the Government’s laws convenient for themselves, they say to themselves: “Most probably Said and his friends oppose the Government’s laws, which suit our caprices, which are illicit in the eyes of civilization. In which case, they are a political society which opposes the Government.”
So I say: You wretches! If the world was eternal, and man was going to remain in it permanently, and his only duty was politics, perhaps there would have been some meaning in your slander. But if I had undertaken this work with a view to politics, you would have found not ten sentences in a hundred treatises, but a thousand, to be political and combative. If to suppose the impossible, like you, we had been working with all our strength for worldly aims and pleasures and politics, which not even Satan could make anyone accept, even if it had been thus, since these twenty years there has been no incident in which we were involved, and the Government looks not to the heart but to the hand, and all governments have fierce opponents, you cannot deem us guilty in the name of the law. My last word is
God suffices me, there is no god but He; in Him do I place my trust — He the Sustainer of the Throne [of Glory] Supreme!15
***


[After our acquittal in Denizli Court I lived alone and did not concern myself with politics. This new affair, which has resulted in our being sent to Afyon Prison, is therefore unlawful in ten ways, as I shall explain.]
The First: Although the Risale-i Nur has been scrutinized by three courts and three committees of experts, and seven departments of government in Ankara and their legal bodies, and although all the treatises were unanimously acquitted without opposition, and Said and his seventy-five companions were all acquitted without being sentenced to a single day’s imprisonment, to again seize those treatises as though they were pernicious writings is totally contrary to the law, as anyone the slightest bit reasonable would understand.
The Second: A man who lived for three and a half years all alone and a stranger in Emirdag after having been acquitted, with his door locked from the outside and bolted on the inside, who accepted only one out of a hundred people on essential business, and even gave up the work of writing he had pursued for twenty years and wrote no more —he had the lock on his door smashed by detectives for political purposes and they broke in on him, but they could find nothing other than an Arabic prayerbook and a wall-hanging. Anyone with even a grain of fairness would understand how illegal it was to harass him in this way.
The Third: As he said in court: if there is someone who as is confirmed by seventy witnesses, for seven years knew nothing of the Second World War and was not curious about it nor asked about it, and now for ten years has been in the same state of mind, and for twenty-five years has read no newspaper nor listened to one, and for thirty years has said: “I seek refuge with God from Satan and politics,” and has avoided politics with all his strength, and if in twenty-two years of the most tortuous distress, in order not to attract the attention of politicians or become involved in politics, has not once applied to the Government to alleviate his conditions —if there is such a person, is it in conformity with any law to raid his place of seclusion as though he was plotting political intrigues, and cause him unheard of suffering while he was ill? Anyone with an iota of conscience would pity him in that state!
The Fourth: Eskishehir Court studied the Risale-i Nur for six months because we had been charged with organizing a political society and founding a sufi order, and due to that suspicion and because of the personal hatred towards us of the great leader it urged certain members of the judiciary to act against us, yet that court acquitted us of founding a political society and sufi order and the Risale-i Nur charges, and only making a pretext of a short piece called Treatise On Islamic Dress, gave sentences of six months to fifteen out of a hundred students, not in accordance with the law but arbitrarily. And although until the investigations had been completed they remained in prison for four and a half months, that is, they served prison sentences of one and a half months, and ten years later Denizli Court again on a number of pretexts like organizing a political society and founding a sufi order, and after scrutinizing closely twenty years’ worth of letters and writings, sent five boxes of books to Ankara Criminal Court, and although those books and letters were the subject of two years’ close scrutiny by Ankara and Denizli Courts, they passed a unanimous decision for their acquittal concerning the political society and sufi order16 and other pretexts, and returned all the books to their owners. They also acquitted Said and his companions. So anyone who has not lost his humanity will understand just how illegal it is to look on him as a political activist and accuse him of being a plotter, and to provoke the officers of the court against him.
The Fifth: Because of the compassion which is the basis of my way and that of the Risale-i Nur and for thirty years has been a principle by which I have lived, so that no harm comes to the innocent I do not censure the tyrants who persecute me, let alone cursing them. Even when angry at some of those depraved wretches who oppress me out of vicious hatred, or even the irreligious tyrants, my compassion prevents me from responding with a curse, let alone physically. For those cruel tyrants have parents and children; I do nothing to them so that no material harm comes to those four or five elderly unfortunates and innocents. Sometimes I even forgive them. It is because of this compassion that I absolutely never interfere in government or disturb public order. Moreover, I have recommended this so strongly to all my friends that some of the fair-minded police of three provinces have admitted that “these Risale-i Nur students are police of a sort; they preserve order and maintain public security.” There are thousands of witnesses to this fact, and they have confirmed it through twenty years’ experience and thousands of students have corroborated it by never having been involved in any incident recorded by the police, so which law permits that unhappy man’s house to be raided as though he was a revolutionary and ‘komitadji’, and for pitiless men to insult him, and despite not finding anything in his house, as though he was a multiple criminal gather up his most precious, miraculous Qur’an and the inscriptions hanging on his wall as though they were pernicious writings? What benefit demands turning thousands of religious people who thus serve public order with their good morals against government and public order because of some baseless suspicion?
The Sixth: Endless thanks be to God that thirty years ago, through His grace and the effulgence of the Qur’an, a person realized just how valueless and meaningless are the fleeting fame and glory of this world, and its egotistical self-admiration and celebrity, and since that time has struggled with all his strength against his evil-commanding soul, and to be self-effacing and give up egotism, and not to be artificial and hypocritical. Those who have served him or befriended him are perfectly certain of this and testify to it. For twenty years he has fled with all his might from people’s good opinions and their attention, which everyone takes too much pleasure in, and contrary to everyone else has rejected praise and acclaim and being accorded a spiritual rank. He has also rejected the excessively good opinions of him of his closest brothers, and has wounded their feelings by not accepting the praise and commendation expressed in their letters. He has show himself to be devoid of virtue, and has ascribed all virtue to the Risale-i Nur, a Qur’anic commentary, and hence to the collective personality of the Risale-i Nur students, thinking of himself as only a lowly servant. This proves that he has not tried to make himself liked, and he has not wanted to and has rejected it. So under what law has he been deemed guilty because without his consent some of his friends in a distant place had an excessively good opinion of him and eulogized him and awarded him a high spiritual rank; and because of what a preacher said in the region of Kütahya whom he does not know; and because of a letter with a forged signature which had been sent to Kütahya, where I have never sent any letter; and because of an offensive book in Balikesir, the author of which is unknown? Would any law in the world permit sending officials to break the lock of a wretched, aged, ill stranger’s room as though he had committed a serious crime, and allow them to justify this by finding only a book of supplications and a wall-hanging? Would any politics allow such aggression?
The Seventh: Would any law permit for an unfortunate who, although at this time inside the country when there are so many lively political parties and currents, internal and external, and the ground is ripe to take advantage of this, that is, to win numerous diplomats and politicians as supporters in place of his handful of friends, told all his friends, solely in order not to get involved in politics, nor damage his sincerity, nor attract the government’s attention to himself, nor to become preoccupied with the world: “Beware! Don’t get carried away by those political currents! Don’t get involved in politics! Don’t disturb public order!”; and although two currents caused him harm and distress because he withdrew in this way, the old one because of its groundless fears, and the new, because its says he does not help it — despite all this he never interfered in the worldly’s world and was busy with his life in the hereafter, and wrote not even one letter in twenty-two years to his own brother in the village of Nurs in his native region, nor ten letters in twenty years to his friends in those provinces — so which law permits that anyone intervenes to this extent with his preoccupation with the hereafter?
Would any law permit collecting up copies of the Risale-i Nur, in which three courts of law have found nothing indictable, although under the liberty laws the publications of those without religion and the communists are not interfered with despite being extremely harmful for the country and nation and morality. For the Risale-i Nur has been striving for twenty years to maintain the country and nation’s social life and morality and security; and has been effectively struggling to regain for this nation its true support, the Islamic world’s brotherhood and its friendship, and to strengthen these; and the parts of the Risale-i Nur like Zülfikâr and The Staff of Moses (Âsâ-yi Mûsa), which having been studied for three months by the Directorate of Religious Affairs on the orders of the Minister for Internal Affairs for the purpose of having it criticized, fully appreciated its value and had it put in the Department library as “an important work;” and The Staff of Moses, which was placed on the tomb of the Prophet Muhammad (Peace and blessings be upon him), as a sign of its acceptance was seen there by the Hajjis. Would any law, conscience, or justice permit these to be collected up as though they were injurious papers and sent to court?
The Eighth: Then a person who although he was given complete freedom after twenty-two years of distressing and unjustified exile, did not return to his native region where he had thousands of friends and relations, but preferred solitude and exile so that he should have no contact with social life and politics; and who gave up the very meritorious congregation of the mosque in preferance to performing the prayers on his own and remaining in his room; that is, his state of mind made him avoid the people’s adulation; and as is testified to by twenty years of his life and confirmed by thousands of valuable Turks, preferred one pious Turk to numerous negligent Kurds, and who even proved in court that he would not exchange a hundred negligent Kurds for one Turkish brother with powerful belief like Hafiz Ali; and who in order not to be the object of their respect and veneration, never met with people so long as it was not essential and did not go to the mosque; and for forty years has worked with all his strength and all his works for Islamic brotherhood and so that Muslims would love one another; and who, since the Turkish nation is the Qur’an’s standard-bearer and is praised by the Qur’an, has great love for that nation and has passed his life among its people —in order to insult this person with the tongue of officialdom and make propaganda and scare away his friends, the former governor said: “He is a Kurd and you are Turks. He is a Shafi‘i and you are Hanafi’s,” trying to frighten everyone into abandoning him. And although over twenty years and in two courts he was not forced to change his manner of dress, and the army peaked cap was modified, a brimmed hat was forcibly placed on the head of that recluse — what benefit is there is all this? What law permits it?
The Ninth: is very important,17 and very powerful, but it touches on politics so I am remaining silent.
The Tenth: This is an attack, which no law permits, and is without advantage, and is only making mountains out of molehills due to some meaningless delusion, and is no part of any law. Concerning this too I am remaining silent so as not to touch on politics, which according to our way we are unconcerned with.
In the face of treatment which is thus illegal in ten ways, all we say is For us God suffices, and He is the Best Disposer of Affairs!
S a i d N u r s i
***


I have a few more points I want to submit to
the authorities of Afyon, and to its Court and Police
The First: Most of the prophets appearing in the East and in Africa, and most of the philosophers emerging in the West and in Europe is a sign of pre-eternal Divine Determining that in Asia religion is dominant and philosophy is in second place. In consequence, even if those ruling in Asia are not religious, they should not interfere with those who work for religion; they should encourage them.
The Second: The All-Wise Qur’an is the intellect and power of thought of the head of the earth. If, I seek refuge with God, the Qur’an was to depart from the globe, the globe would go mad. It is not far from reason to suppose that another planet colliding with its head emptied of reason, would cause doomsday to erupt. Yes, the Qur’an is a chain, a ‘rope of God,’ binding the earth to the Divine Throne. It preserves the earth more than gravity. Thus, the Risale-i Nur, which is a true and powerful commentary on the Qur’an of Mighty Stature, is a supreme Divine bounty which has been demonstrating its effectiveness for twenty years in this century, an insuppressible miracle of the Qur’an. The Government therefore should not be interfering in it and trying to scare its students away from it, but protecting it and encouraging people to read it.
The Third: In Denizli Court I said the following in connection with all the believers assisting with prayers for forgiveness those who have departed for the past, and their bequeathing good works on their spirits:
When you are asked by millions of believing plaintiffs at the Supreme Tribunal: “Why did you want to ruin with imprisonment and persecution the Risale-i Nur students, who were striving to save the country and nation from anarchy and irreligion and immorality and their compatriots from eternal annihilation, although because of the liberty laws you looked tolerantly on the publications of atheists and communists and political societies that produce anarchists, and did not bother them?” What answer will you and those who want to convict and ruin the Risale-i Nur students, who serve the truths of the Qur’an, give? I am asking you the same thing! I said that to them and those just and fair-minded people acquitted us, demonstrating the fairness of the judicial system.
The Fourth: I was expecting to be taken for interrogation to a place of consultation, in either Ankara or Afyon, where questions would be asked and answered about matters of overriding importance and the Risale-i Nur’s relation to them. Yes, matters connected with finding ways of restoring the brotherhood, love, and good will of three hundred and fifty million Muslims for this nation and country, and their moral assistance for it. An indication that the Risale-i Nur is the most effective means of achieving this is the following:
In Mecca this year, a scholar of great eminence translated the main collections of the Risale-i Nur into both one of the Indian languages and Arabic, and sending them to India and Arabia, said: “Just as he strives through the Risale-i Nur to secure unity and Islamic brotherhood, our most powerful support, so he demonstrates that the Turkish nation is always progressive in religion and belief.”
I was also expecting that momentous questions would be asked like “What is the extent of the service the Risale-i Nur can provide in the face of the danger communism poses to this country, because it turns into anarchy? How can this blessed country be defended against this terrible torrent?” It should have been thus, but having been blown up out of all proportion due to the petty and personal slander of the spiteful, matters holding not the slightest importance and which are in no way crimes, were discussed, which caused distress me in these serious conditions, the like of which I have never before suffered in my life. Meaningless questions were asked about one or two minor personal matters which three previous courts had previously examined then acquitted.
The Fifth: The Risale-i Nur cannot be contested or defeated. It has been silencing the most obdurate philosophers for twenty years. It demonstrates the truths of belief as clearly as the sun. Those who rule this country should profit from its strength.
The Sixth: Destroying my unimportant character because of my personal faults, and through contemptuous treatment poisoning public opinion about me does not harm the Risale-i Nur, in fact it strengthens it in some ways. For in place of my mortal tongue are the undying tongues of a hundred thousand copies of the Risale-i Nur, and they cannot be silenced; they will speak out. And as they have up to now, the thousands of powerful tongues of its sincere students will continue that sacred, universal service till the end of the world, God willing.
The Seventh: As I stated in the previous trials putting forward the proofs, our enemies and those who oppose us both officially and unofficially, deceiving the Government, making some of its leading members suspicious about us and causing the judiciary to move against us, are either seriously deceived or have been deceived by others, or are exceedingly treacherous revolutionaries working on account of anarchy, or cunning atheists struggling against Islam and the truths of the Qur’an on account of apostasy. Calling absolute despotism “the Republic” in order to attack us, and making the regime a screen to absolute apostasy, and calling absolute dissipation “civilization,” and calling arbitrary compulsion on account of disbelief “the law,” they have both ruined us, and deceived the Government, and preoccupied the judiciary with us for no reason. Referring them to the wrath of the All-Compelling and Glorious One, we take refuge in the citadel of For us God suffices, and He is the Best Disposer of Affairs so as to defend ourselves against their evil.
The Eighth: Last year the Russians sent numerous people to make the Hajj as propaganda in order to show that they are more respectful towards the Qur’an than other nations and, because of religion, to try to turn the Islamic world against the religious people of this country. But the main collections of the Risale-i Nur were being spread at that time in both Mecca, and Medina, and Damascus, and Egypt, and Aleppo, attracting the appreciation of the religious scholars, which both negated the communist propaganda, and showed to the Islamic world that like formerly the Turkish nation and its brothers are supporting religion and the Qur’an and are the elder brothers of the other peoples of Islam and their heroic commander in the service of the Qur’an. Those collections from the Risale-i Nur demonstrated this in those sacred centres. Will it not the bring the earth to anger if this valuable national service of the Risale-i Nur is responded to with torments in this way?
The Ninth is a brief summary of a matter that was proved and elucidated in my defence in Denizli.
If through his genius and intelligence a great military commander arrogates to himself all the positive virtues of the army and ascribes to the army his own negative evils, the courageous actions and virtues of the soldiers, which equal them in number, will be reduced to one, while the commander’s evils will be equal in number to the soldiers, which is an awesome wrong and contrary to the truth. This being so, I said to the public prosecutor in our previous trials, who was attacking me because of the slap a Hadith I expounded forty years earlier dealt that person: “It’s true I’m offending him due to predictions made by Hadiths, but I’m also defending the army’s honour and preserving him from serious error. As for you, for the sake of one single friend of yours, you are affronting the honour of the army, which is the Qur’an’s standard-bearer and an heroic commander of the Islamic world.” God willing, the prosecutor saw the matter more fairly and was saved from his error.
The Tenth: It is because in the administration of justice the essence of justice and the rights of everyone who applies have to preserved without discrimination and the duty of those involved is to work solely for the sake of right, that during his caliphate, Imam ‘Ali (May God be pleased with him) sat together with a Jew in court and they were tried together. On another occasion, a just judge saw that an official was angry with a delinquent thief when he was cutting off his hand as demanded by the law. He immediately sacked the official, and full of regret said: “Those who up to now have been influenced by their feelings in this way while executing the law have perpetrated great wrongs.” Yes, even if in executing the law he does not pity the convicted man, he may not be angry; if he is, he is acting tyrannically. If he carries out capital punishment angrily, even if it is in retaliation (qisas), he becomes a sort of murderer.”
Thus, in courts of law it is this pure, unbiased truth which rules. But although three courts have acquitted us, and perhaps if they knew, ninety per cent of this nation would testify that the Risale-i Nur students are harmless and beneficial for nation and country, the students are being angrily and contemptuously mistreated, despite being innocent and much in need of consolation and the indulgence of the law. But since we have decided to meet with patience and forbearance every calamity and insult, we are silent, referring it to God and saying: “Perhaps there is some good in this.” However, I was afraid that these innocent unfortunates being treated in this way due to unfounded suspicions and the malicious reports of informers would lead to the visitation of disaster, and I was therefore obliged to write this. Anyway, if there is any fault in this matter, it is mine. These unfortunates assisted me solely seeking God’s pleasure and to save their religious belief and lives in the hereafter. For them to receive such treatment when they were deserving of praise and appreciation, is enough to make anyone angry.
Moreover, it is amazing, but again they are making unsupported assertions about a political society. However, both three courts have scrutinized this aspect of the case and acquitted us, and neither the courts, nor the police, nor the experts’ committees have discovered any sign of any society that could justify such an accusation: the Risale-i Nur students are a brotherhood which looks to the hereafter, like the students of a teacher, or university students, or the students of a Qur’an teacher who is teaching them to memorize the Qur’an. Those who have made charges against them calling them a political society, have to look on all tradesmen, preachers, and school-children as belonging to such societies. I therefore see no necessity to defend those imprisoned here as a result of such meaningless and baseless charges.
However, there is nothing at all to prevent me defending the Risale-i Nur with the same facts that I have defended it with three times previously, for it closely concerns both this country and the Islamic world, and it is the beneficial cause of plenty and blessings, material and spiritual, for this nation and country. No law or politics prohibits this or could prohibit it.
Yes, we are a society, but we a society which every century has three hundred and fifty million members. Every day with the obligatory prayers, its members demonstrate five times with perfect veneration their attachment to the principles of that sacred society, and their wish to serve it. In accordance with the sacred programme of Indeed, the believers are brothers,18 they hasten with their supplications and spiritual gains to assist one another. Yes, we are members of that holy and vast society. And our particular duty is to convey in confirmatory form to the people of belief the Qur’anic truths of faith, and save them and ourselves from eternal annihilation and perpetual solitary confinement in the Intermediate Realm. We have absolutely no connection with any worldly, political, plotting society, political or revolutionary, as has been imputed to us; we do not condescend to any such meaningless, purposeless secret society. In any event, four courts of law have investigated this down to the finest details, and then acquitted us concerning it.
S a i d N u r s i
***


My written objections, which form a supplement and addition to my defence, and were sent to six departments of government in Ankara, and presented to Afyon Criminal Court
I say this to Afyon Court: Enough now! My patience is exhausted! It is a cruel and unprecedented wrong that in addition to having harassed me for twenty-two years without reason by holding me under constant surveillance in exile in total isolation and solitary confinement, to have illegally imprisoned the Risale-i Nur students three times and caused us loss of hundreds of thousands of liras because of unfounded suspicions and utilizing ‘possibilities’ instead of facts. And this, in spite of the fact that other than two or three matters six courts have been unable to find anything contrary to the law in the hundred parts of the Risale-i Nur. The future and its generations will curse the tyrants who have been responsible for it. Up to now I have found consolation since it is my conviction that they will condemn them and cast them down to the depths of Hell at the Last Judgement, and holding my silence I have endured it. Otherwise, we could have defended our rights to the full.
Six courts over fifteen years have scrutinized the Risale-i Nur and our correspondence, and five of them in effect acquitted us on all points. Only Eskishehir Court made a pretext of five or ten words in the short treatise about the veiling of women, a single matter, and gave a light sentence under a ‘flexible’ law. When they did this, I wrote the following in the correction which after the Appeal Court I sent officially to Ankara as the sole example of illegality:
A long time ago, following the consensus and rulings of three hundred and fifty thousand Qur’anic commentaries, I expounded the Qur’anic verses about the veiling of women, which for one thousand three hundred and fifty years have taught and enjoined a powerful, perpetual Islamic practice and sacred principle of three hundred and fifty million people, in order to defend them against an atheist’s objections and his criticisms of Qur’anic civilization. If there is any justice in the world, the Court will surely quash the conviction of someone and the sentence passed on him for expounding the verses, since he was following the way taken by our forefathers for one thousand three hundred and fifty years; it will surely remove this extraordinary stain from the legal establishment of this Islamic State.
I wrote this in the addendum containing my corrections and showed it to the public prosecutor. He was horrified and said: “There is no need for this. Your sentence was short and only a small part of it remains. There is no need to send this.”
Thus, you have understood the truly strange examples like this one in my defence and objection, which has been presented to you and the departments of government in Ankara. What I seek and hope from Afyon Court is this: I await from you in the name of true justice that you decide on the complete freedom of the Risale-i Nur, whose service and effulgence profits the nation and country as much as an army. Otherwise, I have to inform you that when the five or ten of my friends who were sent to prison because of their relations with me are released, I have the idea of committing some offence which will necessitate the heaviest penalty, compelling me to bid farewell to this life. It is like this:
Although for the good of the country and nation, the Government should give me full protection and assist me, the fact that it is pressurizing me suggests that part of the communist organization and the secret atheistic society that have been working against me these last forty years, with which it has now combined, have both gained control of important positions, and are opposing me. It worries me, for there are numerous signs that the Government either does not know of this, or it is permitting it.
Chairman of the Court! With your permission, I shall ask you a question about which I am extremely curious: why, although I have in no way been involved in politics, have the politicians deprived me of all civil rights, all liberties, and even all the rights of life? And why have they forbidden my very careful brothers and loyal assistants to have any contact with me, who tried to protect me against those plans to assassinate me while I was being held for thee and a half months in total isolation, and to defend me against my covert enemies who have poisoned me eleven times, and have even prevented me, although I am elderly, alone, in exile, and ill, from studying my blessed, harmless books, which I always had with me?
I pleaded with the public prosecutor to give me my books, but he did not give them although he promised. They compelled me to remain alone in a huge, locked, and freezing ward with nothing to occupy myself, and instead of the officials and menials concerned being friendly and comforting, they quite simply encouraged them to look on me hostilely. A small example is this: I wrote a petition to the prison governor, public prosecutor, and chairman of the court, and sent it to one of my brothers to write out since I do not know the new letters. It was written and was given to them. Then, as though I had committed some heinous crime, they nailed up my windows. The smoke from the stove was a great discomfort to me, and I insisted that they left one window open. Now they have nailed that up too. Also, although according to prison practice, solitary confinement usually lasts around a fortnight, I was in total isolation for three and a half months and they did not allow any of my friends to have any contact with me. Also, three months ago a forty-page indictment was written against me, and they showed it to me. But I do not know the new letters, and I was ill, and my own writing is very poor, so I pleaded with them to let two of my students come, who know my language, and could read the indictment and write out my objections to it. But they did not permit it. They said: “The defence lawyer should come and read it.” Then they did not permit him either. Only, they told one of my brothers to write it out in the old letters and give it to me. But it would take six or seven days to write out those forty pages. To make the hour’s work of reading me the indictment stretch over six or seven days, just so that no one should have contact with me, is appalling repression and deprives me of my right of defence entirely. A multiple murderer condemned to be hanged does not receive such treatment. I truly suffer extreme distress since I know of no reason for this unprecedented torment. I heard that the Chairman of the Court is fair-minded and kind. I have therefore for the first and last time written this petition and complaint.
S a i d N u r s i ,
who is ill, wretched, and in total isolation.
***


The Indictment contains four basic points concerning me
First Point: I consider myself to be a regenerator of religion, as though I was proud and self-seeking.
I reject this with all my strength. Moreover, all my brothers will testify that I have never accepted anyone’s suggestion that I was the Mahdi. In fact, when the experts’ committee of Denizli Court said “If Said was to declare himself Mahdi, all his students would accept it,” Said stated in his objections, saying: “I am not a Sayyid, and the Mahdi will be a Sayyid,” thus refuting them.
Second Point: Publishing things secretly.
Our covert enemies should not misconstrue things, for there is nothing that touches on politics and public order. Also, they should not make the duplicating machine and the old letters a pretext. Six courts of law and various departments of government in Ankara understood the blow dealt by the Risale-i Nur19 at Mustafa Kemal, and they did not bother about it and acquitted us, returning all our books to us including the Fifth Ray. Moreover, his bad deeds were pointed out in order to preserve the army’s worth. One person was disliked in order to affectionately praise the army.
The Third: “He encourages the breaching of public security.” This extraordinary accusation is refuted by the facts that over a period of twenty years six courts and the police of ten provinces have not recorded a single instance when any of the hundred thousand Nurju’s and hundred thousand copies of parts of the Risale-i Nur breached public security or disturbed public order, and they have not found any such thing. It is meaningless to reply to a few unimportant matters in this new indictment, for three courts of law have acquitted us on these very points and they have been replied to repeatedly. Since charging us with these matters is the equivalent of charging Ankara Criminal Court and the Courts of Denizli and Eskishehir, which acquitted us concerning them, I leave it to them to reply. But there are two or three further matters.
The First: Although it was studied for two years in the closest detail by Denizli and Ankara Criminal Courts and they acquitted us and returned the book, this Indictment applies one or two matters in the Fifth Ray to a commander who is dead and gone and shows them to be indictable offences. So we say: absolutely no law can deem it an offence to make a fair, general criticism which might be made applicable to a person who dead and gone and has no connection with the Government.
Manipulating the facts, the prosecution has taken one aspect of that general interpretation and applied it to that commander. No law can consider it a crime if one hundredth of a meaning which may be understood as referring to someone is found in a confidential and private treatise. Moreover, the treatise expounds allegorical Hadiths in wondrous fashion. Since those explanations were written thirty or forty years ago, and decisive answers have been given in my defence and objections, which have been presented to three other courts besides yours, and to six departments of government in Ankara, and have received no criticism, surely it cannot be considered to be at variance with any law if explanations of the Hadith’s true meaning turn out to fit a faulty individual.
Also, the merits of the reforms in which that person had a part, the faults of which he was the cause, are not only his, they are also the army’s and the government’s. He only had a share of them. Just as it is surely not a crime to criticize him for his faults, so it cannot be said it is attacking the reforms. Also could it possibly be a crime not to like someone who turned the Aya Sophia Mosque into a house of idols —despite its being an eternal source of this heroic nation’s honour, and shining like a jewel in its jihad and service of the Qur’an, and being a vast and precious souvenir of the nation’s swords— and who also transformed the Shaykh al-Islam’s Office into a girls’ high school?
The Second Matter with which I am charged in the Indictment:
Three courts of law have acquitted me on this matter; and as I pointed out forty years ago when elucidating the wondrous interpretation of a Hadith, the Shaykh al-Islam of men and jinn, Zembilli ‘Ali Efendi, stated: “It is not permissible to put a brimmed hat on one’s head, even as a joke,” and all the Shaykh al-Islams and all the Islamic ‘ulama considered it impermissible. The mass of Muslims were therefore in danger when they were forced to wear such hats (that is, they either had to renounce their religion or rebel); but since in one section of the Fifth Ray, which was written forty years ago, it says “The wearing of the brimmed hat will be enforced, and prostration in prayer will be forbidden. But the faith in the heads of those wearing it will make the hat prostrate, God willing, making it Muslim,” it saved the mass of Muslims both from rebellion and revolt, and from voluntarily renouncing their religion and belief; and although no law at all can propose such a thing to those living in seclusion; and in twenty years none of six provincial authorities have forced me to wear it; and officials in their offices and women and children and people in the mosques and the majority of villagers are not compelled to wear it; and it has now been officially taken off the soldiers’ heads; and in many provinces now berets and knitted hats are not prohibited; nevertheless, it has been put forward as a reason for the conviction of myself and my brothers. Could any law in the world, any principle, any good, consider this completely meaningless charge to be a crime?
The Third Matter with which I am charged:
Incitement to breach public security in Emirdag. My objection to this is as follows:
Firstly is my irrefutable list of objections, which has been presented to the court here and to six departments of government in Ankara with this court’s knowledge and permission. I am now stating it exactly in answer to the indictment.
Secondly: As is testified to by all those who met with me in Emirdag and is confirmed by its people and police, in my solitude I avoided involvement in politics with all my power. I even gave up writing and corresponding with others. I wrote nothing apart from two pieces, one on repetition in the Qur’an, the other about the angels. And I used to write one letter a week to one place to encourage people in the Risale-i Nur. In fact, in three years I wrote only three or four letters to my own brother, who is a Mufti and for twenty years was with me as my student, and was very anxious about me, and sent me congratulations for the religious festivals. And although for twenty years I have not written once to my brother who is in my native region, I am accused in the indictment of breaching security, and once again, of “opposing the reforms.” In reply I say this:
The fact that in twenty years six courts of law and the police of ten provinces connected with the matter have not recorded any incident involving the disturbance of public order and breaching of security in connection with the twenty thousand or perhaps a hundred thousand people who enthusiastically read the twenty thousand copies of the Risale-i Nur, shows that it looks on a single possibility out of thousands as being established fact. But if there is no sign of anything concerning one possibility out of two or three, there can be no crime. And it is not one possibility out of thousands, but everyone including the prosecutor who attacks me, could kill numerous people; they could disturb public peace and order on account of communism, and breach security. That is to say, it is contempt of court and the law to put forward extraordinary and exaggerated possibilities in place of events.
Furthermore, every government has opponents. It is no crime to oppose a government purely intellectually. The government looks to the hand, not to the heart. Especially someone who has performed great services for this country and nation and caused no harm, and latterly played no part in the life of society, but has been made to live in absolute isolation, and whose works have been appreciated and applauded in the most important centres of the Islamic world.21 I fear that those who level these quite extraordinary, groundless accusations at such persons are unknowingly being exploited on account of anarchy, indeed, communism.
I have understood from certain signs that with the idea of belittling the Risale-i Nur and due to groundless suspicions about the Mahdi question, which has political associations, our covert enemies are investigating completely baseless suggestions that the Risale-i Nur is being exploited for this. Perhaps it is because of these suspicions that I am made to suffer such torments. I say to those tyrannical secret enemies and to those who listen to them out of hostility to us: God forbid! Again, God forbid! Both my seventy-five-year life, and especially these last thirty years, and the one hundred and thirty parts of the Risale-i Nur, and the thousands of people who have offered me their sincere friendship testify that at no time have I overstepped my mark in such a way and made the truths of belief a means of winning rank, fame, and renown for myself.
Yes, the Risale-i Nur students know and I have pointed out proofs of it in the courts that, not to gain for myself any position or fame, and win spiritual rank and a high rank in the hereafter, but in order to serve the believers with all my conviction and strength in the question of belief, I am ready to sacrifice not only my life in this world and its transient ranks, but —if necessary— my life in the hereafter and its everlasting ranks, which everyone seeks; and even, in order to be a means of saving certain unfortunates from Hell, —if necessary— to forgo Paradise and myself go to Hell. Just as my true brothers know this, so I have proved it in some respects in the courts. Accusing me in this way of insincerity in my service of the Risale-i Nur and belief, and depreciating the Risale-i Nur and devaluing it, will deprive this nation of its sublime truths.
If, because they imagine this world is eternal and that like themselves everyone exploits religion and belief for the world, these wretches ascribe worldly motives to someone who challenges all the people of misguidance in this world, is ready to sacrifice his lives both in this world, and if necessary, in the next; and as he claimed in the courts would not exchange a single truth of belief for rule of the whole world; and out of sincerity and its mystery flees with all his strength from politics and all ranks, material and spiritual, which hint of politics; and has endured unequalled torments for twenty years; and due to his way, has not condescended to any involvement in politics; and with respect to himself considers himself far inferior to his students, and believes himself to be truly wretched and unimportant — if because of the extraordinary strength of belief they have obtained from the Risale-i Nur, some of his sincere brothers ascribe to him in their private letters some of the virtues of the Risale-i Nur, because he is their ‘interpreter’; and in consequence of a custom which has absolutely no political overtones they afford him a high rank —like people call ordinary persons they love “My lord! My benefactor!,”— and they think much better of him than is his due; and follow the old, acceptable custom practised between master and students, which is not objected to and has the meaning of thanks, and praise him excessively; and write exaggerated eulogies, which has long been the custom to write at the ends of acceptable books; if they do these things, can it in any way be considered a crime? For sure it is opposed to the truth in a way since it is exaggeration, but he is a stranger, alone, with numerous enemies, and there are numerous things to make him lose his helpers. So purely in order to strengthen their morale in the face of so many opponents and to prevent them fleeing and not to destroy the enthusiasm of those who praised him excessively, he changed part of what they had written so that it referred to the Risale-i Nur and did not reject it outright. It may be understood therefore just how far from the truth, the law, and fair-mindedness certain officials have fallen when they try to make the above person’s service of belief look to this world, despite his age and his being at the door of the grave. My last word is:
And for every calamity: we belong to God, and to Him is our return.22
S a i d N u r s i
***


Supplement
I saw that it was written on the back of the last report concerning the investigations of the examining magistrate: “On the pretext that its explanations of three verses against civilization were not in conformity with the present Civil Code, four months ago the decision was taken by the Cabinet to officially prohibit the distribution of The Miraculousness of the Qur’an, that is, the Twenty-Fifth Word.”
My reply to this: The Miraculousness of the Qur’an is now part of Zülfikâr, and on only two pages of the four hundred pages of Zülfikâr are explanations of the three verses, which reply in a way that cannot be objected to, to some of civilization’s criticisms of the Qur’an, and were included in three of my old treatises. One of the verses is about the veiling of women; the second, And to the mother, a sixth,23 is about inheritance; as is the third, And for the man a portion equal to that of two women.24 I expounded the wisdom of these verses’ meanings in a way that would silence the philosophers, in two pages twenty years ago, and in my other treatises thirty years ago. It is therefore our legal right, instead of banning the four-hundred-page Zülfikâr on the suspicion that it was written now, to excise those two pages from it and return the book to us — just as if a letter contains one or two harmful words, those words are cut out and the publication of the rest is permitted. We seek our rights from your just court in this matter.
Since nobody could find the opportunity to come to read to me the forty-page indictment, which was given me a month ago, they read it to me today, 11th June, for the first time. I listened to it, and I saw that the list of my objections which I wrote for you two months ago, and the Appendix and Addendum to my objections of nearly a month ago, had been given to both six departments of government in Ankara, and to your office. Those objections refute and demolish that indictment. I see absolutely no necessity to rewrite the objections to it. I only say now, in order to recall to the prosecution, the following two or three points:
The reason I did not take the indictment into consideration and reply to it was to avoid insulting the honour of the three just courts that had acquitted us and being in contempt of them. For those courts acquitted us after studying in the minutest detail all the points in the present indictment. To completely disregard their acquittals is to insult the honour of the judiciary.
Second Point: Due to its gross misrepresentations, attaching unimaginable meanings to one or two matters out of thousands, the prosecution accuses us of certain offences. However, those matters are in the large collections of the Risale-i Nur. The ‘ulama of al-Azhar University in Cairo, the leading scholars of Damascus, the exacting scholars of Mecca and Medina, and of Aleppo and so on, and especially the investigative scholars of the Directorate of Religious Affairs, have all seen them and have praised them appreciatively and put their signatures to them. So it was with astonishment and bewilderment that I saw the pseudo-scholarly objections in the indictment. Even if I had made some errors and the indictment was correct in what it imputed, although thousands of scholars had not spotted them or objected to them, they still would not constitute a crime; they would only be scholarly errors. Moreover, three courts have acquitted the entire Risale-i Nur and ourselves. Only Eskishehir Court gave light sentences to myself and fifteen out of a hundred of my companions because of fifteen words in the Twenty-Fourth Flash, which is about the veiling of women. I wrote in the addendum to my objections that if there is justice on the face of the earth, it would not accept my being convicted for expounding that verse and complying with what was laid down in three hundred and fifty thousand Qur’anic commentaries. As though collecting water from a thousand streams and in its cleverness, the prosecution tried to use against us a number of points in books and letters written over twenty years. That makes the, not three, but five or six courts which acquitted us on this point our accomplices in this imaginary crime. I am reminding the prosecution not to insult the honour of those just courts.
The Third: Even if explicitly, to criticize and object to a leader who is dead and gone, whose relations with the Government have ceased, and who was the cause of certain faults in the reforms, cannot be a legal offence. But there was not anything explicit; the prosecution applied my general statements to him through its misrepresentations. It publicized those confidential meanings, which we do not tell to everyone, and drew everyone’s attention to them. If there is any crime involved, the prosecution is guilty. Because it is inciting the people, and attracting their attention to those meanings.
The Fourth: Due to baseless suspicions, repeating the same old story, collecting water from a thousand streams, the prosecution investigated hints of a secret society, despite our unequivocal acquittal on this point by three courts. However, while there are numerous political societies which are harmful for this nation and country, which they permit and look on tolerantly, to call a secret society the solidarity of the Risale-i Nur students with their fellow-students, which as established by the testimony of thousands of witnesses and signs and the fact that six provinces did not interfere with us, is solely for the good of the country, nation, and religion, on account of happiness in this world and the next, and to strive against the currents from inside and outside the country which are bent on corruption, and like the prosecution to accuse them of “exploiting religion and inciting the people to disturb public order and breach security,” although in twenty years not one single such incident has been recorded in connection with the Risale-i Nur students, will bring not mankind, but the earth to anger, thus rejecting such an accusation. However... there is no need to say anything further. My written objections and its addendum, which were written long before the indictment, are my reply to it.
Prisoner S a i d N u r s i ,
Afyon Prison
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
I say this to Afyon Court and the Chief Criminal Judge:
Because since my early youth I could not endure to be dominated, I severed my relations with the world. Now life has become a great burden for me with this meaningless, unnecessary oppression. I do not have the power to endure the persecution of thousands of officials outside. I am fed up with this sort of life. With all my strength I am requesting of you that you sentence me. To enter the grave is not within my power, and I have to remain in prison. You too know that the unsubstantiated crimes the prosecution accuses me of are non-existent. I cannot be convicted because of them. However, I have serious faults before my true duties, for which I can in effect be convicted. If it is appropriate to ask, I shall reply to your question. Yes, my only crime out of my serious faults is this: it occurred to me here in Afyon Prison that in the view of reality it was an unforgiveable fault that, because I had not looked to the world, I had not performed the weighty duty with which I had been charged in the name of the country, nation, and religion, and my not knowing this did not excuse me.
The fact that three courts have acquitted us in this respect shows just how far from truth and justice those have fallen who give the name of a worldly, political society to the Risale-i Nur students’ disinterested attachment to the Risale-i Nur and its interpreter, which looks purely to the hereafter, and try to show that they are guilty of a criminal offence. We too say:
The basis and foundation of human society and particularly the Islamic nation are the sincere bonds between relatives, and the concerned attachment between tribes and groups, and due to Islamic nationhood the spiritual brotherhood and mutual assistance between believers, and the devotion to one’s nation, and unshakeable attachment to and partiality for the truths of the Qur’an and those who propagate them. It is only by denying these bonds, which ensure the life of society, and by accepting the ‘red peril’ —which scatters the terrible seed of anarchy from the North, which ruins the younger generation and nationhood, and drawing to itself everyone’s children, destroys kinship and nationhood, and opens up the way to the complete corruption of human civilization and the life of society— that the Risale-i Nur students can be called a political society, which is an indictable offence. For this reason, true students of the Risale-i Nur proclaim openly their sacred attachment to the truths of the Qur’an and their unshakeable bonds of brotherhood which look to the hereafter. Because they are happy to accept any penalty they may receive because of that brotherhood, they admit in your just court the truth as it is. They do not stoop to defend themselves with lies, sycophancy, and cunning.
Prisoner
S a i d N u r s i
***


An Addendum to the Addition to My Written Objections to the Indictment Presented to Afyon Court
Firstly: I tell the court that since the new indictment is based on the old indictments of Denizli and Eskishehir Courts, and on the superficial investigations of the superficial ‘committees of experts,’ who were opposed to us, I claim in your court that if I cannot prove one hundred errors in this indictment, I shall be happy with a hundred-year sentence. Now I have proved my case; if you wish I can present you with the table of more than a hundred errors.
Secondly: When during the Denizli trial, our books and papers had been sent to Ankara and I was full of anxiety and despair that the judgement would be given against us, I wrote to my friends the following piece, which has been added to the end of some of my defence speeches: “If the officers of the law who are studying the Risale-i Nur with the idea of criticizing it strengthen or save their belief through it, bear witness that I forgive them. For we are here to serve. The Risale-i Nur’s function is to strengthen and save belief. We are charged with serving belief without differentiating between friend and foe, and without taking sides.”
Judges of the Court! In consequence of this truth, the powerful, irrefutable proofs of the Risale-i Nur have directed the hearts of the people of the court towards itself; whatever you do against me, I forgive you; I will harbour no grudge. It is because of this that although I have been riled by the extreme tyranny and repression I have suffered, and the contemptuous treatment and defamation of my person, which have been to an extent I have never previously experienced, I have endured it and have not even spoken ill of those involved. The collections of the Risale-i Nur, which you have in your possession, form my irrefutable, incontestable defence and my objections to all the charges made against us and the crimes of which we are accused.
It is astonishing that although the leading scholars of Cairo, Damascus, Aleppo, Medina and Mecca, and the exacting scholars of the Directorate of Religious Affairs have studied the Risale-i Nur collections minutely, and offering no criticisms have praised and applauded them, the ‘clever’ persons who compiled the indictment against us showed through an extraordinary and obvious error —stating that the Qur’an contains forty Suras— just how superficially they considered the matter. Despite hundreds of thousands of the people of reality affirming the Risale-i Nur, under these severe conditions, and myself in exile, alone and wretched and the object of fearsome attacks, that prosecutor, who does not even know how many Suras there are in the Qur’an, said: “Although the Risale-i Nur attempts to expound the Qur’an and interpret Hadiths, it has no scholarly substance or value in teaching its readers in a part of it...” It is understood just how far his criticisms are from the law, reality, justice and equity.
I also make this complaint to you, that although for two hours you made us listen to the entire forty-page indictment, which contains hundreds of errors and wounds our hearts, despite my insistence you did not allow me two minutes to read one and a half pages in reply, which were the complete truth. In the name of justice I therefore request that you permit me to read my entire list of objections.
Thirdly: Every government has opponents. But so long as they do not disturb public order, they may not be touched legally. Is it at all possible then that myself and those like me who are disenchanted with the world and work only for the grave should give up spending the remainder of their lives within the bounds taught by the Qur’an, on the way our forefathers followed for one thousand three hundred and fifty years, in a way permitted by the rules sanctified at all times by three hundred and fifty million believers, — that we should give up that way, and being coerced by our enemies and their subterfuges, merely for this brief and fleeting worldly life, support the savage laws and principles of an immoral, dissolute civilization, indeed, of a sort of communism, and adopt them as our way? No law anywhere, and no one the tiniest bit fair, would force us to accept them. We only say to those who oppose us: Don’t bother us and we won’t bother you!
It is due to this fact that I support neither intellectually nor on scholarly grounds the arbitrary commands of a commander, called laws, which have made Aya Sophia into a house of idols and the Shaykh al-Islam’s Office into a girls’ high school. And for myself I do not act in accordance with them. But although for twenty years I have been severely oppressed during my tortuous captivity, I have not become involved in politics, nor provoked the authorities, nor disturbed public order. Although I have hundreds of thousands of Risale-i Nur friends, not a single incident has been recorded involving the disturbance of the peace. I am fed up with life due to the utterly humiliating and unjust treatment directed at my person here in my exile in the last period of my life, such as I have never before suffered and which has galled me. I feel disgust at freedom even, under this oppression. I have written you a petition saying that contrary to everyone else, I want not my acquittal but to be convicted and given not a light sentence, I want the heaviest penalty. For in order to be saved from this unparalleled, extraordinarily tyrannical treatment, there is no solution for me other than entering either the grave or prison. But since suicide is not permitted, and the appointed hour of death is unknown and outside my power, I am resigned to the imprisonment I now suffer in absolute solitary confinement.25 However, I am not presenting this petition for the present, for the sake of my innocent companions.
Fourthly: Confirmed by all that I have written in the Risale-i Nur these thirty years of my life, the period I have called that of the New Said, and the facts concerning my person, and testified to by the fair-minded people and friends who have met with me with serious intention, I state this: As far as I have been able I have tried to restrain my evil-commanding soul from indulging in self-advertisement, fame-seeking, and pride, and perhaps a hundred times I have wounded the feelings of the Risale-i Nur students who have excessively good opinions of me. As is confirmed by both my close friends and my brothers, and the signs they have observed, I told them: “I possess nothing, I am the wretched herald of the jeweller’s shop of the Qur’an.” It is not winning worldly rank for myself and high position and fame, even supposing I was given high spiritual rank, being frightened of the possibility of my soul taking a share in the service I perform and spoiling my sincerity and pure intention, I decided to sacrifice those ranks and positions for my service. Yet despite my acting in this way, and my not accepting the gratitude of some of my brothers for their benefiting from the Risale-i Nur —which has been presented in your high court as though it was some political matter of great moment— you have made their respect for me, which is greater than that of a son for his father, the subject of interrogation. You have driven some of them to deny it. You have made us listen in astonishment. Can it be imagined a crime for some unfortunate to be praised although he himself is not happy at this and does not consider himself worthy?
Fifthly: I tell you certainly that to accuse the Risale-i Nur students of belonging to a political society and of political involvement when they have absolutely no connection with any society, association, or political movement, is knowingly or unknowingly to struggle against us on account of a secret atheistic organization which for forty years has been working directly against Islam and belief, or in the name of a sort of communism which produces anarchy in this country. For three courts of law have acquitted in that respect all the Risale-i Nur students and the treatises of the Risale-i Nur. Only, Eskishehir Court gave me one year, and out of one hundred and twenty others, fifteen of my friends six months each because of a single matter in a short treatise about the veiling of women, or perhaps because of the sentence: “According to what I have heard, in the centre of government a shoe-shiner behaved impudently towards the semi-naked wife of an important person, and his astonishing unmannerliness dealt a slap in the shameless face of someone opposed to the veiling of women,” which was written long ago. That means, to accuse the Risale-i Nur and its students now is to charge and convict three courts, and to be contemptuous of them.
Sixthly: The Risale-i Nur cannot be combatted. All the Islamic scholars who have seen it have confirmed that it is a veracious commentary on the Qur’an, that is, it consists of powerful proofs of its truths. It is a miracle of the Qur’an this century, and a firm barrier for this nation and country against the perils from the North. I have understood therefore that it is a duty of your court not to scare off its students, but with regard to general rights, to encourage them, and I await this from you. Thanks to freedom of scholarship, the books and journals of those with no religion and some political atheists, who are harmful for the nation, country, and public security, are not interfered with, so it surely is not a crime to be a student of the Risale-i Nur and save the belief of the innocent, needy youth and preserve them from immorality; indeed, the Government and Ministry of Education should applaud and encourage it.
My last word: May Almighty God allow the judges to execute the law with true justice. Amen.
For us God suffices and He is the Best Disposer of Affairs.26 * The best of lords and the Best of Helpers.27
All praise be to God, the Sustainer of All the Worlds.
S a i d N u r s i
***


My Last Word
I say this to the Judges of the Court:
I have understood from both the indictment and from my long solitary confinement that in this matter it is mostly my person that is under consideration, and it has been seen fit to destroy my character. As though my person was harmful to the government, public security, and the country, and making religion a screen, I harboured worldly aims, and was pursuing some sort of politics. In the face of this, I tell you the following with complete certitude:
Because of these unfounded suspicions, do not injure the Risale-i Nur students by means of slandering my person, for they are devoted to the Risale-i Nur and to this country and nation, and are of great value for them. For if you do, it could open up the way to much immaterial harm for this country and nation, indeed, to their being exposed to danger. I tell you this certainly too: whatever is visited on my person in the way of insult, humiliating treatment, slander, torture, and prison sentences, on account of the way I now follow I have decided to accept it — on condition no harm comes to the Risale-i Nur and its students because of me. There is also reward in this for me in the hereafter. While weeping, I am also pleased since in this way I may be saved from the sins of my evil-commanding soul. If these wretched innocent people had not been sent to prison along with me, I would have spoken out with great vehemence in your court. You have seen too that the person who wrote the indictment wants to destroy my character with his misrepresentations and exaggerations, and partly misinterpreting what is written, by showing that all my books and letters, confidential and otherwise, written over these twenty to thirty years of my life were written this year, and had never been seen by any court, or been pardoned, or been subject to the passage of time. I have said a hundred times that my person is faulty, and the reason that although they have defamed me on every occasion it has had no effect on public regard for me, which is enough to perturb the politicians, is this: there is an intense and overwhelming need here at this time for a number of people to teach religion and strengthen belief, people who will sacrifice the truth for nothing, make it a tool of nothing, and take no share for their own souls. Only in this way may what they teach about faith be profited from and come to be believed in with complete certainty.
Yes, it seems that at no time or place was the need so great, for the danger has come in full force from outside. Although I have admitted and proclaimed that I myself have not met this need, they have supposed that I have met the need to an extent not because of any virtue of mine, but because of the severity of the need and others not being in the forefront. For a long time I have looked on in astonishment and wonder, but only now understood the wisdom in this public regard, of which I am in no way worthy — despite my fearsome faults. The wisdom in it is this:
Here at this time, the Risale-i Nur and the collective personality of its students have directed that severe need to themselves. They have supposed my person to be a representative of the Risale-i Nur’s wondrous reality and its sincere and pure personality —despite my share of its work and service being only a thousandth— and they have given me the attention. But this is both harmful for me, and a burden. It is also not my right. But I have remained silent and have accepted the harm for the sake of the Risale-i Nur and its collective personality. Also, because of my service to it, they have considered my unimportant person to be included in the predictions about the Risale-i Nur, which is a mirror reflecting the All-Wise Qur’an’s miraculousness at this time, and the collective personality of its sincere students, made through Divine inspiration by some of the saints such as Imam ‘Ali (May God be pleased with him) and Gawth al-A‘zam (May his mystery be sanctified). It seems I was mistaken, for in some places I attributed some of their kind attention to my person, and did not direct it towards the Risale-i Nur. The reason for this was my weakness; I apparently accepted part of it for myself to prevent the things that might scare away those who help me multiplying and to increase their confidence in what I said. I warn you! There is no need to defame my transitory person, which is at the door of the grave; there is no necessity to give it so much importance. In any event you cannot combat the Risale-i Nur, so do not combat it! You cannot defeat it. You will cause great harm to this nation and country by combatting it. Anyway you cannot scatter its students. For the defender of the Qur’an at this time and its heroic actions —which in the view of the Islamic world are like those of former times— will not allow the sons of this land’s forefathers, who gave forty to fifty million martyrs on the way of defending the Qur’an, to abandon it. Even if they apparently withdraw, those sincere students are still bound to it with all their lives and spirits. They will not abandon the Risale-i Nur, which is a mirror of that reality, thereby harming this nation, country, and public security.
My last word is:
But if they turn away, say: “God suffices me, there is no god but He; in Him do I place my trust — He the Sustainer of the Throne [of Glory] Supreme!”28
***


A Petition Sent to the Cabinet
I have a request of the greatest importance to present to the Cabinet.
I request the Cabinet that the fifteen-page Fifth Ray, which was originally written years ago, and was later included at the end of the more than three-hundred-page collection called The Illuminating Lamp (Siracü’n-Nur), and was the reason for the collection being collected up by the Cabinet, be removed from The Illuminating Lamp. For it has been established that the work is in many ways useful for the disaster-stricken, the elderly, and those who have fallen into doubt concerning their faith. I request that the piece which is imagined to be harmful is banned, but permission is given for the remaining three hundred pages to be published, so that the calamity-stricken and the elderly can receive solace from it and the needy can profit from the truths of belief that it contains.
Moreover, in the four-hundred-page Zülfikâr, two pages written thirty years ago expounding two verses about inheritance and the veiling for women in reply to the philosophers of Europe, and one line about banks in Signs of Miraculousness (Isharat al-I‘jaz ), published thirty years ago, about the verse But God has permitted trade and forbidden usury,29 and approximately a line written thirty years ago while I was in the Darü’l-Hikmet, among the six questions asked of the Shaykh al-Islam’s Office by the head cleric of the Anglican Church — I request that these passages are excised and the Zülfikâr collection, which has been confiscated on the pretext of those two pages and one line —because they are not in conformity with the present Civil Code— is returned. For it has been highly praised by the Islamic world and its benefits have been seen in fact, and it proves wonderfully three of the pillars of belief. This is what we request and it is our right. Just as if five words of a letter are censored, the remainder are permitted, so we are seeking this important legal right of ours. We demand that together with the Qur’an and the lovers of faith who through the Risale-i Nur serve the nation, country and public security, we are delivered from the oppression of those who make mountains out of molehills concerning us. Also, I have not seen a copy of The Six Attacks for eighteen years, which I wrote when full of anger at the severe repression I was suffering at that time; saying it was confidential I did not give permission for it to be published. Anyway it came into the hands of three or four courts, and they returned it to its owners.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
[This is written to thank the experts’ committee of the Directorate of Religious Affairs. I shall explain three ‘Points’ in order to assist in amending their minor criticisms, the answer of which is clear.]
The First: I thank those scholars in three ways. For myself I am grateful to them.
Firstly: Apart from the Fifth Ray, their summarizing appreciatively the other thirteen parts of The Illuminating Lamp Collection.
Secondly: Their refuting the allegations made against us of founding a sufi order, setting up a political society, and breaching security.
Thirdly: Their corroborating my case in court. That is, I told the court: If there is any fault, it is mine. The Risale-i Nur students are sincere and innocent, and work at the Risale-i Nur for their faith. Thus, their committee of experts also exonerates the Risale-i Nur students, and ascribes all the fault to me. So I say to its members: May God be pleased with you! Only, they made partners in my crime the late Hasan Feyzi and the late Hafiz Ali, and two or three others who are the heirs of those two blessed martyrs and work according to their system. But they were wrong in one way. For they were ahead of me not in faults but in the service of belief, and were given to me by Divine grace as assistants, out of mercy for my weakness, and were free of my faults.
Second Point: The committee of experts said that some of the narrations in the Fifth Ray are ‘dubious’ and others are ‘false,’ and that some were misinterpreted. This was written in the same way as the indictment in Afyon, which was against us. But I proved in a table fifteen pages long that it contained eighty-one mistakes. The respected committee of experts should see the table. An example of one of the mistakes is as follows:
The prosecutor said: “All the interpretations are wrong, and the narrations are either false (mawdu’) or dubious.”
And I say: To interpret a Hadith means saying that such-and-such a meaning is possibly or probably intended by the Hadith. According to logic, it is possible to refute the possibility of that meaning only by proving its impossibility. But just as the meaning has been seen this century and has been realized, so one aspect of the universality of the Hadith’s allusive level of meaning has observedly shown one flash of its miraculous predictions to be true at this time, and can therefore in no way be denied or objected to. It has also been proved in the table that the prosecutor’s saying that “all the narrations are either false or dubious” is wrong in three respects.
The First: It is wrong in ten respects to deny such narrations in their entirety, for Imam Ahmad ibn Hanbal, who memorized a million Hadiths, and Imam Bukhari, who memorized five hundred thousand, did not have the courage to deny them, and anyway such a denial is not possible; and the prosecutor has not seen all the books of Hadiths; and most of the Umma every century have awaited the appearance of what those narrations signify or to witness one aspect of their general meanings; and they have just about been accepted by the Umma; and a number of aspects and samples of them which are completely true have appeared and been seen.
The Second Respect: The meaning of mawdu’ is that a narration is not a Hadith with an authenticated chain of authorities. It does not mean that its meaning is wrong. Since among the Umma, especially the people of reality and those who have had uncovered to them the realities, and some of the Hadith scholars and those qualified to interpret the law, have accepted them and awaited the appearance of what they indicate, surely those narrations contain truths which look to everyone, like proverbs.
The Third Respect: What question or narration is there that in one of their books the scholars, whose ways and schools are all different, have not objected to it? For example, one of the narrations about the appearance of several Dajjals (Antichrists) within Islam is the following Hadith, which foretells explicitly the dissension of Hulagu and Jenghiz: “The ‘Abbasid Caliphate will long continue, until it falls into the hands of the Dajjal.”30 Like this Hadith, which states that after five hundred years a Dajjal will appear in Islam, numerous narrations give news of the figures that will appear at the end of time. Nevertheless, some of the mujtahids who were of different schools, or whose ideas were extreme, did not accept them, saying they were either unauthenticated or dubious. Anyway... the reason I have cut this long story short is related to the Risale-i Nur, for just as four severe earthquakes ‘coincided’31 with the Risale-i Nur being attacked, demonstrating the earth’s wrath, so during the hours I was writing this reply, two severe earthquakes occurred here. It was like this:
It was two earthquakes ‘coinciding’ with the suffering I was experiencing from the wounds caused by the surgical operation of the experts’ report, which had been given me that evening, and from my pitiful difficulties at having no contact with others and having to write myself with my wretched pen. Yes, I received that evening the report from the Directorate of Religious Affairs, on which I had placed most trust during my eight months of distress in solitary confinement, and had expected would come to our assistance. This morning I understood that with the most trivial matters they had helped not me but the public prosecutor. I saw that they said: “Said said that the last four earthquakes were instances of the Risale-i Nur’s wonder-working.” Then, when intending to write, as I had written in the table of errors: “Like acceptable alms-giving, the Risale-i Nur is a means of calamities being repulsed. Whenever it is attacked, calamities seize the opportunity and occur. Sometimes too the earth rages,” two severe earthquakes32 occurred here, which made me give up writing the piece, so I am leaving it and passing on to the third Point.
Third Point: Exacting, veracious, and fair-minded scholars of the experts’ committee! A long-standing and acceptable practice among scholars is their writing eulogies and praises, sometimes exaggerated, sometimes the opposite, at the ends of fine works written by others, and publishing them, and the authors in question being grateful and pleased at the writers of such eulogies, and their rivals also not accusing them of boasting. So I have been unable to equate it with careful study, precise knowledge, kind assistance, and fairness, that you should have considered it self-advertisement that I did not altogether reject the eulogies written by some special and sincere students of the Risale-i Nur in the style of the late Hasan Feyzi and the martyr Hafiz Ali, which they wrote with the idea of assisting me in my helplessness, weakness, aloneness, and exile in the face of so many unfair people attacking and objecting to me savagely, and to encourage the needy to embrace the Risale-i Nur. I was sorry at this. Those pure-hearted friends of mine never thought of politics, but verified by mathematical reckoning said: “One aspect and minor meaning of the Hadith’s universal allusive meaning at this time is the Risale-i Nur,” which cannot be said to be wrong. For time is proving it right. In any event, even if it was very exaggerated or even wrong, it would still only be a scholarly mistake. And everyone can write his own opinions. You know how many various views and opinions are written in the works of the twelve schools of the Shari‘a, and particularly in the Hanafi, Maliki, Shafi‘i, and Hanbali Schools, and of the nearly seventy authorities of the sciences of theology (kalam) and the principles of religion. However, never at any time has the need for agreement between the scholars of religion been as great as it is at present, and for them to avoid dispute. Now we are compelled to leave aside conflict in secondary matters and not to make them the subject of dispute.
***


I have three questions to ask of the equitable hojas of the committee of experts:
The First: Is a person guilty of an offence if someone praises him with a good intention? Especially if he does not want it — could it be thought self-love if as far as he can he either rejects such praise or directs it towards someone else, but in order not to lose his sincere friend, does not scold him, and responds with silence and saying that the praise is a hundred times greater than his due?
The Second Question: At this time of terrible attacks on religion and momentous religious questions, should a lover of the truth from among the Risale-i Nur students be deserving of such blame and insult because of a harmless, minor scholarly error and a mistaken view? Is it permissible that while awaiting from masters like yourselves a gentle warning, the student who wrote the eulogy should be dealt a blow in this way with the hand of the judiciary?
The Third Question: Are these criticisms of yours, related to only one or two matters, fitting for the Risale-i Nur, which these twenty years has never been shaken by its innumerable opponents and has strengthened the belief of thousands of needy people? Also I remind those exact scholars of the following: because they saw a letter of mine at the top of Ahmed Feyzi’s eulogy, they criticize me in their report as though I had written the eulogy to myself. But the letter was written in order not to accept the praises for myself, and to have them cut out of the eulogy, and I did cut out a part of them. Others I was going to modify, but being forced to hurry, I sent the letter to one of my brothers without completing it. He then put the letter at the beginning of the eulogy. Then when it was being sent to a private person, it was seized by the government. Is such a private eulogy, which was purely scholarly and a personal view, and was sent from friend to friend with the idea of consulting about modifying it, deserving of such vehement objections? Moreover, the two small collections bound in red and black consisted of a number of confidential letters written privately to friends in order to congratulate, encourage, and gratify them. Anyway, one or two people had been interested in them, and had gathered them together in a book so they should not get lost. In the searches it fell into the hands of the police. Is there any need to put forward absurd suppositions about such letters, make them the subject of interrogation, and try to relate them to politics? Is it not like being blind to the terrible dragons assaulting the Qur’an, and not even looking at them, and trying to combat pestilential mosquitoes?
Does it not infer by ignoring Saraçoglu, who calls religion and the training of Muhammad “poison”, and by disputing The Illuminating Lamp, which demonstrates the Qur’anic reality as clearly as the sun and proves it to be the perfect cure for mankind’s wounds, assisting in the confiscation of that collection? We await from persons like yourselves balm for our wounds, and your insight and assistance, and we are not offended at your minor criticisms.
Prisoner,
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
[This forms the introduction to the pieces that follow it.]
With the idea of helping a little to refute with true, fair evidences Afyon Court’s decision against us and turn the Appeal Court in our favour, and in order to indicate briefly some of the errors in the indictment, we have written exactly the pieces from the confidential treatises which they mentioned as being offences; pointing out the errors, we show those who are convicting us to be guilty of an offence.
For instance: In order to have me sentenced to the heaviest penalty, they wrote at the end of the indictment as an index of all my crimes: “The matters Said Nursi rejects: One: the abolition of the Empire and Caliphate.” This is both wrong and an oversight. For fifteen years ago in Eskishehir Court I replied to a question about my writing in the Twenty-Sixth Flash, the Treatise For the Elderly: “I was grieved at the passing of the sovereignty of the caliphate,” and my reply silenced the court. Anyone who considers to be a crime an unimportant memory, faded with time, which was covered by the pardon and has been acquitted, is himself guilty.
As documentary evidence for this imaginary crime, they showed a Hadith from one of the Flashes, which is also found in The Miracles of Muhammad (PBUH): “After me the caliphate will last thirty years, then it will be rapacious monarchy, then corruption and tyranny.”33 That is, after the four Rightly-Guided Caliphs there will be corruption. I wrote in one of my old treatises that this Hadith contained three miraculous prophecies. Then in the indictment, it gave as my crime: “In one of his treatises Said says: ‘After the caliphate will be tryanny and corruption.’” You superficial committee! Anyone who considers it a crime to explain the miraculous prediction of a Hadith which foretells the widespread spiritual and material corruption among mankind of the present and an event that will cause chaos on the earth, is himself guilty both spiritually and materially.
They also wrote that “a person is guilty of political reaction if he calls innovation, misguidance, and atheism, the reforms, such as the closure of the sufi tekkes and zaviyes and the religious schools; the acceptance of secularism; the establishment of nationalist principles instead of Islam; the wearing of the brimmed hat; the banning of Islamic dress for women; the enforced use of the Latin alphabet in place of the Qur’anic alphabet; the ezan and iqama being recited in Turkish; the prohibition of religious instruction in schools; the recognition of equal rights for women and in inheritance; and the abolition of polygamy.
Unfair committee! The Qur’an of Miraculous Exposition has every century been the sacred, heavenly guide of three hundred and fifty million people, the programme of all their happiness, and the sacred treasury of the life of this world and the next. If it is possible to deny numerous of its explicit verses, which do not bear interpretation, about the veiling of women, inheritance, polygamy, the recollection of God, instruction in religious knowledge and its dissemination, and the preservation of the marks of religion, and to make guilty of crimes all the authoritative Islamic interpreters of the law and all the Shaykh al-Islam’s, and if you can annul the passage of time, quash the numerous court acquittals, and the legal pardons, and abolish confidentiality and the private side of things, and freedom of conscience and freedom of thought, and intellectual and scholarly opposition, and remove them from this country and its governments, you can make me guilty of these things. Otherwise in the court of truth, reality, and justice you will be awesomely guilty!
S a i d N u r s i
***


[Although it is against them, a piece the court astonishingly showed to be against us.]
I say in this court of law that if there is any justice on the face of the earth, it will reject the unjust decision to convict a man who, basing it on the agreement and confirmation of three hundred and fifty thousand Qur’anic commentaries and following the beliefs of our forefathers for one thousand, three hundred and fifty years, expounded a Divine rule that has been considered most sacred and genuine in the social life of three hundred and fifty million Muslims every century for one thousand three hundred and fifty years; it should quash the judgement.
***


[A piece which the court wrote with astonishment and appreciation in its decision, as though it was against us, but which in fact condemns them.]
In the Twenty-Sixth Letter, Said Nursi speaks of himself like this: “This wretched brother of yours has three personalities which are far from each other.
“T h e F i r s t : In regard to being the herald of the elevated treasury of the All-Wise Qur’an, I have a temporary personality which pertains solely to the Qur’an. The extremely exalted character demanded by the position of herald is not my character; I do not possess such a character. It rather consists of the qualities necessitated by the position and the duty. Whatever you see in me of this sort of quality, is not mine, so do not consider me as possessing it; it belongs to the position.
“T h e S e c o n d P e r s o n a l i t y : Through Almighty God’s grace, a personality is given me at the time of worship, when I am turned towards the Divine Court; this personality displays certain marks. These marks arise from “knowing one’s faults, realizing one’s want and impotence, and seeking refuge in utter humility at the Divine Court,” which are the basis and meaning of worship. Through this personality, I know myself to be more wretched, powerless, wanting, and faulty than everyone. Should the whole world praise and applaud me, they could not make me believe that I am good or possess perfection of any sort.
“T h e T h i r d : I have my true personality, that is, the degenerate personality of the Old Said, that is, certain veins of character inherited from the Old Said. Sometimes it inclines to hypocrisy and desires rank and position. Also, because I do not come of a noble family, lowly characteristics are to be observed, like my being frugal to the point of miserliness. My brothers! I am not going to describe the many secret faults and ills of this personality, lest I chase you away altogether. ... Almighty God has compassionately demonstrated His power in me so that He employs my personality, which is like that of the lowest common soldier, in serving the mysteries of the Qur’an, which resembles the most exalted position of field marshal. Thanks be to God a hundred thousand times! The soul is baser than everything, and the duty higher...”
All praise be to God, this is from the bounty of my Sustainer!
***


[This is a piece that badly scared the court, so that they recorded it against us in the judgement. However, those vehement words were written fifteen years ago and were afterwards softened with the following.]
This sentence should make them see fairly: “My brothers! For the sake of the innocent and the elderly, don’t take revenge on those who kill me wrongfully. The torments of the grave and Hell are enough for them.”
“In view of the treatment you have meted out to me, and your beliefs, I oppose you in general fashion. You are sacrificing your religion and life in the hereafter for the sake of your lives in this world. According to you, due to the opposition between us and contrary to you, we are always ready to sacrifice our lives in this world for our religion and for the hereafter. To sacrifice two or three years of humiliating life under your domination in order to win sacred martyrdom, is like the water of Kawthar for us. However, in order to make you tremble, relying on the effulgence and indications of the All-Wise Qur’an, I tell you this with certainty:
“You shall not live after killing me! You shall be driven out of the world, your Paradise and your beloved, by an irresistible hand, and swiftly cast into everlasting darkness. Behind me, your Nimrod-like chiefs will be quickly killed and sent to me. In the Divine presence I shall grasp hold of the scruffs of their necks, and on Divine justice casting them down to the lowest of the low, I shall take my revenge!
“O you miserable wretches who sell religion and your lives in the hereafter for this world! If you want to live, do not interfere with me! Know that if you do, vengeance shall be taken on you many times over, and tremble! I hope from Divine mercy that my death will serve religion more than my life, and my death explode over your heads like a bomb, scattering you! Cause me trouble if you have the courage! If you do anything, you shall see!” It concludes with a Qur’anic verse.
***


[The court recorded this against me, despite being a passage which accuses them of being extreme.]
In Ankara, Mustafa Kemal entered the office of the Speaker of the Assembly furiously angry. He said: “We summoned you here in order to explain your important ideas to us. But you came and wrote things about the five daily prayers, and sowed discord amongst us.” Although Said told him: “Those who do not perform the prayers are traitors, and the pronouncements of traitors are to be rejected,” by way of apology Mustafa Kemal swallowed his anger. Although his feelings and principles had been wounded, no one laid a finger on the Old Said, those imperious commanders were even frightened of him. It is written that this occurred through the wondrous power of the future collective personality of the Risale-i Nur’s future heroic students, and was a shining instance of the Risale-i Nur’s wonder-working.
***


[A passage which was recorded against us, but which makes the court guilty.]
It is said “We do not support either intellectually or on scholarly grounds the arbitrary commands, called laws, of the commander who made Aya Sophia into a house of idols and the Shaykh al-Islam’s Office into a girls’ high school, and in respect of my person, I do not act in accordance with them.”
It is said in his petition dated 29.8.1948: “An idea occurred to me, it was like this: the fact that although for the good of the nation and country the Government should be protecting and helping me, it is oppressing me, suggests that the secret atheistic organization which struggles against me together with the section of the communist organization which has combined with that organization have gained hold of important official positions and are now confronting me. As for the Government, either it is uninformed of this, or it permits it. Could it possibly be a crime not to love a man who has turned Aya Sophia into a house of idols, which is an eternal source of pride for an heroic nation, and a shining decoration in the world showing its service of the Qur’an and jihad, and a vast and precious souvenir of their swords, and has turned too the Shaykh al-Islam’s Office into a girls’ high school?”
***


[The piece the court reckoned was the most likely to have Said convicted. It attached entirely the wrong meaning to these words, which Said had used in Denizli Court against his covert enemies; and altering it to refer to the Government, put it forward as a reason for his conviction.]
He called “some of the new laws of the State, which has carried out the reforms, ‘arbitrary compulsion on account of disbelief;’ the Republic, ‘absolute despotism;’ the regime, ‘absolute apostasy and communism;’ and civilization, ‘absolute dissipation.’”
***


[A piece included with astonishment and appreciation in the court’s decision.]
Writing out the Risale-i Nur yields numerous benefits, both in this world and in the next. These are:
1. To strive morally against the people of misguidance.
2. To assist Üstad Bediuzzaman in disseminating the truth.
3. To serve Muslims in respect of belief.
4. To acquire knowledge through the pen.
5. To practise worship in the form of reflective thought, one hour of which may on occasion be the equivalent of a year’s worship.
6. To enter the grave in a state of belief.
It also yields five sorts of worldly benefits:
1. Plenty in one’s sustenance.
2. Ease of mind and happiness.
3. Plenty in one’s livelihood.
4. Success in what one does.
5. By virtue of being a Risale-i Nur student, to share in the prayers and supplications offered by all Risale-i Nur students. This will soon be understood by the young, and the university will turn into a Risale-i Nur school.
***


[It is astonishing but they considered this sincere devotion to be a crime.]

One of the two plans followed by the covert dissemblers: To destroy my good name; as though in that way the Risale-i Nur would be depreciated.
The Second: To prevent the spread of the Risale-i Nur by causing the Risale-i Nur students to become anxious and slack. Never fear! Let the heads of wretches like ourselves be sacrificed for a sacred truth for which millions of heroic heads have been sacrificed!
***


[It is extraordinary but Hasan Feyzi’s most sincere and entirely true preface and eulogy, which was conformable with reality and of no harm but great benefit to many, was said to constitute an offence, and on its being included at the end of one of the collections of the Risale-i Nur, was given as the reason for the collection’s seizure.]
Hasan Feyzi wrote a letter, a summary of which is this:
“O Risale-i Nur! There is no doubt that you are the tongue of Truth, and inspiration of Truth, and have been written with His permission.” “I am no one’s property. I was taken from no book, I was stolen from no work. I belong to the Sustainer and to the Qur’an. I am a wondrous Light pouring forth from an immortal work.” “You are a most effulgent book of truth and mercy. You adorn and honour some of your special, sincere students with the decorations of the saints and purified scholars. Moreover, your treatises have not entered the courts as a criminal or suspect, but as a teacher, instructor, and guide. In every session of justice you have displayed splendidly, brilliantly, your power and forcefulness, your greatness and pride. You laved them with the water of belief and the Qur’an.”
“O Ustad, the Risale-i Nur’s Servant and Interpreter! Ustad, God’s servant, spiritual son of Imam ‘Ali (May God be pleased with him), and disciple of Gawth al-A‘zam (May his mystery be sanctified)! Raise me to the elevated degree of your knowledge!” “Only a month’s worth of provisions, around a kilo, wrapped in paper and hanging from a nail. He attains to an inexhaustible existence within his deprivation. He abstains from accepting gifts. If he had accepted alms and charity, he would have been a millionaire today.”
[They questioned only one of the reasons for the naming of the Risale-i Nur. They said that they saw no one with the name of Nur among his close students. As it says in the reply in the footnote, Nuri Benli and Küreli Nuri the Clockmaker are now distinguished in their service of the Risale-i Nur. That is to say, they cannot criticize it, so are compelled to base their allegations on the most trivial matters.]
The reason that in the Twenty-Sixth Word, the thirty-three Words, thirty-three Letters, thirty-one Flashes, and thirteen Rays are called the Risale-i Nur is this: throughout my life the word ‘Nur’ (light) has everywhere confronted me. For instance, my village was Nurs, my late mother’s name was Nuriye, my Naqshi master was Sayyid Nur Muhammad, one of my Qadiri masters was Nuruddin, one of my Qur’an masters was Nuri, and of my students those most attached to me have been those with Nur in their names. (But how strange it is that there is no one among the important Risale-i Nur students with the name Nuri.)34 And what elucidates and illumines my books most are the comparisons about light. And what has solved most of my difficulties related to the Divine truths is the luminous Name of Nur, out of the Most Beautiful Names. And my particular leader in my passionate enthusiasm for the Qur’an and my restricting my service to it, is ‘Uthman Dhi’l-Nurayn (May God be pleased with him).
***


[Hücumat-i Sitte (The Six Attacks) and its Addendum were both written twenty years ago, and in the face of fierce and tyrannical aggression, and are highly confidential, and were written when I was angry, and during the Second World War, all of which justify the anger. So it is far from any justice to look on it as a crime as though it had been written now, and to seize it.]
Written at the head of the Addendum to the Six Attacks is this: “This Addendum was written in order to avoid the disgust and insults that will levelled at us in the future. That is to say, it was written so that when it is said: ‘Look at the spineless people of that age!’, their spit should not hit us in the face, or else to wipe it off. Let the ears ring of the leaders of Europe, savage beneath their humanitarian masks! And let this be thrust in the unseeing eyes of those unjust oppressors who inflicted these unscrupulous tyrants on us! It is a petition with which to hit over the head tthe followers of modern low civilization, who this century have a hundred thousand times over necessitated the existence of Hell.”
“Recently, the concealed aggression of the irreligious has taken on a most ugly form; tyrannical aggression against the unfortunate people of belief and against religion. Our private and unofficial call to prayer and iqama was interrupted during the private worship of myself and one or two brothers in the mosque I myself repaired. ‘Why are you reciting the iqama in Arabic and making the call to prayer secretly?’ they asked. My patience was exhausted in keeping silent. So I say, not to those unscrupulous vile men who are not worth addressing, but to the heads of the Pharaoh-like society who with arbitrary despotism plays with the fate of this nation: O you people of innovation who have deviated from the straight path of religion, I want the answer to six questions.
“The First: Every government in the world, every people which rules, even cannibals, and the chief of a band of brigands, have some principle, some law, by which they rule. So according to which principle do you carry out this extraordinary aggression? Show your law! Or do you accept as the law the arbitrary whims of a handful of contemptible officials? Because no law can interrupt private worship in that way; there cannot be such a law!”
***


[It is regretable that they objected to one or two sentences in Isharat-i Seb‘a (The Seven Signs), which is both old, and confidential, and true, and that they attempted to have it seized and us prosecuted. But the truth it contains is so powerful it should be proclaimed to all the world and mankind for the good of society.]
“The biggest fool in the world is he who expects progress, prosperity, and happiness from irreligious anarchists like them. One of those fools who occupied a high position, said: ‘We said “Allah! Allah!” and remained backward. Europe said “Guns and cannons,” and advanced.’
“According to the rule, ‘a fool should be answered with silence,’ the answer for such people is silence. But because behind certain fools are inauspicious clever people, we say this:
“O you wretches! This world is a guest-house. Every day with their corpses, thirty thousand witnesses put their signature to the decree ‘Death is a reality’ and they testify to the assertion. Can you kill death? Can you contradict these witnesses? Since you can’t, death causes people to say: ‘Allah! Allah!’ Which of your guns and cannons can illuminate the everlasting darkness confronting someone in the throes of death in place of ‘Allah! Allah!’, and transform his absolute despair into absolute hope? Since there is death and we shall enter the grave, and this life departs and an eternal life comes, if guns and cannons are said once, ‘Allah! Allah!’ should be said a thousand times.”
***


[It is amazing but they turned around a sentence in the Sixteenth Flash which was in our favour, so that it was against us, and showed they were inclined to seize that valuable treatise.]
From the Sixteenth Flash: “As for the calamity of war, it would cause great harm to our service of the Qur’an. ... Like the One Powerful Over All Things sweeps and cleans in a minute the atmosphere filled with clouds and shows the shining sun in clear skies, so He may also dispel these black and merciless clouds and show the truths of the Shari‘a like the sun, and give them without expense or trouble. We await it from His mercy that He will not sell them to us expensively. May He give intelligence to the heads of those at the top, and belief to their hearts; that would be enough. Then matters would put themselves to rights.”
“Since what you hold in your hand is light, not a club, and light cannot be objected to, nor fled from, nor can harm come from showing it, why do you advise caution to your friends, and prevent them showing many light-filled parts of the Risale-i Nur to people?”
“The heads of most of those at the top are drunk and they cannot read them. And even if they do read them, they cannot understand them; they give them the wrong meaning, and interfere. In order that they do not interfere, they should not be shown them until they come to their senses. ... Therefore, I advise my brothers to be cautious and not to give the truths to those who are unfit...”
***


[Although the veiling of women is a Qur’anic command, and a most powerful reply has been given concerning it, and the piece was written long ago, and a prison-sentence has been served for it, they are again citing it as an offence. They are also calling a criminal offence, and attempting to confiscate, a truth written on its own from the Treatise For The Elderly which is of the greatest value and useful for everyone and was included in A Guide For Youth. These show that they have been unable to find anything.]
After explaining that the veiling of women is a command of the Qur’an, it says in the Twenty-Fourth Flash, which is about that subject: “The fact that, according to news received, the bare-legged wife of a high-ranking man in the world was accosted by a common shoe-shiner in the country’s capital, in the market-place in daylight in front of everyone, deals a slap in the shameless faces of those opposed to the veiling of women!”
While in the Twenty-Sixth Flash, about the Elderly, it says: “I climbed to the top of Ankara citadel, which was far more aged, dilapidated, and worn out than me. It seemed to me to be formed of petrified historical events. The old age of the season of the year together with my old age, the citadel’s old age, mankind’s old age, the old age of the glorious Ottoman Empire, and the death of the Caliphate’s rule, and the world’s old age all caused me to look in the most grieved, piteous and melancholy state in that lofty citadel at the valleys of the past and the mountains of the future. ... As I sought consolation looking to the right, that is, to the past, my father and forefathers and the human race appeared in the form of a vast grave and filled me with gloom rather than consoling me. ... I looked at the present day. It appeared ... as a coffin bearing my half-dead, suffering and desperately struggling corpse.”
***


[They criticized the following where they should have applauded it, citing it as an offence.]
“I spent most of the salary I had received from the Darü’l-Hikmeti’l-Islamiye, and had put aside a small amount to go on the Hajj. Through the plenty resulting from frugality and contentment, that scanty money was sufficient for me. It prevented me being humiliated. There is still a little left of that blessed money.”
It is written that the Twenty-Second Flash is marked as confidential and is for my closest and most sincere and loyal students: “First Indication: Why is it that although you do not interfere in the world of the worldly, they interfere in your hereafter on every opportunity?” “It is the authorities of the province of Isparta and its people that should answer this question.”
***


[Those who deemed a crime this innocent, sincere, astonishing hope and desire, born of the compassion resulting from belief, are surely themselves guilty of a crime.]
Said says in one of his signed letters: “I used to be astonished at the innocent seven to ten-year-old children who would run up to me when they saw me driving around in the phaeton and hold onto my hands, and I wondered what the reason was. Then suddenly it was imparted to me that “with a premonition of the future, the group of young innocents sensed that through the Risale-i Nur they would find happiness and would be saved from spiritual dangers.”
***


[To deem this piece a crime although the beginning is in my favour and the end is a wish and hope, is beyond all fairness.]
It is written that a number of verses and Hadiths allude unanimously to a luminous truth this century, and point to a supreme regenerator of religion who is to come at the end of time; that the most important of the three duties of that person and community will be to save belief, and that there will be no harm in their disregarding the two duties which dominate the broad sphere, such as reviving the Shari‘a and setting up the caliphate. However, this might lead the Risale-i Nur’s opponents, particularly the politicians, to criticize and attack it, for which reason he has cut out a part of the short treatise of our precise brothers, together with some of its sentences, and will send it in amended form.
In a signed letter, Said Nursi writes: “The fact that the verses Verily We have granted you a manifest victory; * And that God may help you with powerful help35 in Qur’anic script over the gate of War Ministry, which was made into the University, were covered over by marble slabs and have now been brought to light, is a sign of the Qur’anic script again being permitted, and the aim followed by the Risale-i Nur being achieved. It is also a sign that the university will become a Risale-i Nur ‘Medrese’.”
***


[This is Husrev’s footnote at the end of my letter entitled The ‘Takbirs’ of the Hajjis, which furnishes a perfect reply to their criticisms of my explanations.]
In the letter signed by Said Nursi, with the heading ‘The takbirs of the Hajjis on Arafat,’ is the reply to “a significant number of the Risale-i Nur students asking persistently about a prominent guide from the Family of the Prophet who is to come at the end of time; they suppose you to be him. For your part, you consistently refuse to accept their ideas, and shrink from such a suggestion. This is a contradiction. We want the answer to this matter.”
The reply: The collective personality of the sacred community which the Mahdi descended from God’s Messenger will represent will have three functions: to save belief, to revive the marks of Islam under the title of the caliphate of Muhammad (PBUH), and to modify to some extent the laws of the Shari‘a of Muhammad (PBUH). He will attempt to carry out this vast duty. Since the Risale-i Nur students see the first duty completely in the Risale-i Nur, saying that the second and third duties are in second and third place, they rightly suppose the Risale-i Nur’s collective personality to be a sort of Mahdi. Since some of them suppose its wretched Interpreter is a representative of that collective personality, they sometimes call him by the same name. Indeed, they say that through interpretation and investigation it is understood from the predictions of some of the saints that the Risale-i Nur is that very guide of the end of time. There is confusion on two points, and they have to be interpreted.
The First: In reality the latter two duties are not of the same degree as the former. However, influenced by this century’s ideas in particular the mass of people and the politicians consider the caliphate of Muhammad (PBUH) and Islamic Unity to be immeasurably more extensive than the first duty. Every century a sort of Mahdi and Regenerator who gave guidance has appeared, but since they have performed only one of the three functions, they have not been given the title of the Great Mahdi.
The Second: That supreme person of the Last Days will be a descendant of the Prophet (PBUH). For sure I am like a spiritual son of Imam ‘Ali (May God be pleased with him), and I have received instruction from him in the realities; and since in one sense the Family of Muhammad (PBUH) includes true Risale-i Nur students, I too may be thought of as belonging to the Prophet’s Family. But it is not permissible in the Risale-i Nur way to desire any sort of egotism or personality or personal rank, or to win fame and renown. Even if rank in the hereafter was given me, I would feel myself compelled to leave it aside in order not to spoil the sincerity of the Risale-i Nur. A semi-consenting reply is given,36 and the ascription of Mahdiship is clearly and decisively rejected.
***


[The events in this piece are facts, and since in extraordinary fashion three minutes after my saying: Don’t upset me, the earth will become angry!, there was an earthquake, this should be applauded in amazement, as is demanded by compassion, and not be made the object of criticism.]
It is said: “Ten hours after having given my statement for four hours and suffering considerable discomfort, virtually at the same time, the fire in the Ministry of Education broke out, which caused loss worth two million liras and demonstrated that the Risale-i Nur is a means of repulsing calamities. For if it is attacked, the calamities find a way and strike.”
In letter number one hundred and forty-one, it proves that the fires in the Ministry of Education in Ankara and in a garage, in a factory in Izmir, and a large building in Adana being burnt to the ground after I had given my statement for four and a half hours were not coincidence, then it says: “Don’t deprive me of my treatises, or both I and this country will pay for it; the earth will vent its anger with earthquakes. Three minutes after saying this an earthquake occurred which lasted three seconds, and the Ministry of Education was engulfed in flames; numerous earthquakes have coincided with aggression against the Risale-i Nur and its students, as has been proved four times by courts of law, which cannot be chance or coincidence. Numerous incidents have shown that the Risale-i Nur is a means of calamities being repulsed in this country.”
In letter number one hundred and forty-seven: “This time, the winter displayed its fury when we were attacked. The weather raged with storm and was bitterly cold, but when the assaults ceased and the Nurjus experienced an expansiveness, those bitterly cold days began to smile like the first days of spring. ... The burning down of the Ministry of Education was a universal blow.
***


[A situation worthy of congratulation should not be objected to.]
One of the numerous meaningless questions they asked me this time in court, was: “How do you live?” I replied: “Through the plenty resulting from frugality. A person who one Ramadan in Isparta lived on one loaf of bread, a one-kilo bag of yoghurt, and one kilo of rice would not stoop to embracing the world for his livelihood and would not be obliged to accept gifts.”
***


[As with the defence Zübeyir37 read in court, his brilliant eulogy drove them to appreciate it, God willing, for amazed, they included it in the judgement.]
In a section with the heading: “Our young people want to be taught truth and realitiy, and to have the highest morality,” on page thirteen, Zübeyir Gündüzalp wrote by typewriter: “The Risale-i Nur is a masterpiece written not through the author’s will, but inspired by the Creator, in order to save the Muslims of the 20th century and all humanity from the dark, oppressive ideas.”
On page twelve: “If it was said to a person serving the Risale-i Nur: ‘Copy out these books instead of the Risale-i Nur, and I’ll give all the wealth of Ford,’ he would reply, without even raising the nib of his pen: ‘If you gave me all the world’s wealth and its sovereignty too, I would not accept it.’”
On page fifteen: “If we are attached to honest writers a hundred times over, our attachment to a great person like Bediuzzaman who guides us in this world and the next, is immeasurable, total.”
On page twelve: “The collective personality of the Risale-i Nur has diagnosed the social, spiritual, and religious sicknesses of this age, and at a Divine command has offered to all humanity at this time the All-Wise Qur’an’s truths in a way that will cure its chronic social ills.”
On page forty-four: “Bediuzzaman said that someone who studies these treatises for a year may become an important scholar. Yes, that is how it is.”
On page fifty-four: “The judges who study the Risale-i Nur do not make incorrect judgements.”
[This piece is entirely in my favour and is the exact truth, and should not have been included with the offences in the court’s decision.]
Ahmed Feyzi amended part of his work, but having to hurry he sent it without completing the corrections. In it, it is said: “Does it not infer by ignoring Saraçoglu, who calls religion and the training of Muhammad ‘poison’, and disputing The Illuminating Lamp, which demonstrates the Qur’anic reality as clearly as the sun and proves it to be the perfect cure for mankind’s wounds, that you are assisting in the confiscation of that collection?”
It says the following in the conclusion of one of his defence speeches, presented to the court on an unknown date. He stated that neither himself nor the students were occupied with politics; the writings shown to be aggressive were confidential; there was freedom of thought and of conscience; that even if the above appeared to be criticism of some laws, this did not constitute a crime; many of the treatises under consideration were written a long time previously; they had been scrutinized by committees of experts and had been found to be harmless; that just as there had previously been convictions for them in Eskishehir Court, so they had been acquitted in Denizli Court, so it was not right that they should be tried again for the same offence; the Risale-i Nur students had up to now been involved in no activities that would disturb public order; and that since no one was named explicitly in the Fifth Ray and its purpose was only to inform, this did not constitute a crime either.
Further examples may be thought of in the same way.
S a i d N u r s i
***


To the Judges of the Court of Appeal
[Again they did not permit me to speak in the session held to discuss the possible quashing by the Appeal Court of Afyon Court’s unjust decision concerning us. They made us listen to a third severe indictment. They also did not allow anyone to come to help me with writing. Despite my poor handwriting and my being ill, I am presenting this complaint to your Court —which has acted justly towards us twice previously— as a supplement to my petition concerning the appeal.]
In His Name, be He glorified!
A petition to the Supreme Tribunal of the Resurrection; and a complaint to the Divine Court; the Appeal Court of the present should also listen as well as coming generations and the enlightened future teachers and students of the universities. Of the hundreds of torments and calamities I have suffered these twenty-three years, I am setting ten before the court of justice of the All-Glorious Sovereign together with my complaints.
The First: Despite my faults, I have dedicated my life to this nation’s happiness and the saving of its religious belief. Saying, let my head too be sacrificed for a truth, that is, the truth of the Qur’an, for which millions of heroic heads have been sacrificed, I worked with the Risale-i Nur with all my strength. Through Divine assistance, I persisted in the face of all the cruel torments. I did not withdraw.
For example: One instance of the exceedingly cruel treatment I have received during my trial and imprisonment in Afyon: although three times, and every time for nearly two hours, they forced myself and the innocent Risale-i Nur students, who were awaiting solace from justice, to listen to the slanderous, malicious indictments, they did not allow us more than one or two minutes to defend our rights, despite my repeated requests for five or ten minutes.
I have been kept for twenty months in total isolation, with only one or two of my friends being permitted to visit me for three or four hours. For only a small part of my defence speeches did I have anyone to help me with the writing. Then they were forbidden as well, and punished exceedingly brutally. They compelled us to listen to the prosecutor’s biased indictment, which was like water gathered from a thousand streams, and which I proved contained eighty-one errors in fifteen pages arising from twisted meanings and slander and lies. They did not permit me to speak. If they had permitted me, I would have said:
Although as required by freedom of thought and freedom of conscience, you do not interfere with Jews, Christians, and Zoroastrians, and particularly now with anarchists, apostates, and dissemblers, hiding behind the screen of communism, who both deny your religion, and insult your forefathers accusing them of misguidance, and accept neither your Prophet (PBUH) nor the laws of the Qur’an; and although through the Qur’an’s instruction millions of Muslims in the lands and under the rule of an imperious, bigoted Christian state like Britain, reject all the false beliefs and infidel rules of the English, their courts do not interfere with them; and although opponents of all governments openly publish their ideas without those governments bothering them; and although both the Isparta authorities, and Denizli Court, and Ankara Criminal Court, and the Directorate of Religious Affairs, and the Appeal Court twice, no, three times, have all scrutinized these forty years of my life, and my one hundred and thirty treatises, and my most private treatises and letters, and they had in their possession for two or three years all the copies of the Risale-i Nur, confidential and otherwise, yet they could not show a single matter necessitating the smallest penalty; and although despite the fact I am extremely weak, oppressed, defeated, and am enduring the harshest conditions, our innocence has been proved by the Risale-i Nur collections you hold as well as our four-hundred-page defence, which have been shown to be a most powerful, sound, and veracious guide for two hundred thousand true and devoted students benefiting this country, nation, and public security; — in spite of all these, under which law, what conscience, what good, what crime do you convict us, contemptuously giving us the harshest sentences and severest solitary confinement? Certainly you shall be questioned about this at the Last Judgement.
The Second: One reason they put forward for punishing me was my expounding the Qur’an’s explicit verses about veiling, inheritance, recitation of the Divine Names, and polygamy, written to silence those who object to them in the name of civilization.
Fifteen years ago I wrote the following piece to Eskishehir Court and the Appeal Court, which was also included in the court’s decision. I repeat the piece as a complaint to the Supreme Tribunal at the Last Judgement, and as a warning to the enlightened teachers of the future, and together with Elhüccetü’z-Zehrâ (The Shining Proof) as a sort of addition to my petition to the Appeal Court, which twice has acted fairly in acquitting me and has listened to my cry for justice, and to the committee of judges who did not permit me to speak and due to the malicious indictment which I proved contained eighty errors, convicted me to two year’s hard labour and solitary confinement together with two year’s further exile elsewhere under close surveillance:
I say this that if there is any justice on the face of the earth, the Appeal Court will quash this decision which convicts someone who expounded Qur’anic verses which in each century for one thousand three hundred and fifty years have acted as sacred, true Divine principles in the social life of three hundred and fifty million Muslims, and expounded them relying on the consensus and affirmation of three hundred and fifty thousand Qur’anic commentaries and following the beliefs of our forefathers for one thousand three hundred years. Is it not a denial of Islam and a betrayal of our millions of religious and heroic forefathers to convict, because he expounded those verses, someone who according to reason and learning does not accept certain European laws applied temporarily due to certain requirements of the times and who has given up politics and withdrawn from social life, and is it not to insult millions of Qur’anic commentaries?
The Third: One reason they cited for our conviction was breaching security and disturbing public order. Putting forward the remotest possibility, one in a hundred or even a thousand, in place of actual events, and putting the wrong meanings on forty to fifty words from some confidential treatises and private letters out of the hundred thousand words and sentences of the Risale-i Nur, they present these as evidence, and accusing us want to have us punished.
Calling to witness those who have known my life these thirty to forty years and the thousands of ‘special’ (has)38 students of the Risale-i Nur, I say: to accuse of disturbing public order someone who, —at a time the commander of the British occupation forces in Istanbul was sowing discord among Muslims, even deceiving the Shaykh al-Islam and some leading men of religion and inciting the Committee of Union and Progress and the Freedom and Accord Party to struggle against each other, thus paving the way for the Greek victory and defeat of the National Movement,— foiled that insidious plan of the commander by printing and publishing through the efforts of Eshref Edib his work Hutuvat-i Sitte (The Six Steps) against the British and Greeks, not retreating even in the face of threat of execution; who did not flee to Ankara even when summoned because of the above service by the leaders there; who attached no importance when a prisoner-of-war to the Russian Commander-in-Chief’s order for his execution; who with a speech during the Thirty-First of March Incident induced eight regiments to obey their officers;39 and in the Military Court, disregarding the threat of execution said in reply to the presiding pashas’ questions of: “You too are a reactionary, you too wanted the Shari‘a?”, “If constitutionalism consists of one party’s despotism, then let all men and jinn witness that I am a reactionary and ready to sacrifice my very soul for a single matter of the Shari‘a,” causing those high-ranking officers to appreciate and admire him, and while expecting his execution, they decided on his acquittal, then on being released, he did not thank them but went on his way shouting: “Long live Hell for all tyrants!”; and as is written in the decision of Afyon Court, when Mustafa Kemal angrily said to him in the office of the Speaker of the Assembly:40 “We summoned you here so you would tell us of your elevated ideas, but you came and wrote some things about the five daily prayers and sowed conflict among us,” he replied: “After belief, the obligatory prayers are the most elevated question. Those who do not perform the prayers are traitors, and the pronouncements of traitors are to be rejected;” who said this in the presence of forty to fifty deputies, and forced that fearsome commander to swallow his anger and make a sort of apology; and in connection with whom not one matter has been recorded by the police and authorities of six provinces connected with the disturbance of public order; and among whose hundreds of thousands of students not the smallest incident has been witnessed (apart from one insignificant incident concerning a rightful defence in which one unimportant student was involved); in connection with none of whose students any crime has been heard; and whichever prison he has been sent to has there reformed the other prisoners; and as testified to by these twenty-three years of his life and three provincial authorities and three courts acquitting him and a hundred thousand of his students, who know the value of the Risale-i Nur, affirming it verbally and by action, despite hundreds of thousands of copies of it being distributed throughout the country, the Risale-i Nur has produced only benefits and caused no harm; and who is a recluse, single, a stranger, elderly, poor, and sees himself at the door of the grave; and who with all his strength has given up transitory things, and has sought ways of atoning for his former sins and making his life eternal, and attaches not the slightest importance to worldly rank, and who, so that no harm will come to the innocent and the elderly, out of his compassion does not curse those who torment and torture him; — those who say about such a man: “This old recluse disturbs the peace and breaches public security; his aims are the intrigues of this world, and his correspondence is for this world, in which case he is guilty” and who convict him under such severe conditions are surely themselves guilty from the ground to the heavens, and they shall give their account at the Last Judgement!
Can it be said about a man who with a speech induced eight mutinying regiments to obey their officers, and with a single article persuaded thousands of people to support him, and was not frightened before the three above-mentioned formidable commanders, and did not fawn to them, and in courts of law declared: “If I had heads to the number of hairs on my head and every day one was cut off, I would not surrender to atheism and misguidance and betray my country and nation and Islam; I would not bow this head, which has been dedicated to the Qur’an, before tyrants,” and was concerned with no one in Emirdag apart from five or ten brothers of the hereafter and three or four servants — could it be said about such a man, as it does in the indictment: “This Said was working secretly in Emirdag; he poisoned the minds of some of the people giving them the idea of disturbing the peace; twenty men gathered round him and wrote private letters praising him, which shows that he was hatching a revolt and was involved in covert politics against the government”? I refer it to your consciences to understand just how far from right, justice, and fairness those who torment him have deviated by, with unprecedented animosity and hatred, throwing him into prison for two years, in solitary confinement, and by not allowing him to speak in court.
Is it at all possible that someone who has received public attention a hundred times greater than is his due, and brought thousands of men to obedience with one speech, and induced thousands of people to join the Ittihad-i Muhammedî Society with one newspaper article, and made fifty thousand people listen admiringly to his address in Aya Sophia Mosque41 — that such a man should work at it for three years in Emirdag and deceive only five or ten people, and fill his grave, which he is approaching, with unnecessary darkness rather than with light? Is it at all possible that he should do this? Satan himself could not make anyone accept it!
The Fourth is their citing my not wearing the brimmed hat as an important reason for my conviction.42 They did not allow me to speak, otherwise I would have said this to those who were trying to punish me: I stayed as a guest for three months in the police station in Kastamonu. At no time did they say to me: “Wear the brimmed hat!” And although in three courts of law I did not wear the hat and did not remove my own headgear, they did not interfere with me. And on that pretext for twenty-three years a number of irreligious tyrants have inflicted a very distressing and severe penalty on me unofficially. And children, women, villagers, officials in their offices, and those who wear the beret are not compelled to wear the hat. And there is no physical benefit in wearing it. Yet because of their fabrications and allegations a recluse like myself has paid a twenty-year penalty for not wearing headgear that all the mujtahids and Shaykh al-Islams have prohibited. Those who are trying to have me punished again because of a meaningless custom related to dress; and with such force, repetition, and insistence to have me found guilty because of my dress —despite, saying there is personal freedom, their comparing to themselves those who drink raki in public in Ramadan during the day and do not perform the obligatory prayers, and not bothering them— surely after suffering the everlasting extinction of death and perpetual solitary confinement of the grave, at the Last Judgement they will be questioned concerning this error.
The Fifth: Those who have heard this third indictment and seen the judgement that we published will confirm that on pretexts as flimsy as a fly’s wing, they are trying to confiscate some of the treatises of the Risale-i Nur, which is alluded to favourably by thirty-three Qur’anic verses, was applauded by such saints as Imam ‘Ali (May God exalt him) and Gawth al-A‘zam ( May his mystery be sanctified), is affirmed by a hundred thousand believers, and in twenty years has won a highly beneficial rank for this nation and country without causing any harm. Even, making a pretext two pages about two correct explanations of two verses, which were written long ago and have been covered by pardons, it was even the cause of the four-hundred-page Zülfikâr and The Miracles of Muhammad (Mu’cizat-i Ahmediye) being seized, which has strengthened and saved the belief of a hundred thousand people and is extremely beneficial and valuable. And now, giving the wrong meaning to one or two words out of a thousand, they are trying to have that infinitely useful treatise seized. As for us, we say:
And for every calamity, we belong to God, and to Him is our return.43 * For us God suffices, and He is the Best Disposer of Affairs.44
The Sixth: To those who deem me guilty of a crime because some of the Risale-i Nur students have seen the wondrous proofs of the Risale-i Nur and profited from its irrefutable teachings about belief, which are at the degree of ‘knowledge of certainty,’ and as encouragement, congratulations, appreciation, and gratitude, praise me excessively and have an over-favourable opinion of me, I say this: when a powerless, weak, semi-literate, lonely exile subject to derogatory propaganda designed to scare the people away from me, I found for myself some of the cures of the Qur’an and its sacred truths related to belief which were a perfect remedy for my ills. Then concluding that they were also just the medicine for this nation and the sons of this land, I wrote down those valuable truths. Since I have very poor handwriting and I was much in need of assistants, Divine favour sent me loyal and staunch helpers.
If I had completely rejected their good opinion of me and sincere praise and offended them by rebuking them it would have been like contempt for and hostility towards those Lights taken from the treasury of the Qur’an. Thinking too it would cause those diamond-penned stout-hearted assitants to leave me, I directed their praise and applause for my bankrupt person to the Risale-i Nur, a miracle of the Qur’an to which in truth the praise is due, and to the collective personality of its leading students. But I did offend them in a way by saying that they were affording me a share a hundred times greater than my due. Could any law impute guilt to a man because others praise him although he eschews it and is not happy at it? For this is what the officials are doing, who act in the name of the law.
Although it was written on page fifty-four of the court’s judgement, which was written against us but which we published: “That great person of the end of time will be a descendant of the Prophet (PBUH), and we students of the Risale-i Nur can be considered to be members of the Prophet’s Family only in meaning. Also, there can be no egotism of any sort in the way of the Risale-i Nur, nor any wish for position and personal rank, or fame and renown. Even if I was offered high rank in the hereafter, I would feel myself compelled to refuse it in order not to damage the sincerity of the Risale-i Nur;” and although on pages twenty-two and three it is written: “Knowing one’s faults and realizing one’s poverty and impotence, and humbly seeking refuge at the Divine Court; with that personality I know myself to be more wretched, impotent, and faulty than everyone. So even if all the people praised and lauded me, they could not make me believe that I am someone good, of high spiritual and moral rank. Lest I frighten you off, I shall not say the many secret ills and bad characteristics of my third, true, personality. Out of His grace, Almighty God employs this personality in the mysteries of the Qur’an like a lowly private soldier. Endless thanks be to God. The soul is lower than everything, and the duty higher,” — although this is written in the Court judgement, they find me guilty of being called a supreme guide due to the praises of others, which in fact refer to the Risale-i Nur, and are thus deserving of paying an awesome penalty due to the error.
The Seventh: Although Denizli Court and Ankara Criminal Court and the Appeal Courts unanimously acquitted us and all the treatises of the Risale-i Nur and returned them and our letters to us, and they said “Even if the Appeal Court’s decision to quash the decision and Denizli’s acquittal were wrong, since they have been made final, the case cannot be retried,” I was sent to Emirdag, where I spent three years as a recluse. There, so long as there was no necessity, I spoke only with the two or three tailor apprentices who were assisting me, and rarely, for five or ten minutes with certain religiously-minded people. I wrote no letters other than once a week to one place as encouragement in the Risale-i Nur, and wrote only three letters in three years to my Mufti brother. I gave up writing pieces, which I had been doing for twenty to thirty years, except for two points, twenty pages in length, which were useful for the people of the Qur’an and for belief. One was about the wisdom in the repetitions in the Qur’an, and the other, about the angels; I wrote no other treatise. Only, I gave permission for the treatises which the courts had returned to be made into large collections, and since five hundred copies of The Supreme Sign, which had been printed in the old letters, had been handed over to us by the court, and since duplicating machines were not officially banned, I gave permission to my brothers to duplicate them so they could be published for the benefit of the Islamic world, and I busied myself with correcting them. I was certainly not concerned with politics in any way. Moreover, although official permission had been given for us to return to our native region, contrary to all the other exiles I accepted the hardship of exile in order not to become involved in politics and the world, and did not return. The treatment I have received these last twenty months proves that the person who is trying in this third indictment to find guilty such a man through the baseless accusations, lies, and misinterpretations is ruled by two fearsome meanings, which I shall not utter for now. What I do say is this: the grave and Hell are sufficient, and I refer it to the Last Judgement.
The Eighth: Since the Fifth Ray was returned to us after remaining for two years in the hands of Denizli and Ankara Courts, it was added at the end of the large collection called The Illuminating Lamp together with my defence, which had led to our acquittal in Denizli Court. For sure, previously we had held it to be confidential, but since the courts had advertised it and returned it after acquitting us, I permitted its duplication seeing that it was thus harmless. The original of the Fifth Ray was about allegorical Hadiths and was written thirty to forty years ago. For sure some Hadith scholars stated that some of the Hadiths that were well-known by the Umma were ‘dubious,’ but since it was their apparent meanings that had been objected to, the piece was written solely to save the believers from doubting them. Then since some time later some of its wondrous interpretations became clear for all to see, I held it to be confidential so that it should not be given the wrong meaning. Then numerous courts studied it minutely, and together with publicizing it, returned it to us. So I refer it to the consciences of those who have convicted us arbitrarily to see just how far it is from justice, right, and fairness to now again find us guilty because of it. And saying, For us God suffices, and He is the Best Disposer of Affairs, I refer them to the Last Judgement.
The Ninth: This is very important, but since those who have convicted us have studied the Risale-i Nur, I have not written it so as not to upset them.
The Tenth: This is powerful and important, but again so as not to offend them, I have not written it for now.
S a i d N u r s i ,
who is being held in absolute solitary confinement.
***


[Part of a petition written during the Eskishehir trial fifteen years ago and sent to the Cabinet.]45
You who “bind and loose”!
I have suffered an injustice the like of which has rarely been seen in the world. To remain silent before such an injustice is disrespect for right. I am compelled therefore to divulge a most important fact. Demonstrate the fault I have committed so that the law demands either my execution or a hundred and one year’s imprisonment, or prove that I am completely mad, or else give complete freedom to myself, my treatises, and my friends, and collect our losses from those who caused them.
Yes, every government has a law and a principle according to which penalties are given. If there is nothing in the laws of the Government of the Republic to necessitate the heaviest penalty for myself and my friends, we should be given our complete freedom, as well as recompense and appreciation and an apology. For if my important service of the Qur’an, which is clear and open, is against the Government, I should receive not a year’s sentence in this way and a number of my friends, six months each, I should be given the death sentence or a hundred and one year’s imprisonment and those earnestly attached to me and my work should be given the heaviest penalties. But if our service is not against the Government, we should receive not penalties, charges and imprisonment, but appreciation and recompense. For it is service the nature of which may be understood through its one hundred and twenty treatises, and its challenging the great philosophers of Europe and overthrowing their principles. Certainly, such effective service will either produce ghastly results inside the country, or it will yield most advantageous, elevated, and scholarly fruits. In which case, I cannot be given a year’s sentence for playing a childish game of hoodwinking, and deceiving public opinion, and concealing the intrigues of tyrants and their lies about us. Those like me either receive capital punishment, proudly climbing the gallows, or they remain free in the position of which they are worthy.
Yes, a clever thief can steal diamonds worth thousands, so he would not sentence himself to the same penalty for stealing a fragment of glass worth virtually nothing. No thief would do that, indeed, no conscious creature. Such a thief is cunning, not utterly stupid in that way.
Sirs! According to your delusions, I am like that thief. Rather than living in seclusion in a poor village in one of the districts of Isparta for nine years and putting in danger myself and my treatises which are the aim of my life by turning against the Government the ideas of five to ten ingenuous unfortunates, who have been given very light sentences along with me, I could have held a high position in either Ankara or Istanbul like formerly and manipulated thousands of people towards the aim I was following. Then I would not have been convicted so abjectly, but would have been involved in the world with the pride and dignity befitting my way and duty.
I do not say this out of pride or to boast, but ashamedly, to point out the errors of those who, recalling some of my old self-advertisement and hypocrisy, want to abase me so that the position I hold lacks all importance and cannot be profited from. So I say to them:
As someone who, as confirmed by his old defence, which was published under the name of The Testimony of Two Schools of Misfortune, reduced to obedience with a speech eight rebelling regiments during the Thirty-First of March Incident; and as was reported in the newspapers of the time, with an article called The Six Steps performed the important service of turning the ideas of the Istanbul ‘ulama against the British and in favour of the National Movement; and delivered an address to thousands in Aya Sophia, making them listen to him; and was greeted with tumultuous applause by the Assembly and deputies in Ankara, and had one hundred and sixty-three deputies assign one hundred and fifty thousand liras for his religious school and university; and without quailing responded completely firmly to the angry President in the Speaker’s office and invited him to perform the obligatory prayers; and while in the Darü’l-Hikmeti’l-Islamiye was unanimously considered worthy by the Union and Progress Government of the duty of effectively inviting the philosophers of Europe to accept Islamic wisdom; and Isharat al-I‘jaz (Signs of Miraculousness), the work he wrote on the front during the War and has now been seized, appeared so valuable to Enver Pasha, who was Commander-in-Chief at the time, that with respect shown by no one else and the idea of sharing in the good and glory of that memento of the War, which was racing to the future, he contributed the paper to have the work printed so that the exploits of its author during the War would be remembered — such a man would not descend to disgracing the dignity of his learning, the sacredness of his service, and his thousands of valuable friends by tainting himself with a petty crime like a horse-thief, abductor of girls, or pickpocket so that you could sentence him to a year’s imprisonment and treat him like a stealer of goats or sheep. He would prefer execution to suffering under the arbitrary persecution of a malicious detective or common policeman the year’s sentence now given him together with being held under supervision for a year, after having been tormented for ten years without reason with oppressive surveillance — although he could not endure to be dominated by the Sultan. If such a man had been involved in the world and if he had harboured such a wish and if his sacred service had permitted, he would have interfered in it to an extent ten times greater than the Menemen Affair and Shaykh Said Revolt.46 The booming sound of a cannon heard by all the world would not have subsided to the buzz of a fly.
Yes, I make the following point for the attention of the Government of the Republic: this situation has been brought about through the intrigues, machinations and propaganda of the covert organization which drove me to this misfortune. The evidence that widespread propaganda and terror and a conspiracy have been orchestrated against us in a way never before seen in any event is this, that although I have a hundred thousand friends, not one of them has been able to write me any letter for six months, or to send any greetings, and the fact that due to the informing of plotters who are trying to deceive the Government, interrogations and searches have been continually carried out from the eastern provinces to those in the west.
The plan these intriguers hatched was evidently to organize an ‘incident’ that would be the cause of thousands like me receiving the heaviest penalties. However, the result was a penalty that recalled an incident of petty pilfering perpetrated by the commonest person. Of one hundred and fifteen people, fifteen innocent men were given sentences of five or six months. Would any rational creature in the world prick the tail of a fierce lion or terrible dragon with his brilliantly sharp diamond sword, and make it turn on him? If his intention was self-defence or combat, he would use his sword somewhere else.
With your deluded view, you conceive of me as such a man, for that is the way you have charged me and sentenced me. If I act in a manner so contrary to consciousness and reason, this great country should not be terrorized and public opinion turned against me with propaganda, I should be sent to a lunatic asylum like a common madman. But if I am someone of the importance you afford me, my keen sword would not be pointed at the tails of the lion or the dragon to make them attack him, he would rather defend himself as far as he could. Just as I have voluntarily chosen seclusion these last ten years, and tolerating difficulties beyond human endurance, have interfered in no way whatsoever in matters of government, nor have I wanted to interfere. Because my sacred duty prohibits me.
O you who bind and loose! Is it at all possible that in the one hundred and twenty treatises of a person who, as was written in the newspapers twenty-five years ago, with one newspaper article caused thirty thousand people to accept his ideas, and drew the attention of the huge ‘Operation Army’ on himself, and replied with six words to the questions of the chief cleric of the English, who wanted six hundred, and gave a speech after the Constitutional Revolution as though he was a leading diplomat, — would only fifteen words related to politics and the world be found in the one hundred and twenty treatises of such a man? Is it at all reasonable to accept that this man follows politics and his aim is this world and he is troubling the Government? If his mind was set on meddling in politics and the Government, such a person would have made it clear in a single of his treatises, and indicated it in a thousand places. If his purpose had been criticism with political intent, would he not have found anything to criticize other than one or two rules about the veiling of women and inheritance, which have long been in force?
Yes, the politically-minded opponent of a ruling regime which had enacted far-reaching reforms would have found not those one or two to object to but thousands. As though the reforms of the Government of the Republic consisted only of one or two minor matters. Although I had no intention to criticize it whatsoever, because of one or two words in one or two of my books which I had written long previously, it was said: “He is attacking the ruling regime and its reforms.” So I ask: Should the whole country be busied with a scholarly matter which demands not the smallest penalty, in a way to cause anxiety?
Thus, myself and five to ten of my friends being given the most minor, trivial sentences; and the whole country being intimidated by powerful propaganda against us and being made to hate us; and Sükrü Kaya, the Interior Minister, being called to Isparta with a significant force of soldiers in order to perform a task a single private soldier could perform, that is, to arrest me; and Ismet, the head of the Cabinet, going to the eastern provinces in that connection; and for two months in prison my being prohibited from speaking with anyone; and no one asking after me or sending me greetings while alone in this exile; — all these show that it is a meaningless, pointless, illegal situation like a tree as huge as a mountain producing a fruit the size of a pea. Seeing that ‘government’ means ‘to govern with wisdom,’ it is not something any government would be involved in, especially a legal government like the Government of the Republic, which adheres more closely to the law than any other.
I want my rights within the bounds of the law. I accuse of being criminals those who act against the law in the name of the law. The laws of the Government of the Republic certainly reject the arbitrary acts of such criminals. I am hopeful that my rights will be restored to me.
S a i d N u r s i
***


An Example of the Risale-i Nur’s Veracity
N O T E
As the fair-minded and enlightened who read the following treatise,47 which was written nineteen years ago, will clearly understand, the Risale-i Nur, with all its one hundred and thirty parts, is concerned only with belief and the hereafter and was written in that spirit, completely free of all political and worldly motives. This clear and definite fact was corroborated by the lengthy investigations and minute studies carried out by the Courts of Eskishehir, Isparta, Denizli, and Afyon. In this connection, we are requesting your concern and assistance in having all our books returned to us, which for more than twenty months have been held by Afyon Court, and not the smallest point of which was shown by the Appeal Court as constituting an offence, and which have saved the belief of thousands of people, and have been praised and applauded by their readers, and scholars, and the Islamic world.
The greater part of the books held by Afyon Court were collected by the first of our companions to be released. Saying: “We gave these books of ours to Ustad, their owner; they should be handed over to him,” they referred them to me. In particular, they left in the court the gilded Qur’an which was written showing the miraculous ‘coincidences’ of letters,48 which was among the confiscated books. Before everything we await the swift return to us of those books and our Qur’an, which were previously returned to us by Denizli and Ankara Courts.
S a i d N u r s i

The Sixteenth Letter
In the Name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate.
Men said to them: “A great army is gathering against you,” and frightened them. But it [only] increased their belief; they said: “For us God suffices, and He is the best Disposer of Affairs.”49
This letter manifested the meaning of the verse, But speak to him mildly,50 and was not written vehemently. It is the answer to a question asked me both explicitly and implicitly by many people.
[To reply is not agreeable to me and I do not want to, for I have bound everything to reliance on God. But since I have not been left in peace to myself in my own world and since they have directed my attention towards the world, I am compelled to propound five ‘Points’ in the language of the Old Said in order to explain the reality of the situation both to my friends, and to ‘the worldly,’ and to those in authority, so as to save not myself, but my friends and my Words, from the suspicions and ill-treatment of ‘the worldly.’]
FIRST POINT
It is asked: “Why have you withdrawn from politics and now have nothing to do with them?”
T h e A n s w e r : The Old Said of nine or ten years ago was involved in politics a certain amount; indeed, thinking he would serve religion and learning by means of politics, he was wearied for nothing. He saw that it is a dangerous way which is doubtful and full of difficulties and for me superfluous, as well as forming an obstacle to the most necessary duties. It is mostly lies and there is the possibility of unknowingly being a tool in the hand of Europe. Furthermore, one who enters politics is either successful or is in opposition. As for being successful, since I am neither an official nor a deputy, to work in politics is unnecessary and nonsense for me. Politics has no need for me so that I should interfere for nothing. If I join the opposition, I would do so either with ideas or with force. If it was with ideas there is no need for me, for the questions are all clear, and everyone knows them as I do. To wag one’s chin pointlessly is meaningless. If I join the opposition with the use of force in view and to provoke an incident, there would be the possibility of committing thousands of sins in order to reach a doubtful goal. Many people would be afflicted by disaster on account of one. So saying that in conscience he could not accept committing sins and causing the innocent to commit sins due to a one or two in ten possibility, the Old Said gave up cigarettes together with the newspapers, politics, and worldly conversation about politics. Decisive evidence for this is the fact that for the past eight years I have not read a single newspaper nor listened to one being read. Let someone come forward and say that I have read one or listened to one. Whereas eight years ago the Old Said used to read perhaps eight newspapers every day. Furthermore, for the past five years I have been under the closest scrutiny and surveillance. Anyone who has observed the slightest hint of political activity should say so. But for someone like me who is nervous, fearless, and without attachment, who considers the best stratagem to be without stratagem, his ideas will not remain secret for eight days, let alone eight years. If he had had the appetite and desire for politics, he would not have left any necessity for investigation and scrutiny, he would have given voice like the firing of a cannon.
SECOND POINT
Why does the New Said avoid politics with such vehemence?
T h e A n s w e r : He avoids it so vehemently in order to serve belief and the Qur’an, which is of the greatest importance, the greatest necessity and is the most pure and most right, in order not to sacrifice unnecessarily and officiously for one or two doubtful years of worldly life the working for and gaining of more than millions of years of eternal life. For he says: I am getting old and I do not know how many more years I shall live, so the most important question for me must be to work for eternal life. The prime means of gaining eternal life and the key to everlasting happiness is belief, so one has to work for that. But since I am obliged by the Shari‘a to serve people in respect of learning so that they may profit also, I want to perform such a duty. However, such service will either concern social and worldly life, which I cannot do, and also in stormy times it is not possible to perform such service soundly. Therefore, I left aside that aspect and chose the aspect of service to belief, which is the most important, the most necessary, and the soundest. I leave that door open so that the truths of belief I have gained for myself and the spiritual remedies I have myself experienced may be acquired by others. Perhaps Almighty God will accept this service and make it atonement for my former sins. Apart from Satan the Accursed, no one, be it a believer or an unbeliever, one of the veracious or an atheist, has the right to oppose this work. For unbelief resembles nothing else. In tyrannizing, vice, and grievous sins there may be an inauspicious satanic pleasure, but in unbelief there is no sort of pleasure at all. It is pain upon pain, darkness upon darkness, torment upon torment.
Just how contrary to reason it would be for someone like me who is unattached, alone, and compelled to atone for his former sins to leave aside working for an endless eternal life and serving a sacred light like belief, and to cast himself in old age into the unnecessary, perilous games of politics—just how contrary to wisdom, just what a lunacy it would be even lunatics would understand!
But if you ask why service of the Qur’an and belief prohibit me, I would say: Since the truths of belief and the Qur’an are each like diamonds, if I was polluted by politics, the ordinary people who are easily deceived, would wonder about those diamonds I was holding, “Aren’t they for political propaganda to attract more supporters?” They might regard the diamonds as bits of common glass. Then by being involved with politics, I would be wronging the diamonds and as though reducing their value. O you whose view is restricted to this world! Why do you struggle against me? Why do you not leave me to myself?
If you say: The shaykhs sometimes interfere in our business, and they sometimes call you a shaykh.
I reply: Good sirs! I am not a shaykh, I am a hoja [teacher]. The evidence is this: I have been here four years and if I had taught a single person the sufi way, you would have had the right to be suspicious. But I have told everyone who has come to me: Belief is necessary, Islam is necessary; this is not the age of sufism.
If you say: They call you Said-i Kurdi; perhaps you have some nationalist ideas, and that doesn’t suit our interests.
I would reply: Sirs! The things the Old Said and the New Said have written are clear. I cite as testimony the certain statement, “Islam has abrogated the tribalism of the Age of Ignorance.” For years I have considered negative nationalism and racialism to be fatal poison, since they are a variety of European disease. And Europe has infected Islam with them thinking it would cause division, and Islam would break up and be easily swallowed. My students and those who have had anything to do with me know that for years I have tried to treat that disease. Since it is thus, good sirs, I wonder why you make every incident a pretext to harass me? According to what principle do you cause me distress at every worldly incident, like punishing and inflicting trouble on a soldier in the west because of a mistake made by a soldier in the east due to the connection of the army, or convicting a shopkeeper in Baghdad because of a crime committed by a tradesman in Istanbul due to their being in the same line of business? How can the conscience demand this? What benefit can require it?
THIRD POINT
My friends who wonder how I am and are astonished at my meeting every calamity silently with patience ask the following question: “How can you endure the difficulties and troubles with which you are faced, whereas formerly you were very proud and angry and could not endure even the least insult?”
T h e A n s w e r : Listen to two short incidents and stories and you shall receive your answer:
The First Story: Two years ago an official spoke insultingly and contemptuously about me behind my back. They later told me about it. For about an hour I was affected due to the Old Said’s vein of temperament. Then through Almighty God’s mercy the following fact occurred to me; it dispelled the distress and made me forgive the man. The fact is this:
I addressed my soul saying: if his insults and the faults he described concern my person and my soul, may God be pleased with him, because he recounted the faults of my soul. If he spoke the truth, he drove me to train my soul and he helped in saving me from arrogance. If he spoke falsely, he has helped to save me from hypocrisy and undeserved fame, the source of hypocrisy. No, I have not been reconciled with my soul, for I have not trained it. If someone tells me there is a scorpion on my neck or breast or else points it out to me, I should be grateful to him, not offended. But if the man’s insults were directed towards my belief and my attribute of being servant of the Qur’an, it does not concern me. I refer him to the Qur’an’s Owner, Who employs me. He is Mighty, He is Wise. And if it was merely to curse at me, insult me, and destroy my character, that does not concern me either. For I am an exile, a prisoner, a stranger, and my hands are tied, and it does not fall to me to try to restore my honour myself. It rather concerns the authorities of this village where I am a guest and under surveillance, then of the district, then of the province. Insulting the prisoner of a person, concerns the person; he defends the prisoner. Since the reality of the matter is this, my heart became easy. I said,
My [own] affair I commit to God; for God [ever] watches over His servants.51
I thought of the incident as not having happened. But unfortunately it was later understood that the Qur’an had not forgiven him...
The Second Story: This year I heard that an incident had occurred. Although I only heard a brief account of it after it had happened, I was treated as though I had been closely connected with it. Anyway I do not correspond with anyone, and if I do, I only write extremely rarely concerning some question of belief to a friend. In fact I have written only one letter to my brother in four years. Both I prevent myself from mixing with others, and ‘the worldly’ prevent me. I have only been able to meet with one or two close friends once or twice a week. As for visitors to the village, once or twice a month perhaps one or two used to meet with me for one or two minutes concerning some matter to do with the hereafter. In exile, a stranger, alone, with no one, I was barred from everything, from everyone, in a village which was unsuitable for someone like me to work for a livelihood. Even, four years ago I repaired a tumble-down mosque. Although with the certificate I had from my own region to act an imam and preacher I acted as imam in the mosque for four years (May God accept it), this past Ramadan I could not go to the mosque. Sometimes I performed the five daily prayers alone. I was deprived of the twenty-fivefold merit and good of performing the prayers in congregation.
I displayed the same patience and forbearance in the face of these two incidents that befell me as I did towards the treatment of that official two years ago. God willing I shall continue to do so. I think like this and say: if this ill-treatment, distress, and oppression inflicted on me by ‘the worldly’ is for my faulty soul, I forgive it. Perhaps my soul will be reformed by means of it, and perhaps it will be atonement for its sins. I have experienced many of the good things in this guest-house of the world; if I experience a little of its trials, I shall still offer thanks. If ‘the worldly’ oppress me because of my service of belief and the Qur’an, it is not up to me to defend it. I refer it to the Mighty and Compelling One. If the intention is to destroy the regard in which I am held generally, to expunge undeserved fame, which is baseless and causes hypocrisy and destroys sincerity, then may God bless them! For I consider being held in regard by people generally and gaining a name among them to be harmful for people like me. Those who have dealings with me know that I do not want respect to be shown to me, indeed, I can’t abide it. I have even scolded a valuable friend of mine perhaps fifty times for showing me excessive respect. If their intention in slandering me, belittling me in the eyes of the people, and defaming me is directed towards the truths of belief and the Qur’an of which I am the interpreter, it is pointless. For a veil cannot be drawn over the stars of the Qur’an. “One who closes his eyes only himself does not see; he does not make it night for anyone else.”
FOURTH POINT
The answer to a number of suspicious questions:
T h e F i r s t : ‘The worldly’ say to me: “How do you live? What do you live on since you do not work? We don’t want people in our country who sit around idly and live off the labour of others.”
T h e A n s w e r : I live through frugality and the resulting plenty. I am not obliged to anyone other the One Who provides for me and I have taken the decision not to become obliged to anyone else. Yes, someone who lives on a hundred para, or even forty para, does not become obliged to anyone. I do not want to explain this matter. To do so is most disagreeable to me, as it may make me feel a sort of pride or egotism. But since ‘the worldly’ ask about it suspiciously, I reply as follows: since my childhood, throughout my life, it has been a principle of my life not to accept anything from the people, even zakat, not to accept a salary —only I was compelled to accept one for one or two years in the Darü’l-Hikmeti’l-Islamiye on the insistence of my friends— and not to become obliged to people for a worldly livelihood. The people of my native region and those who have known me in other places know this. During these five years of exile, many friends have tried earnestly to make me accept their gifts, but I have accepted none of them. If, therefore, it is asked me, “So how do you manage to live?”, I reply: I live through Divine bestowal and blessings. For sure, my soul deserves all insults and contempt, but as a wonder resulting from service of the Qur’an, I receive plenty and blessings which are a Divine bestowal in the matter of sustenance. In accordance with the verse,
But the bounty of your Sustainer rehearse and proclaim,52
I shall recall the bounties Almighty God has bestowed on me, and mention a few examples by way of thanks. But together with being thanks, I am frightened that it will induce hypocrisy and pride so that blessed plenty will be cut. For to make known a secret Divine gift of plenty causes it to cease. But what can I do, I am compelled to tell them.
The First: This six months one bushel (kile)53 of wheat, consisting of thirty-six loaves of bread, has sufficed me. There is still some left, it is not finished. How much longer54 it will last, I do not know.
The Second: This blessed month of Ramadan I received food from only two houses, and both of them made me ill. I understood that I am prohibited from eating the food of others. The rest of the time, in the whole of Ramadan, three loaves of bread and one okka55 of rice sufficed me, as was witnessed and told by Abdullah Çavus, the owner of a blessed house and a loyal friend who saw my economizing. The rice even was finished two weeks after the end of Ramadan.
The Third: For three months on the mountain one kiyye56 of butter was enough for me and my guests, eating it every day together with bread. On one occasion even I had a blessed visitor called Süleyman. Both his bread and my bread were about to be finished. It was Wednesday. I told him to go and get some bread. For two hours’ distance on every side of us there was no one from whom he could have got any bread. He said that he wanted to stay with me on the mountain on Thursday night so that we could pray together. Saying, Our reliance is on God, I told him to stay. Later, although it had no connection with this and there was no reason for it, we both began walking till we reached the top of the mountain. There was a little water in the ewer, and we had a small piece of sugar and some tea. I said to him: “Brother! Make some tea!” He set about making it and I sat down under a cedar-tree overlooking a deep ravine. I thought regretfully to myself: we have a bit of mouldy bread which will only just be enough for us this evening. What shall we do for two days and what shall I say to this ingenuous man? While thinking this, I suddenly turned my head involuntarily and I saw a huge loaf of bread on the cedar-tree in among the branches; it was facing us. I exclaimed: “Süleyman! Good news! Almighty God has sent us food.” We took the bread, and looking at it saw that no bird or wild animal had touched it. And for twenty or thirty days no one at all had climbed to the top of that mountain. The bread was sufficient for us for the two days. While we were eating and it was about to be finished, righteous Süleyman who had been the most loyal of loyal friends for four years, suddenly appeared from below with more bread.
The Fourth: I bought this sack coat that I’m wearing seven years ago second-hand. In five years I have spent only four and a half liras on clothes, underwear, slippers, and stockings. Frugality and Divine mercy and the resulting plenty have sufficed me.
Thus, there are numerous things like these examples and numerous sorts of Divine blessings. The people of this village know most of them. But do not suppose I am mentioning them out of pride, I have been forced to, rather. And do not think they were due to my goodness. These instances of plenty were either bestowal to the sincere friends who have visited me, or a bestowal on account of service to the Qur’an, or an abundance and benefit resulting from frugality, or they have been sustenance for the four cats I have which recite the Divine Names “O Most Compassionate One! O Most Compassionate One!”, which comes in the form of plenty and from which I benefit too.
Yes, if you listen carefully to their mournful miaowings, you will understand that they are saying, “Ya Rahim! Ya Rahim! O Most Compassionate One! O Most Compassionate One!” We have arrived at the subject of cats and it has recalled the hen. I have a hen. This winter every day almost without exception she brought me an egg from the treasury of Mercy. Then one day she brought me two eggs and I was astonished. I asked my friends “How can this be?” They replied: “Perhaps it is a Divine gift.” The hen also has a young chick she hatched in the summer. It started to lay at the beginning of Ramadan and continued for forty days. Neither I nor those who assist me have any doubt that, being both young, and in winter, and in Ramadan, this blessed situation was a Divine gift and bestowal. And whenever the mother stopped laying, it immediately started, not leaving me without eggs.
S e c o n d S u s p i c i o u s Q u e s t i o n : ‘The worldly’ ask: How can we be confident that you will not interfere in our world? If we leave you free, perhaps you may interfere in it. Also, how do we know that you are not being cunning? How do we know that it is not a stratagem, showing yourself to have abandoned the world and not taking things from the people openly, but secretly?
T h e A n s w e r : My attitude and situation in the Court Martial and in the period before the proclamation of the Constitution, which are known by many, and my defence in the Court Martial at that time called The Testimony of Two Schools of Misfortune, show decisively that the life I lived was such that I would not resort to the tiniest wiles, let alone cunning and subterfuge. If trickery had been resorted to in this last five years, application would have been made to you in sycophantic manner. A wilely man tries to ingratiate himself. He does not hold back; he always tries to deceive and hoodwink. Whereas I have not condescended to lower myself by responding to the severest attacks and criticisms levelled at me. Saying, I place my trust in God, I turned my back on ‘the worldly.’ Moreover, one who discovers the reality of this world and knows the hereafter, is not sorry if he is sensible; he does not turn back to the world and struggle with it again. Someone after the age of fifty who has no connection with anything and is alone, will not sacrifice eternal life for one or two years of the chatter and deception of this world. If he does so, he is not cunning, but foolish and crazy. What can a crazy lunatic do so that anyone should bother with him? As for the suspicion of outwardly abandoning the world while inwardly seeking it, in accordance with the verse,
Nor do I absolve my own self [of blame]; the [human] soul is certainly prone to evil,57
I do not exonerate my soul, for it wants everything bad. But in this fleeting world, this temporary guest-house, during old age, in a brief life, it is not reasonable to destroy eternal, everlasting life and eternal happiness for a little bit of pleasure. Since it is not profitable for the reasonable and the aware, my soul has willy-nilly had to follow my reason.
T h e T h i r d S u s p i c i o u s Q u e s t i o n : ‘The worldly’ say: Do you like us? Do you approve of us? If you do like us, why are you stand-offish and have nothing to do with us? If you do not like us, that means you object to us, and we crush those who object to us.
T h e A n s w e r : Not you, if I had loved your world, I would not have withdrawn from it. I don’t like either you or your world. But I do not interfere with them. For I have different goals, different points have filled my heart; they have left no place in my heart to think of other things. Your duty is to look to the hand, not to the heart. For you seek your government and your public order. So long as the hand does not interfere, what right do you have to interfere in the heart and say, “the heart should love us too,” although you are in no way worthy of it? Yes, just as I desire and long for the spring during this winter, but I cannot will it nor attempt to bring it, so I long for the world to be righted and I pray for it and I want the worldly to be reformed, but I cannot will these things, because I do not have the power. I cannot attempt them in fact, because it is neither my duty, nor do I have the capacity.
F o u r t h S u s p i c i o u s Q u e s t i o n : ‘The worldly’ say: we have experienced so many calamities, we no longer have confidence in anyone. How can we be certain that given the opportunity you won’t interfere as you wish?
T h e A n s w e r : The previous points should give you confidence. In addition, since I did not interfere in your world while in my native region among my students and relatives, in the midst of those who heeded me and of exciting events, for someone who is alone in exile, with no one, a stranger, weak, powerless, turned with all his strength towards the hereafter, cut off from all social relations and correspondence, who has only found a few friends from far afield who are also turned to the hereafter, and who is a stranger to everyone else and whom everyone else regards as a stranger — for such a person to interfere in your fruitless and dangerous world would surely be a compounded lunacy.
FIFTH POINT
This concerns five small matters.
T h e F i r s t : ‘The worldly’ ask me: Why do you yourself not practise the principles of our civilization, our style of life, and our manner of dressing? Does this mean you oppose us?
M y r e p l y : Sirs! What right do you have to propose to me the principles of your civilization? For as though casting me outside the laws of civilization, you have wrongfully forced me to reside in a village for five years prohibited from all social relations and correspondence. While you left all the exiles in the town with their friends and relations, then gave them the papers granting them an amnesty, without reason you isolated me and did not allow me to meet with anyone from my native region with one or two exceptions. That means you do not count me as a member of this nation and a citizen. How can you propose to me that I apply your civil code to myself? You have made the world into a prison for me. Such things cannot be proposed to someone in prison. You closed the door of the world on me, so I knocked on the door of the hereafter, and Divine mercy opened it to me. How can the confused customs and principles of the world be proposed to someone at the door of the hereafter? Whenever you set me free and return me to my native region and restore my rights, then you can require me to conform to your principles.
S e c o n d M a t t e r : ‘The worldly’ say: “We have an official department for instructing in the precepts of religion and truths of Islam. With what authority do you publish religious works? Being a convicted exile, you have no right to mix in these matters.”
T h e A n s w e r : Truth and reality cannot be restricted. How can belief and the Qur’an be restricted? You can restrict the principles and laws of your world, but the truths of belief and Qur’anic principles cannot be forced into the form of worldly dealings, be given an official guise and offered in return for a wage. Those mysteries which are Divine gifts, those blessings, come rather through a sincere intention and giving up the world and carnal pleasures. Moreover, that official department of yours accepted me and appointed me as a preacher while I was in my home region. I accepted the position, but rejected the salary. I have the document in my possession. With the document I can act as an imam and preacher everywhere, because my being exiled was unjust. Also, since the exiles have been returned, my old documents are still valid.
Secondly: I addressed the truths of belief which I have written directly to my own soul. I do not invite everyone. Rather, those whose spirits are needy and hearts wounded search out and find those Qur’anic remedies. Only, to secure my livelihood I had printed a treatise of mine about the resurrection of the dead before the new script was introduced. And the former governor, who was unfair to me, studied the treatise, but did nothing against it since he could find nothing in it to criticize.
T h i r d M a t t e r : Some of my friends remain apparently aloof from me because ‘the worldly’ consider me with suspicion and in order to appear favourable to ‘the worldly,’ indeed, they criticize me. But the cunning ‘worldly’ attribute their aloofness and avoiding me not to their loyalty to ‘the worldly’ but to a sort of hypocrisy and lack of conscience, and they look on those friends of mine coldly.
So I say this: O my friends of the hereafter! Don’t stand aloof from my being a servant of the Qur’an and run away. Because, God willing, no harm will come to you from me. Suppose some calamity is visited on you or I am oppressed, you cannot be saved by avoiding me. By doing that you will make yourselves more deserving of calamity and a blow. What is there, that you should have these groundless fears?
F o u r t h M a t t e r : I see during this time of my exile that certain boastful people who have fallen into the swamp of politics regard me in a partisan manner, with rivalry, as though I am connected with the worldly currents like they are.
Sirs! I am in the current of belief. Before me is the current of unbelief. I have no connection with other currents. Perhaps some of those who work for a wage see themselves as excused to a degree. But to take up a position opposed to me in rivalry for no wage in the name of patriotism, and harass me, and oppress me, is a truly grievous error. For as was proved above, I have no connection at all with world politics. I have dedicated and vowed all my time and my life to the truths of belief and the Qur’an. Since it is thus, let the one who torments and harasses me in rivalry think that such treatment of his is similar to causing harm to belief in the name of atheism and unbelief.
F i f t h M a t t e r : Since this world is transitory, and since life is short, and since the truly essential duties are many, and since eternal life will be gained here, and since the world is not without an owner, and since this guest-house of the world has a most Wise and Generous director, and since neither good nor bad will remain without recompense, and since according to the verse,
On no soul does God place a burden greater than it can bear58
there is no obligation that cannot be borne, and since a safe way is preferable to a harmful way, and since worldly friends and ranks last only till the door of the grave, then surely the most fortunate is he who does not forget the hereafter for this world, and does not sacrifice the hereafter for this world, and does not destroy the life of the hereafter for worldly life, and does not waste his life on trivial things, but considers himself to be a guest and acts in accordance with the commands of the guest-house’s Owner, then opens the door of the grave in confidence and enters upon eternal happiness.59
***


The Addendum to the Sixteenth Letter
In His Name!
There is nothing but it glorifies Him with praise.
Without reason ‘the worldly’ became suspicious of a powerless stranger like myself, and imagining me to have the power of thousands of people, put me under numerous restrictions. They did not give permission for me to stay one or two nights in Bedre, a district of Barla, or on one of the mountains of Barla. I heard that they say: “Said has power equal to that of fifty thousand soldiers, we cannot therefore set him free.”
So I say: You unhappy people whose view is restricted to this world! How is it that you do not know the matters of the world, despite working for the world with all your strength, and govern it like lunatics? If it is my person you fear, it is not fifty thousand soldiers, one soldier even could do more than me. That is, he could be posted at the door of my room and tell me: “You can’t go out!”
But if it is my profession and my being herald of the Qur’an and the moral strength of belief that you fear, then you are wrong, it is not fifty thousand soldiers, you should be aware that in respect of my profession I have the strength of fifty million! For through the strength of the All-Wise Qur’an, I challenge all Europe including your irreligious people. Through the lights of belief I have published I have razed the sturdy bastions they call the physical sciences and Nature. I have cast down lower than animals their greatest irreligious philosophers. If all Europe was to gather, of which your irreligious people are a part, through God’s assistance, they could not make me recant a single matter of that way of mine. God willing, they could not defeat me....
Since the matter is thus, I do not interfere in your world, so don’t you interfere in my hereafter! If you do, if it will be of no avail.
What is determined by God cannot be turned by force;
A flame that if lit by God, cannot be extinguished by puffing.
‘The worldly’ are exceptionally and excessively suspicious of me; quite simply, they are frightened of me. Imagining things non-existent in me, which even if they were existent would not constitute a political crime and could not be the cause of accusation, like being a shaykh, or of significant rank or family, or being a tribal leader, and influential, and having numerous followers, or meeting with people from my native region, or being connected with the affairs of the world, or even entering politics, or even the opposition; imagining these things in me, they have been carried away by groundless fears. At a time even that they are discussing pardoning those in prison and outside, that is, those that according to them cannot be pardoned, they have quite simply barred me from everything. A bad and ephemeral person wrote the following good and enduring words:
If tyranny has cannon, shot, and forts,
Right has an untwistable arm, a constant face.
And I say:
If the worldly have rule, power, and strength,
Through the Qur’an’s effulgence, its servant
Has unfaltering knowledge, an unsilenceable voice;
He has an unerring heart, an unquenchable light.
Many friends, as well as a military commander under whose surveillance I was, repeatedly asked: “Why don’t you apply for the release papers and put forward a petition?”
T h e A n s w e r : I do not apply and I cannot apply for five or six reasons:
The First: I did not interfere in ‘the worldly’s’ world so that I should have been convicted and apply to them. I was convicted by Divine Determining; my faults are before it, and I apply to it.
The Second: I believe and have certain knowledge that this world is a swiftly changing guest-house. Therefore, it is not the true homeland and everywhere is the same. Since I am not going to remain permanently in my homeland, it is pointless to struggle for it; it is not worth going there. Since everywhere is a guest-house, if the mercy of the guest-house’s Owner befriends one, everyone is a friend and everywhere familiar. Whereas if it does not befriend one, everywhere is a load on the heart and everyone hostile.
The Third: Application is made within the framework of the law. But the way I have been treated these six years has been arbitrary and outside the law. The Exiles’ Law was not applied to me. They looked on me as though I had been stripped of all the rights of civilization and even of all worldly rights. To apply in the name of the law to those whose dealings with me have been thus outside the law is meaningless.
The Fourth: This year, the local official applied in my name for me to stay for a few days in the village of Bedre, which is a sort of district of Barla, for a change of air. How can those who reject such an unimportant need of mine be applied to? If they are applied to, it would be a futile and degrading abasement.
The Fifth: To claim a right before those who claim a wrong to be right, and to apply to them, is a wrong. It is disrespectful towards right. I do not want to perpetrate such a wrong and show disrespect for right. And that is that.
The Sixth: The distress and difficulty ‘the worldly’ have caused me has not been due to politics, because they know I do not meddle in politics and flee from it. Rather, knowingly or unknowingly, they torment me on account of aggressive atheism because I am bound to religion. In which case, to apply to them infers regretting religion and flattering the cause of aggressive atheism.
Moreover, Divine Determining, which is just, would punish me through their tyrannical hand on my applying to them and having recourse to them, for they oppress me because of my being bound to religion. As for Divine Determining, from time to time it represses me due to my hypocrisy before ‘the worldly,’ because of my deficiency in religion and in sincerity. Since this is so, for the time being I cannot be saved from this distress. If I apply to the worldly, Divine Determining would say: “Hypocrite! Pay the penalty for applying!” And if I do not apply, ‘the worldly’ say: “You don’t recognize us, go on suffering difficulties!”
The Seventh Reason: It is well-known that an official’s duty is to give harmful individuals no opportunity to cause harm and to assist those who are beneficial. Whereas the official who took me into custody approached me, an elderly guest at the door of the grave, when I was expounding a subtle aspect of belief contained in There is no god but God as though I was perpetrating some misdemeanour, although he had not been to me for a long time previously. He caused the sincere unfortunate who was listening to be deprived, and me to be angry. There were certain people here, and he attached no importance to them. Then when they acted discourteously in a way that would poison the life of the village, he started to be gracious and appreciative towards them.
Furthermore, it is well-known that someone in prison who has committed a hundred crimes can meet with the person who supervises him whether the official be of high or low rank. But in this last year, although two important people in the national government charged with supervising me have passed by my house several times, they have absolutely neither met with me nor asked after my condition. At first I supposed that they did not come near to me due to enmity, then it became clear that it was due to their fearful suspicions; they were fleeing from me as though as I was going to gobble them up. Thus, to recognize a government whose members and officials are like those men and have recourse to it and apply to it, is not sensible, but a futile abasement. If it had been the Old Said, he would have said, like ‘Antara:
The very water of life becomes Hell through abasement,
Whereas Hell with dignity becomes a place of pride.
The Old Said no longer exists, and the New Said considers it meaningless to talk with ‘the worldly.’ Let their world be the end of them! They can do what they like. He is silent, saying, we shall be judged together with them at the Last Judgement.
The Eighth Reason for my not applying: According to the rule, “The result of illicit love is merciless torment,” Divine Determining, which is just, torments me through the tyrannous hand of ‘the worldly’ because I incline towards them, since they are not worthy of it. Saying, I deserve this torment, I am silent. For in the Great War I fought and strove as a Commander of a volunteer regiment. Applauded by the Commander-in-Chief of the army and Enver Pasha, I sacrificed my valuable students and friends. I was wounded and taken prisoner. Returning from captivity, I cast myself into danger through works like The Seven Steps, aiming them at the heads of the British, who had occupied Istanbul. I assisted those who hold me without reason in this torment and captivity. As for them, they punish me in this way for that help. Those friends here cause me in three months the hardship and distress I suffered in three years as a prisoner-of-war in Russia. And the Russians did not prevent me from giving religious instruction, although they regarded me as a Kurdish Militia Commander, a cruel man who had slaughtered Cossacks and prisoners. I used to instruct the great majority of my ninety fellow officer prisoners. One time, the Russian commander came and listened. Because he did not know Turkish, he thought it was political instruction, and put a stop to it. Then later he gave permission. Also, in the same barracks, we made a room into a mosque, and I used to lead the prayers. They did not interfere at all. They did not prevent me from mixing, or from communicating, with the others. Whereas my friends here, my fellow citizens and co-religionists and those for whose benefits in the form of religious belief I have struggled, have held me in a tortuous captivity not for three years, but for six, for absolutely no reason and although they know I have severed all my relations with the world. They have prevented me mixing with others. They have prevented me from giving religious instruction, despite my having a certificate, and even from giving private instruction in my room. They have prevented me from communicating with others. They have even barred me from the mosque which I repaired and where I acted as prayer-leader for four years, although I had the necessary certificate. And now, to deprive me of the merit of performing the prayers in congregation, they do not accept me as prayer-leader even for three private individuals, my permanent congregation and brothers of the hereafter.
Furthermore, if, although I do not want it, someone is to call me good, the official who holds me in surveillance is jealous and angry. Thinking he will destroy my influence, he entirely unscrupulously takes precautions, and pesters me in order to curry favour with his superiors.
To whom can someone in such a position have recourse other than God Almighty? If the judge is also the claimant, of course he cannot complain to him. Come on, you say! What can we say to this? You say what you like, I say this: there are many dissemblers among these friends of mine. A dissembler is worse than an unbeliever. For that reason they make me suffer what the infidel Russian did not make me suffer.
You unfortunates, what have I done to you and what I am doing? I am trying to save your belief and am serving your eternal happiness! It means that my service is not sincere and purely for God’s sake so that it has the reverse effect. In return, you torment me at every opportunity. For sure, we shall meet at the Last Judgement. I say:
God is enough for us and the best of protectors.60 * The best of lords and the best of helpers.61
The Enduring One, He is the Enduring One!
S a i d N u r s i


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
I shall explain in three ‘Points’ an effective solace for those who are experiencing the calamity of prison, and for those who kindly help them and faithfully supervise their food, which comes from outside.
First Point: Each day spent in prison may gain as much as ten days’ worship, and, with regards to their fruits, may transform those transient hours into enduring hours, and through five or ten years’ punishment may be the means of saving a person from millions of years of eternal imprisonment. For the believers, the condition for gaining this most significant and valuable advantage is to perform the obligatory prayers, repent for the sins that were the cause of their imprisonment, and offer thanks in patience. For sure, prison is an obstacle to many sins; it does not provide the opportunity for them.
Second Point: Just as the cessation of pleasure causes pain, so does the cessation of pain give pleasure. Yes, on thinking of past happy, enjoyable days, everyone feels a pang of regret and longing, and says: “Alas!”, and recalling calamitous, unhappy days of the past, experiences a sort of pleasure since they are passed, and says: “Praise and thanks be to God, that calamity has left its reward and departed.” He breathes a sigh of relief. That is to say, an hour’s temporary pain and sorrow leave behind a sort of pleasure in the spirit, while a pleasurable hour leaves a pain.
Since the reality is thus; and since past calamitous hours together with their pains are no longer existent, and future distressing days are at the present time non-existent, and there is no pain from nothing, to continually eat bread and drink water today, for example, because of the possibility of being hungry and thirsty in several days’ time, is most foolish. In just the same way, to think now of the past and future unhappy hours, which simply do not exist, and to display impatience, and ignoring one’s faulty self, to moan as though complaining about God is also most foolish. So long as the power of patience is not scattered to left and right, that is, to the past and future, and is held firm in the face of the present of hour and day, it is sufficient. The distress is reduced from ten to one.
In fact, but let it not be complaining, Divine favour pointed out the above fact to me while, during a few days of material and spiritual affliction, illness and trial the like of which I had never before experienced in my life, I was being crushed in particular by the despair and distress of the heart and spirit which resulted from my being unable to serve the Qur’an and belief with the Risale-i Nur. I was then content with my distressing illness and imprisonment. For, saying: “It is great profit for an unfortunate like myself who waits at the door of the grave to make one hour which might be passed in heedlessness ten hours’ worth of worship,” I gave thanks.
Third Point: There is great gain in compassionately aiding and assisting prisoners, in giving them the sustenance they need, and in soothing their spiritual wounds with consolation. Giving them their food which comes from outside is like alms-giving which, exactly to the amount of the food, is written in the book of good deeds of those, outside and inside, who do this, together with the warders concerned. Especially if the unhappy prisoner is old, ill, poor, or a stranger, then the reward of this alms-giving increases many times over.
The condition of this high profit is to perform the obligatory prayers so that such service is for God’s sake. Another condition is to hasten to their assistance with sincerity, compassion and joy, and in such a way as to not make them feel obliged.
***


A Short Addendum from A Guide For Youth
In His Name, be He glorified!
Those in prison are in great need of the true consolation of the Risale-i Nur. Particularly those who having suffered the blows of youth, are passing their sweet, young lives in prison; they need the Risale-i Nur as much as they need bread.
Indeed, youth heeds the emotions rather than reason, and emotions and desires are blind; they do not consider the consequences. They prefer one ounce of immediate pleasure to tons of future pleasure. They kill for the one minute pleasure of revenge, then suffer for eighty thousand hours the pain of prison. And one hour’s dissolute pleasure in questions of honour may result in life’s enjoyment being utterly destroyed due to distress at the fear of both prison and enemies. There are many other examples, many pitfalls for the unfortunate young because of which they transform their sweet lives into the most bitter and pitiable lives.
Consider a vast state to the north;62 it has gained possession of the passions of its young people and is shaking this century with its storms. For it has made lawful for its youths the pleasing daughters and wives of upright people, and these youths act only according to their feelings, which are blind to all consequences. By permitting men and women to go together to the public baths, they are even encouraging immorality. And they consider it lawful for vagabonds and the poor to plunder the property of the rich. All mankind trembles in the face of this calamity.
It is therefore most necessary in this century for all Muslim youths to act heroically, and to respond to this two-pronged attack with keen swords like The Fruits of Belief and A Guide For Youth from the Risale-i Nur. Otherwise those unfortunate youths will destroy utterly both their futures in this world, and their agreeable lives, and their happiness in the hereafter, and their eternal lives, and transform them into torment and suffering. Furthermore, through their abuses and dissoluteness, they will end up in hospitals, and through their excesses in life, in prisons. In their old age, they will weep copiously with a thousand regrets.
If, on the other hand, they protect themselves with Qur’anic training and with the truths of the Risale-i Nur, they will become truly heroic youths, perfect human beings, successful Muslims, and in some ways rulers over animate beings and the rest of the animal kingdom.
When a youth in prison spends one hour out of the twenty-four each day on the five obligatory prayers, and repents for the mistakes that were the cause of his disaster, and abstains from other harmful, painful sins, this will be of great benefit for both his life, and his future, and his country, and his nation, and his relatives, and he will also gain with his fleeting youth of ten to fifteen years an eternal, brilliant youth. Foremost the Qur’an of Miraculous Exposition, and all the revealed scriptures, have given this certain good news.
If such a youth demonstrates through moderation and obedience, his gratitude for the pleasing, delightful bounty of youth, it will both increase it, and make it eternal, and make it a pleasure. Otherwise it will be both calamitous, and become painful, grievous, and a nightmare, and then it will depart. It will cause him to become like a vagrant, harmful for both his relatives, and his country, and his nation.
If the prisoner has been sentenced unjustly, on condition he performs the obligatory prayers, each hour will be the equivalent of a day’s worship, and the prison will be like a recluse’s cell. He will be counted among the pious hermits of olden times who retired to caves in order to devote themselves to worship. If he is poor, aged, and ill, and desirous of the truths of belief, on condition he performs the obligatory prayers and repents, each hour will become the equivalent of twenty hours’ worship, and prison will become like a rest-house for him, and because of his friends there who regard him with affection, a place of love, training, and education. He will probably be happier staying in prison than being free, for outside he is confused and subject to the assaults of sins from all sides. He may receive a complete education from prison. On being released, it will not be as a murderer or thirsting for revenge, but as someone penitent, proven by trial, well-behaved, and beneficial for his nation. In fact, the Denizli prisoners became so extraordinarily well-behaved after studying the Risale-i Nur for only a short time that some of those concerned said: “Studying the Risale-i Nur for fifteen weeks is more effective at reforming them than putting them in prison for fifteen years.”
Since death does not die, and the appointed hour is unknown, it may come at any time; and since the grave cannot be closed, and troop after troop enter it and are lost; and since it has been shown through the truths of the Qur’an that for those who believe death is transformed into the discharge papers releasing them from eternal annihilation, while for the corrupt and the dissolute it is disappearing for ever into eternal annihilation, and is unending separation from their loved ones and all beings, most certainly and with no doubt at all, the most fortunate person is he who with patience and thanks fully benefits from his time in prison, and studying the Risale-i Nur works to serve the Qur’an and his belief on the straight path.
O man who is addicted to enjoyment and pleasure! I am seventy-five years old, and I know with utter certainty from thousands of experiences, proofs, and events that true enjoyment, pain-free pleasure, grief-free joy, and life’s happiness are only to be found in belief and in the sphere of the truths of faith. While a single worldly pleasure yields numerous pains; as though dealing ten slaps for a single grape, it drives away all life’s pleasure.
O you unfortunates who are experiencing the misfortune of prison! Since your world is weeping and your life is bitter, strive so that your hereafter will not also weep, and your eternal life will smile and be sweet! Benefit from prison! Just as sometimes under severe conditions in the face of the enemy, an hour’s watch may be equivalent to a year’s worship, so in the severe conditions you are experiencing, the hardship of each hour spent as worship becomes the equivalent of many hours, it transforms that hardship into mercy.
***


My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
I offer you not my condolences but my congratulations. Since for some instance of wisdom Divine Determining has sent us to this third School of Joseph (Medrese-i Yusufiye),63 and has specified that we should eat some of the sustenance allotted us here and it is that sustenance that has summoned here; and since as we have understood certainly from our past experiences, Divine favour has manifested on us the meaning of the verse, It is possible that you dislike a thing which is good for you;64 and since our new brothers here in this School of Joseph are in more need of the solace of the Risale-i Nur than anyone, and the members of the judiciary are more in need of the rules and other sacred laws set out in the Risale-i Nur than other officials; and since the very numerous copies of the Risale-i Nur are performing your duty outside and their conquests do not cease; and since each fleeting hour passed here is the equivalent of eternal hours passed in worship; surely, because of these points, we should joyfully offer thanks for this affair in perfect patience and with fortitude. I am going to repeat exactly to you all the short letters I wrote as consolation in Denizli Prison. God willing, those apposite notes will comfort you too.
***


My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Firstly: I offer Almighty God endless thanks that heroes have emerged from among the Muftis, preachers, imams, and hojas, for it is they who in fact should lay claim to the Risale-i Nur. Up to now, it has been the youth, those educated in the secular schools, and their teachers who have been devoted to the Risale-i Nur. Now, thanks be to God, Ethem, the Ibrahim’s and Ali Osman’s have cleared the names of the students and teachers of the religious schools, and transformed their timidity into courage.
Secondly: They should not worry about this incident, which occurred due to their whole-hearted activities and excitement. For in respect of its consequences, Denizli Prison caused those who had acted incautiously to be congratulated. Its difficulties were few and immaterial benefits, numerous. This third School of Joseph will not lag behind the second, God willing.
Thirdly: Since the merit increases proportionately to the hardships, we should offer thanks for these conditions. We should try to perform our duties of serving religious belief with sincerity, which is our duty, and not concern ourselves with being successful or obtaining good results, which is God’s concern. We should say: “The best matters are the most difficult,”65 and patiently offer thanks in the face of our difficulties in this place of trial. We should understand that it is a sign of the acceptability of our actions and a diploma for having passed the examination of our sacred struggle.
***


I have a petition I want to put before the prison administrators, and chiefly the Prison Governor, which is apparently unimportant, but has great importance in my eyes
After spending twenty-two years in total isolation, my seventy-five-year-old body cannot sustain inoculations. In fact, long ago they inoculated me, and it left a suppurating wound which persisted for twenty years. It was like a chronic poisoning. Two doctors in Emirdag and my friends there know this. Also, four years ago in Denizli they inoculated me together with all the other prisoners. Although it had no harmful effects on any of them, it made me ill for three weeks. Through Divine preservation, I was not forced to go to the hospital, which for me is dangerous. It is absolutely certain that my body cannot take inoculations. Both my excuses are powerful, and being extremely weak at the age of seventy-five, I can take the inoculation only of a ten-year-old child. Moreover, because I am in perpetual solitary confinement, I do not have contact with anyone. Also, two months ago the provincial governor sent two doctors to Emirdag to give me a thorough examination. They could find no trace of any contagious disease, only that I had lumbago, and was extremely weak, elderly, and alone. This condition of mine certainly does not oblige me to be inoculated.
I also have a very important request of you: Don’t send me to hospital. Don’t force me into a situation I could never have endured these twenty-two years of solitary confinement, that is, to be put under the command of nurses I do not know. I have started to think of entering the grave as being pleasant, but for now I have chosen prison, for the sake of the prison administrators, whose humanity I have witnessed, and to console the other prisoners.
***


My Dear , Loyal Brothers!
Firstly: Don’t be upset at my being ill-treated or at the contempt directed at my person. For they can find no fault in the Risale-i Nur so struggle against my unimportant and faulty self instead. I am pleased at this. I am bound by what I have learnt from the Risale-i Nur to proudly offer thanks, if for its well-being and honour, I suffer pains, misfortune, and insults even a thousand times greater. So you should not pity me in this respect.
Secondly: The widespread, fierce, and merciless attack has for now abated twentyfold. They rounded up a few people in place of thousands of ‘special’ (has)66 Risale-i Nur students, and a handful of new brothers instead of hundreds of thousands of people who are concerned. That is, Divine grace made the assault very insignificant.
Thirdly: Through Divine grace, the former provincial governor, who for two years was conspiring against us, has been repulsed, and there is a strong possibility that the Interior Minister, whose suspicions had been excessively aroused about us, has ameliorated this fierce assault due to his being from the same place and his forefathers having been very religious. So do not despair or be alarmed!
Fourthly: Numerous experiences and events have shown in a way to make one completely certain that if the Risale-i Nur weeps, either the earth quakes or the skies weep too. As we have often seen with our own eyes and in part proved in court, the start of winter smiling like summer in unprecedented fashion coincided with the Risale-i Nur smiling at its being secretly duplicated by machine and published, and then on its weeping when it came to a standstill with the widespread searches and confiscations, this coincided with the sudden severe wrath and weeping of winter. It is my guess that this is a powerful sign that the Risale-i Nur is a supreme, shining miracle of the Qur’an this age, and that the earth and universe are concerned with it.
S a i d N u r s i
***


My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
It suddenly occurred to me today that rather than offering condolences to those sent by Divine Determining and destiny to this ‘school’ in connection with the Risale-i Nur, I should congratulate them. For each has come in place of perhaps a thousand of our innocent brothers, saving them to an extent from trouble. Moreover, together with continuing to serve belief, they are performing a huge service in a short time, like doing a hundred year’s work in ten years. Also, they are embarking on this exacting struggle and the trial of this new ‘School of Joseph,’ in order to have a active share in its universal, far-reaching and valuable consequences. They are also meeting with their loyal, sincere brothers without difficulty, whom they were eager to see, and they are studying together. Since the easy times in this world do not continue and go for nothing, surely the people who make high gains with such little trouble should be congratulated.
My brothers! This widespread attack is against the Risale-i Nur’s conquests. But they have understood that the more the Risale-i Nur is attacked, the more brilliantly it shines; the circle of those it teaches is expanded and gains in importance; it is not defeated; it only slips behind the veil of sirran tanawwarat.67 For this reason they have changed their tactics and no longer attack the Risale-i Nur openly. But Divine favour overspreads us, so we should offer thanks in perfect patience.
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
It has become necessary to explain two of my strange and subtle states of mind.
The First: When, being in solitary confinement, I was unable to meet with my brothers such as yourselves, whom I love more than my life, it was imparted to me that there was a Divine favour and a benefit in this. For numerous of our brothers of the hereafter were spending fifty liras coming to Emirdag to see me, for fifty minutes, some for ten minutes, and some returned without seeing me at all, and these they would have thrown into this School of Joseph on some pretext. Even if with my little available time and the state of mind arising from my seclusion I had been able to, the work of serving the Risale-i Nur would not have permitted me to converse at length with those devoted friends.
Secondly: One time a famous scholar was seen on numerous fronts in the War by those who had gone to the jihad. They said to him... And he replied: “Certain saints are doing this in my place in order to gain reward for me and allow the people of belief to benefit from my teaching.” In exactly the same way, in Denizli it was even made known officially that I had been seen in mosques there, and the governor and warders were informed. Some of them became alarmed, asking, “Who opened the prison gates for him?” Exactly the same thing happened here. But rather than attributing a very minor wonder to my own very faulty and unimportant self, The Ratifying Stamp of the Unseen Collection, which proves and demonstrates the Risale-i Nur’s wonders, wins confidence in it a hundred or rather a thousand times more, and ratifies its acceptance. And the heroic students of the Risale-i Nur in particular ratify it with their pens and states, which are truly wonders.
S a i d N u r s i
***


My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Don’t worry about me, I am pleased and happy just to be together with you in the same building.
Our task now: one set of my defence speeches should be sent to Isparta. If possible, twenty copies should be made both in the new letters, and by duplicating machine in the old. It should even be shown to the public prosecutor there. A copy should also be given to our lawyer in person, and another copy given to the prison governor, which he should give to our defence lawyer. It should also be sent in both the new letters and the old to the departments of government in Ankara, as it was sent while we were in Denizli. If possible, five copies should be prepared to send to Ankara. For the copies of the Risale-i Nur in the old letters which were seized, were sent to those departments, and particularly to the Directorate of Religious Affairs, before being sent here. Also, tell our lawyer, Ahmed Bey, that when writing out my defence on the typewriter to pay especial attention to its being correct. For my manner of expression does not resemble anyone else’s. Sometimes a wrong letter, or even a wrong point, changes the matter in question and spoils the meaning. Also, if you are not given permission to use the two typewriters that have been sent, they should be returned. Also don’t become alarmed or dismayed. And don’t despair. As the verse Verily with every difficulty, there is relief68 infers, Divine favour will swiftly come to our aid, God willing.
***


My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
The Risale-i Nur meets with you in my place and gives excellent instruction to the new brothers who are eager for it. We have seen from experience that to be occupied with the Risale-i Nur by either studying it, or reading it out loud, or writing it out, affords an expansiveness to the heart, an ease to the spirit, health to the body, and makes sustenance plentiful. Now a hero of the Risale-i Nur like Husrev has been bestowed on you. God willing, this School of Joseph will be another blessed place of study, part of the Medresetü’z-Zehra.69 Up to now, I had not shown Husrev70 to ‘the worldly,’ and I was hiding him. But the published collections have shown him up completely to the politicians, and nothing secret has remained. I have therefore described two or three of his tasks to my ‘special’ (has) brothers. But now before us among those who will listen to the truth are two awesomely obdurate people. One of them emerged in Emirdag, on account of both atheism and communism, and the other here. They are trying with extreme cunning to alarm the officials and turn them against us with slander. At present we have therefore to act with the greatest caution and not be scared, and to bide our time relying on God till His grace comes to our assistance.
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
And there is nothing but it glorifies Him with praise.
My friends in prison and brothers in religion!
It occurred to me to explain a truth to you which will save you from both worldly torment and the torment of the hereafter. It is as follows:
For example, a person killed someone’s brother or one of his relatives. A murder which yields one minute’s pleasure of revenge causes millions of minutes of both distress for the heart and the anguish of prison. And the fear of revenge by the murdered man’s relatives, and anxiety of finding himself face to face with his enemy drives away all his pleasure in life. He suffers the torment of both fear and anger. There is only one solution for this, and that is reconciliation, which the Qur’an commands, and truth, reality, benefit, humanity, and Islam require and encourage.
Certainly, in reality what is required is peace, because the appointed hour is set, it does not change. Since his appointed hour had come, in any event the murdered man would have stayed no longer. As for the murderer, he was the means of God’s decree being carried out. So long as there is no reconciliation, both sides perpetually suffer the torments of fear and revenge. It is because of this that Islam commands that “one believer should not be vexed with another believer for more than three days.” If the murder was not the result of a vindictive grudge and enmity, and a two-faced troublemaker instigated the discord, it is essential to make peace quickly. Otherwise, the minor disaster becomes a large one, and continues. If they make peace, and the murderer repents and prays continuously for the man he killed, then both sides will gain much and become like brothers. In place of one departed brother, he will gain several religious brothers. He will be resigned to Divine Decree and Determining and forgive his enemy. Especially since they heed the lessons of the Risale-i Nur, both individual and public peace and well-being, and the brotherhood that there is in the sphere of the Risale-i Nur, require that they put aside all the hard feelings that exist between them.
It was thus in Denizli Prison; all the prisoners who were enemies became brothers through the lessons of the Risale-i Nur. It was one reason for our acquittal, and caused even the irreligious and ungodly to say about those prisoners: “Masha’llah! Barakallah!” Also it was an utter relief for those prisoners. I myself have seen here a hundred men suffer inconvenience on account of one man and not go out to take exercise together. It is oppression towards them. A manly believer of sound conscience will not cause hundreds of other believers harm because of some petty error or benefit. If he makes a mistake and does cause harm, he should repent immediately.
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear,Loyal Brothers!
I congratulate both the Risale-i Nur, and you all, and myself, and give you the good news of Husrev, Hifzi, and Bartinli Seyyid. Those who went on the Hajj this year learnt that prominent scholars in Mecca were translating the main collections of the Risale-i Nur into both Arabic and Hindustani and were trying to have them published. They had also found such favour in Medina that they had been placed on the blessed tomb of the Prophet (PBUH) in the Rawdat al-Mutahhara. Haji Seyyid saw with his own eyes The Staff of Moses (Asâ-yi Mûsa) on the Prophet’s tomb. That means it has been found acceptable by the Prophet (PBUH) and was met with pleasure by him (PBUH). As we told those who were going from here to make the Hajj, we had made the intention and the Risale-i Nur was going to visit those blessed places in our stead. Endless thanks be to God, one of the many benefits of the Risale-i Nur heroes publishing those collections after having corrected them, is that they saved me both from the task of correcting them myself and from that anxiety; so too, since those copies will form the source for others written out by hand, they have become like hundreds of ‘correctors.’ May the Most Merciful of the Merciful have written in the records of their good works, a thousand merits for each letter of those collections. Amen. Amen. Amen.
***


An Auspicious Dream which turned out to be true
Ali, who assists me, came to me and said: “I had a dream in which you and Husrev kissed the hand of the Prophet Muhammad (Peace and blessings be upon him).” Then I received the letter telling me that the Hajjis had seen The Staff of Moses Collection, which had been written out by Husrev, on the Prophet’s (PBUH) tomb. This is to say, in effect The Staff of Moses kissed the Prophet’s (PBUH) hand in my place by means of Husrev’s pen, and was found acceptable by the Prophet (PBUH).
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers and Companions in Prison!
Firstly: Do not worry that we have not been able to meet in person. We are constantly together in spirit. Whichever of the treatises of the Risale-i Nur you are able to get hold of and read, and which you listen to, you will see me within it, but as a servant of the Qur’an instead of my insignificant person, and you may converse with me. For my part, I meet with you in imagination in all my prayers and in what you have written, and it is as though we are all the time together in some sphere of existence.
Secondly: We say this to the new students of the Risale-i Nur in this new School of Joseph: as indicated by the Qur’an, and as even the committee of experts had to admit, “The faithful Risale-i Nur students will enter their graves in a state of belief. And through the effulgence its collective personality, according to his degree, each student receives a share of the spiritual gains and supplications of all his brothers. It is as though each seeks Divine forgiveness and worships with thousands of tongues.” These two profits and results reduce to nothing all the difficulties and hardships of this extraordinary time; the two high profits are given their faithful customers at a very lost cost.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
The Afyon defences contain important truths concerning both ourselves, and the Risale-i Nur, and this country, and the Islamic world.
It is probably necessary to prepare five to ten copies of them in the new letters so they may be sent to the departments of government in Ankara. Whether they release us or punish us is of no importance, our task now is to inform both the Government, and the courts, and the nation of the truths the defences contain. Perhaps that was one reason Divine Determining sent us to this place of study. They should be written out by typewriter as quickly as possible. Even if they were to release us today, we would still be obliged to send them to Ankara. Don’t be deceived and put it off; enough now! Let this be our last defence in the face of the extreme oppression and unprecedented torments we have suffered three times in fifteen years for the same matter on trumped-up charges. Since in the previous courts they legally gave us a typewriter so that we could defend ourselves, they can cite no law for depriving us of the right here. If you find no solution officially, our lawyer should write out five copies outside on a typewriter, but he should pay great attention to their containing no mistakes.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Loyal New Brothers and Old Prisoners!
I have formed the firm conclusion that, in respect of Divine favour, you are an important cause in our entering here. That is to say, with its consolation and the truths of belief, the Risale-i Nur is to save both you from the distress of this calamity of prison and from much worldly harm, and your life from passing profitlessly and in vain through grief and sorrow and being wasted on the winds of fancy, and your hereafter from weeping like your world is weeping now; it is to provide you with true solace.
Since the reality of the matter is this, of course you must be brothers to one another, like the Denizli prisoners and students of the Risale-i Nur. You can see that they examine all your possessions, and food, bread, and soup which come from outside so that a knife does not get in among you and you do not attack one another. The warders who faithfully serve you suffer much trouble. Also, you do not go out to exercise together, as though you were going to attack one another like wild beasts. New friends, who are by nature bold and courageous! With great moral courage you should say to the group at this time:
“If not knives, but Mausers and revolvers were given us, and the order to fire as well, we would not hurt our friends who are unfortunate and suffering this calamity like ourselves. Through the guidance and at the command of the Qur’an, and belief, and Islamic brotherhood, and our interests, we have decided to forgive them and to try not to offend them, even if formerly there were a hundred reasons for our hatred and hostility,” so transforming this prison into an auspicious place of study.
***


My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Just as every group of the worldly engaged in politics, art, or some duty, or some task related to the life of society, or some particular commercial activity, gathers together in congresses of a sort to discuss its work, so the Risale-i Nur students, who are engaged in the sacred service of certain, verified belief,71 have gathered together in the congress of this School of Joseph at the order of Divine Determining, impelled by dominical grace. God willing, numerous valuable, beneficial and significant results will be bestowed in consequence, and that if the leading students have a value of ‘one’ in other places like an alif,72 here coming shoulder to shoulder with three other alifs and meeting with them, they will become one thousand one hundred and eleven, and in consequence of this coming together their value, and God willing, their sacred service and reward, will be a thousandfold; the single alif will become a thousand.
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
The reason they nailed up my window today was my greeting the prisoners in connection with the trial. They apparently made something else the pretext. Don’t be at all anxious. On the contrary, since they are preoccupied with my unimportant person and not causing too much trouble to the Risale-i Nur and its students, I am earnestly and sincerely pleased. Since they are persecuting me by insulting and tormenting my person, it means they are not doing the same to you and the Risale-i Nur, and lessens to an extent their interfering with the Risale-i Nur, so I offer thanks in patience and am not anxious. You too should not be at all upset. I am of the opinion that our covert enemies’ directing the attention of the officials towards my person is an instance of Divine favour and a good thing from the point of view of the well-being of the Risale-i Nur and its students. Certain of our brothers should not become angry and speak sharply. They should act circumspectly and not become alarmed. They also should not speak of this matter to everyone. For there are spies who attach the wrong meanings to what our naive brothers and those who are not yet accustomed to being cautious, say. The spies make mountains out of molehills and may inform on them. Our situation now is no joking matter. Nevertheless, do not be at all worried. We are under Divine protection and are resolved to meet all hardships with perfect patience, indeed, with thanks. We are obliged to offer thanks, for a small amount of hardship yields plentiful mercy and reward.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
For two important reasons, and in consequence of a powerful warning, I have been obliged to leave, with respect to the heart, the task of all the defences to the Risale-i Nur students who have been sent here and will be its leading students in the future, especially H, R, T, F, S.73
First Reason: I understood certainly both in the examining magistrate’s office, and from numerous other signs, that as far as they possibly can they are trying to make difficulties for me and to prevent me defeating them intellectually, and that they have received official communications. They are not allowing me to speak on various pretexts as though if I do, I shall display political and scholarly prowess sufficient to silence the court, and practised diplomats. In fact, while being questioned, I replied “I don’t know” to one of the questions. In astonishment the judge asked: “How could someone of your extraordinary intelligence forget something?” They suppose the wondrous elevatedness of the Risale-i Nur and its scholarly findings to be the product of my thought and they have taken fright. They do not want to let me speak. Also, they think that anyone who meets with me immediately becomes a devoted Risale-i Nur student, so they do not allow me to meet with anyone. The Head of the Directorate of Religious Affairs even said: “Whoever meets with him is immediately drawn to him; his power to attract is considerable.”
This means that the best thing for us now is for me to hand over my work to you. And my old and new defence speeches, which you have, should take part in your consultations in my place. That is sufficient.
The Second Reason: This is being left to another time. However, a brief indication of that warning is this: an extremely powerful duty which looks to the hereafter and an effective state of mind, which for twenty-five years have made me give up politics, newspapers, and other transitory things, and prevented me being occupied with them, are most definitely preventing me being preoccupied with this question in detail. When consulting with your two defence lawyers, you may sometimes discuss my duty too.
***


My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
This was imparted to me now as I was performing the prayers: because of their excessively good opinion of you, your brothers await instruction and assistance, both material and spiritual, from you. Just as in worldly affairs you have handed things over to the ‘special’ (has) students, leaving them to the leading students (erkan) to confer over, and you were right to do so, so you have appointed the Risale-i Nur and the collective personality of its students to perform your scholarly work related to belief, the Qur’an and the hereafter, and the collective personality of those purely sincere ‘special’ students performs that duty of yours much more completely than you, in addition to the duties of its members. They always have done so up to now. For instance, someone who meets with you and receives brief, minor instruction and a little advice, may receive from a single part of the Risale-i Nur instruction a hundred times greater. They may also receive advice from it. Thinking that their collective personality, whose ‘station’ is extremely elevated and prayers acceptable, is an ‘Ustad’ and helper who, God willing, is always with them, it was consolation for my spirit, and good news, and made me feel at peace.
***


My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
There being two small explosions in two days in extraordinary and meaningful fashion when there was no apparent reason for them, does not resemble chance.
The First: The cast-iron stove in my ward suddenly made a loud bang like a revolver, and the thick, strong iron of its lower part exploded like bomb, splitting into two pieces. Hamdi the Tailor was startled and we were left in astonishment. For on numerous occasions this winter it had been red hot with the coal, and had withstood it.
The Second: The second day in Feyzi’s ward, for no reason at all the beaker on top of the water pitcher suddenly disintegrated in extraordinary fashion. It occurred to me that the terrible bombs prepared against us in Ankara caused our defence speeches, which had been sent to six departments of government there, to explode, without causing us harm, God willing; and the angry stove which had been lit against us split into two without harming us. It is also possible that my beloved stove, my only and very useful companion, listened to my sorrows and entreaties, and was giving me the news: “You’re going to depart from this dark dungeon, no need remains for me...”
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
Today, due to a spiritual warning, I felt a disquiet, a grief, on account of you. Just when I was feeling upset at those of my brothers who being anxious about their livelihoods want to be released quickly, a blessed memory occasioned a truth and some good tidings to be imparted to me: the ‘Three Months’ will begin in five days time, which are truly blessed and are the months of highly meritorious worship. For if the reward yielded by good works at other times are tenfold, in the month of Rajab they are more than a hundredfold, in Sha‘ban they exceed three hundredfold, and in Ramadan they reach a thousandfold, while on Fridays in Ramadan they reach thousands and on the Night of Power may reach thirty thousand. It is certainly highly profitable therefore, to spend those three months —which are thus a sacred market for the trade of the hereafter earning plentiful gains for it, and an exceptional exhibition for the people of reality and worship, and in three months may secure for the believers a life of eighty years— in this School of Joseph, which increases the profits tenfold. Whatever the hardships suffered, they are pure mercy. As with worship, so with the service of the Risale-i Nur; with respect not to quantity but quality, its profits are fivefold. For people are continuously entering this guest-house, then being released, and they are means of the Risale-i Nur’s lessons being disseminated. Sometimes one man’s sincerity yields the benefits of twenty men. It is of no importance if such a man suffers a little hardship and distress so that the mystery of the Risale-i Nur’s sincerity might spread among the unfortunate prisoners, who are inclined to be political heroes and are much in need of the Risale-i Nur’s solace. In regard to the problem of livelihood, since these three months are a market for the hereafter, I felt perfectly easy at it and understood that being here inside until the Bayram74 is a great bounty, for since all of you were sent to this prison in place of numerous other Risale-i Nur students, and some of you in place of a thousand, they will help out in your business outside.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Firstly: I offer you congratulations with all my heart and soul for the month of Rajab and the holy night of Ragha’ib tomorrow.
Secondly: Don’t give up hope, and don’t worry or be alarmed. God willing, Divine grace will come to our aid. The bomb that was being prepared these last three months exploded. The news given by my stove, Feyzi’s beaker, and Husrev’s two drinking-cups turned out to be true. But it was not terrible, it was slight. God willing, the fire will be extinguished completely. All their assaults are to discredit my person and taint the Risale-i Nur’s conquests. The blow the man more harmful than the covert dissembler in Emirdag and merely a pawn in the hands of secret atheists, and the ‘semi-hoja’ who favours the innovations, were trying to strike us as hard as they could was reduced twentyfold. God willing, they will cause us not even one wound, and what they think and intend and their plans to scare us away from each other and from the Risale-i Nur will come to nothing. It is absolutely essential that out of respect for these blessed months, trusting that they are gaining abundant reward for us, we steadfastly offer thanks in patience, and relying on God, submit to the rule ‘He who believes in Divine Determining is saved from unhappiness.’
S a i d N u r s i
***


To the Prime Minister’s Office, the Ministry of Justice, and Ministry of Home Affairs75
All members of the Government who saw the Proclamation of the Constitution, the First World War, the Armistice Period, the setting up of the Nationalist Government, and the Republic know me well. Nevertheless, with your permission, we shall take a look at my life as though on a film.
I was born in the village of Nurs in the province of Bitlis. As a student, I debated with the scholars I encountered, and through Divine favour, defeating in scholarly debate all who opposed me, I came as far as Istanbul. In Istanbul, winning calamitous fame, a victim of my rivals’ trouble-making, I was dragged to the lunatic asylum on the orders of Sultan ‘Abdulhamid. On the Proclamation of the Constitution, I attracted the attention of the government of the Committee of Union and Progress with my activities during the Thirty-First of March Incident. I confronted them with the proposal to open an Islamic university in Van called the Medresetü’z-Zehra, resembling al-Azhar University. I even laid its foundations. On the outbreak of the First War, I gathered together my students and took part in the War as the Commander of a militia force. I fought on the Caucasian Front and was taken prisoner at Bitlis. I escaped from where I was being held and returned to Istanbul. I was appointed a member of the Darü’l-Hikmeti’l-Islâmiye. During the Armistice period, I worked against the occupying forces with all my might, and on the victory of the National Government, in appreciation I was summoned by it to Ankara, where I repeated my proposal to open the university in Van.
The life I had lived up to then had been that of a patriot. I had wanted to serve religion by means of politics. But from then on, I turned my back on the world completely, and in my own words, buried the ‘Old Said’. As the ‘New Said’, devoting myself entirely to the hereafter, I withdrew from the world. Retiring from social life, I went into seclusion on the hill Yusha Tepesi in Istanbul. Later on I went to Bitlis and Van, in my native region, where I lived in a cave. I remained alone with the pleasures of my spirit and conscience. That is to say, taking as my principle “I seek refuge with God from the Devil and politics,” I plunged into the depths of my own spiritual world. Passing my time studying the Qur’an of Mighty Stature, I started to live as the ‘New Said.’ But the manifestations of Divine Determining sent me as an exile to other places. Then, getting those with me to write down the inspirations born in my heart from the effulgence of the Qur’an, a number of treatises came to be written. I gave them the name of the Risale-i Nur. This name was born in my conscience, for truly they were based on the light of the Qur’an. I believe absolutely certainly that this was Divine inspiration, and I said to those who were acting as scribes: “Barakallah!” For it is not possible to begrudge others the light of belief.
Exchanging copies, these treatises of mine were written out by a number of believers. I formed the opinion that they were driven on by God in order to strengthen the injured belief of Muslims. I understood that just as no believer could obstruct this Divine prompting, so I considered it a religious obligation to encourage it. Anyway these treatises, which now number one hundred and thirty, consist entirely of discussions of the hereafter and belief, and contain no deliberate mention of politics or this world. Nevertheless, they became the object of interest of a number of opportunists. Investigations were carried out into them, and I was arrested and sent to the prisons of Eskishehir, Kastamonu, and Denizli. Trials were held. As a result, truth was manifested and justice was executed, but those opportunists never wearied of hounding us. This time they arrested me and sent me to Afyon. I am under arrest and am being interrogated. They accuse me as follows:
1) You have founded a political society.
2) You publish ideas opposing the regime.
3) You harbour political aims.
The evidence for these are ten or fifteen sentences in two or three of my treatises. Respected Minister! As Napoleon said: “Bring me a straightforward sentence to which no second meaning can be attached, and I’ll have you executed for it!” There is no sentence uttered by man which may not constitute an offence by having forced meanings attached to it. Especially the writings of someone like me who has reached seventy-five years of age, has withdrawn entirely from the life of this world, and has dedicated his life here to that of the hereafter — they will certainly be free. Being close to having a good intention, he will be fearless. It is unfair to study them simply in order to seek out offences in them. It is nothing other than unjust. Not one of any of my one hundred and thirty treatises comprises any purpose connected to the matters of this world. Proceeding from the light of the Qur’an, they are all to do with the hereafter and belief. In any event all the trials held up to now have come to the same conclusion and have resulted in acquittals. It is therefore a shame to busy the courts unnecessarily and take innocent believers away from their work and business in the name of the country and nation. While the Old Said spent all his life for the sake of the happiness of the country and nation, how could the New Said be preoccupied with politics when he is seventy-five years old and has completely withdrawn from the world? This is your opinion too.
I have only one aim; it is this: at this time as I approach the grave, I hear the hooting of the Bolshevik owls in this country, which is a Muslim land. The sound is damaging the fundamentals of belief of the Islamic world. Making them lose their belief, it binds the people, and particularly the youth, to itself. Struggling against it with all my strength, I am calling the youth and all Muslims to believe. I am struggling against these unbelieving masses. I want to enter the Divine presence with this struggle of mine. This is all I do. As for those who prevent me from doing this, I am frightened that they are communists! For me it is a sacred aim to co-operate with the forces of religion who have embraced the struggle against these enemies of belief. Release me! Let me work to reform the youth, poisoned by communism, and for this country’s faith! Let me serve Divine unity!
Prisoner
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
The most effective remedy for the ghastly troubles and hopelessness of the world, especially at this time, especially those smitten by disaster and the Risale-i Nur students in particular, is to console and enhearten one another and strengthen one another’s morale, and like true, devoted brothers to pour balm on one another’s sorrows and afflictions and with true compassion, soothe one another’s troubled hearts. The true brotherhood between us which looks to the hereafter cannot sustain anyone feeling offended or taking sides. I have placed all my trust in you and am counting on you, and you know that I have decided to sacrifice happily not only my comfort, self-respect, and honour for you, but also my very spirit, and indeed, you can see this. I swear even that the torment caused these last eight days by the trifling incident of two leading Risale-i Nur students apparently avoiding and upsetting each other instead of consoling each other, has caused my spirit, heart, and mind to weep and cry out: “Alas! Alas! Mercy! Succour us O Most Merciful of the Merciful! Preserve us and save us from the evil of satans from among jinn and men. Fill my brothers’ hearts with loyalty, love, and fraternal feelings for each other!”
My brothers, as unyielding as steel! You help me. Our situation is extremely sensitive. I relied on you to such an extent that I handed over all my duties to your collective personality. So for your part, you should help me immediately. For sure, the incident was trifling, temporary, and unimportant, but even a hair, a mote, on the mainspring of our clock or the pupil of our eye causes pain. This point must be very important, for three physical explosions and three non-physical observations gave news of it exactly.
S a i d N u r s i
***


My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
My stove and the two drinking-cups of the Feyzi’s, Sabri, and Husrev disintegrating foretold a terrible calamity. It is absolutely essential that we practise true solidarity and disregard one another’s faults, our most powerful point of support, and never take offence at a hero of the Risale-i Nur like Husrev, since he takes my place and is an important representative of the Risale-i Nur’s collective personality. The last few days I felt a terrible distress and despair, and said to myself in alarm: “Our enemies have found a way to defeat us.” Both my stove and the absolutely correct observation I made in my imagination gave correct news. Beware! Beware! Beware! Quickly repair your solidarity, which up to now has been as strong as steel. There is a strong possibility this incident will cause more harm —especially at this juncture— to our service of the Qur’an and belief than our being sent to prison.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
The night of the Prophet’s (PBUH) Ascension is the equivalent of a second Night of Power. Working this night as much as one possibly can causes a thousandfold increase in spiritual gains. In accordance with the mystery of spiritual partnership, on this valuable night, God willing, like some angels who glorify God with forty thousand tongues, you will perform worship and supplications with forty thousand tongues. This will yield much reward in this place of tribulation, and you will be offering thanks through your worship tonight for the coming storm involving us being reduced a thousandfold. Together with congratulating you for your perfect caution and prudence, I give you the good news that dominical grace is being manifested most clearly for us.
S a i d N u r s i
***


My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Firstly: I congratulate you with all my heart and soul for the Night of the Ascension.
Secondly: It has been our claim for twenty years that as far as it is possible the Risale-i Nur students do not disturb public order. As a Divine favour, and as a wonder resulting from your loyalty and sincerity, the harm of our imprisonment has been reduced a hundredfold. For there was a strong possibility that those who attack us could have taken it as a sign supporting their main claim that we disturb public order and breach security and made it a pretext for refuting our case. The mountain was made into a molehill. Otherwise those who makes mountains out of molehills concerning us could have taken advantage of it and induced many people to believe their slanders against us.
Thirdly: Do not worry about me. My being in the same building as you reduces all my difficulties and distress to nothing. In fact, our being gathered together here is important in numerous respects, and it is in many ways beneficial for our service of belief. Indeed, since a number of significant facts in the supplement to my written objections have been sent to the six departments of government, and have come to their attention and influenced them to an extent, it has reduced all our troubles to nothing.
Fourthly: Busying oneself with the Risale-i Nur both dispels distress, and may be counted as five sorts of worship.
Fifthly: The previous misfortune was lessened a hundredfold through the teachings of the Risale-i Nur. Otherwise, because of the sensitivity of the time and place, that single molehill would have become mountains, like putting a match to gunpowder. In fact, some officials said: “Those who listen to the lessons of the Risale-i Nur were not involved.” If only everyone had listened to its teachings, nothing would have happened. As far as you can, don’t allow things to escalate; don’t let anything else be added to the difficulties of prison. Like the Nurjus, the other prisoners should be brothers and not be angry at each other.
S a i d N u r s i
***


My Dear, Loyal, Sincere Brothers!
It has become obligatory for us to practise as far as we can within the bounds of possibility the principles of the Treatise On Sincerity and sincerity in its true sense among ourselves and towards one another. I have received certain information that for the past three months three men have been posted here to distance my ‘special’ (has) brothers from one another by playing on differences in ideas or temperament. They are also drawing out the court proceedings in order to make the resolute Nurjus fed up and to shake them, and to make the sensitive and irresolute one’s suspicious and cause them to give up their service of the Risale-i Nur. Beware! Beware! Don’t let the self-sacrificing brotherhood and genuine love you have maintained up to now be shaken. If they are shaken only a jot, it will cause us great harm. For only a small jolt in Denizli caused hojas like... to keep their distance. Our service of the Qur’an and belief necessitates that if necessary we sacrifice our very souls for one another; true devotees do not become vexed with one another because of difficulties or irritability arising from other things; with perfect humility, modesty, and resignation, they attribute the faults to themselves, and try to increase their love and sincerity. Otherwise it will be blown up out of all proportion, possibly causing irreparable harm. Leaving it to your perspicacity, I cut this short here.
S a i d N u r s i
***


My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
In consequence of an important warning I received, there are now one or two tasks connected with the Risale-i Nur, which are to try with all your might, through the lessons of the Risale-i Nur, not to fall into dispute or take up biased sides in among the other unfortunate prisoners in this third School of Joseph. For there are terrible troublemakers who are concealed and attempting to take advantage of differences, grudges, hatred, and obstinacy. Since if necessary the majority of our fellow-prisoners manifest a vein of heroism which makes them ready to sacrifice their lives for their country, nation, and friends, surely those brave men should sacrfice for the good of the nation and peace and quiet here in prison their obstinacy, hatred, and enmity, which are entirely without benefit and extremely damaging in these stormy times. For in this way they may be saved from the corruption of those who are covertly inculcating communism, which turns into anarchy. It may otherwise lead to significant difficulties and upsets at this time, like putting a match to gunpowder, both for a hundred wretched prisoners, and for the innocent Risale-i Nur students, and for the town of Afyon. It might also lead to the intervention of a secret society which is here but whose roots are abroad. Since Divine Determining sent us here for their sake, and because of their happiness and ease of mind some of us do not want to leave and we sacrifice our comfort for them and endure every hardship patiently, certainly it is absolutely essential that for the sake of those new brothers of ours, like the Denizli prisoners, and out of respect for the months of Sha‘ban and Ramadan, we do not become angry with one another and make peace like brothers. In any case, we and I consider them to be within the circle of Risale-i Nur students and include them in our prayers.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Firstly: In accordance with the meaning of “Good lies in what God wishes,” there are many instances of good in our trial being delayed and those of our brothers who have been released being here on the day it recommences.
Yes, since the Risale-i Nur question is of importance for the Islamic world in general and this country in particular, there should be lively gatherings such as that in order to attract everyone’s attention to its truths. For in its glittering fashion, beyond all our hopes and precautions, and our concealing it, and our enemies belittling it, and outside our wills, the Risale-i Nur teaches its truths openly to friend and foe alike. It unhesitatingly divulges its most private secrets to the most distant stranger. Since the truth is this, we should consider our trifling difficulties to be a bitter medicine like quinine, and offering thanks in patience, say: “This too will pass, God willing.”
Secondly: I wrote this to the supervisor of this School of Joseph: just as when I was a prisoner-of-war in Russia, the Bolshevik storm first erupted in the prisons, so the French Revolution first began in the prisons and with the prisoners known in the histories as “vagabonds.” Because of this, in both Eskishehir and Denizli we Risale-i Nur students tried to reform the other prisoners as far as we possibly could. In both prisons it was extremely successful. Here it will be even more useful, for as a result of the Risale-i Nur’s instuction at this sensitive time, the squall76 that blew up was only a hundredth of what it would have been. Otherwise the harmful outside currents which take advantage of conflict and such incidents, and await such opportunities, would have ignited the gunpowder and caused a conflagration.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal, Unshakeable Brothers, who do not become dispirited at difficulties and abandon us!
Due to some physical and spiritual tribulation, my evil-commanding soul was feeling sad on your account when this was imparted to me: if you had suffered these difficulties ten times over in order to meet with all your brothers here at close quarters it still would have been cheap. It appears necessary that like in former times the people of reality used to gather together and meet at least once or twice a year, the Risale-i Nur students gather together every few years in the School of Joseph. In keeping with the God-fearing and ascetic way of the Risale-i Nur, and its teaching those most in need, everyone, even those who oppose it, and to allow its collective personality to speak, if it entails a thousand difficulties and tribulations, it is of no importance whatsoever. A few of our weak brothers becoming fed up in our previous prisons and leaving the circle of the Risale-i Nur caused immeasurable loss to them but no harm to the Risale-i Nur. More resolute and sincere students appeared in their stead. Since the trials of this world are transient and pass swiftly, leaving us their fruits and rewards, we should trust in Divine grace and offer thanks in patience.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Firstly: Send the last two pages, in either the old letters or written by typewriter, unofficially to the Chairman of the Court by means of someone serious you consider suitable. When you do so, give him also the following note, written separately: “Said thanks you and says: ‘They’ve unnailed the windows, but the prosecutor does not permit any of my brothers or those who attend me to come to me. And he requests that you give him his precious, miraculous Qur’an, which is in the court, so that he can read it during these blessed months. He sent three juz’77 of that wondrous Qur’an to the Directorate of Religious Affairs as samples so that they could print it photographically. Besides that, he requests one of the Risale-i Nur collections which is in the court so that he can read it in his loneliness, solitary confinement and severe distress, and it can comfort him and be a companion. In any event, three or four courts of law have seen those collections and not objected to them. Similarly, they have been much appreciated and praised by the leading scholars of Mecca, Medina, Damascus, Aleppo, and the university of al-Azhar in Cairo, and none of them has criticized or objected to them.’”
S a i d N u r s i
***


My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Feyzi has two copies of the Hizb al-Nuri78 with him. If he is not in need of them, let one of them be sent to me, or let Mehmed Feyzi write out another copy. Also, the Treatise On Ramadan and the printed Supreme Sign (Âyetü’l-Kübra) are needed here. Quickly reduce the tension between you and repair the damage. Beware! Beware! The slightest deviation causes enormous harm to the Risale-i Nur circle. Don’t get carried away by feelings arising from the difficulties. My stove exploding was an indication of this calamity.
S a i d N u r s i
***


My Dear, Loyal Brothers Husrev, Mehmed Feyzi, and Sabri!
Trusting in you with all my strength, I was expecting to enter the grave with peace of mind and to leave to you the welfare of the Risale-i Nur. I was certain that nothing at all could part you from each other. Now there is an official communication concerning ghastly plans to create differences between the leading Risale-i Nur students. Since, as necessitated by the strength of your loyalty and your intense concern for the Risale-i Nur, you are ready to sacrifice your lives for one another if necessary, certainly you are bound to sacrifice your extremely trivial, temporary, and unimportant feelings. It will otherwise cause untold harm at this juncture, and I tremble at the possibility of anyone leaving the Risale-i Nur circle. For the last three days I have again been shaken by distress such as I have never before experienced. I have now understood certainly that petulance as slight as a hair on the eye on the part of those like yourselves has the effect of a bombshell on our lives with the Risale-i Nur. I’ll tell you this even, much effort was made during that storm [revolt] to connect us with it. Now they are trying to distance you from one another. Although I have suffered ten times more than you for your sake, I have decided not to see the faults of any of you. I ask of you in the name of our master, the Risale-i Nur’s collective personality, not to insist on your own way, whether justified or not. If in that extraordinary place hidden fingers are stirring things up with your being together, one of you move to Tahiri’s ward.
S a i d N u r s i
***


My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Please do not be offended at the great importance I have given to the three of you being annoyed at each other. For like me, Husrev and Feyzi are somewhat unsociable and reserved. They also differ from each other in temperament. As for Sabri, he is involved in the life of society through his relatives and manner of his livelihood, and is obliged to be cautious. Since, due to these differences of ways and temperaments, the three of you have probably been unable to maintain your patience and forbearance in the uproar of the ward and its noisy crowd, I become alarmed and suspicious. For only slight opposition at present causes much harm.
S a i d N u r s i
***


My Dear, Loyal Brothers and Fellow-Students in this School of Joseph!
The holy Night of Acquittal (Bera’at), tonight, is like a sacred seed of the whole year and the programme of human destiny, and is therefore as holy as the Night of Power. Just as all good works on the Night of Power yield thirty thousand merits, so on this Night of Acquittal the merits of such acts and for each letter of the Qur’an rise to twenty thousand. If at other times such merits are ten, during the three months [of Rajab, Sha‘ban, and Ramadan] they rise to a hundred or a thousand. Then on the well-known holy nights, they rise to tens of thousands or twenty or thirty thousand. These nights may be the equivalent of fifty years of worship. It is highly profitable to be occupied as far as one can with the Qur’an, seeking Divine forgiveness, and uttering prayers for the Prophet (PBUH).
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
May the peace of God be upon you, and His mercy and blessings!
I congratulate you with all my heart and soul for the Night of Acquittal, which may gain for the believers the equivalent of fifty years of worship. I await with complete certainty from Divine mercy that through the mystery of spiritual partnership and the effulgence of solidarity, like some angels who utter glorifications with forty thousand tongues, all the purely sincere Risale-i Nur students will be performing their worship and seeking forgiveness as though with forty thousand tongues.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
Firstly: At the suggestion of some hojas who support the innovations, the indictment has objected to a matter in the Fifth Ray, as though it does not accept the coming of the Islamic Antichrist (Dajjal), and numerous other Antichrists. An answer to this is the sound Hadith, a brilliant and certain miracle of the Prophet (PBUH): “The caliphate will continue with the sons of my uncle ‘Abbas until it passes into the destructive hand of the Antichrist.”79 That is, the ‘Abbasid caliphate will continue for the lengthy period of five hundred years, then it will be wiped out by one of the three Antichrists, known as Jenghiz and Hulagu, then he will treacherously rule within Islam. That is, as is indicated by numerous Hadiths, there is clear evidence that three Antichrists will appear in the Islamic world. The predictions made by the above Hadith are two clear miracles.
The First is that the ‘Abbasid Caliphate, which was to come into existence, would continue for five hundred years.
The Second was that it would come to an end at the cruel, destructive hand of an Antichrist called Jenghiz and Hulagu. Is it at all possible that the Owner of the Shari‘a, who in the books of Hadith foretold even the most minor things related to the Qur’an and marks of Islam, should not have foretold the extraordinary events of our times? And is it at all possible that there should be no allusions to the Risale-i Nur students, who steadfastly serve the Qur’an in the midst of those strange events, in the widest sphere and under the severest conditions, and the fruits of whose service are affirmed by friend and foe alike?
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
And they were covered by humiliation and misery.80
[One fine point about this verse]
My Dear Brother Re’fet Bey, Commander of the Risale-i Nur and Servant of the Qur’an!
The Jewish nation has always been excessive in its love of life and this world, and has therefore deserved the blows of abasement and misery it has received every century. However, in the Palestine question it is not love of life and this world, but a significant sort of national and religious feeling because Palestine is where the prophets of the Children of Israel are buried, and the prophets belonged to their nation. In consequence they have received no swift blows. A small group could never otherwise have held out in the midst of the vast Arab lands; it would quickly have been humiliated.
S a i d N u r s i
***


Q u e s t i o n : Is there any verse stating that the earth is round, and if so, which Sura is it in? I am hesitant as to whether it is flat or round. All countries are situated in lands surrounded by sea. What is there to keep in the outer edges of these seas? I request that you provide an explanation, and I kiss your hands.
Emirdagli Ali Hoca
The Risale-i Nur has solved questions of this sort. The Islamic scholars have accepted that the earth is round, and this in no way contradicts religion. The word ‘sath’ in the verse81 does not indicate that the earth is not round. It has been laid down by the learned authorities that to be turned towards the qibla (istikbal-i kible) while performing the prayers is obligatory, and this is applicable to every part of the prayers, including the bowing and prostrating. Since according to the Shari‘a, there is a luminous line from the Ka‘ba upwards as far as the Divine Throne, and downwards to the ground, performing all the actions of the prayers in the direction of the qibla is possible with the earth being round.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
And there is nothing but it glorifies Him with praise.82
May God’s peace and mercy be upon you, and His blessings, for ever and ever
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
I congratulate you with all my heart and soul on the blessed month of Ramadan. May Almighty God make the Night of Power the equivalent of a thousand months for all of you, and accept it as an eighty-year lifetime of worship. Amen.
Secondly: I am of the opinion that there are numerous benefits and instances of good in our remaining here until the Festival. If we were to be released now, we would both lose out on all the good of this School of Joseph, and spoil Ramadan, which looks purely to the hereafter, and taint our spiritual states with worldly activities. In accordance with “good lies in what God wishes,” we shall find great joy in this, God willing.
You have also understood in the court that since they can in no way convict us with their laws, they discuss trifling things of no importance like some petty matters in some petty letters which have less connection with the law than a fly’s wing. For they have found no way to attack the significant, universal matters of the Risale-i Nur. Also their slandering my person so as to deprive it of importance instead of the widespread, general Risale-i Nur and its students is very advantageous for us; Divine Determining does not allow them to interfere with the Risale-i Nur and its students, and preoccupies them with myself. So I say to you and to all my friends: for the well-being of you and the Risale-i Nur, I accept wholeheartedly, even with my evil-commanding soul’s agreement, and with joy and gratitude, all the difficulties inflicted on my person. Just as Paradise is not inexpensive, so Hell is not unnecessary. The world and its tribulations are transitory and fleeting. Also, since we shall be avenged a hundred times over at the Last Judgement, and in part in this world, for the ill-treatment we receive at the hands of our covert enemies, we should feel sorry for them rather than angry.
Since the reality is this, it is truly good fortune to submit without alarm, and with caution, and perfect patience and thanks, to whatever Divine Determining has decreed for us and to trust in Divine grace, which protects us, and with truly sincere, consoling, and heartfelt friendliness and love for our brothers here, together with them busy ourselves with our supplications, which in Ramadan yield a thousandfold reward; and with our study and reading, try not to give importance to these minor passing hardships. The Risale-i Nur’s giving instruction in this most important examination and trial, and its making its enemies read it, is a significant victory for it.83
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
And there is nothing but it glorifies Him with praise.
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Firstly: It is stated in sound narrations: “Seek the Night of Power in the second half of Ramadan, especially in the last ten days.”84 It is therefore a great happiness to try to profit from the Night of Power, which may gain for a person an eighty-year lifetime of worship, and which is probably among the coming nights.
Secondly: According to the meaning of “Whoever believes in Divine Determining is saved from grief and sorrow,” and “Look on the good side of things,” and,
Those who listen to the Word and follow the best [meaning] in it; those are the ones whom God has guided, and those are the ones endued with understanding,85
we should now look on the good side of everything, the aspect that affords ease of mind, so that meaningless, unnecessary, harmful, ugly, distressing, temporary circumstances do not hold our attention and preoccupy our minds. In the Eighth Word, one man entered a garden while another left it. The fortunate man looked at the flowers and beautiful things, and relaxed and enjoyed himself. But the unfortunate one looked only at the dirty, ugly things, although he was unable to clean them up, so he was nauseated and upset instead of resting, and then went on his way. Now, the stages of man’s social life, and especially the School of Joseph, resembles a garden. It contains both ugly and beautiful things, and distressing and happy things. The sensible person is he who busies himself with the beautiful, happiness-inducing things, and ignores the ugly, distressing things, and offers thanks happily instead of complaining querulously.
S a i d N u r s i
***


My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Firstly: There is a strong possibility that tomorrow night is the Night of Power. Some of the scholarly authorities stated it is tomorrow. Even if it is not in fact, since the Umma consider it to be so, God willing it will be accepted as such.
Secondly: I am anxious about the comfort of our brothers in Ward Six, where there was a disturbance. There is a finger from outside which stirs up the prison, and particularly Ward Six. Our brothers there should be careful and cautious, and not get mixed up in anything.
Thirdly: Have you sent the piece to the lawyer, to have it read to the Chairman of the Court? Also, because it is the same matter, Halil Hilmi is not only Sabri’s lawyer, but everyone’s. That is how I look on him. He should now assist our first lawyer on account of all of us.
Fourthly: I gave Tasköprülü Sadik Bey’s introduction to Sabri to write out. If it has already been written out, the part that has been corrected should be sent to him. A newly written-out copy should be sent to me. I have a copy of Sadik’s short poem here. If you do not have a copy, I shall send it to you.
S a i d N u r s i
***


My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Firstly: I send congratulations both for your Festival, and for that of your fellow-prisoners. I consider those who exchange greetings with you to have greeted me. It is as though I have made the Festival visits on all of them; you should know this and you should tell them.
Secondly: Due to the warning of my cast-iron stove disintegrating without reason, and our acting with complete caution and self-restraint in consequence, the force of that ‘squall’ was reduced a hundredfold and the gunpowder did not ignite. Now again my water-flask disintegrating extraordinarily without reason informs us that we should again behave with perfect self-composure, patience, and caution. It was imparted to me that covert dissemblers want to employ depraved profligates and apostacizing communists against the religiously-minded people; they are even trying to interfere here.86
***


My Dear, Loyal, and Unshakeable Brothers!
I congratulate you with all my heart at your quickly healing that wound of ours. I felt completely easy last night as a result. In fact, the Medresetü’z-Zehrais expanding, and the true sincerity, self-sacrifice and abandoning of egotism, and complete humility of the Risale-i Nur circle are being adopted and are spreading. Certainly, very petty and temporary sensitivity, irritability, and petulance cannot spoil its powerful teachings and the bonds of brotherhood. The Treatise On Sincerity is the best advice on this point. Their worst strategy now in striking at us and the Risale-i Nur and agitating us, is to make the Risale-i Nur students look coldly on each other by playing on differences in their ideas and temperaments, and to separate them from each other. For sure, it was only a minor tiff, but only a hair on the eye causes the pain of a stone, so that my flask gave news of it as though it was a major incident. The late Hafiz Ali (May God be pleased with him) complaining shortly before his death about a very minor such situation has come to mind perhaps a hundred times, and saddened me.
S a i d N u r s i
***


My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
I gave the students’ written objections to the prison governor. I told him: “We want to send this, together with the end part of my written objections, to the Directorate of Religious Affairs and Ankara Criminal Court, which acquitted us and our treatises, and if it’s appropriate, to send too the list of errors and corrections, but privately and just for the information.” He said: “It is appropriate.” Now you may ask the lawyer to prepare several copies of the students’ written objections and two copies of the list.
Also, write to the Directorate of Religious Affairs and say: since you wrote perfectly correctly in the report about Said and his friends you sent Afyon this time that it is your duty to defend scholars of religion, both the oppressed Said and his innocent companions are extremely grateful to your department. Anyway, our case is related to religion and learning, so the Department of Religious Affairs should be concerned with it before the police, judiciary, or any other department. For this reason, both in Denizli and Afyon, we applied firstly to your department, sending our complaints to the scholars there. Write a paragraph expressing this meaning.
S a i d N u r s i
***


My Dear, Loyal Brother, Re’fet Bey!
Out of respect for the Qur’an of Mighty Stature, and for the sake of your relations with the Qur’an, and in honour of your twenty years of service to belief through the Risale-i Nur, quickly put an end to this apparently small, but because of the sensitivity of our situation, terrible and grievous quarrel between you. For it greatly assists the covert dissemblers who are trying to destroy us, and is like putting a match to gunpowder. There is otherwise a strong possibility that because of an ounce of personal rights tons of harm will come to us and our service of the Qur’an and belief. I swear that if one of you was to insult me most terribly and entirely trample my honour but not give up serving the Qur’an, belief, and the Risale-i Nur, I would forgive him and make peace with him and try not to be offended. You know that our enemies try to take advantage of the slightest unmannerliness, so make it up quickly. Stop being petulant, which is meaningless and so harmful. Otherwise, like Shemsi, Shefik, and Tevfik, some of us will apparently join those who oppose us, causing great harm and deficiency to our service of belief. Up to now Divine favour has made up for any losses by bestowing numerous others who work on the same system. God willing, it will again come to our aid.
S a i d N u r s i
***


My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
The governor evidently very much liked The Supreme Sign and A Guide For Youth. Now he wants The Staff of Moses (Asâ-yi Musa) and Zülfikâr. I told him that I would bring them to him. If there are copies of them here in Afyon, set aside one each of The Staff of Moses, Zülfikâr (bound, large size), A Guide For Youth, and The Supreme Sign.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Firstly: This report has had exactly the same result as the one in Denizli. They have exonerated us on the points on which we have been charged, but in order to ingratiate themselves with them and show that they are not Nurjus, and due to a vein of Wahhabism, they have attacked us with a few scholarly criticisms. I reckon this report arrived before the indictment was written, for the indictment includes some points from it. In which case our list of errors and corrections answers them completely. What do you think of this? Also, what are my new replies like? Are they apt? I wrote them very hastily when in a wretched state.
Secondly: Up to now they were apparently preoccupied with our persons, and the questions of a political society, a sufi order, and a few unimportant private letters. But now, with seizing The Illuminating Lamp (Siracü’n-Nûr) and The Six Attacks (Hücumat-i Sitte), and the experts’ committee directing attention to the Risale-i Nur, and the machinations of our covert enemies, the Risale-i Nur has been attacked in a sort of way, which is a means of ensuring tranquillity in this country. So as with many times previously, at exactly the same time as the country was being attacked in this way, two severe earthquakes occurred, just as I was writing that discussion. This affirmed me, saying: “There is no need to write it.” So I did not write any more. Then today I heard that there is fear of war. So I said to the person in charge here: “Whenever the Risale-i Nur is attacked, the earth either becomes angry, or there is fear of war. We have experienced numerous such events so that no possibility of chance remained, and these have been pointed out to the courts.” That is to say, my terrible anxiety about the Risale-i Nur recently, and the jealous criticisms of the experts’ committee, and the confiscation of an important part of the Risale-i Nur, although I did not realize it, coincided with The Illuminating Lamp —which is like acceptable alms-giving and a means of repelling disaster— disappearing behind the veil of concealment, the earthquake, and fear of the outbreak of war.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Do not worry, we are under Divine protection. There are numerous instances of mercy interspersed among the outward difficulties. The experts’ committee was obliged to object to one piece, but certainly they have become Nurju’s at heart.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal, Unshakeable, Undismayed Brothers, who would never give up working for the hereafter for this fleeting world!
Don’t be upset at remaining here a little longer and their wanting to extend our case somewhat. On the contrary, be pleased, like me. For since life never stops and rushes to extinction, in places of tribulation such as this it becomes eternal through the fruits its yields for the hereafter. Moreover, the circle the Risale-i Nur teaches is expanding. For example, the scholars of the experts’ committee are being obliged to study The Illuminating Light with close attention. Also, it is possible that if we were released now, it would cause deficiencies in our work for the cause of belief in one or two respects. Although the distress I suffer far exceeds yours, I do not want to be released. So as far as you can, try to endure it patiently and become accustomed to this sort of life, and to find solace and ease of mind by writing out the Risale-i Nur and reading it.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Firstly: If necessary, I can send you two copies of the list of errors and corrections from the end of the defences, which I have here in the new letters. They are to be sent to the Directorate of Religious Affairs in addition to the reply to the experts’ committee, and to the Ankara Criminal Court. A copy of the reply to the experts’ committee should also be given to the court here.
Second: It’s good that they have expanded our case. Up to now they had made it appear minor and unimportant in order to devalue it, but secretly were giving it much importance. The situation now will be more advantageous for our work in the way of belief and the Qur’an, God willing.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Firstly: If it had been free this year perhaps some of us would have made the Hajj. God willing, our intention will be accepted as though we had made it, and in these distressing conditions our service of belief and the Risale-i Nur will yield the high reward of the Hajj.
Secondly: Since we have repeatedly said that “the Risale-i Nur is a powerful and true Qur’anic commentary,” it was imparted to me that I should explain a fact, since some inattentive people do not know the full meaning of this. The fact is this:
There are two sorts of Qur’anic commentaries:
The first is the well-known sort of commentary. Commentaries of this sort expound and elucidate the Qur’an’s phraseology, words, and sentences.
The second sort explain, prove, and elucidate with powerful arguments the Qur’an’s truths related to belief. This sort has great importance. Sometimes the well-known, externalist commentaries include this sort in summary fashion. But the Risale-i Nur has made it its basis directly, and is a commentary on the Qur’an’s meanings which silences obstinate philosophers in unprecedented manner.
Thirdly: This morning I was going to write something, but did not. Now the same matter has come up, and the clerk Sâlim Bey gave permission. Husrev and Tahiri should come tomorrow in order to write a petition to the Cabinet.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Is it us and the Risale-i Nur who are the most harmful things around so that all other writers are free to write and all classes of people are free to meet together? But without religious education, Muslims cannot be governed except by means of absolute despotism and absolute bribery. For just as up to the present no Muslim has ever become a true Christian or Jew, they rather become irreligious and completely corrupted; so a Muslim cannot become a communist; he turns into an anarchist and can be governed by nothing other than absolute despotism. We Risale-i Nur students are working both for government, and public order, and the happiness of the country and nation. Those opposed to us are irreligious anarchists and enemies of the country and nation. It is essential that the Government should not interfere with us, but protect and assist us.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Firstly: Their releasing publishers of the Risale-i Nur like Re’fet, Edhem, the Çaliskan’s, and Burhan shows that it is not forbidden to disseminate the Risale-i Nur and the court does not intervene. It is also a sign that it has decided that there is no political society. Also, since in prolonging our case it has attracted widespread attention to the Risale-i Nur, and is like a general invitation to read it and an official advertisement, and it has excited the desire of the needy to study it, it has been led to benefits for us and the believers far surpassing our tribulations and losses. It is a sign, God willing, that this sacred instruction will have the effect of an atom bomb against the aggressive troops of misguidance, who are on the assault at this time throughout the earth in the most widespread and terrible fashion.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear Brothers Re’fet, Mehmed Feyzi, Sabri!
I received a severe warning and sign, and earnestly request of you for the sake of the Risale-i Nur and out of respect for this Festival and for the sake of our old rights that you try to heal this awesome new wound of ours. For our covert enemies are following two plans: one is to destroy my character with insulting treatment, and the second is to make us feel coldly towards each other. To criticize, object to, and be offended at chiefly Husrev is to cause division amongst us. I tell you that if Husrev had a thousand faults, I would still be chary of opposing him. For to oppose him now is to directly oppose the Risale-i Nur and myself and to support those who have ruined us. It is a terrible betrayal so that an extraordinary thing happened to me for no reason like my stove disintegrating. I am also of the opinion that the last torments to have been inflicted on me resulted from your meaningless and very harmful lack of solidarity. A fearful finger is stirring things up here, especially in Ward Six. Don’t make me weep this Festival. Quickly make heart-felt peace!
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
I wanted only two or three of our brothers to be released today. But the Divine favour that looks to us left them behind here for their own good. It is absolutely essential that our present situation is maintained for around three weeks. For our being together for this Festival is necessary both for us, and the Risale-i Nur, and for our work, and for our physical and spiritual comfort, and so that we can receive a full share of the Hajjis’ prayers, and to save the treatises that have been sent to Ankara from being confiscated, and so that those who pity us in our plight and embrace the Risale-i Nur may increase in number, and it can be a proof that we did not have recourse to the traitors to the country, nation, and religion by consenting to serious errors of the present.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Unable to endure —due to their vein of Wahhabism— Imam ‘Ali’s (May God be pleased with him) earnest interest in and appreciation of the Risale-i Nur, and influenced by the groundless suspicions that last year caused Zamzam water to be poured away and this year prevented people going to make the Hajj, the experts’ committee directed their unfair, incorrect, and unjustifiable jealous criticisms at the Fifth Ray. At this time of suspicion and alarm, the safest place for us is prison. God willing, the treatises of the Risale-i Nur will win the freedom of both us and themselves. Since under these harsh conditions in the face of so many opponents they are making themselves read in unprecedented fashion, and making their students work in prison in various ways, and through Divine favour not allowing them to be ruined; we are bound to be content with this much and to offer thanks instead of complaining. It is because of this contentment that I am able to endure all my severe distress. I do not interfere in God’s concerns.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Of these two copies, one is mine and one is the governor’s. Correct the governor’s copy according to the copy that has my handwriting on it. While studying The Supreme Sign this time, I saw that the Second Station until the end, and the ‘conversation’ at the end, were of the greatest importance, and I profited from them enormously. One of you should read and the other listen, so that you can profit too. In addition to doing the corrections, our brothers should not remain idle, but should study in pairs.
Secondly: My copy of the Tenth Word, the notebook here containing letters, and the rest should not get lost nor remain idle. I am leaving it to Ceylan to supervise this.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
While reading Jaljalutiya now, it was imparted to me the moment this question occurred to me: “I wonder what the relationship is between sura thumma nun in the phrase Bi-haqqi tabaraka thumma nun wa sa’il, at the twenty-sixth degree, which indicates the Treatise On Divine Determining?” I saw when reading the start of that Sura, Nun. By the pen and by the [record] which men write,87 that it is the word Nun that is the origin, basis, pre-eternal source, and eternal master of all pens, writing, and books, and indicates the pen of Divine Determining, and light, and the light of pre-eternal knowledge. That is, just as By the [winds] that scatter broadcast88 looks to the Treatise On Minute Particles with a powerful relation inferring an indication, so does the word Nun look to the Treatise On Divine Determining with a powerful indication.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal, Unshakeable Brothers!
Firstly: In accordance with the meaning of “Good is in what God wishes,” there is good in our case being delayed. My heart and the Risale-i Nur’s freedom demanded that it should be thus. By consoling each other, strengthening each other’s morale, and scholarly debate and pleasant conversation, and by writing out and studying the Risale-i Nur, you will be successful in attracting Divine mercy, which erases the point of difficulty, and transforming these transitory hours into eternal ones.
Secondly: Since we exchanged the Festival greetings in the temporary prison of the court, as a Festival sweet I sent what is for me the very meaningful honey from the village of Nurs together with the Zamzam water which Zübeyir, the hero from Konya, brought me. Put the water in the flask of honey and mix them together. Then leave the Zamzam in it, and drink it with good health.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
An important and meaningful question was asked by someone important. He asked me: “You are not a political society and three courts of law have acquitted you on that point, and this has also been established because six provinces which have kept you under surveillance for twenty years have not made any accusations in connection with it. Nevertheless, there is a wondrous attachment between Nurjus that is not found in any political society or group. We would like to have this difficulty solved for us.”
In reply I said this: “That is true, the Nurjus are not a political society of any sort or a group organized for any political, worldly, negative, personal, or communal interests, and they could not be thus. They are the sons and daughters and grandchildren of the old heroes of this land, the millions of Islamic devotees who with perfect joy sacrificed their lives to win the rank of martyrdom. They have inherited their vein of self-sacrifice so that they display this wondrous attachment, and in Denizli Court caused this impotent, wretched brother of theirs to declare on their account: “Let our heads also be sacrificed for a truth for which millions of heroic heads have been sacrificed!” He said this in their name, leaving the court in astonished and appreciative silence. That is to say, among the Nurjus are true, sincere, positive devotees who act solely for God’s pleasure and the hereafter, so that the fearsome secret societies of the Masons, communists, corrupters, atheists, godless, and Tashnaks have found no means to oppose them, and so want to ruin and scatter them through ‘flexible’ laws by deceiving the Government and judiciary. God willing, they can do nothing, only be the reason for the devotees of the Risale-i Nur and of the faith increasing in number.”
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
I am going to relate to you a question and answer of forty years ago which resembles that of yesterday. In those days of long ago, since the Old Said’s students’ passionate attachment to their Master was such they would sacrifice their very lives for him, the Old Said was able to halt the Armenian Tashnak revolutionaries around Van and Bitlis, where they were very active, and was able to silence them to a degree. He found Mauser rifles for his students, and for a while his medrese was like a barracks with guns and books side by side. Then a General from the army came and saw them and said: “This isn’t a medrese, it’s a barracks.” Because of the Bitlis Incident he became suspicious, and ordered that they collected up our rifles. A month or two later, the Great War broke out and I reclaimed my rifles. Anyway...
They asked me in connection the above: “The Armenian revolutionaries, among whom are fervent devotees ready to sacrifice their lives, are frightened of you, so that when you climb the mountain Erek Dagi near Van, they withdraw and go elsewhere. What force do you have that makes them do that?”
In reply I told them: “Since the Armenian devotees display this wondrous self-sacrifice for the fleeting life of this world and the temporary interests of trifling, negative nationalism, and attack us, surely the students, who strive for everlasting life and the positive interests of vast, sacred Islamic nationhood and believe that the appointed hour cannot be changed, will not lag behind those devotees.89 If necessary, they unhesitatingly and proudly sacrifice the certain appointed hour and few years of illusory outward life for millions of years of true life and the well-being and interests of thousands of millions of their fellow believers.”
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal, Faithful, Kindly Brothers!
For two days I have felt an aching in my head and nerves from ’flu. And needing the consolation and companionship in such circumstances of meeting with friends, I was constricted by the terrible loneliness and isolation. Complaints like the following occurred to me: “Why do we suffer this torment? How does it benefit our work?”
Then this morning the following was imparted to me: for us to be set this rigorous examination, and to be struck on the touchstone numerous times to see clearly whether we are gold or brass, and to be tried unfairly in every respect, and to be passed through ever finer sieves three or four times to see whether our evil-commanding souls take a share or are playing any tricks, is extremely necessary for our service, which should be purely and solely in the name of truth and reality, so that Divine Determining and dominical grace permit it. For by being exhibited in this field of trial and examination confronted by obdurate, unjust enemies and their pretexts, everyone has understood that there is no trickery, no egotism, no malice, no worldly or personal interests, nor those that look to the hereafter, mixed in with our service, and that it is completely sincere and proceeds from truth and reality. If it had remained concealed, it could have been given numerous meanings. The mass of believers would not have had confidence in it. They would have said: “Perhaps they are deceiving us,” and the elite too would have had their suspicions. Thinking that “perhaps they are acting the same as some of those who sell themselves to acquire spiritual rank for themselves and to win confidence,” they would not feel completely certain about it. Now, following the examination, even the most stubborn and obdurate person is compelled to submit. If your hardship is one, your profits are a thousandfold. God willing.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
Just when with their stringent prohibitions they were trying to scare people everywhere away from me, the advertisement in the newspaper about the incident when I was a prisoner-of-war has increased their interest. Yesterday, three officials who are in favour of insulting my person said in the prison yard: “The people gather when Said appears at the window, and they look at him. He must not stand at the window or we’ll change his ward.” The Chief Warder said this. But don’t you worry at all. I have decided to endure all difficulties. God willing, through the blessings of your prayers, the distress will turn into joy.
Essentially, the incident is true, but because I had no witnesses, I never described it in detail. I did not realize that a squad had come to execute me; I understood later. I did not know that the Russian Commander then said some things in Russian by way of apology. That is to say, the Muslim Major who was present and who reported the incident to the newspaper understood; apparently the Commander said several times: “Forgive me!”
My brothers! When I am busy with the Risale-i Nur, the distress diminishes. That means, our duty is to be occupied with its treatises and to give no importance to passing things, and to offer thanks in patience.
S a i d N u r s i
***


An Astonishing Trait in Bediuzzaman’s Character
[This appeared in the 15th Teshrin-i Evvel, 1948 number of the magazine Ehl-i Sünnet. It was written by the magazine’s owner, who is a lawyer.]
Bediuzzaman was taken prisoner the same day that I was wounded and captured in Bitlis during the First World War. He was sent to Siberia, to one of the big prisoner-of-war camps. I was on the island of Nangün near Baku. One day, Nicola Nicolayavich visited the camp in order to inspect the prisoners. While passing in front of Bediuzzaman, Bediuzzaman ignored him, not so much as stirring a finger. This attracted the the Commander-in-Chief’s attention. On some pretext, he passed by a second time, and again Bediuzzaman did not stir. He passed by a third time, and stopped, then the following exchange ensued:
“Do you know who I am?”
“Yes, I know. You are Nicola Nicolayavich, the Czar’s uncle and Commander-in-Chief of the Caucasian Front.”
“So why do you insult me?”
“Forgive me, but I have not insulted you. I merely doing what my beliefs demand.”
“What do your beliefs demand?”
“I am a Muslim scholar. I have belief in my heart. Someone with belief in his heart is superior to one without belief. If I had risen to my feet, I would have been disrespectful to my beliefs. I did not stand up for that reason.”
“In that case, by saying that I am without belief, you are insulting both my person, and the army to which I belong, and my nation, and the Czar. A military court will be set up at once and you shall be interrogated.”
On this command, a military court was set up. The Turkish, German, and Austrian officers in the headquarters all pleaded with Bediuzzaman to apologize to the Commander-in-Chief. He replied like this:
“I want to travel to the realm of the hereafter, to the presence of God’s Messenger (PBUH), and I have to have a passport. I can’t act contrarily to my beliefs.”
No one could open their mouths in the face of this, and awaited the results. The interrogation ceased, and they passed a sentence of execution for insulting the Russian Czar and army. Bediuzzaman said cheerfully to the officer leading the squad that came to carry out the sentence: “Allow me fifteen minutes to perform my duties.” He took the ablutions, then while performing two rak‘ats of prayers, Nicola Nicolayavich appeared. He said:
“Forgive me! I supposed you acted as you did to insult me, so I had you tried according to the law. But now I realize that you were merely acting out of your beliefs and were carrying out what they enjoin. The judgement is quashed. You are worthy of respect for the firmness of your belief. I disturbed you, again, forgive me.”
A Major, one of Bediuzzaman’s companions, described this high trait of his character and firmness of religion, which is a worthy example for all Muslims, as he himself witnessed it. When I heard it, involuntarily my eyes filled with tears.
Abdurrahim90
My Brothers!
I have no appetite, and because gifts upset me I have sent you my share, which consists of three portions of butter, a basket of grapes, a bag of apples, two packets of tea, and sugar. I was going to give them to you as a gift, but I asked, and you have some too. With the money from them I am going to buy things like yoghurt, eggs, and bread, so the Medresetü’z-Zehra is not displeased at me, saying that I did not eat the gifts. Sell them to the needy, cheaply, and to the deserving, so that the gifts of the Medresetü’z-Zehra and its branches will be blessed in two respects, and be healing for both me and those who receive them. Let Husrev supervise it, and Ceylan and Hifzi sell them.
S a i d N u r s i
***


My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Firstly: The following was imparted to me in connection with the newspaper article about me: an imperious Russian Commander swallowed his anger in the face of the dignity of your belief, and apologized, so if the officials who have seen the truly powerful, sincere teachings —a hundred times better than I could give— of the Risale-i Nur which gain firm belief for a person, persist in their obduracy and do not see the matter fairly, certainly no punishment other than Hell could purify them. The penalty for such a vast crime could not be paid in a brief lifetime. For if oil goes bad, it is inedible; it is not like milk and yoghurt. God willing, the Risale-i Nur will save most of them, before they are corrupted.
Secondly: Let Mehmed Feyzi write to Bedri and tell him that I am including all those he mentioned in his letter in my prayers. They too should pray for me.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Firstly: It has been imparted to me that I should describe the astonishing and instructive treatment I have received during my two periods of captivity. As follows:
I was in a ward in Kosturma in Russia together with ninety other officers who were being held as prisoners-of-war. I used to give them religious instruction from time to time. One day the Russian commander came and he saw this, and said: “This Kurd was made a militia commander and he slaughtered many of our men. Now he’s giving political instruction here. I am forbidding this. He must give no instruction.” Two days later he again came, and this time permitted it, saying: “Since what you are teaching is not political, but religious and moral, you may continue.”
During my second captivity, here in this prison, the court officials forbade one of my close brothers to come to me, although he has listened to my reading from the Risale-i Nur for twenty years, and himself reads better than I do. Neither did they permit those who attend to my essential needs to come, lest they received instruction from me. However, the Risale-i Nur leaves no need for other teaching, and we have no other teachings, and we have no secrets that have not been divulged. Anyway, certain circumstances have made me cut a long story short.
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Two or three times I have been afflicted with an important state of mind. Thirty years ago it made me leave Istanbul’s glittering social life while I was in the Darü’l-Hikmeti’l-Islâmiye and took me up the high hill known as Yûsha Tepesi, where it did not even permit me to have the late Abdurrahman, who was in Istanbul and was the first student and hero of the Risale-i Nur, with me to attend to my needs. Now the first stages of a state of mind similar to that revolution of the spirit, which showed up the nature of the New Said, have begun in me. I reckon it is a sign a Third Said will appear, who will abandon the world altogether. That means, the Risale-i Nur and its heroic students will perform my duties, and no need remains for me. Anyway, all the comprehensive parts of the Risale-i Nur and all its unshakeable, sincere students give instruction far better than me.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
Firstly: I have surmised from a number of signs that of the collections that have been published, it is the Guide For Youth that they give most importance to. I reckon that Hüve Nüktesi (The Air: A Window Onto Divine Unity) has broken the backs of our covert atheist enemies, and smashed the idol of Nature, their foundation and support. For although it was to an extent possible to hide that idol in the dense earth, it was impossible to do so in the transparent air. As a result, because of their obdurate disbelief and apostasizing obstinacy, they are deceiving the judiciary and inciting it against us. God willing, the Risale-i Nur will induce the members of the judiciary to look on us favourably, and will make this attack come to nothing too.
Secondly: Now, both the Ehl-i Sünnet magazine, and the newspaper here, and Zübeyir’s fiery reply, and their preoccupation with the Risale-i Nur have been effective advertisements for it. You take a look at the pieces about us that would please me, in my place, and then inform me of them.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers, Mehmed, Mustafa, Ibrahim, and Ceylan!
Firstly: Yesterday I saw you engrossed in conversation, I was delighted and pleased. I listened happily as though I was at your side. Then suddenly I saw that there were people listening to you on both sides. It continued half an hour. I was worried and said to myself: it is possible that among those listening is a spy who will make a mountain out of a molehill and give the wrong meanings. He may be listening carefully, but because of their lack of caution and enjoyment, the brothers who are chatting are not looking at them or being careful. I sent this as an answer. Thanks be to God, I knew that nothing harmful had been said, but we have to be cautious at this sensitive time.
Secondly: I understood from a letter written by Hoja Hasan that his good opinion of me is a hundred times greater than my due, and that he will be a publisher of the Risale-i Nur who works on the same system as the hero of Denizli, the late Hasan Feyzi. God willing, other Hasan Feyzi’s like him will emerge in Afyon too and it will not lag behind Denizli, and will transform our hardships into mercy.
S a i d N u r s i
***


My Brothers!
I have not been curious about the newspapers, but articles supporting us appearing at this time in both Ehl-i Sünnet and Sebil-ür-Resad has confused those jealous people who oppose us and the covert hostile atheists. The possibility that they might try to silence those friends made me anxious.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
Some true solace, which reduces to nothing our distressing tribulations
The First: Our troubles being transformed into mercy.
Second: The pleasure to be found within the justice of Divine Determining, and the relief felt in submitting to it.
Third: The joy resulting from the Divine favour particular to the Nurjus.
Fourth: The pleasure of our tribulations being transitory and passing.
Fifth: Significant rewards.
Sixth: Not interfering in God’s concerns.
Seventh: Suffering only little difficulty and slight wounds in the face of even the severest attacks.
Eighth: These hardships being very minor in comparison with those others suffer.
Ninth: Happiness at the effects of the widespread advertising of the Risale-i Nur, which arise from the exacting test and examination of serving the Risale-i Nur and belief.
These nine spiritual joys are a salve and medicine so soothing and sweet they are indescribable; they ease our terrible pains.
S a i d N u r s i
***


My Dear, Loyal, Steadfast Brothers!
With all their stratagems, the dissemblers’ attacks these last ten months and their getting hold of an official has not shaken even the youngest student. Their slanders are insignificant. In the face of the hundred lies of his that we proved, he found one single error he said was contrary to the facts, in one of our letters, that a newspaper had reported that the former governor had been promoted. But the error was the newspaper’s. Anyway... such slanders from such people have virtually no effect on us, and, God willing, they will cause no harm to the Risale-i Nur circle. As I told you before, don’t give any importance to the written calumnies of that official, don’t let them confuse your ideas. If there is any legal point the reply to which is not found in my defence, give a brief answer. And say: “Said says: So as not to vex the three courts which acquitted us, nor be in contempt of them, I am not going to afford importance to that malicious indictment by replying to it. My long defence, especially the ten points showing the ten ways it is illegal, furnishes a complete and apt reply.”
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
Firstly: It is an instance of Divine favour that  did not hear that man’s slanderous indictment. I would otherwise have spoken vehemently. I would have said to the Chairman of the Court: I am taking you to court, that is, you and your injustice to the Supreme Tribunal at the Last Judgement, and I am taking your contempt of the law to the court of this world. And the reason I said I have no lawyer was to tell them that he is the lawyer of all of us in general matters, and only I can reply to the attacks on my person. You may tell Ahmed Hikmet this.
Secondly: Our former defences are sufficient to answer the prosecutor’s charges.
Thirdly: Mustafa Osman and Ceylan wrote and told me what they thought of it and that it had caused them no discomfort, and that it would have no adverse effects in the Risale-i Nur circle either. I saw the hero Tahiri. He had the same idea. I was curious as to what Husrev, the Feyzi’s, and Sabri thought.
Fourthly: I reckon it is because disbelief and misguidance now attack us in the form of secret societies and political groups that Divine Determining makes them torment us with this extreme tyranny and accusation of being a political society. That means there is overriding need for the believers to be united. We were unaware of that fact, so received the blow of justice from Divine Determining.
S a i d N u r s i
In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Firstly: When there is a despotic Cabinet which prevents people going on the Hajj, pours away Zamzam water, permits us to be treated extremely unjustly, attaches no importance to Zülfikâr and The Illuminating Lamp (Siracü’n-Nûr) being seized, promotes the officials who torment us maliciously and illegally, and does not hear the loud weeping through the tongue of disposition at the oppression in our house, at such a time, the best place to be is prison. Only, if it was possible, it would best if we were transferred to another prison.
Secondly: Just as they force the most unsuitable people to read the most confidential treatises, so they insist and force us to be a political society. But we felt no need at all to be a political society or secret revolutionary group of any sort. For among the Nurjus, through sincerity and self-sacrifice, the Islamic brotherhood of the unified community of believers has unfolded to a high degree. With the powerful devotion they have inherited from their millions of forefathers, the Risale-i Nur students are bound to a truth for which their forefathers sacrificed their lives, and this has left no need up to now for any society, official or political, secret or open, or any revolutionary group. This means there is now a need, for Divine Determining has set them to pester us. They tyrannize us with accusations of an imaginary political society. And Divine Determining deals us a slap with their hands, saying: “Why haven’t you had complete sincerity, perfect solidarity, or been a perfect ‘God’s party’?”, and it has acted in justice.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
Firstly: I know that you are not in need of consolation. Strengthen one another’s morale, and that will be sufficient. The lines I have hanging on the wall opposite me are sufficient for me. It has been understood that this last attack was completely unjustifiable and illegal intimidation, and the result of groundless suspicions and weakness. However, the stand of the people and police was a sort of objection to that meaningless attack.
Secondly: Is my defence adequate to reply to the new charges as well? Also, are Zübeyir and the lawyers working? They are not anxious, are they? They should not worry at all. In view of the matters with which they have charged us, they should charge all those who share in the brotherhood of belief, and even all the congregations and imams, and the students of all masters and teachers. This means that their opponents have gained considerable power so that instead of actual incidents they are utilizing possibilities in this panicky way and attacking us with extraordinary delusions.
Thirdly: My own view is that we should remain in prison till the spring. Anyway everything comes to a standstill in winter. God willing, Divine favour will again come to our aid.
S a i d N u r s i
***


[One of Husrev’s letters]
In His Name, be He glorified!
Our Beloved Master!
While the main duty of the scholars of the experts’ committee was to defend and protect the believers and especially those who uphold the Qur’an, with their biased reports about us they have driven the Afyon legal authorities to investigate us in the closest detail; have kept you, our beloved Master, under the severest repression for eight months; been the cause of the imprisonment of us students being drawn out; and have studied the undeniably miraculous truths of the Risale-i Nur in a spirit of jealousy. Doubtless, your writings replying to their reports, which incited Afyon Court against us, were the work of your compassion. Let alone defending you, our beloved Master, who for twenty-five years has been struggling against our covert enemies with a handful of students, and the Risale-i Nur, which comprises the Qur’an’s most important truths, although it is your right to ask numerous questions of these scholars who have formed a front against us in this our most perilous time, your very minor questions will do nothing except warn them. The ‘special favour,’ which is a supreme Divine bounty and, arising from sources of which we have much need in these sensitive times, transforms our despair into pride, has again been manifested here in Afyon Prison. The earth, which has not trembled for eight months, again became angry today and twice shook as you were describing the earthquakes which occur when you our beloved Master and the Risale-i Nur are attacked. We too witnessed it, and it strengthened our hope. It pitied your apparent aloneness in the face of the fearsome onslaughts of the cruel enemies thirsting to destroy you. It had physical compassion on your powerlessness, came to your assistance, and with the quaking earth affirmed the rightness of your cause. Giving the good news of “Victory is ours,” which through a Divine, angelic power, issues from your blessed pen, it made us truly grateful to our beloved Master.

The Enduring One, He is the Enduring One,
Your very faulty student, Husrev
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Firstly: What is necessary are caution, composure, and consultation.
Secondly: It was imparted to me that Zübeyir was given to me in place of my late nephew Abdurrahman, and Ceylan, in place of my late nephew Fuad. So here I am handing over my work to them.
Thirdly: I have been informed that the judges of the court have made a pretext of the letter I wrote and was put at the head of hardworking but incautious Ahmed Feyzi’s Mâidetü’l-Kur’an. Saying: “Said affirms the eulogies and the other things written about him,” they have made it a reason for my conviction. I repeatedly said that before anything else Ahmed Feyzi should explain it —that the letter was written in order to not accept the other letters about him, and so that he should modify the other part of it— nevertheless he wrote things unnecessarily that make them angry. If he had a thousand faults, I would not be offended at him, but he should be wary of acting boldly and incautiously, lest harm comes to the Risale-i Nur.
Fourthly: Brother Ahmed Feyzi, the hero of the Feyzi’s, should behave exactly like Tahiri in Tahiri’s ward, which is his medrese, and should encourage his students in place of the those that have been released with lessons from the Qur’an and Risale-i Nur, and with writing out its treatises. The notebooks of the new students, which he sent me yesterday, turned my sorry state into one of joy. “All praise be to God,” I declared.
***


This time, the assault is on a very large scale. Due to their groundless suspicions the Prime Minister and Cabinet attacked us in accordance with some plan. According to information I have received, and numerous signs, due to the false reports and intrigues of covert dissemblers, they have shown us to be closely connected to the Caliphate movement and a secret community belonging to the Naqshbandi Order, indeed to be leading it, and have caused the Government to be greatly alarmed about us. For evidence they point out the large collections of the Risale-i Nur being bound in Istanbul and published throughout the Islamic world and being well-received everywhere, and have scared the Government, and unjustifiably turned the jealous official hojas and suspicious officials against us. They reckoned that numerous documents and plentiful evidence would be brought to light, and that in the vein of the Old Said, I would be unable to endure it and would create a disturbance. But endless thanks be to Almighty God, He reduced the calamity a thousandfold. In all their searches they found nothing to connect us to any secret community or society. We have no connection so that they should have found it. The prosecutor was therefore compelled to resort to lies and slander, giving things the wrong meaning, and making allegations about things that were not offences. Since the truth is this, we and the Risale-i Nur have been delivered from ninety-nine per cent of the calamity. In which case, we should not complain, but offering endless thanks and beseeching Almighty God, await the completion of this manifestation of Divine favour in patience. And with the lessons of the Risale-i Nur, we should console those needy and eager people who constantly enter and depart from this place of study.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal Brother!
I understood from a severe warning that the excessive, detrimental, combative and politically-minded pieces you and Ahmed Feyzi read in court —outside the Risale-i Nur’s way, which is not to be combative, nor to contest the worldly, nor touch on politics, and only when absoutely essential to defend oneself briefly— has caused great harm to the Risale-i Nur. In fact, they were the cause of our sentences and the ill-treatment I have received. I am not offended at you and Ahmed Feyzi, but you should have shown them to me first. Your position was given you as a material Divine decree. You have to act like me to repair the damage. It is essential that Feyzi also gives up the political style of defence with all his strength, and like Tahiri, occupies himself with the Risale-i Nur and the new students.
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear Brothers!
It is necessary to try to print the forty odd pages about me and the Risale-i Nur, the list of errors and corrections and its addendum, and the reply to the Posta newspaper, in both the old letters and the new, in Isparta and in Istanbul, and if possible here as well. Since the court is duplicating by machine the matters they suppose are against us, it is our legal right to duplicate the same matters together with the ninety errors, and this we must do. Later on, my long defence and the written objections of such friends as Ahmed Feyzi, Zübeyir, Mustafa Osman, Husrev, Sungur, and Ceylan shall be printed also, God willing.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear and Loyal Brothers!
It was imparted to me that I should write and tell you of two strange, subtle incidents that occurred within two hours, and were apparently insignificant but in fact important.
The First: I was reading to two people destined to be Risale-i Nur students ‘An Important Matter which was imparted to y Heart on the Night of Power’ from A Guide For Youth, then just as I read “it gains for the Risale-i Nur students in ten weeks the level of study the students of the religious schools (medrese) gain in five or ten years,” this occurred to me: just as through Divine favour the Old Said acquired in fifteen weeks at the age of fifteen the knowledge usually acquired in the medreses with fifteen years of study, so through dominical mercy at this time when there are no medreses, the Risale-i Nur is sufficient for acquiring in fifteen weeks the knowledge of the sciences of reality and belief it would otherwise take fifteen years to acquire, as fifteen thousand people have affirmed through their own experience this fifteen years.
Secondly: That same time, my window, which is heavy, without reason fell on my dishes and bottles and food. I supposed that both the window and all my bottles and drinking glasses were broken and the food they contained ruined. But marvellously, not one thing was either broken or spoilt. Only the meat I had received as a present was spilt. But it was destined for the new students of the Risale-i Nur, maintaining my rule of not accepting presents, and confirming with its extraordinariness the first incident.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Brothers!
In a way totally opposed to the law, our documents and additional pieces for the appeal have not yet been sent to the Appeal Court. Our three authorized lawyers should find some way of ensuring that they are sent as soon as possible. For their prolonging our detention for eleven months on excuses, and not permitting me to speak in court, and their holding me in solitary confinement for eleven months in cold, tortuous, and distressing conditions, tells of a malicious bias unacceptable by justice. It is therefore essential that both our lawyers and you do everything in your power to have our trial transferred to a court in another province.
S a i d N u r s i
***


In His Name, be He glorified!
My Dear, Loyal, Sincere, Steadfast, Devoted Brothers!
Firstly: The reason I don’t keep a copy of ‘The Mystery of To you have We granted’91 with me is that long ago there was some confusion in two premonitions I had.
The First: I perceived through a premonition a terrible event that would occur in this country alone, and the rise of tyrants. The mighty mystery became apparent twelve years later as I had foretold, but in the large sphere, on the face of the earth. For sure it apparently altered what I had predicted, but in reality it turned out to be completely correct and the pure truth. For this reason, I do not keep that treatise with me and I do not give it to others.
Secondly: Forty years ago I used repeatedly to say: “I see a light.” I used to give good tidings of it. I supposed the light to be on a country-wide scale. However, it was the Risale-i Nur; I reckoned the circle of the Risale-i Nur students to be the political sphere of the whole country, and I was in error.
***


Sir!
I thank you for having the flag of the Independence Holiday hung on my ward. During the national struggle in Istanbul, Ankara knew that I had performed the service of maybe a military division through publishing and distributing my work entitled The Six Steps against the British and Greeks, for twice Mustafa Kemal notified me in cypher wanting me to go to Ankara. He even said: “We have to have this heroic hoja here!” That is to say, it is my right to hang this flag this holiday.
S a i d N u r s i
***


[The defence speeches of the Risale-i Nur students during their trials in Afyon Court, which commenced in 1948 as a conspiracy to impose, through propaganda, the death penalty, and during which the Risale-i Nur was firstly convicted, then all copies of it finally returned.]
We say the following in the face of those who, departing from reality and justice, have called the Risale-i Nur students’ attachment for the Risale-i Nur and its interpreter, which looks purely and sincerely to the hereafter, a worldly, political society, and have tried to show this to be a criminal offence, despite three courts of law having acquitted them in that respect:
The basis of all human society, and especially the Islamic nation, are earnest love between relatives; concerned relations between tribes and groups; brotherhood and moral assistance for fellow believers arising from Islamic nationhood; self-sacrificing concern for one’s fellow-countrymen and the members of one’s nation; and unshakeable attachment and devotion to and support for the truths of the Qur’an, which save their eternal lives, and for those who disseminate them. It is only by denying these bonds, which secure the life of society, and by accepting the Red Peril —which is scattering the terrible seed of anarchy in the north, destroying nations and their youth, and by drawing everyone’s children to itself, annihilates kinship and nationhood, and opens the way to the total corruption of human civilization and society— that the Risale-i Nur students can be called a political society in the sense of its being a crime.
The Risale-i Nur students therefore do not hesitate to display their attachment to the Qur’an’s truths and their firm relations with their brothers of the hereafter. They accept gratefully any punishment that may be given them because of that brotherhood, and admit the truth to your just court. They do not condescend to defend themselves with trickery, sycophancy, and lies.
Prisoner, S a i d N u r s i


[Husrev’s Defence]
To Afyon Criminal Court
In the indictment the prosecution has charged me in two respects, one general, the other particular. The general charge is my service of the Risale-i Nur and my sharing in the imaginary crime of my Master. The particular charge is my life of seclusion, which is of no importance and constitutes no crime, as well as a number of circumstances related to my personal life. In reply to the prosecution’s making me share in my Master’s imaginary crime because of my service to the Risale-i Nur, I say this:
On the way my Master has taken, I participate with all my heart and soul in the imaginary crime with which he is charged, in the sacred service he performs through the Risale-i Nur for the Islamic world and particularly for this country and nation. I shall offer thanks to Almighty God till the end of my days for having given me success in this service of religious belief.
Respected Judges! Certain evidence of my success in serving the Risale-i Nur is this:
It was my writing out the copies of the Qur’an, although I had little proficiency in Arabic calligraphy, in a wondrous and unprecedented way, perfectly, outside my will and power. One of these you have in your possession.
The second evidence is my success in writing nearly six hundred copies of various parts of the Risale-i Nur, which for twenty years has secured enormous benefits for this country and nation, and for religion and good morality. In fact, in the short time of one month I wrote out fourteen treatises, as my friends know. I find it superfluous to defend also those points related to my part in my Master’s sacred service, which are supposed to be offences. I affirm with all my strength my Master’s written objections and their addendum, and I present them to your high court as my own objections.
Respected Judges! Our Master follows no worldly or political aim at all in his blessed, sacred, and luminous works, which your court is still holding and which consist of the truths of belief and the Qur’an. Moreover, just as I and my friends confirm the sacred service he has performed for this country and nation, so did the patriots in the Union and Progress government confirm it. For at that time, they gave nineteen thousand gold liras for his university in Van, called the Medresetü’z-Zehra. The lovers of their country admiringly confirmed his patriotic, scholarly endeavours. Then one hundred and sixty-three deputies out of two hundred allotted one hundred and fifty thousand liras, when funds were very scarce, for that university of his in the east.
Throughout his life, my sacred, blessed Master, whom the prosecution has designated a criminal, has compelled even his most obdurate and jealous enemies to submit and those who have sought his conviction in the courts, not permitting them to combat his vehement, sharp words. I inform your high court that I am proud of the service I have performed for the Risale-i Nur this last twenty years, working as a scribe in his sacred service and all his learned activities, the aim of which is to secure the foundation stones of this country’s happiness and prosperity.
Prisoner, Husrev Altinbasak
***


[Tahiri’s Defence]
To Afyon Criminal Court
As has been communicated to me by the office of the Afyon state prosecutor, I have been sent to trial together with my Master, Bediuzzaman Said Nursi, and his other companions in connection with the matter of inciting the people to breach state security by exploiting religious feelings.
I gave correct answers to the questions asked of me both in Isparta Magistrates’ Court, and in the office of the Afyon examining magistrate. Denizli Court, which acquitted us, returned all our books to us, and did not convict us for reading and writing out the treatises of my Master, Bediuzzaman, or for corresponding with our brothers who are his students. However, six years ago, without my Master’s permission, on my own initiative I had printed in Istanbul five hundred copies of the Seventh Ray by Bediuzzaman in the old letters. In accordance with the decision dated 20.7.1945, Denizli Court returned these in their entirety together with their box, handing them over to me in person. They were then distributed at cost price to Risale-i Nur students eager for them.
In consequence of that court’s decision, which had been ratified by the Appeal Court and had been made final, two years ago I bought a duplicating machine in Istanbul and paper, and took them to Isparta.
Of the three collections which you have in your possession, two were written out by my brother Husrev Altinbasak, and one was written out by myself. First of all we printed Zülfikâr, containing The Miracles of Muhammad (PBUH) and The Miraculousness of the Qur’an. This we in part sold, and with the money bought the paper for The Staff of Moses Collection (Asâ-yi Mûsa). We then printed The Staff of Moses, and sold it. Then we bought the paper for The Illuminating Lamp Collection (Siracünnûr), and printed it. This continued for about a year. Then, when bringing around thirty copies of these collections to Egirdir, I was arrested on the way, and handed over to the judicial authorities in Egirdir. Not much time had passed when on the initiative of the Isparta judicial authorities, Husrev Altinbasak’s house was searched and both the duplicating machine and the collections were seized, and we were sent to court to be tried for the offences of a year previously. Since they were religious works which were not prohibited, Husrev Altinbasak, myself, and one other friend were given sentences of one month for printing books without permission. We applied to the Appeal Court, and before it had come to a decision, I was sent to Afyon Prison.
Now, in your high court, because of this altruistic service of mine for my religion and co-religionists, and particularly the question of the Fifth Ray, which contains interpretations of Hadiths and was returned by the former court, the Afyon state prosecutor wants to have me, and the Risale-i Nur’s author, and Husrev Altinbasak, and forty-six other student brothers punished for “breaching state security,” because they wrote out these works and read them.
I say to you in your presence as a full citizen of this country, without deviating from the truth, that for years I have been the student of Said Nursi, whom we hold with the highest esteem as our Master, and who with these works has rectified our conduct religiously and advanced us, and has rejected it when we called him “Regenerator of Religion.” I can testify categorically and absolutely certainly that neither he himself nor his works nor his students have in any way attempted to breach state security. One of the matters concerning which we have been charged is the money obtained from sale of the books, concerning which Isparta Court was fully aware and was unable to find us guilty and sentence us. For just as we were in no need to secure our livelihoods through sale of the books, so we used the money obtained from their sale to buy the duplicating machine, paper, and ink. There is no possibility of this service, which we performed purely for God’s sake with pure intention, being a crime, and therefore request of your high court and consciences that the copies of the Risale-i Nur be returned.
Prisoner, Tahiri
***


[Zübeyir’s Defence]

To Afyon Criminal Court
I am charged with founding a secret society and breaching state security. As I shall set out below, since you will form the certain opinion that I have committed no such crime, I reject the charge here and now. Yes, I can say gratefully and outright that I am a Risale-i Nur student. It would be contrary to the virtue the Risale-i Nur has taught me to deny it, and I cannot commit such a misdemeanour. A person who reads the Risale-i Nur would not conceal it. On the contrary, he would proclaim it proudly and fearlessly. For it contains not a single word or sentence that demands hesitation.
I tried to describe the Risale-i Nur’s value in forty to fifty pages. I cannot say that I praised it. For I do not have the ability to praise any part of the Risale-i Nur, let alone the whole collection. For it is a true commentary on the All-Wise Qur’an, which is the sun of the universe and its intelligence, and has been illuminating and guiding humanity for around one thousand three hundred years. If any matter related to a secret society has been found in the works, as I stated above, I attempted to describe the value of, then punish me for the crime of trying to disseminate harmful works. However, the wonderful way in which the Risale-i Nur is written has been affirmed by learned scholars; it is sufficiently powerful to reform a corrupted society; it is a guide for the people of the twentieth century and saves them from misguidance and the vice they are dragged down to by materialism and Naturalism, and from the dense darkness of their ideas; and through the effulgence of the Qur’an, it has opened up for mankind a way leading to happiness and salvation, pointing it out clearly with its light. So if the Risale-i Nur Collection does not contain any discussions related to the crime of which I am accused, it is my opinion that your court too will agree that to punish me would be contrary to justice.
I was asked by the examining magistrate: “Are you a Risale-i Nur student?”
I do not consider myself worthy to be the student of a genius like Bediuzzaman Said Nursi. But if he accepts me, I proudly confess: “Yes, I am a Risale-i Nur student.”
Having been slandered on numerous occasions by his secret enemies, my Master Bediuzzaman Said Nursi, the peerless author of the Risale-i Nur, has been sent to court, and every time has been acquitted. The Risale-i Nur has been scrutinized line by line by committees of professors and Islamic scholars and they have given reports stating that the work is written with unsurpassed knowledge and is a true commentary on the Qur’an. Since that is the truth, why is he sent to court? My firmly held views on this subject are as follows:
Those who read the Risale-i Nur, especially the perceptive young, acquire a powerful belief. They become unshakeably self-sacrificing and religious, and devoted to their country. The immorality and vice inculcated by negative ideologies can find no foothold where there is indestructible faith. The more those with such belief increase in number, Freemasonry and communism cannot expand and spread. The Risale-i Nur proves rationally, logically, and in scholarly fashion with verses from the Qur’an and extremely powerful proofs and arguments, that materialist philosophy, on which communism is based, has absolutely no connection with truth and reality, and that its theories are completely unfounded. It illumines those who fall into the darkness of those rotten ideas, and saves them. It proves God’s existence with powerful evidences that cannot be denied or objected to, to even materialists, who believe only what their eyes can see.
With its original and attractive style and elevated literary art, this wonderful work quite simply makes itself read, and by high school and university students in particular.
It is because of this that the communists and Masons know that the Risale-i Nur forms a powerful obstacle to the spread of their poisonous ideas. They have recourse to various stratagems and calumnies in order to eliminate the Risale-i Nur, or not to have it read, since, as a true Qur’anic commentary, it is a powerful source of belief. Although up to now there has been no sign whatsoever of any of the lies they have ascribed to us, they continue to attack us. It is understood from this that they want to intimidate us, make us give up the Risale-i Nur and at the same time put before us their own putrid publications. In this way, causing the nation and youth to lose their faith altogether, they want to bring about a decline in moral standards, and thus to make the country cave in on itself. It is their ambition to hand over this country and its people to a foreign power. In the presence of the bench of judges I say this fearlessly:
They should know this and tremble; we are not to be intimidated by mere threats. For we have seen truth and reality in the Risale-i Nur, and learnt it and believed in it. The Turkish youth is not sleeping. This heroic Islamic Turkish nation will not bow down under the yoke of another country. The religious, warlike Turkish nation, the believing, brave Turkish youth, fear nothing. It is for this reason that we read the Risale-i Nur, which raises us to the highest degrees of humanity, ensures that we advance in every field, and instilling in us young people love of religion, country, and nation, makes us true lovers of religion who will sacrifice all our beings for them. And we shall read this work. As I stated above, I have read very little of the Risale-i Nur, and yet I have profited enormously. This work is of the very greatest benefit for this country and nation and for all humanity, and if I had wealth, I would spend all of it to publish it. For I am ready to sacrifice my whole being for my religion and the eternal happiness and well-being of my country and nation.
Moreover, I have not believed in the Risale-i Nur naively. Thirty-three verses of the Qur’an, and Imam ‘Ali (May God be pleased with him) and ‘Abd al-Qadir Geylani (May God be pleased with him) made predictions that the Risale-i Nur would be written and would offer guidance to the people of this age. Furthermore, the parts of the Risale-i Nur that I have read have made me form the opinion that this collection consists of works that teach truth and reality and that reform humanity.
I felt a great emptiness in my spirit, and when searching for a book to read, I came across the Risale-i Nur. Then when I read it, I could not be without it or put it down. I felt that the Risale-i Nur was meeting the overwhelming need in my heart. I found in it the rational proofs of belief to save me from doubts about belief and knowledge. In this way I was saved from the distress of scepticism. I understood from its truths that the Risale-i Nur was written for us, the people of this age.
Powerful belief is necessary so that one may acquire the elevated virtues necessary for good conduct and manners, and courtesy. Since the truths of belief are explained by means of extremely powerful proofs and clear examples in the Risale-i Nur, the more I read it, the stronger my belief became. In this way I was saved from giving up my religion, which is truth and reality and comprises the principles of the highest civilization, and from the calamity of being swallowed by the Red Monster. Thus, since the Risale-i Nur saves its readers from numerous calamities, material and spiritual; makes them more knowledgeable than a university graduate; instils in them love of Islam, country, and nation; and teaches them obedience to God, and to be hardworking and compassionate; no one who realizes its value would give it up, whatever the price. This sincere respect and veneration could be torn out of no one’s heart.
The Risale-i Nur is described by the prosecution as a harmful work. I protest in the strongest terms at this lack of conscience and lie. And it is claimed that I encourage it. Yes, this is true. The hearts of all the enlightened who heard the other lie were pained, indeed they wept and gnashed their teeth. The twentieth century is a time Positivist ideas are dominant. Things for which there are no proof and evidence are not believed in, and we do not believe in them. We want proof that the Risale-i Nur is harmful.
If another of the aims of our covert enemies who concoct these lies is to destroy the solidarity of those who read the Risale-i Nur, which is manifested as their embracing each other in exceptional fashion due to the bonds of Islam and for the sake of serving the Qur’an, and expresses only respect, compassion, and affection, and has no other goal in sight. Our enemies should not struggle against us for nothing. I am the most backward, the most ordinary of those who read the Risale-i Nur, yet I give them this reply:
Even if one of us is in the east, one in the west, one in the south, one in the north, one in the hereafter, and one in this world, we are still together. If the power of all the universe was to amass, it could not separate us from our exalted Master, Said Nursi, or from the Risale-i Nur, or from one another.
For we serve the Qur’an and we shall serve it. Because we believe in the reality of the hereafter, no force can root out this love and solidarity of ours. All Muslims shall gather together in the abode of eternal happiness.
With your permission, I shall describe an important fact concerning the well-being of our country and nation: one of the communists’ secret plans is to incite the people against the Government.
False information was given the leaders of the Government so that Bediuzzaman Said Nursi should be sent to prison and his works be seen as harmful. But no one believed the negative propaganda. For years the people of this nation have believed so firmly that he is a unique Islamic scholar this age and in every way without peer that no propaganda can destroy their true conviction.
I offer praise and thanks to Almighty God that He has favoured me with profiting from the works of a great Master. I am indebted with all my heart and soul to him for being the means of my learning about belief and Islam, and benefiting immeasurably. Since my Master has saved me from the distress I suffered for years as I wrote, and my youth from becoming fodder for communism, and my being condemned to everlasting solitary confinement, I am prepared to languish in this worldly prison for years for him.
If I suffer capital punishment on the way of the Risale-i Nur, a Qur’anic commentary which in twenty years has taught millions of people religion, belief, Islam, and virtue, preserving them from irreligion, I shall run to the gallows crying: “Allah! Allah! Ya Rasulallah!” If I am executed by firing squad on the way of the Risale-i Nur, which protects our young people from abandoning their religion and being swept away by communism to eternal perdition, and from crimes for which they would be shot as traitors to their country, without flinching I shall bare my chest to the bullets. And I beseech my Sustainer that if I am cut to pieces by knives for my Master Bediuzzaman, with my blood spurting in all directions I shall write: “The Risale-i Nur! The Risale-i Nur!”
Respected Judges of the Court!
The education the Risale-i Nur gives is truly marvellous and original; it is without equal. The purpose of other sorts of education is to gain material benefits and to attain various positions. People study mostly for materialist ends and to be able to become famous, or sometimes merely because they have to study. However, those who by reading its treatises, receive the Risale-i Nur education, which resembles an unorganized free university, nurture no worldly aims, only to serve the Qur’an and belief.
Nevertheless, the Risale-i Nur, which consists of serious, scholarly treatises about the truths of belief, is read with such enthusiasm, passion, and pleasure, that it awakens in those who read it faithfully the desire to read it over and over again. Even though those who read and write out the Risale-i Nur may find their lives in danger at the doors of the courtroom, they state openly that they read these wonderful works, and that they shall read them. Even if they know that the decision will be given for their execution, they do not hesitate to display this constancy. This characteristic of the Risale-i Nur, one of its many wonders, makes one ask: “Did those who admit this, find their lives by the wayside?”
This means that contained in the Risale-i Nur and Bediuzzaman is a truth so elevated that as well as not being harmful they did not deny it.
Normally students are made to study under the constraints of discipline and authority. However, Bediuzzaman compelled no one to study the Risale-i Nur, and hundreds of thousands of readers study it devotedly and resolutely, the majority of them without ever seeing him. Such a wondrous method of education was never seen in any medrese, either recently or previously, and was never encountered in any university.
The prosecutor said that “The respect in which Bediuzzaman is held has not been afforded to any other Qur’anic commentator.”
That is correct. Seeing that respect and reverence are awarded in relation to greatness and achievement, and gratitude and thanks are offered to the degree one has profited, Bediuzzaman’s works are profited from to an enormous degree so that respect for him and gratitude to him are unprecedented.
The Masons and communists expended every effort so that Bediuzzaman, the greatest Islamic thinker and writer of the twentieth century, would not be known by us, and especially by the young. But the wide-awake Turkish Muslim nation and youth recognized that hero of religion, our Master, and they benefited from him and allowed others to do so. It is because of this that their extraordinary attachment and confidence cannot be shaken.
Since the Qur’anic verses in the Risale-i Nur are expounded in Turkish with supreme art and skill without anything of their virtues, which are the Qur’an’s greatest miracle, being lost, every class of people —men, women, officials, tradesmen, scholars and philosophers— can read and understand it. Profiting from it to the extent they can, they become ever more attached to it. High school students, university students, professors, lecturers, and philosophers all read it. These educated classes profit from it to an extraordinary degree, affirming its originality and the superior art of its composition, and feeling a strong desire to read the whole work.
When perceptive and appreciative people first come to know Bediuzzaman and the Risale-i Nur, they are infinitely regretful they did not know of them previously, and in order to make up for lost time, never waste their spare time, and if they have five minutes even, pick up the Risale-i Nur, and read it day and night. This extraordinary interest and demand has never ever been shown for the work of any psychologist, sociologist, or philosopher. Only the educated can benefit from them. If a middle school student or a housewife reads the work of a eminent philosopher, he or she does not profit from it. But everyone profits from the Risale-i Nur in accordance with his level. For this reason, the whole nation awaits your decision to acquit Bediuzzaman and the Risale-i Nur students. If in this time of tribulation Said Nursi had not impressed on his students the need for patience, endurance, and moderation, as when the commander of a volunteer militia force in the First War he mustered his students to fight, so out of the great honour in which they hold him thousands of Risale-i Nur students would have pitched their tents on the heights around Afyon and awaited the decision of Afyon Criminal Court to acquit him.
The work that Said Nursi and the Risale-i Nur students do cannot be considered within the framework of the law and be proved to be a secret society. Why can it not be proved? Is a legal expert who has risen to be chief public prosecutor incapable of proving it according to the law? No, he is certainly not incapable. But there is no organization that could be called a secret political society. That is why it cannot be proved.
It is a contradiction that the statement the prosecutor first gave, which was completely accurate and in accordance with the law, said that “the Risale-i Nur students are not a political society,” and then a bit later for some reason said that “they are a political society.” Of course the latter is invalid. We are certain that the judges will see this fact clearly and give the decision that “there is no secret society.”
Judges of the Court!
If when suffering sorrow and anguish a piece was broken off the heart, the news of a youth losing his religion should make the heart break into pieces to the number of its minute particles.
Thus, the acquittal you shall give shall be the cause of the Muslim youth and Islamic world being effectively saved from this terrible plague. This is another of the reasons binding me inseparably to Bediuzzaman and his works.
Your decision to acquit the Risale-i Nur and give it its freedom will save all the Turkish youth and all Muslims from the tragedy of irreligion. For without any doubt at all, one day the Risale-i Nur, a treasury of elevated truths, will be known throughout the world. Then you shall be appreciated by all mankind. Your decision to acquit the Risale-i Nur will make the present and future generations grateful to you, and the more it is read and benefited from, the more you shall be appreicated.
Beware! Do not suppose these sincere words of mine are hypocritical. Absolutely not! Because I am afraid of no one while Bediuzzaman is being tried, nor do I waver.
Only, with your permission, I want to say this much: if the prosecutor continues to make such despicable charges against the Risale-i Nur, which is a superlative means of preventing Freemasonry and communism in this blessed country, and against its author and readers, and he does not desist from making those entirely erroneous accusations, and carried away by his feelings, opposes them, he will be supporting communism and Freemasonry, and will be assisting the noxious atheists to multiply, against whom in truth these charges should be made.
***


[Part of Zübeyir’s Supplement for the Appeal Court]
Through its proofs the Risale-i Nur repairs the belief of people which has been destroyed by the doubts and scepticism sown by the publications of secret atheistic organizations.
One of the least tangible reasons for the youth adhering to the Risale-i Nur as though electrocuted, is this: for years with unparalleled devotion and self-sacrifice, elderly and ill, at a time demanding extraordinary caution, with superhuman patience Bediuzzaman Said Nursi has endured the various torments of his enemies, the communists, Masons, and those hoodwinked by them. With his truth-seeing, realistic view, he has distinguished numerous treacherous stratagems against religion, and has written works about belief which will bring to nothing their fearsomely cunning, covert plans.
But what a regretable, sad and sorry situation it is, that for twenty-five years they have tried to eliminate this champion of Islam, this matchless person, in prisons and places of detention, in absolute solitary confinement. Even if due to animosity resulting from the unfounded suspicions given rise to by the treachery of communists, the Risale-i Nur’s author has been punished, his works continue to be read with ever increasing interest and enthusiasm.
The first and most powerful evidence is this: the young people who read the work The Staff of Moses (Asâ-yi Mûsa), which has been duplicated in the new letters, quickly learn the Qur’anic alphabet in order to be able to read the rest of the works. This removes the obstacle of not knowing the Qur’anic script, which prevents a person learning numerous sciences and compels him to read works written specifically to distance him from religion and belief. Whenever the younger generation has been decked out and fortified with the Qur’an and the sciences that irradiate from it, the nation to which that youth belongs has begun to progress and advance. Here, the youth have begun to fill their spirits, burning with the need for belief and Islam, with the lights of the Risale-i Nur, a Qur’anic commentary. Thus acquiring certain, verified belief, our young people will struggle against irreligion and communism, and will on no account allow their country to be sold to the enemies of Islam. If the communists, therefore, find the opportunity to destroy all paper and ink, numerous youths like myself and older people will be ready to sacrifice themselves, and in order to publish the Risale-i Nur, a treasury of truth, would if it was possible make their skins into paper and blood into ink.
Yes! Yes! Yes! A thousand times!
In the indictment the prosecutor says: “Said Nursi is poisoning the university students with his works.” In reply we say: “If the Risale-i Nur is poison, we are in need of tons of it and thousands of kilos. If he knows where it is to be found in abundance, he should send us there speedily by aeroplane!”
When we Risale-i Nur students suffer the persecution of tyrants for the sake of serving belief and Islam, we prefer to die in the corners of prison or on the gallows to dying on the couch of comfort. We know it to be a supreme Divine favour to die as martyrs in the prison into which we have been unjustly cast because of our service to the Qur’an, rather than living in captivity in what is apparently freedom but in reality absolute despotism.
Prisoner, Konyali Zübeyir Gündüzalp92
Afyon Prison.
***


[Mustafa Sungur’s Defence]
To Afyon Criminal Court
The prosecution wants to have me punished for belonging to the society of Nurjus and inciting the people against the government.
Firstly: There is no society called the Nurju Society, and I belong to no such society. I am a member of the sacred, Divine society of Islam, which every century for one thousand three hundred and fifty years has had three hundred million members, was founded by Muhammad (Peace and blessings be upon him), the Glory of the Universe, and is vast and luminous and promises eternal happiness for all mankind. All thanks be to God, I am determined to obey its sacred injunctions with all my strength.
As for the Risale-i Nur, my being a student of which is considered to be a crime, it is a miracle of the Qur’an that teaches me my religious duties and those related to belief and that Islam is the highest and most sacred religion and the sole means of happiness for mankind. It proves with brilliant evidences that the Qur’an is a decree of the All-Glorious One, Who is the Owner of all beings, is all-present and all-seeing everywhere, and under Whose pre-eternal administration are all beings from minute particles to the stars and suns; it is a miraculous work whose view encompasses pre-eternity and post-eternity and all events; it is the pre-eternal address of an Everlasting Sun which is superior to all other books and miraculous in forty aspects, and which by giving mankind the good news of eternal happiness, is the object of their eternal gratitude. It proves too that God’s Messenger (Peace and blessings be upon him) was sent by the Creator of the Universe, and that with all his conduct and practices was the most perfect, the most loyal, the highest of all men, whose perfections were the most elevated, and through the light of Islam that he brought, gave the best of all news to men, and gave them the most sacred consolation, and who has taken under his spiritual rule fourteen centuries and one fifth of mankind, and to the book of whose good deeds pass the equivalent of all the good deeds performed for one thousand three hundred years by his community, and that he is the reason for the universe’s existence and is God’s Beloved. It proves also with brilliant proofs that both the hereafter, and Paradise and Hell are certain and definite.
With its words and sentences, the Risale-i Nur testifies that it is a pre-eternal and post-eternal light proceeding from the light of the Qur’an and the Light of Muhammad (PBUH). In respect of its belonging to the Qur’an and being a special commentary on it, it pertains to the heavens and the Divine Throne. Thus, with all its Words, all its Flashes and Rays, and all its Letters, the Risale-i Nur, which is supposed to be inciting the people against the Government, teaches the Divine truths, and principles of Islam, and mysteries of the Qur’an. Is it a crime, then, to read the Risale-i Nur, which is thus elevated and worthy of veneration, and teaches good morality and virtue and the truths of belief, and to copy out its parts, which bestow eternal happiness, or to serve it so that believers may profit from it with respect to their belief? Is that inciting the people against the Government? And to visit the author of such a blessed and sublime work, a monument of light who is decked out with the highest degree of belief, laudable morals, and virtue and is at the very summit of human perfections, and to be brothers on the way of the Qur’an and belief with the Risale-i Nur students, who with their good works, veracity, and unshakeable belief this century, have defended the honour of Islam and truths of the Qur’an, and upheld them, and who have no aim other than winning God’s pleasure — is to do these things to found a political society? Which equitable, unsullied conscience could inflict a punishment for these?
Judges of the Court! The Risale-i Nur’s veracity has been affirmed by the most advanced scholars, and with its gaining for its readers the highest level of belief and greatest love of Islam, there is no doubt that all its Words, and its Flashes and Rays are luminous commentaries on the Qur’an of Miraculous Exposition. They are all brilliant suns which dispel spiritual sicknesses and darkness. As is testified to by his pure and upright life, our Master has passed his life on the way of belief and the Qur’an, and enduring every sort of difficulty and distress, has by disseminating the truths of the Qur’an worked to save the sons of this blessed nation in particular from the awesome attacks of communism and every sort of irreligion, and was charged with the sacred duty of writing the Risale-i Nur at this time. He does not instruct us (God forbid!) in immorality and spoliation. He teaches us the saving of belief, the highest cause and most momentous question in the world of humanity. It is most certainly a Divine favour that for twenty-five to thirty years he has striven with the Risale-i Nur to save the religious belief of hundreds of thousands of believers, especially by teaching belief, the greatest happiness in life and its most important purpose, to unfortunates like myself who knew nothing of Islam. We say the following to those who in a way diametrically opposed to reality, consider him to be harmful for the life of society and deny his sacred service of belief and work for religion:
If it is a crime to adhere to God, and obeying the injunctions of religion, save people from terrible calamities such as immorality and being without religious belief, and to make them happy with the permanent happiness of Islam, then he may be said to be harmful to society. It is otherwise the greatest calumny and an unforgiveable crime. The Risale-i Nur’s aim is not this world, it is the never-ending happiness of the hereafter and the pleasure of the Eternal Enduring One, the Compassionate One of Beauty, one shadow of the manifestation of Whose beauty is all the beauty and good in this world, and one flash of Whose love is Paradise together with all of its subtle wonders. Having a thus Divine, sacred, and truly elevated aim, a thousand times over I declare the Risale-i Nur to be free of all transitory things such as inciting the people against the Government. And we seek refuge with God from the evil of those who with slander of this sort try to crush us and prevent us from working for belief or from learning about religion.
Judges of the Court! As is indicated by thirty-three verses of the Qur’an, and pointed out by Imam ‘Ali (May God be pleased with him) and Gawth al-A‘zam (May God be pleased with him) and hundreds of investigative scholars, the Risale-i Nur is a light of the Qur’an those who adhere to which will save their belief, God willing. It most definitely cannot be extinguished or be lost. For example, the attacks made on it these last twenty-five years with the intention of eliminating it, have been the cause of its spreading and shining out in extraordinary fashion. For its Owner is the All-Glorious Monarch in Whose power and under Whose command is everything from pre-eternity to post-eternity. For its truths are the Qur’an’s truths, and through His protection and grace, Almighty God will always make it shine out, God willing.
Judges of the Court! If it is a crime to read and write out the Risale-i Nur —which teaches belief and Islam with the highest love and fervour, and recognizes no aim or purpose other than Divine pleasure, and is certainly a supreme miracle of the Qur’an this age and a luminous commentary on it— and to give its treatises, which teach the truths of belief, to one’s believing brother; and if the bonds of religion and Islamic brotherhood, which are enjoined by religion, and the sacred, Divine fraternity of uniting on the way of the Qur’an and belief for love of God constitute a political society, for me to belong to such a society is the greatest good fortune, and is a happiness greater than that afforded by any favour or award. Endless thanks be to Almighty God, Who bestowed on a wretch like myself the great favour of being a Risale-i Nur student, which gains such happiness and good fortune for a person. My last word is:
For us God suffices, and He is the Best Disposer of Affairs. * God suffices me, there is no god but He; in Him do I place my trust — He the Sustainer of the Throne [of Glory] Supreme!
Mustafa Sungur,
Teacher
***


[Mustafa Sungur’s Supplement for the Court of Appeal]
1. The Criminal Court: My reading the Risale-i Nur and writing it out and giving a part of it to a needy believing brother so that he might benefit from it was called “inciting the people against the Government,” and deemed an offence. However, in my written objections to this charge I said: the Risale-i Nur, which is supposed to incite the people against the Government, is a true Qur’anic commentary. With all its parts it teaches the truths of belief, and bestows the greatest happiness on those who read and write it. Its aim is not anything transitory such as inciting the people against the Government, the way of disruptive, immoral layabouts; it is Divine pleasure, the most perfect of all happiness and good fortune. I am proud to read and write out the Risale-i Nur, which has gained for me the highest virtue and belief, the sweetest bounty, so that I am its luckiest student and most powerless servant. Although I said that I knew to be its student was a supreme Divine gift, and that I constantly thank my Sustainer who granted this vast bounty to a wretch like myself who was not worthy of it, without basing it on any law or evidence, my adherence to belief and Islam was deemed a crime, and entirely contrary to truth and right I was punished.
2. While studying in Kastamonu Gölköy Institute, I myself witnessed the irreligion taught us by some teachers. They said, God forbid, that the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) had written the Qur’an, Islam was now abrogated, civilization had advanced, and that it was a great error and backwardness to follow the Qur’an this century. One day even, a teacher said that because Muslims performed the obligatory prayers and thought of the hereafter, they suffered constant distress and passed their lives unhappily; and that in the mosques of Islam there was a deathly atmosphere, while the Christian churches were always happy and full of life, and that with their musical instruments and other amusements, they enjoyed life and passed their time happily. They tried to break the bonds with Islam and belief in our hearts, and instil denial and disbelief in their place.
Then if through reading several treatises from a peerless light of the Qur’an like the Risale-i Nur —which pours out from the Qur’an’s effulgence, and proves with brilliant evidences and arguments the truths of belief and Islam, and that the religion of Islam is a never-dying inextinguishable sun and means whereby humanity may attain happiness and well-being— a wretch in whom had been instilled the above poisonous ideas and whose spirituality they had wanted to kill with their noxious irreligious lessons, and had even been carried away by them and (God forbid) believing in those ideas had begun to disseminate them — if he had come to believe in the Qur’an, would not his offering the endless joy and happiness he felt to the compassionate, loyal, and true hero Ustad Bediuzzaman, who had gained these for him through the blessed Risale-i Nur he had written; would not his telling the Revered Master, who had been charged with the burdensome duty of writing the Risale-i Nur, how it had saved him from his former life of heedlessness and misguidance, leading him to belief and light, and how it was a sun of guidance and means of happiness for all humanity, and a Divine favour for all men and particularly for believers; and would not his calling “the destruction and corruption of a covert organization of the Sufyan,” those who with their terrible aggressive assaults on the Qur’an and Islam, as described above, were urging the sons of this heroic Muslim nation to embrace irreligion, and trying to raze the sacred, Divine foundations of Islam, to whom millions of people are bound and destroy their eternal happiness and feeling compounded regret and disgust at the lunatics who applaud them and their base, aggressive, tyrannical destruction; and would not his saying to his former fellow students, who had fallen into doubt concerning their faith: “Come, let’s give up following the lusts and whims of our souls; let’s bow before the truths of the Qur’an and hurry to the Risale-i Nur medrese, the guide to happiness this century. Let’s leave those lying scoundrels whom we have been applauding for months or years and reject the falsehoods they showed to be the truth, and attach ourselves to Bediuzzaman Said Nursi’s teachings and take them as our master. Let’s turn our backs on the darkness and embrace the light;” would not these all arise from the joy he found in his belief and his love of the Qur’an and Islam, and from his adherence to them, and his devotion to his nation, and his desiring everyone to acquire true, verified belief and attain infinite happiness?
Is it a crime to attach oneself to God and proclaim that Islam is the loftiest religion and the bringer of virtue and happiness? At a time when with lies and slander, from every side there are overwhelming attacks on the Qur’an and Islam, and attempts are being made to refute the Qur’an and Muhammad (Peace and blessings be upon him), which are extremely elevated, sacred, and precious, yet books which spread irreligion and atheism and rebellious, transient, worthless wretches who attack Islam are held in respect and innovations and the unlawful are applauded — at such a time is it a crime to believe and proclaim the sacredness and loftiness of the Risale-i Nur and that as a miracle of the Qur’an it is a Divine Light and dominical gift which explains and proves decisively and clearly the elevatedness, veracity, and sacredness of the Qur’an and Muhammad (Peace and blessings be upon him); and both God’s existence and that the universe with all its beings and all its members and systems testifies to its Creator’s necessary existence and unity; and because he possesses reason and can think and is the most comprehensive mirror of the Divine Names man is a sort of monarch over all other creatures; and that if he has a relationship with God through worship and belief and preserves himself against misguidance and vice and grievous sins, he becomes worthy of rising to the highest of the high, superior to all beings, and an esteemed guest who will be forever happy in Paradise, but if he denies his Creator through associating partners with Him and rebellion, or through heedlessness and misguidance, he falls lower than an animal, descending to the lowest of the low, coming to deserve everlasting Hell and unending torment and torture; and that the Qur’an is the true Word of God, which is constant, and that its injunctions and commands do not, and cannot, change; and that mankind’s true and permanent happiness is possible only through following the Qur’an’s commands and adhering to them?
The reading of novels and stories, written against Islam for five or ten minutes illicit pleasure, and the publishing of books extremely dangerous and harmful for the country and nation, and their being praised and recommended are not considered crimes, so can it be deemed a crime if we read and write out the Risale-i Nur, which describes the Sun of Islam —which hundreds of millions of people have followed and in which they have found true happiness— or enumerated its elevated characteristics, which we lack the ability to praise? Can anyone who has an atom of belief in his heart and desires the well-being of the country and nation consider the above to be crimes?
Respected Judges of the Appeal Court! This case presented in your elevated presence is directly the case of belief and the Qur’an. It is the case of the eternal happiness and salvation of millions of people. Concerned with this case in effect are foremost God’s Most Noble Messenger (Peace and blessings be upon him) and all the prophets (Peace be upon them), and all the saints and innumerable people of reality and believers, as well as all our forefathers who have departed for the eternal realm. You may now win the love and good will, the prayers and intercession, of those millions of the people of reality. The elevated reality called the Risale-i Nur is before you. Is its aim the lowly, transient ranks and positions of this world, or to win God’s pleasure, the greatest happiness, the purest joy, and highest good fortune? And does it encourage people to be immoral, or does it deck them out with belief and the highest morality and virtue?
Before you is the Risale-i Nur, which pours out from the miraculousness of the Qur’an of Miraculous Exposition and is a Divine Light. Since the greatest case facing people, more important than anything, is to win belief in order to be able to depart from this world for the realm of eternal happiness; and since through the effulgence of the Qur’an, the Risale-i Nur teaches the truths of belief, and as is testified to by hundreds of thousands of people who have read it and written it out, and as indicated by numerous Qur’anic verses and Hadiths of the Prophet (PBUH), and Imam ‘Ali (May God be pleased with him) and many saints like Gawth al-A‘zam (May God be pleased with him), it has definitely won that case; certainly and without doubt, through your elevated love of truth and justice, above every sort of transient anxiety, you will understand and appreciate the Risale-i Nur’s veracious, Qur’anic face and its true value, and that its students pursue no aim other than God’s pleasure.
Judges of the Appeal Court! With his high morality, virtue and compassion our esteemed and elevated Master, Bediuzzaman Said Nursi, strives to save people from the dense darkness of false ideas and eternal solitary confinement, and enduring the severest distress and torments has risen to the highest degree of perfection at this time through being charged by Almighty God with the sacred duty of publishing the truths of the Qur’an, yet entirely contrary to all truth and justice, he is cast into prison. Elderly, ill, and with no one, practising his beliefs and worship in most elevated fashion, possessing the most brilliant intelligence and learning, and having no aim other than saving the belief of people, the terrible suffering of our Master, who is seventy-five years old and truly loves humanity, in the intense cold of Afyon Prison, pierces the heart, causing the severest anguish. Trusting in your elevated truth-loving justice and true philanthrophy, we await the manifestation of justice’s compassion.
Mustafa Sungur
***


[Mehmed Feyzi’s Defence]
To Afyon Criminal Court
The indictment states that I am my Master, Said Nursi’s, chief scribe, and am firmly attached both to himself and to the Risale-i Nur, and have served them, and it deems this an offence. For my part, I accept the charge with all my strength and am proud of it. For I have a powerful, innate yearning for knowledge. Evidence for this is that when during the Denizli affair my house was searched, it was officially established that found in it were more than five hundred various scholarly books, some in Arabic. It is an unusual desire to study and extraordinary love of learning that made me collect these five hundred books, that not one person in a thousand would have at this time, despite my impecuniosity and young years.
Because of this natural capacity of mine, I was searching for a true master. Endless thanks be to Almighty God that He gave me what I was searching for afar, from close by. Yes, my Master, Said Nursi’s life testifies that his only aim in life has been knowlege and to learn the sciences of Islam. I have understood clearly both through my own observations, and from his published biography, and from what I have learnt from his old students, the innate love of learning that I have is found in my Master to an extraordinary degree, so that on his own in wondrous fashion, contrarily to all the other medrese teachers at this time, he has persisted in medrese teaching and endured every calamity. But then, because they did not understand my Master’s extraordinary situation, the politicians attempted to link him with a sort of politics, with which he has no connection, even throwing him into prison. But later Almighty God made his passion for knowledge into a key to the Qur’an’s truths, and the Risale-i Nur emerged, which has left all scholars and philosophers in amazement. Around that time, as a Divine favour I found close by in Kastamonu the Master I had been searching for all my life, whose nature was similar to mine but infinitely more elevated. I shall offer thanks for this to the end of my days.
Just as since early days, in order to preserve the dignity of learning my Master never accepted such things as charity and gifts, so he did not allow his students to accept them. He would bow before no one. In fact, not condescending to crouch down in the trenches in the front lines in the War, or even to enter them, he preserved the dignity of learning. Similarly, heroically preserving the honour of scholarship and teaching in the face of three awesome commanders, he was completely unmoved at their anger and silenced them. I therefore accepted him as my true Master, since I knew that he was someone who had sacrificed everything to preserve the high honour of this nation and country and the Turkish learned establishment. Even, if to suppose the impossible a Master so truly devoted to his country and nation had a hundred faults, they should be looked on tolerantly and not objected to.
A example showing that this country’s patriots in the Second Constitutional Period and the nationalists and patriots under the Republic appreciated in the name of the country and nation our Master’s extraordinary service to learning was that the Committee of Union and Progress government gave nineteen thousand gold liras for his university in the east called the Medresetü’z-Zehra. This was to be organized along the same lines of al-Azhar University. Its foundations were laid in Van Province, but it remained unbuilt due to the First World War. Then the first government of the Republic twenty-four years ago allotted one hundred and fifty thousand liras on the agreement of one hundred and sixty-three deputies. Our Master’s nearly succeeding on his own in founding a large university similar to al-Azhar, which was brought into being only through the enterprise of thousands of teachers, shows that all patriots and lovers of their country, together with the teachers of the medreses (religious schools) should appreciate and applaud him. As for us, because we found such a Master, we decided to endure every sort of hardship and difficulty. I have boundless respect for him as an exceptionally learned scholar at this time, who through the effulgence of his learning and truths of his one hundred and thirty works has caused me to advance on the way of belief and knowledge. God willing, this respect of mine will continue for all eternity.
There is no covert organization which exploiting religion and religious feelings aims to breach public security, in connection with which the prosecution wants to have me convicted. Despite months of investigations and searches it has not been able to verify any such society, nor do we have any connection with such a thing. Our sole concern, within the framework of the laws of the Republic, is for the Risale-i Nur, which has undergone the toughest examinations and has met with due respect from the highest committees of experts and has been acquitted by authorized courts of law. This is not treason towards the country and nation, but scholarly striving in a way that is directly beneficial for country and nation. Other than this we have no political aim nor any other purpose. Thus, since our innocence and sincerity are clear in this matter, I seek the manifestation of justice from your just court and my acquittal, as in Denizli Court.
Prisoner, Kastamonulu Mehmed Feyzi Pamukçu,
Afyon Prison
***


[Ahmed Feyzi’s Defence]
To Afyon Criminal Court
Judges of the Court!
Is it not the duty and right of a believer to serve the Qur’an and the Prophet (PBUH) by meeting with a scholar of religion, reading and writing out his books about the truths of religion, and hastening to the assistance of his co-religionists? Is there any law prohibiting us from this service of religion? Is it a crime to criticize certain aspects of the atheistic immoral currents of our times? We are purely a body of religiously-minded people which has no connection whatsoever with politics or government. To think well of someone and consider him worthy is a personal opinion that may be held by anyone. We know Bediuzzaman to be the most elevated scholar of religion of our times. We know him to be someone who follows reality, and who expresses and explains the truths of religion without toadying to anyone. We call him a mujahid because of his service to religion and relying on the Qur’an’s unshakeable truths, his undertaking the defence of our country against the currents of immorality and disbelief which threaten it. In a country in which freedom of religion and conscience are the rule, we cannot be held guilty of an offence because of the views we hold in the light of our consciences. Therefore, we are not obliged to give account to anyone.
As for the matter of the persons foretold in Hadiths to come at the end of time: we did not fabricate these. They have their origin in religion. In a number of Hadiths, God’s Messenger (Peace and blessings be upon him) said that the life of his community would not exceed one thousand five hundred years. The major historical events up to that time, which would have the greatest significance for the life of his community and for the life of the world, he gave news of, calling them “the signs of the end of the world.” He drew the attention of the Muslim Umma to their evil. He said that those who were heedless and ignorant of these evils would meet with everlasting misery and loss. There are innumerable religious proofs of these. We believe in God, His Messenger, and the Qur’an. So as the result of this belief and belief in the Messenger’s veracity, should we not strive to save ourselves from everlasting perdition? Should we not see what is happening around us? Wondering, “Have those perilous times come? Don’t let it be us who are the generation that falls prey to those dangers,” should we not point out how they may be applied to existent religious truths? If we disregard the positive evidences before us and the proven scholarly truths which take us to the Divine existence, and supposing the irreligion of Europe to be the greatest means of civilization and sole mark of knowledge, we abandon our religion, who will save us from eternal perdition? Should we not think of this? Would a person of this mind who recognizes nothing superior to the Qur’an and its truths, throw himself into everlasting perdition out of fear of temporary punishments? Or would he attach any worth to transient values? Would he give up his duty of serving God, and His Messenger, and His religion? These then are the true factors tying us to Bediuzzaman. Is there any other source of religion that can silence the pre-eternal needs of our spirits?
The prosecutor recommends to us the thousands of Arabic books which fill the libraries but do not interpret the spirit of today. He himself and those who think like him may not like the compendium of knowledge, treasury of freedom, and elevated reality called the Risale-i Nur, and they may criticize it. That is a matter for themselves. But they may not interfere in our preferring this or that work, or our attaching value to them. We like the Risale-i Nur. And we know it to be a true, unhypocritical book on religion and a Qur’anic commentary. Values and value judgements are questions of conscience. No one can interfere in them. Yes, we agree that the Risale-i Nur’s author always teaches pure truth. The fact that he does not accept this does not shake our opinion. Moreover, our opinion is based not on his wonder-working in the physical realm, but on the wonders of his knowledge, the extraordinary manifestations of which we have observed in his teachings with the Risale-i Nur, which challenge all the world of knowledge. Can you show us a second Bediuzzaman who although his [official] period of study was no more than three months, spread such a brilliant light of knowledge; and with the wonders of his learning displayed a logic so advanced in the ultimate questions of science that they left even the loftiest thinkers in amazement; and in a language he learnt only in the second part of his life had such a captivating style of exposition, and such a gripping ardour; who overflows with love and passion, and is exuberant like a sea of belief, a treasury of Divine knowledge, an ocean of wisdom?
Do you consider it excessive that we consider to be Master, the monument of virtue and light who shows not the slightest inclination towards the pomp of fleeting, superficial ostentation; nor stoops to even the smallest benefit or pleasure; nor attaches any value to anyone who fawns at the feet of fleeting filth; who awaits nothing from anyone, nor asks for it, and accepts nothing offered to him; who displaying the best example of the purest chastity and enduring patiently, with forbearance, every sort of deprivation, has dedicated himself to the truth and to making known the lights of the Qur’an and knowledge of Muhammad (PBUH); and out of the abundance of his compassion weeps at the suffering of the country and nation; and who never gives up his work, which is for the happiness of those around him, despite all the betrayals he has suffered; and disregarding his own old age and aloneness, strives and battles with selfless, Divine exertion to save people from the pits of ignorance and whirlpool of denial? In addition to the wonders of his knowledge described above, he is worthy of being known and followed as an example of perfection and virtue because of this matchless self-sacrifice, self-sufficiency, and masterpiece of chastity and moderation, which he has shown at this time when moral values have been lost.
That is how we look on Bediuzzaman and his works. Is it solely because of our attachment to him, which arises from our belief, and our belief in the severe rebukes and reprimands of the Qur’an and Muhammad (PBUH) concerning unbelief and morality that he has involved us in politics, which are deemed fleeting filth? Or can it be called corruption to inform about God and His Messenger, the truth and the Qur’an some of the sons of our compatriots who for twenty-five years have been unable to learn the truths of religion and are heading for certain perdition, in order to save them from everlasting extinction, and to reform their unsullied spirits and innocent consciences?
Judges of the Court! We are in no way involved in politics. We know that for those like us who are not versed in politics, politics is a way beset with a thousand and one perils, dangers, and responsibilities. In any event we attach no importance to fleeting externals. We only look to the good face of the world, which takes us to Divine pleasure. We therefore vehemently reject the charge that we pursue politics or contest the concept of the state. If there had been any such intention, there would have been some small manifestation of it in twenty-five years. Yes, we have a negative front, a side which rebukes, turned to immorality and unbelief. This arises only from belief and our necessarily joining in the Qur’an’s severe expressions and comprehensive warnings about these things. If these reasons and this sincere, straightforward style of exposition do not convince you, sentence us to whatever sort of punishment you please. But do not forget that Jesus (Peace be upon him), who today has six hundred million followers, was sentenced to death like a common thief by the authorities of his time only because his heart beat for mankind’s happiness and he bore the trust of delivering the message.
Having spoken out freely, we shall be proud to face our conviction. With the cry of For us God suffices, and He is the Best Disposer of Affairs, we open our hands to the Court of the Dispenser of Needs.
Prisoner, Ortaklar Bucagili Ahmed Feyzi Kul
Afyon Prison.
***


[Ceylan’s Defence]
To Afyon Criminal Court
Making a mountain out of a molehill, because of my service to my Master and the Risale-i Nur, of which I am proud, the prosecution portrays me as a prominent diplomat or cunning plotter. In reply to his apportioning me a large share of the imaginary crime with which the Risale-i Nur is charged, I say this: I am closely attached to my Master, Bediuzzaman, from whom, by reading his works on religion, belief, and morality, I have profited to such an extent that I would readily sacrifice my life for his sake. However, my attachment is not as the prosecution said, harmful for the country and nation, in order to incite the people against the state; it is rather an unseverable attachment on the way of saving myself from the eternal annihilation of the grave, from which no one can escape, and saving the belief of my brothers in religion, which, like me, they are in need of saving in these perilous times, correcting their conduct, and becoming useful members of the nation and country.
I am one of those close to him. From time to time for four years I have proudly attended on him. During this time, I have witnessed nothing other than total virtue. I have not once heard him say a single word about his being the Mahdi or the Regenerator of Religion. More than a hundred thousand copies of the Risale-i Nur and hundreds of thousands of pure intentioned Risale-i Nur students, who have saved their belief by reading its treatises, can testify that he is the very epitome of humility.
My blessed Master considers himself to be a Risale-i Nur student like us. This is what he claims. This may be seen easily in many of his letters, which you have in your possession, and especially in the Treatise On Sincerity, which is included in The Staff of Moses Collection (Asâ-yi Mûsa). He repeatedly says in his letters: “Enduring truths like the sun or diamonds cannot be constructed on transient persons, and transient persons cannot lay claim to those precious truths.” So to accuse him of boasting and of claiming to be the Mahdi and Regenerator of Religion is not something anyone of intelligence would do. For if you read carefully and fairly all his treatises and letters, you will form the certain conviction that the like of this profoundly learned scholar of the times has not been encountered for centuries. He is a saver of belief the like of whom will not be encountered, who at a time the red sparks of communism are licking the eaves of our houses is a patriot far more useful and productive for the country and nation than an army. I am regretful that I was not earlier the student of such a work and the esteemed Master who wrote it.
Respected Judges of the Court!
With the idea of performing a sacred service for the nation, so that like me the sons of this land might profit from the Risale-i Nur, whose endless benefits I myself had experienced, I had printed A Guide For Youth (Gençlik Rehberi) in Eskishehir. I ask you: how contrary is it to justice that while service of the Risale-i Nur, which is a true and irrefutable Qur’anic commentary, and thus to belief of an unfortunate like myself should have met with praise and appreciation, and encouragement, we received this severe treatment?
I request of your just court that you give the decision for the Risale-i Nur’s freedom, for it is the sustenance of our spirits, means of our salvation, and key to our eternal happiness. If the circumstances, some of which I have mentioned and enumerated above constitute a crime in your view, I shall accept with total resignation the harshest penalty you can inflict.
Prisoner, Emirdagli Ceylan Çaliskan,
Afyon Prison
***


[Mustafa Osman’s Defence]
To Afyon Criminal Court
I say in reply to the matters which have been put forward as offences, that I took part in the imaginary activities against the regime reputedly perpetrated by Bediuzzaman Said Nursi, who is accused of founding a secret society and by exploiting religious feelings, of being engaged in activities that might breach state security:
1. Yes, like many Risale-i Nur students, I began to collect the treatises of the Risale-i Nur and to read them with the intention of receiving a civilized, religious education and learning Qur’anic conduct, which is a national characteristic and is worthy of true Turkism and Islam, and an historical honour and virtue of ours. I intended to become a useful member of the country and nation, and defend it against the effects of foreign ideologies.
How could it be considered an offence at a time vice and immorality have trampled the honour and mode of action of our forefathers, which found fame in history, and poisoned the life of society, and have spilled into the streets to the extent of disgusting even the immoral, alarming public opinion, so that it is gossiped about in every home, and this grievous situation, which gives rise to criticism in the form of news about the moral police and of various other subjects in the newspapers and magazines, which are the tongue of public opinion, is rapidly spreading and quite simply becoming general — to read the Risale-i Nur Collection at such a time, which saved me as it saves all Muslims who read it; and to give it to my compatriots when they insistently asked for it, who knew and heard that I read these works, so that it could rectify their morals too; and so to save through the Risale-i Nur and its effective teachings these people who had lost their moorings and were becoming harmful for the country and nation; and to give it to them to read since it would assist them to become useful to humanity — how could this be considered an offence? It is the luminous, effective weapon of Bediuzzaman in his sacred, moral struggle, which is worthy of praise and appreciation. With his effective teachings about religion he is a mujahid, fighting against the dangerous red plague of communism which is spreading like an epidemic even in our country and makes the whole world tremble — how could it be considered a crime for myself to have given these treatises to people when they have thus in twenty years transformed into useful members of the country and nation twenty thousand people, and probably more? And how could charges be made against its respected author in the same way? I ask your consciences.
2. The Hadith which the prosecution stated was “false” and therefore unscholarly, is said to be “sound” in the books of Hadiths. So having been accepted by the scholars of Hadiths, and the fact that the leading Istanbul scholars both before the Constitutional Revolution and during it accepted Bediuzzaman’s interpretations and replies, which are now found in the Fifth Ray, to the questions they asked of him in connection with the questions asked of them by the Japanese and the Anglican Church, and those prominent scholars did not object to his replies establishes definitely that the Hadith is sound.
Moreover, the truths of not a part of the Risale-i Nur, but of all of it, are so powerful that no true Islamic scholar could object to them, so that foremost the Directorate of Religious Affairs, and true scholars throughout the country since the Constitutional Period, have been compelled to accept and respect them. The objections of one or two individuals who are known as scholars but who are bereft of true knowledge do not refute those truths and powerful proofs. They are merely ridiculous. Is it a betrayal of the regime to write a letter of thanks to the author of the Risale-i Nur because one is captivated by the truths of the Qur’an and belief it contains, the spiritual and material benefits of which have become clear, and which are studied all over the country by every class of person in order to save their eternal lives from extinction, and from which thousands of compatriots have profited and so are eternally indebted to their esteemed author, since he has saved their belief; is it a betrayal, relying on the undeniable truths stated by the Hadith which is deemed to constitute an offence, to consider certain acts and works to have appeared in this country, which are referred to by the Hadith, and supposing it to be thus, relying on the statements of numerous Islamic scholars, to see it as a victory of the Qur’an which will lead to the repairing of certain errors and to be pleased at this, and to privately put this view to a Master from whose works one has received effulgence; and to hope that the country and nation will not fall into anarchy and thus into the embrace of the Red Peril, which causes the whole world to tremble — is this a betrayal of the regime? Is it to malign the reforms? And although several courts of law have acquitted that scholar, who is utterly deserving of commendation and appreciation, and although he is very elderly, a recluse, and has no one, to charge him with the same matters, arrest him, put him into solitary confinement, and send him to trial, and for us too, to consider to be a crime these scholarly views of ours and our working to save our belief, and to put these forward as evidence of our supposed breaching of state security, is the just decision of which conscience? I ask this of your court and leave it to your consciences.
3. The charge of “Carrying Bediuzzaman’s picture as though it was something sacred, and collecting his letters, and corresponding with him.” To carry not a simple picture, but one decorated in gold and jewels, of the universal scholar and esteemed author who through his works has saved my spiritual life and eternal life from extinction, and allowed me to experience the pleasure and happiness of physical life, and who has saved the belief of thousands like me, and to send him letters and congratulate him, and to get to know others who love him, is my right as it is for all members of humanity. I do not suppose this right of mine to constitute a crime, and finally I say: as the police of two provinces and numerous towns can testify, in order to be able to serve this country, nation, and humanity, for long years the Risale-i Nur students have saved themselves through the Risale-i Nur from being aimless, and have been the means of saving others. Although the patriotic service they have performed for this country and its government has in reality been greater than a police force of thousands, and is worthy of recognition and appreciation, it has been misinterpreted and we have been arrested, as though deliberately on behalf of some foreign power. All our work and businesses have gone to rack and ruin and our wretched families and children have been left weeping and destitute. Which laws of democracy does this conform to? Which just decisions of which just judges? I request from your respected Court, which executes justice in the name of the just Turkish nation and its high Assembly, that these works, the numerous benefits and advantages of which are obvious and undeniable, are left free and that we are acquitted.
Prisoner, Safranbolulu Mustafa Osman,
Afyon Prison
***


[Hifzi Bayram’s Defence]
To Afyon Criminal Court
I am charged with reading some of the works —which teach the truths of the Qur’an and belief and are of great benefit for the nation and country— of the Islamic scholar Bediuzzaman, who is accused of attempting to breach state security by exploiting religious feelings; and with obtaining and giving —on request— to a number of acquaintances some of his treatises, from which I had greatly benefited in respect of belief and religion and which had led me to acquire Qur’anic manners, in the hope that it would be for their good and they would profit from his teachings about belief, and religious and moral instruction, a national characteristic. In addition, on the pretext of a number of acquaintances sending letters of a friendly or scholarly nature to my address, it is alleged that I am a partner in the crime of the above-mentioned. I object as follows to these matters with which I have been charged:
1. I did not read the Risale-i Nur, which has previously been tried and acquitted and returned to its author, and has been praised and recommended by the country’s religious scholars, with any idea of causing trouble in the way insisted on by the prosecution. I saw every part of it to be nothing but an important Qur’anic commentary which effectively teaches Islam and gives religious instruction, the way to make people virtuous and advance morally, and to save nations from falling into the abyss. Since this is the case, I do not suppose that to read these with the intention of study or maintaining my religion and belief, and to give them to others, and to obtain them for others, constitutes a crime. For nowhere at all has any incident harmful to the country and nation in which Risale-i Nur students have taken part been witnessed or recorded by the police. In addition, it is totally false to say: “they study and read them secretly” and to arouse doubts about a secret society. Because, whether scholarly or political, the Risale-i Nur students have no connection with any society, secret or open. In fact, several years ago the same charges were made against Bediuzzaman and many others, and they were sent for trial in Denizli Criminal Court, and although all the parts of the Risale-i Nur were scrutinized in the closest detail, they were all acquitted. I do not know the extent to which the imperatives of justice demand putting forward as evidence for a serious crime such as breaching state security and betrayal of the regime, reading a work which itself and whose author have been acquitted, and giving it to others to read; so I refer it to your consciences!
2. Among the charges was my being sent, while under arrest, a treatise by someone I do not know from Bayezid. I have not seen this treatise. I am uninformed about what it contains. If it is the Risale-i Nur, I accept it. You ask, and I shall reply. Only, I learnt that the prosecutor mentions the Mahdi in the indictment, and my Master is innocent of all such accusations. Just as I have never heard him mention such a thing, so I have not seen it in any of his works. Moreover, at every opportunity he has forbidden his students to venerate him, exalt him, or accord him any rank, and he has rebuked those who have written him such letters. We have always known him to be an important scholar who seeks no rank or position, and to be a precise and exacting hoja.
Prisoner, Hifzi Bayram


[Emirdagli Mustafa’s Defence]
To Afyon Criminal Court
I say briefly in reply to the prosecution’s accusing me of being a partner in my Master Bediuzzaman’s imaginary crime:
The service I have performed for my Master and the Risale-i Nur, without having the very slightest regret, resembles a mere droplet before an ocean of grace and favour. Just as tiny fragments of glass are sacrificed on the way of obtaining a treasury of precious diamonds, so I am every moment ready to sacrifice my life for the Risale-i Nur, which is the means of saving my everlasting life. I consider it would be a terrible betrayal of my blessed Master, the leading scholar of the age, and of his sole aim, belief and the Qur’an, to abandon the Risale-i Nur, the innumerable benefits of which, worldly and for the hereafter, have been established, because of temporary imprisonment and its unimportant hardships and so that no harm should come to our brief, tumultuous lives in this world, or to be indifferent towards the Risale-i Nur and my Master. I do not want to deviate even an iota from what he permits and commands.
Respected Judges of the Court!
Why does it seem excessive that despite my indigence I should be the student of a leading religious scholar who has formed a powerful front against communism, which aims to scatter its poisonous microbes over our beautiful land? This surely proves that the riches of the Risale-i Nur far exceed worldly riches. Leave my Master and the Risale-i Nur free for ever so they may save the belief of the Turkish youth like myself, and the young people may become useful members of the country. The need of us Turkish youth for the Risale-i Nur is thousands of times greater than the need for air of someone held in close confinement, and the need for light of someone in pitch blackness, and the need for food and water of someone parched with thirst and hungry in the desert, and the need for a life-saver of someone drowning in the sea. It is therefore not conformable with the honour of justice, because of the above facts, some of which I have mentioned, to condemn Bediuzzaman, who has won our greatest good opinion and regard, and to whom we are attached with unbreakable bonds, and the many unfortunates who are his good-intentioned students, and leave us to rot in prison.
Prisoner, Emirdagli Mustafa Acet,
Afyon Prison
***


[Halil Çaliskan’s Defence]
To Afyon Criminal Court
Respected Judges of the Court!
In the indictment read to me by the prosecution my service of my Master is cited as a serious crime. My Master came to our town in 1944 and resided there for four years. For forty years he has given up all the pleasures and comforts of the world and worked only for belief and Islam and to save the eternal happiness of Muslims, particularly in our country, on the way of belief and the hereafter. With the Risale-i Nur’s teachings on belief and morality, he has constructed a barrier against the noxious ideas of communism, which are causing great harm to our religion, and particularly among our nation, which is Muslim and Turkish. The material and spiritual harm it causes is excessive. He prevents too similar things harmful to the nation. Does my proud service on and off for three years of the Risale-i Nur and my Master, who is worthy of being applauded by all the scholars in the world, constitute a crime in the view of justice? It is also shown to be a crime that I left being a tailor to perform that service. But if I was to sacrifice my very life for the Risale-i Nur, which is truth and reality and a true commentary on the Qur’an, and for my Master, should it be deemed a serious offence and myself known as a traitor to my country? I ask you.
Respected Chairman of the Court! I read some parts of the Risale-i Nur and I wrote some out. Endless thanks be to Almighty God that due to the yearning I had long felt for knowledge, I began to profit from these treatises. Although I was closely concerned with them, I saw nothing in them about inciting the people against the Government, or disturbing public order, or founding a secret society. Nor did I hear anything from my Master about being the Mahdi or Regenerator of Religion, or anything about such movements. The sole aim of the Risale-i Nur and our Master and us students is to serve Islam, and particularly the Turkish nation, with respect to belief and morality. Certainly, the Risale-i Nur and its servants should not be harassed because of this service. Our sole aim and purpose was this and nothing else. And we performed this duty for God’s pleasure. In any event we could not exploit such a sacred duty for the world or any worldly benefit, and would not stoop to such a thing. We therefore cannot endure the prosecution’s charges against the sincere Risale-i Nur students, who have belief in their hearts, are preoccupied with the hereafter and have no worldly ambitions whatsoever, of founding a secret political society, which never at any time occurred to us.
Respected Judges of the Court! We believe that you have understood the aims, intentions, and nature of the Risale-i Nur students, and have formed the opinion that we have no connection with the crimes with which we are charged by the prosecution. We therefore request from your high court and your consciences that our books are returned to us, free, and we are acquitted.
Prisoner, Emirdagli Halil Çaliskan,
Afyon Prison
***


[Mustafa Gül’s Defence]
To Afyon Criminal Court
I am not a member of any secret society. In any event, my Master Bediuzzaman Said Nursi never founded any such society. He always taught us about the truths of the Qur’an and warned us severely against being concerned with politics. I am only the student of the great Master Said Nursi. I am bound to him and to the Risale-i Nur with all my heart and spirit. I would be happy with any punishment inflicted on me for the sake of the Risale-i Nur and my Master. Through his works, my Master saved my belief and life in the hereafter. His aim is to save all Muslims and all our compatriots from unbelief and for them to win eternal happiness. It has become clear in all our trials that we have no connection with any political ambitions. Although the reality is this, we have again unjustly and irrelevantly been dragged to court. We have understood from this that they want to break our solidarity. Our solidarity is not turned to any worldly or political end or matter. We only have the very greatest respect for our Master. Those who read the Risale-i Nur acquire an extraordinary belief, Islam, morality, and perfection.
We are incapable of not having enormous love for our Master. I am attached with all my being to my Master and to the Risale-i Nur students. This attachment could not be severed or broken even if I was executed. I and all my brothers are innocent. We request with all our strength that the Risale-i Nur is left free. I request that my elevated Master and innocent Nurju brothers and myself are acquitted.
Ispartali Mustafa Gül
***


[Küçük Ibrahim’s Defence]
To Afyon Criminal Court
Respected Judges!
The crime with which we are charged is both irrelevant and pertains to the world, it is political. But you, esteemed judges, understood at first sight whether or not we were people who would be involved in politics. However, even if hundreds of authoritative people were to ensure that this cold and alien charge was a hundred per cent realized, and my intelligence was a hundred times greater than it is, because of the feeling the Risale-i Nur and its esteemed author have given me, I would flee with all my being from that temporary, fleeting political thrill and adventure, and spend it on the way of belief in the hereafter and being saved from Hell. Both our respect for and attachment to the Risale-i Nur’s worthy author, and reading and writing out the Risale-i Nur, and our corresponding with the Risale-i Nur students and our relations with them, all look directly to the hereafter, as was affirmed by Denizli Criminal Court and the Court of Appeal. So much so that because of the ideas we have acquired from the Risale-i Nur, we would not exchange these luminous beings for worldly and material values. We will persist in this belief until we die.
Respected Judges of the Court!
Since we are gathered together here due to this fearsome charge, I am bound by conscience and for the sake of the country to state an important fact: only in my own neighbourhood, due to the reform of people’s characters brought about by the Risale-i Nur, over a period of ten years, in full sight of everyone, foremost myself and many others have learnt the way home. Vice and waywardness have been transformed into happy family lives. Mothers and fathers now pray for those who were the cause of it. You may listen to the stories of many people of this sort, in our province and around it. Particularly in Denizli Prison, when the Risale-i Nur entered there, it had such an overwhelmingly beneficial effect on the prisoners that it is still talked about. It was the same when I arrived here at Afyon Prison; whoever I spoke to, they described their former states and present states, and spoke gratefully of the Risale-i Nur students, praying for them. These facts are well-known. I am astonished that love for the Risale-i Nur, which has reformed me and my fellows to this great extent, both socially, morally, and with regard to the hereafter, and especially is an important Qur’anic commentary, and love for its esteemed author, and to write letters of consolation to my compatriots, could have been something political. Out of this astonishment I say that there cannot be such a crime. At the most I can say that the covert enemies of the Qur’an and thus of the Risale-i Nur have made the judiciary and police suspicious about us for no reason, and have thus been the cause of our packing the prisons. For sure, the elevated judges will understand these facts, and placing their hands on their consciences will give their just decisions, concerning which good tidings are given by God Almighty, and they will make the Muslim Turkish nation, which throughout the country is eagerly awaiting their decision, grateful to them.
Prisoner, Inebolulu Ibrahim Fakazli,
Afyon Prison
***
FOOTNOTES
1. Qur’an, 3:173.
2. Qur’an, 9:129.
3. The severe earthquakes which occurred the four times the Risale-i Nur was contested proved that it would be “most regretable for this country.”
4. Qur’an, 6:164, etc.
5. The Darü’l-Hikmeti’l-Islâmiye was a learned body set up in 1918 to find solutions for the problems confronting the Islamic world, and to provide scholarly answers for attacks made on Islam. It was attached to the Shaykh al-Islam’s Office and was composed of nine permanent members and various officers. Bediuzzaman’s appointment was ratified by the Caliph in August 1918.
6. The Proclamation of the (Second) Constitution in July, 1908.
7. Bukhari, Fitan, 26; Muslim, Fitan, 101, 102; Tirmidhi, Fitan, 62; Musnad, iii, 115; 211, 228, 249, 250; v, 38, 404-5; vi, 139-40. For this and the other Hadiths about the signs of the end of time, see, The Fifth Ray in the present work.
8. In 1922, during the Independence Struggle. [Tr.]
9. Sayyid Ahmad Sanusi. He took over the leadership of the Sanusiyya movement in North Africa in the early 1900’s, and fought alongside the Ottomans against Italian aggression in 1911. As a staunch supporter of the Caliphate, he was invited to Istanbul in 1918, and subsequently appointed ‘General Preacher’ in eastern Turkey and greatly assisted the Turks in the War of Independence. [Tr.]
10. The name given the revolt which broke out in the army in Istanbul in 1909 and resulted in the dethronement of Sultan ‘Abdulhamid. Despite playing a pacifying role, Bediuzzaman was arrested following the revolt along with many others and tried, but was acquitted. [Tr.]
11. The famous Shaykh Said Revolt which broke out in February, 1925 in eastern Turkey. Bediuzzaman strongly advised its leaders against undertaking any such action against the Government, as it would “... make Ahmed kill Mehmed, and Hasan kill Husayn.” [Tr.]
12. A minor incident which occurred in the town of Menemen in western Turkey 1930, but was blown up out of all proportion and brutally suppressed. Bediuzzaman was in no way involved in it. [Tr.]
13. It had formerly been a common practice to gather together in a single volume for constant reading Sura al-An‘am and other meritorious suras and verses from the Qur’an. [Tr.]
14. I said that in order to offer supreme thanks for a supreme Divine bounty like the radio, it should “recite the Qur’an so that all the people on the face of the earth could listen to it, and the atmosphere might become a hâfiz of the Qur’an.”
15. Qur’an, 9:129.
16. The basis and aim of the Risale-i Nur is certain belief and the essential reality of the Qur’an. For this reason, three courts of law have acquitted it in regard to being a tarikat. Furthermore, not one person has said during these twenty years: “Said has given me tarikat [instruction].” Also, a way to which for a thousand years most of this nation’s forefathers have been bound may not made something for which [the members of the nation] are answerable. Also, those who combat successfully those covert dissemblers who attach the name of tarikat to the reality of Islam and attack this nation’s religion, may not themselves be accused of being a tarikat. As for a society or community, it is a fraternity which look to the hereafter within Islamic brotherhood. It is not a political society, as three courts have ruled. They have acquitted it in that respect.
17. The fact that there were Christians and Jews in Islamic governments, and Muslims in Christian and Zoroastrian governments shows that opponents who do disturb public order or interfere in government cannot be legally interfered with. Moreover, one is not answerable for possibilities. Otherwise everyone would have to be sent to court and tried because of ‘possibility’, for everyone might kill other people.
18.Qur’an, 49:10.
19. The wrong meaning has been given in the Indictment, for it has deemed an offence some instances of the Risale-i Nur’s ‘wonder-working’ (kerâmet) which took the form of ‘slaps’. As though disasters like the earthquakes that occur when the Risale-i Nur is attacked are blows dealt by the Risale-i Nur. God forbid! We never said such a thing, nor wrote it. What we said in many places supported by proof was that like acceptable almsgiving, the Risale-i Nur is a means of repulsing disasters. Whenever it is attacked, it hides itself; then calamities seize the opportunity and assault us. Yes, confirmed by thousands of Risale-i Nur students and what they have observed, supported by hundreds of incidents and events and their ‘coincidences’,20 which in no way could have been attributed to chance, as well as numerous indications and ‘coincidences’ of the Qur’an, some of which were even pointed out in court, I have formed the certain conviction that those ‘coincidences’ are a Divine bestowal indicating the Risale-i Nur’s acceptability and are a sort of wonder of the Risale-i Nur on account of the Qur’an.
20. ‘Coincidences’ (tevâfukat): the unintentional correspondence of words or letters in lines or patterns on one or several pages, or the ‘coinciding’ of apparently unrelated events. [Tr.]
21. In the eightieth of the hundred errors about these works in the indictment, the prosecution says: “The interpretations in the Fifth Ray are incorrect.”
The Answer: In the Fifth Ray, it is said: “God knows best, one interpretation is this.” What this means is: “It is possible that one meaning of the Hadith is this.” Logically, this cannot be proved wrong. It can be proved wrong only by proving its impossibility.
Secondly: Although for the past twenty years, indeed forty years, those who opposed me, and then those who tried to oppose the Risale-i Nur, have not refuted my interpretations on grounds of either logic or scholarship, and thousands of learned people —the religious scholars who oppose me together with the Risale-i Nur students— have confirmed them, and have not said “he’s been smitten by the evil-eye,” I refer it to your fair-mindedness to judge just how unjust it is for those who do not know how may Suras there are in the Qur’an to meet them incredulously.
In Short: The meaning of interpretation is one probable or possible meaning of a Hadith or Qur’anic verse out of many.
22. Qur’an, 2:156.
23. Qur’an, 4:11.
24. Qur’an, 4:176.
25. The same situation has now continued for seventeen months.
26 Qur’an, 3:173.
27 Qur’an, 8:40.
28. Qur’an, 9:129.
29. Qur’an, 2:275.
30. See, al-Hindi, Kanz al-‘Ummal, xiv, 271, No: 33,436; Musnad al-Firdaws, iii, 447; Majma’u’l-Zawa’id, v, 186; Jam’u’l-Fawa’id, i, 849.
31. ‘Tevâfuk’: See page 407, fn. 20 above.
32. These two earthquakes coincided with Friday, 18.9.1948, in the morning. Signed in the name of the Risale-i Nur students being held in Afyon Prison, Halil Mustafa Mehmed Feyzi Husrev
33. Musnad, iv, 273; v, 220, 221; Qadi Iyad, al-Shifa, i, 340.
34. At that time it was thus; now twenty years have passed.
35. Qur’an, 48:1, 3.
36. Inequitable Court! Could there be any reply more decisive than this? Signed, Husrev, in the name of the Risale-i Nur students.
37. Zübeyir Gündüzalp (1920-1971) was born in Konya Province, and became a student of Bediuzzaman while working as a telegraphist for the Post Office. He later became one of his closest students, displaying complete devotion to Bediuzzaman and sincerity in his service of the Risale-i Nur. He became one of the leading figures of the movement after Bediuzzaman’s death. [Tr.]
38. In his writings, Bediuzzaman mentions ‘has’ (special) by which he probably meant those that loyally and devotedly served the Risale-i Nur, and ‘erkan’ (leading; lit. ‘pillars’), those who in addition to their devoted service played a more organizing role. [Tr.]
39. See page 384, fn. 10.
40. Before finally going there sometime in the final months of 1922, Bediuzzaman was on several occasions secretly summoned to Ankara by Mustafa Kemal during the Independence Struggle, in recognition of his effective struggle against the occupying forces. [Tr.]
41. These events occurred in early 1909. [Tr.]
42. According to the famous Hat Act passed 25 November 1925, the wearing of European headgear became compulsory, and all other headgear was banned. [Tr.]
43. Qur’an, 2:156.
44. Qur’an, 3:137.
45. A petition was sent to the Cabinet fifteen years ago concerning this same matter. Now, since it has again arisen, I am obliged to send it again to the departments of government concerned.
46. See page 385, fns. 11, 12.
47. The Sixteenth Letter was written several years previously to Eskishehir and Denizli Courts, yet its rebuffing all the points of objection as though it had seen the three courts demonstrates clearly that it was the object of Divine bestowal and grace.
48. Tevafuk: See page 407, fn. 20.
49. Qur’an, 3:173.
50. Qur’an, 20:44.
51. Qur’an, 40:44.
52. Qur’an, 93:11.
53. 36.5 lbs. [Tr.]
54. It lasted a year.
55. About 2.8 lbs. or 1,300 grammes. [Tr.]
56. About 2.8 lbs. [Tr.]
57. Qur’an, 12:53.
58. Qur’an, 2:286.
59. The reason for these ‘sinces’ is this: I take no notice of the wrongs and tyranny perpetrated against my person and give them no importance. I say, “They are not worth worrying about,” and I do not interfere in the world.
60. Qur’an, 3:173.
61. Qur’an, 8:40.
62. This refers to Russia. [Tr.]
63. Recalling the imprisonment of Yusuf, related in the Qur’an, Bediuzzaman called prison ‘Medrese-i Yusufiye’, the School of Joseph, impressing on his students that prison was essentially a place of study and training. [Tr.]
64. Qur’an, 2:21:6.
65. ‘Ajluni, Kashf al-Khafa’, i, 55; Muhammad al-Shaybani, Sharh al-Sirat al-Kabir, i, 11.
66. See, page 445, footnote 38.
67. Sirran tanawwarat: a phrase taken from the qasidat al-Jaljalutiyya, attributed to Imam ‘Ali ibn Abi Talib.
68. Qur’an, 94:6.
69. Medresetü’z-Zehrâ: the Islamic university Bediuzzaman had since his early youth endeavoured to found in eastern Anatolia, in which the modern and religious sciences would be taught side by side, and which he intended would play the central and unifying role in Asia that al-Azhar plays in Africa. Despite twice receiving funds for it and actually laying the foundations, it was never completed due to the vicissitudes of the times. Although it was not realized in the form he had originally foreseen, while in Kastamonu (1936-’43), he wrote: “Endless thanks be to Almighty God for He has made the province of Isparta into a Medresetü’z-Zehrâ, which has long been the goal of my dreams, —into an al-Azhar University.” See, Kastamonu Lahikase (1960), 172. [Tr.]
70. Husrev Altinbasak (1899-1977) was from Isparta and became one of Bediuzzaman’s leading students. With his fine handwriting he wrote out hundreds of copies of the treatises of the Risale-i Nur. He is reputed to written nine copies of the Qur’an showing the ‘coincidences’ of the name of ‘Allah’. He was together with Bediuzzaman in the prisons of Eskishehir, Denizli, and Afyon. [Tr.]
71. ‘Certain, verified belief’: an approximate translation of tahkikî (Arabic: tahqiqi) iman. It also has the meaning of ‘ascertained through enquiry,’ ‘resulting from investigation,’ and ‘confirmatory.’ See also, page 569, footnote 1. [Tr.]
72. Alif: the first letter of the Arabic alphabet, the numerical value of which is one, and which is written as a vertical dash. [Tr.]
73. Husrev, Re’fet, Tahiri, Feyzi, and Sabri.
74. Bayram: Arabic, ‘Id, the two big festivals in the Muslim calendar. Here, the festival marking the end of Ramadan. [Tr.]
75. This piece was written by Ustad Bediuzzaman’s lawyers, with his permission while he was being held in Afyon Prison, and was sent to the government ministries mentioned. Signed, Sungur
76. The squall was a revolt that broke out in the prison, but none of the Risale-i Nur students was involved.
77. A juz’ is a thirtieth part of the Qur’an. [Tr.]
78. Hizb al-Nuri: A forty-five-page Arabic piece which Bediuzzaman described as “manifesting the meaning of the Hadith ‘An hour’s reflective thought may be better than a year’s [supererogatory] worship,’ a luminous proof of the Risale-i Nur, a supreme invocation springing from it, and a small sample of it.” [Tr.]
79. Musnad al-Firdaws, iii, 447; al-Hindi, Kanz al-‘Ummal, xiv, 271, No: 33436; Suyuti, Ta’rikh al-Hulafa’, 6, 16; Majma’u’l-Zawa’id, v, 187; Cam’u’l-Fawa’id, i, 849.
80. Qur’an, 2:61.
81. See, Qur’an, 88:20.
82. Qur’an, 17:44.
83. It is certainly bad that some of our brothers are unnecessarily denying that they are students of the Risale-i Nur, especially .... , and that they are concealing their considerable past services. But because of that service we should forgive them and not feel angry at them.
84. Bukhari, Fadl Laylat al-Qadr, 2, 3; Tahajjud, 21; Muslim, Siyam, 207-19.
85. Qur’an, 39:18.
86. Yesterday I felt happy and joyful. Then I realized that my brother in Nurs had eight months previously sent some Nurs honey in a flask to me in Emirdag. Yesterday it arrived here from Emirdag. I told them to quickly bring it to me. I waited, but it was not brought. My happiness suddenly turned into anger. It was the cause of that flask with the honey, which in my eyes was a hundred times more precious than the flask, being given to a stranger and sent to the market, and then the flask suddenly broke. I have sent an amount of that sweet honey, a gift from the village of Nurs, my birthplace, so that all my brothers may have a taste of it as a ‘Festival sweet.’
87. Qur’an, 68:1.
88. Qur’an, 51:1.
89. Impotently, I say in the name of my brothers: if necessary, we shall overtake them and advance far beyond them, God willing. We shall show that we are the heirs of our forefathers both in religion, and in heroism.
90. Ustad did not ask for this article to be published in the newspaper, but being both of great interest, and an instructive example, and very exciting, it has been included here. Husrev
91. Qur’an, 108:1.
92. After this defence and its addendum were sent to the Court of Appeal, the Court authorities sent a telegraph ordering that Zübeyir should be released from prison.

The Fifteenth Ray
The Shining Proof
This consists of two ‘Stations’
[This lesson is a treatise which is apparently unimportant, but in reality is of the greatest importance, and is extremely powerful and comprehensive. It is a Qur’anic fruit of Paradise and of belief which was produced from the uniting —at the degrees of ‘knowledge of certainty’ and ‘absolute certainty’— of my life of reflective thought and the spiritual life of the Risale-i Nur, which is based on ascertaining reality through its evidences (tahkikî).1]
S a i d N u r s i
The First Station
[A concise summary of the Twentieth Letter, and Part One of the instruction given in the third ‘School of Joseph’.2 It consists of three ‘Parts’]
In the Name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate
And from Him do we seek help
I am someone who has spent thirty-five years in seclusion, and particularly at night forgets the world, and having for twenty-three years suffered the annoyance of being under hostile surveillance, has become unsociable. Being all alone, I become fed up if I am for even an hour with anyone other than those who assist me or are desirous of the lessons of the Risale-i Nur. But then, on the pretext of the petition I wrote to the Court of Appeal about being held for eleven months in total solitary confinement in Afyon Prison, they forcibly transferred me to Ward Five and forbade my brothers to come to me. I was feeling truly alarmed that I would be unable to endure the crowded conditions when suddenly as a sign of wrath and anger, the cold became so severe I would not have survived had I remained in my former place. The hardship turned into mercy for me.
It occurred to me as I was reciting the tesbihat following the prayers: “In all the wards the Risale-i Nur students are working as hard as they can at the Risale-i Nur and its lessons both on their own account and in your place. But because this fifth ward is somewhat isolated and is constantly being filled and emptied, the need here is greater for the Risale-i Nur’s instruction. The youths and elderly people read the newspapers, which write about the assaults of Russia with its awesome denial of God, and are therefore in far greater need of its definitive, powerful instruction about belief in God’s existence and unity.” I was thinking of writing a brief summary of the Twentieth Letter and the sacred sentence:
There is no god but God, He is One, He has no partner; His is the sovereignty and His is the praise; He gives life and deals death, and He is Living and dies not; in His hand is all good; He is Powerful over all things; and to Him shall be your return,3
which for years I have recited ten times after the morning prayer. For it points out the affirmation of Divine unity on a vast scale, and with its eleven phrases demonstrates in detail as clearly as the sun both eleven proofs of the Divine necessary existence and dominical unity, and eleven good tidings. According to one narration, it bears the Greatest Name. But then it was suddenly imparted to me that I should teach this concise summary to Nadir Hoja and the youths here. So saying: “In the name of God,” I began:
This sentence demonstrating Divine unity contains eleven good tidings and eleven proofs of the truths of belief. For now, I shall point out briefly the proofs only and refer their further explanation and the good tidings to the Twentieth Letter and other parts of the Risale-i Nur. However, I cconsider it appropriate to write here a few points I did not tell them when I was writing the lesson. Of the eleven phrases of the above sentence affirming Divine unity:
THE FIRST PHRASE: ‘There is no god but God’
The proof here is the treatise called The Supreme Sign (Âyetü’l-Kübra), which has been printed. It was because it is a matchless wonder that in giving news of various parts of the Risale-i Nur, Imam ‘Ali (May God be pleased with him) said: “And by the Supreme Sign preserve me from sudden death,” and making that Supreme Sign an intercessor, through the treatise’s victories in the Courts of both Ankara and Denizli and its spreading effectively and secretly, it was both the reason for the Risale-i Nur students being acquitted, and since its secret printing had led to the students’ imprisonment for nine months, it both clearly affirmed Imam ‘Ali’s (May God be pleased with him) wondrous prediction, and his prayer for the Risale-i Nur students.
Yes, the Seventh Ray, The Supreme Sign, points out thirty-three vast, universal, unanimous proofs in all beings. Alluding to innumerable evidences in each universal proof, it proves firstly that heavens indicate the Necessarily Existent One’s existence and unity with the words of the stars; the earth with the phrases and sentences of the animals and plants; and so on, until the universe as a whole, with the words of all its contents and beings, and the truths of contingency and createdness and change — it proves them as clearly as sunlight and as certainly as the day. Those who want unshakeable belief and seek an unbreakable sword to combat irreligion and anarchy should refer to The Supreme Sign.
THE SECOND PHRASE: ‘He is One’
A concise indication of the proof in this phrase is as follows:
In every aspect of the universe a unity, a oneness, is apparent. For example, it displays a unity and oneness by being a well set-out city, a magnificent palace, a meaningful, materialized book, and a embodied Qur’an every verse, and even every letter and point of which is miraculous. Similarly, since the palace’s lamp is one and the same, and its calendar-lamp, and fiery cook, and water-bearing sponges, and hundreds of thousands of other things it contains are all one and the same, it proves decisively that the owner, ruler, scribe, and author of the palace, city, book, and mighty embodied Qur’an is existent, one, and single.
THE THIRD PHRASE: ‘He has no partner’
A brief indication of the proof in this is as follows:
The source, master, and basis of The Supreme Sign is the sublime verse:
Say: if there had been [other] gods with Him —as they say— behold, they would certainly have sought out a way to the Lord of the Throne! [to the end of the verse],4
which is also called the Supreme Sign. That is, if God had any partners and others had intervened in creation and interfered in His dominicality, the order of the universe would have been spoilt.” However, the perfect order in everything, small and large, particular and universal, from the wing of the tiniest fly and the cell of the pupil of the eye to the numberless birds which fly through the air and the solar system, furnishes indubitable and decisive evidence for the impossibility and non-existence of any such partners. It also testifies self-evidently to the existence and unity of the Necessarily Existent One.
THE FOURTH PHRASE: ‘His is the dominion’
A concise indication of the lengthy proof contained in this phrase:
We see that behind the veil One of boundless power and knowledge makes the face of the earth into an arable field, and every spring sows in it all mixed up together the seeds of a hundred thousand species of plants. Then in perfect order without confusing any of their crops, He raises them and with the hand of mercy and wisdom, out of them distributes to the two hundred thousand animal species their sustenance and rations according to need. He performs these acts of disposal in His vast, rich dominions, especially on the face of the earth. Those, then, who do not recognize that All-Wise Disposer and Compassionate Owner are compelled to deny the earth together with its produce, like the foolish Sophists.
THE FIFTH PHRASE: ‘His is the praise’
This is a very brief indication to the very extensive proof contained in this phrase:
Yes, we see with our eyes and understand clearly with our minds that this city of the universe, quarter of the earth, and barracks of men and animals is governed, supervised, and maintained by an All-Compassionate Provider, a Munificent Provider of Bounties. For in order to have His bounties praised and thanked for, He makes the earth into a merchant ship and railway train bringing provender, and the spring into a waggon filled with a hundred thousand sorts of foods and packets of conserves called breasts, conveying them to the needy living creatures whose rations have been exhausted at the end of winter. Anyone with an iota of intelligence would agree that this was the work of an All-Compassionate Provider. While one who does not affirm it and deviates into denial is a foolish, harmful animal since he is then obliged to deny all the regular bounties and specific foods on the face of the earth, which are the cause of praise and thanks.
THE SIXTH PHRASE: ‘He gives life’
An extremely brief allusion to the proof in this phrase:
Yes, it is proved in the Tenth Word and in other parts of the Risale-i Nur that every spring on the face of the earth a glorious army is raised to life which consists of three hundred thousand species of living beings of infinite variety. With its innumerable members, all of whose lives and necessities are given them with perfect order and regularity, it displays a hundred thousand samples, indeed, signs, of the supreme resurrection of the dead. All those innumerable different creatures which are intermingled and mixed up together are raised to life in perfect balance and order without error, mistake, or deficiency, with none being confused, disarranged, or forgotten. Those hundreds of thousands of animal species with their uncountable members, which all differ as regards their forms, art, and livelihoods, are resurrected from droplets of fluid called sperm which is all similar, from seeds resembling earth, from tiny grains which differ little from one another, from the tiny eggs of flies which are all similar, and the birds from the same air and from fluid and eggs which are either the same as or only a little different from each other. The person, therefore, who does not conclude that it is an Ever-Living and Self-Subsistent One, an All-Knowing, Creative Giver of Life Who writes out on the page of the earth and the spring a hundred thousand different books, all together, one within the other, without error, perfectly, is surely compelled to deny both himself and all the living creatures throughout the earth, in all the springs attached to the string of time, and on the faces of the living earth and space, and must himself be the most foolish and wretched of living creatures.
THE SEVENTH PHRASE: ‘And deals death’
A very brief indication of the proof contained in this phrase:
In the autumn when the three hundred thousand species of living creatures are being discharged from their duties under the name of death, the registers and pages of the actions of each species and all their members, and the indexes of all they have done, and the lists of all they will do the following spring, and their seeds, which are spirits of a sort, are all entrusted in their places to the hand of wisdom of the All-Glorious Preserver. The person, therefore, who does not recognize that All-Wise Creator, the Ever-Living and Undying One, Who inscribes in the miniscule seeds of the fig-tree, each of which is like an immortal spirit and bears all the laws governing the tree’s life, the story of the tree’s life, which contains writing enough to fill a book, thus making it like a large volume — such a person is certainly not even an idiot and delirious animal, but more abject than the devils who stoke the fires of Hell, and will be condemned to eternal death.
Yes, just as it is a hundredfold impossibility and futility that the above universal, comprehensive, wise, purposive acts, which comprise numberless wonders and miracles and point to the proofs of these Phrases, should be without the one who performed them; so too, to attribute them to blind, impotent, unconscious, deaf, lifeless, confused, disorderly, overwhelming causes is impossible, precluded and unjustifiable a thousand times over. For if that was the case, every particle of earth would have to possess an infinite power and wisdom, and a wondrous, universal craftsmanship so that it could give form to all the plants and flowers; and as it says in the piece about the air in A Guide For Youth, every molecule of air would have to possess the ability to know all speech and all the words spoken on the radio and telephone, and to teach them to the other molecules. No satan even could make anyone accept such an extraordinary idea. The penalty for unbelief and denial, which is thus far from reason and reality and constitutes insult and aggression against all beings, could only be a terrible Hell, which is pure justice. We should surely declare in the face of such disbelievers: “Long live Hell!”
THE EIGHTH PHRASE: ‘And He is living and dies not’
An extremely brief indication of the proof in this phrase is this:
For example, on the disappearance of the tiny suns reflected in the bubbles on the surface of a choppy sea or flowing river, the bubbles that replace them display the same tiny suns, thus pointing to the sun in the sky and testifying to it, and with their disappearance and death they indicate the existence of a perpetual sun. Similarly, the creatures on the surface of the constantly changing sea of the universe, and ever-renewed, infinite space, in the arable field of minute particles, and in the river of time, which with its flow draws all transitory beings into its embrace, continuously and speedily flow on and depart, and their apparent causes die along with them. Every day, every year, a universe dies and a new one replaces it. Since the crops of travelling worlds and flowing universes are continuously reaped from the field of particles, certainly just as the bubbles and tiny suns point to a perpetual sun with their passage, so the deaths of those numberless creatures and endless crops, and their being discharged in perfect orderliness together with their apparent causes, testify with the clarity and certainty of daylight, indeed, of the sun, to the necessary existence and being and unity of an Ever-Living Undying One, an Eternal Sun, an Enduring Creator, a Most Pure and Holy Commander. All beings testify to these a thousand times more clearly and definitely than the existence of the universe.
Now you have certainly understood just how deaf, foolish, and offensive is someone who does not hear these loud voices and powerful testimonies that fill the universe, nor heeds them.
THE NINTH PHRASE: ‘In His hand is all good’
A brief indication of the proof contained in this phrase is as follows:
We see that each sphere of the universe, each realm of being, each level, each individual and member, and even each cell of each body possesses a store or depot containing its reserve supplies of sustenance, an arable field or treasury producing and preserving all its necessities. For at exactly the right time, in perfect order and balance, with perfect wisdom and graciousness, all their necessities are given to those needy beings by a hidden hand, outside their power and will.
For example, mountains contain all the minerals and chemicals necessary for man and living beings, and the things necessary for life; on someone’s command and through his planning, they are perfect stores and treasuries. Similarly, through the power of an All-Wise Provider, the earth is an arable field, a harvest, a kitchen, producing with perfect order and regularity the sustenance of all those living beings. Even, just as human beings and all their bodily members have treasuries and stores, and the cells of their bodies have tiny depots; so it goes on, till the world of the hereafter, a store of which is this world; and an arable field and store of Paradise are the world of Islam and true humanity, which produce the good, beauty, and lights of this world; and one storehouse of Hell are the filthy matters and groups of this world, which come from non-existence, which is evil, and yield the produce of evils, ugly things, and disbelief, and which pollute the worlds of existence, which are good. And the store of the stars’ heat is Hell, while the treasury of lights is a Paradise. Alluding to all those infinite treasuries, the phrase ‘In His hand is all good,’ then, demonstrates a most brilliant proof.
Yes, this phrase, together with the phrase, ‘In His hand are the keys of all things,’ points out to anyone not totally blind an infinitely extensive, wondrous proof of Divine dominicality and unity. For example, consider only the following out of those endless treasuries and stores: just as with his command of “Awake!” and the key of His will, an All-Wise Disposer Who holds the keys of seeds and grains, which are all tiny stores containing the members and destinies of huge trees or shining flowers, opens up in perfect balance and order the minute door of a seed; so too throwing open with the key of the rain the treasury of the earth, without error He opens all the seeds, which are the tiny stores and seminal fluid of plants, as well as the storehouses of droplets, which receive the command to develop and are the origin of animals, and the seminal fluid composed of water and air of birds and flying insects. If you want to understand and see that He opens up with the hand of wisdom, will, mercy, and choice, all the treasuries and depots, physical and non-physical, universal and particular, in the universe, each with its particular key, consider your own heart, mind, body, stomach, and garden, and the spring, which is the flower of the earth, and its flowers and fruits, for they are all opened up by a hidden hand, with perfect order, balance, mercy, and wisdom, with all different keys which come from the workbench of “Be! And it is.”5 That hidden hand draws out pounds of foods from a minute box weighing less than an ounce, and sometimes hundreds of pounds, and presents them to living creatures as a feast. Is it at all possible that blind force, deaf nature, aimless chance, or lifeless, ignorant, impotent causes could interfere in such a boundless orderly, knowing, and percipient act, in such totally wise, purposive art in which no chance played any part, in such error-free perfectly balanced disposals, and in such completely just dominicality which is free of all tryanny? Could any being who does not see and administer all beings together at once, nor holds under his command minute particles together with the planets and stars, intervene in this disposal and government which is in every way wise, purposeful, miraculous, and balanced?
As the verse, Well-nigh bursting with fury6 states, Hell rages at the person who does not recognize the All-Compassionate Disposer, the All-Wise Sustainer, in Whose hand is all good and Who holds the keys of all things, and deviates into denial; it boils up in fury, saying through the tongue of disposition: “He deserves my boundless torments and is in no way worthy of compassion.”
THE TENTH PHRASE: ‘And He is powerful over all things’
An extremely concise indication of the proof contained in this phrase is as follows:
As soon as every conscious creature who comes into this guest-house of the world opens his eyes, he sees that a power holds in its grasp the whole universe, and within that power are a pre-eternal, all-embracing knowledge which never confuses anything and a most precise wisdom and favour which never act purposelessly or without balance. Just as, spinning a single particle from the army of particles like a Mevlevi dervish in ecstasy, it employs it in numerous duties; so at the same time and according to the same law, it causes the globe of the earth to travel a twenty-four thousand-year-distance in a year, again like an ecstatic Mevlevi. At the same time and according to same law, through which it sends to men and the animals the produce of the seasons, it makes the sun into a shuttle or spinning-wheel, and spinning it ecstatically so it exerts an attraction, it employs the planets, the army of the solar system, in various duties in perfect order and balance. At the same time and according to the same law of wisdom, that same power writes one within the other, without error or confusion, hundreds of thousands of species, which resemble books, on the page of the face of the earth, and displays thousands of samples of the supreme resurrection of the dead. That same power at the same time transforms the page of the atmosphere into a slate for writing and erasing. Employing all its particles, which are like the nibs of pens or the points of the book, in the tasks specified for them by will and command, it endows all of them with such ability that each receives all words and speech as though it knows them, and broadcasts them without confusion. It employs each as a miniscule ear and tiny tongue, proving that the element of air is a ‘throne’ of Divine will and command.
Thus, according to this brief indication, the one who makes the universe into a well-ordered city, a first-class apartment-building and guest-house, and a miraculous book and Qur’an, and holds in His grasp with the balance of knowledge and arrangements of wisdom all the levels, realms, and groups of creatures from the universe as a whole to minute particles, and disposes of them, is Most-Merciful and Compassionate. So the person who does not recognize that Most Merciful and Compassionate One, Who demonstrates as clearly as the sun and daylight His wisdom and mercy within His power, and makes known His existence and unity within His absolute dominicality, thus wanting recognition through belief in return for His making these known, and love through worship in return for His making Himself loved, and thanks and praise in return for His bounties — the satans in human form who do not recognize Him, or try to love Him through worship, in fact foster a sort of enmity towards Him through denial, and are each minor Nimrods and Pharaohs, and are certainly deserving of infinite torment.
THE ELEVENTH PHRASE: ‘And to Him is your return’
This means to say: just as beings will depart for His presence, going to the eternal world, the hereafter, and the everlasting realm of happiness; so it is He Who is the place of recourse of all the creatures in the universe. All the chains of causes are based on Him and rest on His power. They are all merely veils for the disposals of His power. All apparent causes are only screens for preserving the dignity and majesty of His sacred power. They have no effect whatsoever in creation. If it was not for His will and command, nothing, not even a particle, could move or act. A very brief indication of the proof contained in this phrase is as follows:
Firstly: We refer to the Tenth Word and its addenda, the Twenty-Ninth Word, the Seventh Topic of The Fruits of Belief, the Third Ray, and to the treatises of the Risale-i Nur about belief, the proof, leading to completely certain belief, that the resurrection of the dead will occur and the hereafter and eternal life will be brought about as indubitably and definitely as the coming spring, as this sacred phrase states. Truly, those treatises have proved this pillar of belief in such a way with so many evidences that they compel even the most obdurate deniers to affirm that the existence of the hereafter is as certain as the existence of this world.
Secondly: One third of the Qur’an of Miraculous Exposition looks to the resurrection of the dead and the hereafter, and it constructs all its claims on them. Since this is so, all the miracles and evidences proving the Qur’an’s veracity also indicate the existence of the hereafter. Similarly, all the miracles bearing witness to the prophethood of Muhammad (Peace and blessings be upon him), and all the evidences of his prophethood, and all the proofs of his truthfulness, testify also to the resurrection of the dead and the hereafter. For just as throughout his life, one of his most constant calls concerned the hereafter, so all the twenty-four thousand prophets (Peace be upon them) taught eternal life and everlasting happiness, giving the glad tidings to mankind, and proving them with innumerable miracles and certain evidences. Since this is so, all the miracles and evidences proving their prophethood and veracity testified to the hereafter and eternal life, which was their constant and most important teaching. Making an analogy with this, all the evidences proving the other pillars of belief testify also to the resurrection of the dead and the throwing open of the realm of bliss.
Thirdly: In order to display His perfections and His power and dominicality, an All-Glorious Maker, a Beauteous Maker, an All-Perfect Allah creates the universe together with all its atoms, planets, parts, and levels. With perfect wisdom He continuously makes each being work at a task, indeed, at numerous tasks, and in order to display the eternal, endless manifestations of His Names, He sends caravan after caravan, indeed, world after travelling renewed world, and the tribes of creatures to the guest-house of this world and the arena of trial which is worldly life. He records for the cinemas of the hereafter set up in the World of Similitudes, with the cameras of the Intermediate Realm, all their images, deeds, and circumstances, and after releasing them from their duties, sends other tribes, caravans, and flowing, travelling worlds to the arena in order to perform those duties and be mirrors to the manifestations of His Names. Is it therefore at all possible that there should be no realm of reward and punishment, no resurrection of the dead and last judgement for men, who with consciousness and intelligence respond in this fleeting world to all the aims of the Creator, loving Him with all their capacity and making Him love them; recognizing Him and making Him known; beseeching with endless supplications everlasting happiness in the hereafter; and since, possessing intelligence, they suffer infinite pains, they long for eternal life, which is pure pleasure, with all their beings, spirits, and capacities? God forbid! A hundred thousand times, God forbid!
Since these brief indications are proved and explained brilliantly, powerfully and in detail in the Risale-i Nur, we refer you to that and here cut this long story short.
Glory be unto You! We have no knowledge save that which You have taught us; indeed, You are All-Knowing, All-Wise.7
***


A Brief Summary of Sura al-Fatiha
[Part Two of the only lesson I gave after having been transferred temporarily from solitary confinement in the third ‘School of Joseph’ to the company of others.]
This is a short sample of the lessons given to the Risale-i Nur students in prison:
While reciting Sura al-Fatiha during the prayers, it commanded me to expound one drop from its ocean and a single flash from the seven colours in the light of its sun. For sure we had written some very sweet and agreeable points from this sacred treasury in part of the Twenty-Ninth Letter, particularly in the journey of imagination taken in “the Nun of na‘budu,” and the Eight Symbols (Rumuz-u Semaniye), and the Qur’anic commentary Signs of Miraculousness (Ishârâtü’l-I’caz), and in other parts of the Risale-i Nur, but I felt obliged to write down my reflections during the prayers, but only the allusions to the pillars of belief and their proofs from that very sweet Qur’anic summary, in the form of a concise extract and in the manner of Part One above. So referring the phrase In the Name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate to two or three treatises of the Risale-i Nur, I am starting from All praise be to God:
In the Name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate. * All praise be to God, the Sustainer of the All the Worlds. * The Merciful, the Compassionate; * Owner of the Day of Judgement; * You alone do we worship and from You alone do we seek help; * Guide us to the Straight Path; * The path of those whom You have blessed, not those who have received Your anger, nor those who have gone astray.8
FIRST PHRASE: ‘All praise be to God’
A very brief allusion to the proof of the truths of belief in this phrase.
Filling the face of the earth, indeed, the universe, are intentional bestowals and bounties, which are the cause of praise and thanks, especially the sending of pure, clean, nutritious milk to infants from between blood and excrement; so too are there purposeful gifts and presents, and kindly benefactions and feasts. The price of these is to say “In the Name of God” at the start, “All praise be to God” at the end, and in the middle to perceive the bestowal in the bounty, and through it to recognize your Sustainer. Consider your own self, your stomach, and your senses! How many things and bounties they need! See how many foods and delights they want for the price of praise and thanks, then compare all living creatures with yourself. Thus, the endless praise offered verbally and through tongues of disposition in response to these general bestowals shows as clearly as the sun the existence and universal dominicality of One Who is Worshipped and Praised, an All-Compassionate Bestower of Bounties.
SECOND PHRASE: ‘The Sustainer of All the Worlds’
A very short allusion to the proof contained in this phrase:
We see with our eyes that within the universe are not thousands, but millions of worlds, small universes, mostly one within the other. Although the conditions for the administration and running of these are all different, they are organized, maintained, and administered so perfectly that like a single page held constantly in view the universe is renewed and changed, and like a line, each of all those worlds is written by a pen of power and determining. Every instant attestations, particular and universal, are made, boundless, unending testimonies to the number of minute particles and the beings formed of them, to the necessary existence and unity of a Sustainer of All the Worlds who administers these millions of worlds and travelling universes with an infinite knowledge, wisdom, and limitless all-embracing mercy within an infinite dominicality. Not to affirm, perceive, understand or see a dominicality which raises and administers with the same law, the same dominicality, the same wisdom, all beings from the arable field of particles to the solar system and the Milky Way, and from the cells of the body to the storehouse of the earth, to the universe in its entirety, certainly makes a person deserving of endless torment, and negates his worthiness to be pitied.
THIRD PHRASE: ‘The Merciful, the Compassionate’
An extremely brief allusion to the proof in this phrase:
Yes, the existence and reality of a boundless mercy is as clearly apparent in the universe as the light of the sun. As certainly as light testifies to the sun, so this extensive mercy testifies to a Most Merciful and Compassionate One behind the veil of the Unseen. An important part of mercy being sustenance, that mercy is signified by the Name of Provider. As for sustenance, it points to an All-Compassionate Provider so clearly that anyone with an iota of intelligence is compelled to affirm Him. For example, He sends food to all living beings, particularly to the helpless and young, throughout the earth and the atmosphere, in truly wondrous fashion beyond their wills and power, from seeds, droplets of fluid, and grains of earth which all resemble each other. He makes the hen-birds search out the food and bring it their wingless, frail chicks in the nests at the tops of trees. He subjugates the hungry lioness to her cubs, so she does not eat the meat she finds but gives it them. He sends the pleasant, nutritious, pure, white milk, like the water of Kawthar, from the springs of breasts to the infants of humans and young of other animals, without it being polluted by red blood and filthy excrement, sending also their mothers’ tenderness to assist them. Then just as in truly wondrous fashion He causes the appropriate sustenance to hasten to all the trees, which need a sort of food, so He bestows an extensive table of foods on man’s senses, which require sustenance physical and non-physical, and on his mind, heart, and spirit. It is as though the universe consists of hundreds of thousands of laden tables of every different kind and sort, all enfolded one within the other like the petals of the rose and shirts of the maize cob. With a multitude of various tongues, particular and universal, to the number of tables and the foods they bear and their bounties, these point out to everyone who is not completely blind a Most Merciful Provider, an All-Compassionate and Munificent One.
If it is said: The calamities, ugliness, and evils in this world are contrary to that all-embracing mercy, and spoil it.
The Answer: This question has been answered completely satisfactorily in various parts of the Risale-i Nur such as the Treatise On Divine Determining. Referring you to them, here we make only a brief allusion, as follows:
All the elements, all the realms of beings, and all creatures, have numerous duties, particular and universal, and each of those duties yields numerous results and fruits. For the most part these are beneficial, beautiful, good, and are mercy. Only a few of them encounter those lacking ability, those who act wrongly, or those who deserve punishment and disciplining, or those who will be the means of producing many shoots of good. An apparent, minor evil is ugliness; it is apparently unkind. But if for that minor evil not to occur, the element and universal being is prevented by mercy from performing its duty, then all its other good and beautiful results would not come into existence. Since the non-existence of a good is evil and the spoiling of beauty is ugly, evils, ugliness, and pitilessness would occur to the number of those results. Thus, hundreds of evil and instances of unkindness would be perpetrated just so that one evil would not occur, which would be entirely contrary to wisdom, benefit, and the mercy of dominicality. For example, things like snow, cold, fire, and rain have hundreds of benefits and purposes. If through their own choice careless or imprudent people harm themselves, for instance if they put their hands in the fire and say there is no mercy in its creation, the innumerable good, beneficial, merciful uses of fire will give them the lie, and hit them in the mouth.
Moreover, man’s selfish desires and lowly emotions, which are blind to consequences, cannot be the criteria, measure, or balance of the laws of mercy, sovereignty, and dominicality which are in force in the universe. He sees things according to the colour of his own mirror. A black-hearted, cruel person sees the universe as weeping, ugly, dark, and tyrannical. But if he looks through the eye of belief, he sees a macroanthropos clothed in seventy thousand beautiful garments one over the other, sewn of instances of mercy, good, and wisdom. Like a houri of Paradise dressed in seventy fine garments, it is always laughing, smiling with mercy. He will observe that mankind within it is a miniature universe, and each individual man a microcosm. He will exclaim with all his heart and spirit:
“All praise be to God, the Sustainer of All the Worlds * The Merciful, the Compassionate. * Owner of the Day of Judgement!”
FOURTH PHRASE: ‘Owner of the Day of Judgement’
A very concise indication of the proof contained in this phrase:
Firstly: All the evidences which testify to the proof of ‘And to Him is your return,’ and to the resurrection of the dead and hereafter at the end of the Part One of this lesson, testify to the extensive truth of belief which ‘Owner of the Day of Judgement’ indicates.
Secondly: As is said at the end of the Tenth Word, just as the eternal dominicality, mercy, and wisdom of the universe’s Maker, and his pre-eternal and post-eternal beauty, glory, and perfection, and His endless other attributes and hundreds of Names certainly require the hereafter; so does the Qur’an testify to the abode of the hereafter with thousands of its verses and proofs, as does Muhammad (Peace and blessings be upon him) with his hundreds of miracles and evidences, and all the prophets (Peace be upon them) and the revealed books and scriptures, with their innumerable evidences. The person, therefore, who does not believe in the everlasting life of the hereafter casts himself into a sort of Hell in this world, arising from his unbelief, and suffers constant torment. As is described in A Guide For Youth, through their death and parting, all the past and the future and creatures and universes continuously rain down endless pains on his spirit and heart, making him suffer the torments of Hell before going there.
Thirdly: ‘The Day of Judgement’ (Yawm al-Din) alludes to a vast and powerful proof of the resurrection of the dead, but a situation has arisen here causing the postponement of that proof to another time. Perhaps too, no need remains for it. For various parts of the Risale-i Nur have proved with hundreds of powerful arguments that the morning and spring of the resurrection of the dead and Great Gathering will occur as certainly as day follows night and spring follows winter.
FIFTH PHRASE: ‘You alone do we worship and from You alone do we seek help.’
It occurred to me that before pointing out the proof contained in this phrase, I should relate a true journey of the imagination which is described in the Twenty-Ninth Letter. It was like this:
As is explained in the Risale-i Nur, and especially in the Qur’anic commentary, Signs of Miraculousness (Isharat al-I‘jaz) and The Eight Symbols (Rumûz-u Semâniye), one time when I was seeking out the Qur’an’s miracles I found four or five miraculous predictions at the end of Sura al-Fath and an historical miracle in the verse: This day We shall save you in your body,9 and even flashes of miraculousness in numerous other words and sometimes miraculous points in letters. Then, when reciting Sura al-Fatiha during the prayers, a question occurred to me in order to inform me of a miracle in the Nun of na‘budu and nasta‘in ([You alone] do we worship [and from You alone] do we seek help).
Why was it not “You alone do I worship and from You alone do I seek help,” rather than the first person plural, that is, “We worship You and We seek help from You”? Suddenly the broad arena of a journey of the imagination opened up through the door of that “Nun” (we). I understood experientially the mighty mystery and vast benefits of praying in congregation, and that this single letter is a miracle, and I actually saw this. It was as follows:
At that time while performing the prayers in Bayezid Mosque in Istanbul, I said: “You alone do we worship and from You alone do we seek help.” I looked and saw that the congregation in the mosque was saying “Guide us!” the same as me; its members were all participating in my supplication, corroborating it. Then another veil was drawn back. I saw that all the mosques in Istanbul had as though become a huge Bayezid Mosque. All their congregations were exclaiming: “You alone do we worship and from You alone do we seek help” like me, setting their seals on my assertions and entreaties, and saying “Amen!” to them. Then within their taking on the form of intercessors for me, a further veil was unfolded in my imagination. I saw that the World of Islam had assumed the form of a huge mosque, with Mecca and the Ka‘ba as the mihrab. The rows of all the Muslims performing the prayers were in circles facing the sacred mihrab. Saying like me “You alone do we worship and from You alone do we seek help * Guide us...” each was both supplicating in the name of all, and testifying, and affirming it; also making all the others intercessors for himself. Then, when thinking: “What such a vast community claims could not be wrong and its supplications would not be rejected; it repulses Satanic doubts,” and when affirming the vast, self-evident benefits of performing the prayers in congregation, another veil was unfolded. I saw that the universe and all the varieties of creatures were as though performing the prayers through the tongues of their beings and worshipping in a way particular to each. Responding with extensive worship to the all-embracing dominicality of the Glorious All-Worshipped One, each group affirmed the testimonies and affirmation of Divine unity of all the others. While observing that this was the case since they all take up positions proving the same result, yet another veil was unfolded. I saw that just as the universe, the macroanthropos, exclaims: “You alone do we worship and from You alone do we seek help” with the tongue of disposition, and numerous of its parts declare it through the tongue of capacity and innate need, and conscious beings say it verbally, all thus displaying their worship before the Creator’s compassionate dominicality; in just the same way, through the silent tongue of need and submission to their Creator’s dominicality, all the particles, powers, and senses of my body, like those of all my companions in that vast congregation, each resembling a tiny universe, declared: “You alone do we worship and from You alone do we seek help.” In this way they showed that they were acting in accordance with the Divine will and command and were at every instant in need of their Creator’s grace and mercy and assistance. And just as entering through the door of the Nun, I had observed in wonderment both the sacred mystery of performing the prayers in congregation and the beautiful miracle of the Nun, so I went out from it. “All praise be to God!”, I exclaimed. Thereafter I became accustomed to reciting the verse, You alone do we worship and from You alone do we seek help on account of those three congregations and those companions, great and small.
Now we have completed the introduction and come to our main topic, and a brief indication of the proof alluded to by You alone do we worship and from You alone do we seek help:
Firstly: We see with our own eyes that in the universe and especially on the face of the earth, within an awesome, continuous, regular activity and creativity, a compassionate, administering absolute dominicality responds with perfect wisdom and favour to the pleas for help and entreaties made by act, tongue, and state, replying actively to each. Sound intelligences and the eye of belief see within the appearance of this dominicality, the response of the manifestation of an absolute Godhead, an Object of universal worship, to the thousands of sorts of worship of all beings, particularly living beings, and the voluntary, innate worship of all the groups of mankind in all its varieties. All the revealed scriptures and prophets also tell of this.
Secondly: As signified by the nun of na‘budu in the introduction above, each of the three congregations, and all of them, being engaged all together in their different, innate, voluntary worship, is without doubt a grateful response to a ‘worshippedness,’ and a boundless, unequivocal testimony to a Most Holy Object of Worship. As signified by the nun of nasta’in, the three congregations mentioned above, that is, every group and every individual from the totality of the universe to the congregation of the particles of a living body utters pleas for help and supplications both by act and state, testifying indubitably to the One Who administers them compassionately and hastens to assist them, and replies to and accepts their entreaties. For example, as is said in the Twenty-Third Word, the acceptance of the three sorts of supplications of all the creatures on the earth in a way which is truly wondrous and beyond all expectation, testifies definitely to a Compassionate Sustainer and Answerer of Prayer. Yes, before our eyes the supplications of grains and seeds to their Creator through the tongue of innate capacity to become shoots and trees, are accepted. Similarly, all living creatures seeking from someone through the tongue of innate need, their sustenance, which their hands cannot reach, and all their vital necessities and desires, which are beyond their power, testifies clearly to a Munificent Creator Who before our eyes accepts all those supplications they offer through the tongue of innate need, and at exactly the right time wisely makes strange, unconscious creatures speedily reply to their calls for help.
Thus, as in the above two paragraphs, the acceptance of the verbal supplications of all groups, especially the wondrous acceptance of the prophets’ (Peace be upon them) supplications and those of the elite, attest to the proof of Divine unity which From You alone do we seek help comprises.
SIXTH PHRASE: ‘Guide us to the Straight Path’
Yes, just as the shortest way among paths leading from one place to another, and the shortest of lines drawn from one distant point to another, are the straightest and most direct; in exactly the same way, the straightest and most direct of spiritual paths and interior ways are the shortest and easiest. For example, all the comparisons in the Risale-i Nur between the ways of belief and unbelief demonstrate decisively that the way of belief and the affirmation of Divine unity is extremely short, direct, straight, and easy, while the ways of unbelief and denial are extremely lengthy, difficult, and dangerous. That is to say, unbelief and the association of partners with God are not tenable in this straight, wise universe, in which everything is driven down the easiest and shortest path, and belief and the affirmation of Divine unity are as necessary and essential in the universe as the sun.
Also, the most comfortable, beneficial, and the shortest and safest way in human morality and conduct is the way of the straight path and moderation.
For example, if the power of reason deviates from the wisdom of the middle way and the easy, beneficial straight path, it falls into either excess and a pernicious wiliness, or deficiency and a calamitous stupidity, and is prey to all sorts of difficulties on their lengthy paths.
And if the power of anger does not follow the path of courage, which is the middle way, it descends into either excess and a most injurious, oppressive fury and arrogance, or into deficiency and an abased, painful cowardice and timidity, and as the penalty for the error of deviating from the straight path, suffers continuous torments of the conscience.
And if the power of animal appetites strays from the safe middle way of chastity, it falls into either excess and a calamitous, shameful debauchery and immorality, or into deficiency and frigidity, that is, an inability to experience pleasure, and suffers the torments of that spiritual sickness.
Thus, like these, in personal life and social life, in all their ways, the direct path is the easiest, shortest, and most beneficial. And ways other than the straight path are full of troubles, and are lengthy and harmful.
That is to say, just as Guide us to the straight path is a comprehensive supplication and wide-reaching worship, so it indicates a proof of Divine unity, instruction in wisdom, and moral training.
SEVENTH PHRASE: ‘The path of those whom You have blessed’
A concise indication of the proof contained in this phrase:
Firstly: The answer to the question of who “those” are, is the verse:
Of the prophets [who teach], the sincere [lovers of the truth], the witnesses [or martyrs] [who testify], and the righteous [who do good].10
This verse lists the four classes of mankind who have received the bounty of right-guidance. That is, with “the prophets” it indicates Muhammad (Peace and blessings be upon him), who is the leader of the four classes, with “the sincere [lovers of the truth]” Abu Bakr the Veracious, and with “the witnesses [or martyrs] [who testify]” ‘Umar, Uthman, and ‘Ali (May God be pleased with them). With these prophecies, that after the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) and after Abu Bakr, both ‘Umar, and ‘Uthman, and ‘Ali would be both Caliphs and martyrs, this verse displays a flash of miraculousness.
Secondly: The truth of Divine unity, which these most elevated, most true and rightly-guided four classes of mankind have taught with all their strength since the time of Adam, with innumerable proofs, miracles, wonders, evidences, and illuminations, and whom the majority of mankind have affirmed, is most certainly as definite as the sun. With their hundreds of thousands of miracles and proofs, these pre-eminent members of mankind have proved their veracity and truthfulness, and their consensus and agreement in positive matters such as Divine unity and the Creator’s necessary existence forms such a proof it can be in no way doubted. They are the straightest and the most veracious and verified of guides and the leaders in perfection among mankind, and man is the most important result of the universe, the Divine vicegerent on earth, and of living creatures the most elevated and with the most comprehensive capacity. Those therefore who do not recognize a truth upon which those four classes have unanimously agreed, and deny the truths in which they believed unshakeably, with ‘absolute certainty’, ‘vision of certainty’, and ‘knowledge of certainty’, and in proof of which they put forward the universe together with all its beings, such deniers surely perpetrate an infinite crime and are deserving of infinite punishment.
EIGHTH PHRASE: ‘Not those who have received Your wrath nor those who have gone astray’
A concise indication of the proof contained in this phrase:
Based on unanimous reports, and universal, certain events and observations, human history and the sacred revealed scriptures relate in clear, definite fashion how on thousands of occasions succour arrived wondrously from the Unseen for the prophets, the people of the straight path, and how what they sought was given them exactly, and how on hundreds of occasions wrath and heavenly blows were visited on their enemies, the deniers. This demonstrates conclusively and unmistakably that the universe and mankind within it have a sovereign, just, generous, munificent, mighty, subjugating Disposer and Sustainer Who in various historical incidents wondrously bestowed victory and salvation on many of the prophets such as Noah, Abraham, Moses, Hud, and Salih (Peace be upon them), and visited terrible heavenly calamities on numerous oppressors and deniers like the Thamud, ‘Ad, and Pharaoh, as punishment in this world too for rebellion against the prophets.
Since the time of Adam (Peace be upon him), two mighty conflicting currents have come down to us. One is that of the people of prophethood, righteousness, and belief, who, following the straight path, receive the bounty of happiness in this world and the next. Since they act in accordance with the true beauty, order, and perfection of the universe, they both receive the favours of the universe’s Owner, and experience happiness in this world and the next. Being the means of mankind rising to the level of the angels, or higher, through the truths of belief they attain to a sort of Paradise in this world, and to bliss in the hereafter, and they cause others to win these too.
As for the second current, because it deviates from the straight path and through excess and deficiency transforms the intelligence into an instrument of torture amassing pains, it casts humanity down to a degree lower than the animals. Moreover, in addition to receiving the blows of Divine wrath in return for their wrongdoing in this world, due to their intelligences, they see the universe as a place of universal mourning and as the slaughterhouse of living creatures toppling over in death, and as exceedingly ugly and confused, thus causing their consciences to suffer a perpetual Hell in this world and making themselves deserving of everlasting torment in the next.
Thus, the verse,
Not those who have received Your wrath nor those who have gone astray
at the end of Sura al-Fatiha informs us of these two mighty currents. It is also the source, basis, and master of all the comparisons in the Risale-i Nur. Since the treatises of the Risale-i Nur expound this verse with hundreds of comparisons, we refer you to them for further explanation, and here suffice with this brief indication.
NINTH PHRASE: ‘Amen’
An extremely brief allusion to this:
The nun in na’budu and nasta’in points out to us those three great congregations, particularly the congregations of those who affirm Divine unity in the mosque of the World of Islam, and especially the congregations of millions performing the prayers at that time, and it places us among them and opens the way for us to receive a share of their intercession; we too, then, through the word “Amen,” join in the supplications of that congregation of believing worshippers, affirming what they say, and offering a plea that their intercession and seeking of help will be accepted. It transforms our insignificant worship, supplications, and entreaties into universal, extensive worship, causing universal dominicality to respond to it. That is to say, through the mystery of the brotherhood of belief and Islamic unity, through the bonds of unity of the congregation of millions in the mosque of the Islamic world at the time of the prayers, and by means of ‘spiritual radios,’ the “Amen” at the end of Sura al-Fatiha acquires universality and may become millions of “Amens.”11
All praise be to God, the Sustainer of All the Worlds.
Glory be unto to You! We have no knowledge save that which you taught us; indeed, You are All-Knowing, All-Wise.12
In the Name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate
And from Him do we seek help
[Part Three of a single lesson of the third School of Joseph]
Introduction
Part Two was written at the implied command of Sura al-Fatiha in the five daily prayers, and through the effulgence of ‘I testify that there is no god but God.’ Now I have been obliged —for three reasons I am not at present permitted to disclose— to write this Third Part, prompted by the tongue of ‘I testify that Muhammad is the Messenger of God,’ and through the effulgence of the sublime verses at the end of Sura al-Fath:
It is He Who sent His Prophet with guidance and the Religion of Truth, to proclaim it over all religion, and enough is God for a Witness. * Muhammad is the Messenger of God; and those who are with him are strong against unbelievers, [but] compassionate among each other,13
which contain five miraculous predictions. Referring the details, explanations, and documented proofs to The Miracles of Muhammad in Zülfikâr, which is about the Messengership of Muhammad (PBUH), and to the Arabic al-Hizb al-Nuri in The Supreme Sign, here shall be written very briefly and concisely in the second and third of three ‘Indications’, a summary of the Hizb al-Nuri and a sort of translation of the part of the testimony of faith “Muhammad is the Messenger of God” which I constantly use in my Arabic reflective thought together with the affirmation of Divine unity, repeating them in the tesbihat following the prayers.
FIRST INDICATION
Muhammad (Peace and blessings be upon him), who responded with universal worship and teaching to the manifestation of the dominicality of the universe’s Owner, and His eternal Godhead, and His infinite bounties, is as necessary for the universe as is the sun. For he is the supreme master of mankind and its greatest prophet, the Glory of the World, and the one addressed by “If not for you, if not for you, I would not have created the spheres.”14 The Muhammadan Reality was the reason for the world’s creation, and is its result and most perfect fruit. So too, truths connected with the universe such as its true perfections and its being the enduring mirrors of an eternal Beauteous One of Glory, and the manifestation of His Names, and the works —charged with duties— of His wise acts, and His most meaningful missives, and its bearing an everlasting world, and its producing the result of the hereafter and an abode of bliss for which all conscious creatures yearn, — these are all realized through the Muhammadan (PBUH) Reality and his messengership. Since this is so, the universe testifies most powerfully and decisively to his messengership. Moreover, the messengership of Muhammad (PBUH) and the Muhammadan Reality give certain good news of eternal life, which, in order to be saved from non-existence, nothingness, eternal extinction, and absolute annihilation, foremost the World of Islam, and all mankind and all conscious creatures, constantly and earnestly seek, with all the powers of their comprehensive natures, with the tongues of all their abilities, and with all their supplications, worship, and entreaties. They thus testify to Muhammad’s messengership and the Muhammadan Reality, endorsing that he is the pride of mankind and the most noble of creatures. Moreover, in accordance with the rule “the cause is like the doer,” the equivalent of all the good works performed every day by three hundred and fifty million believers being recorded in Muhammad’s (Peace and blessings be upon him) book of good works, and the single person of Muhammad (PBUH) attaining to a ‘station’ manifesting the universal worship and effulgence of hundreds of millions of righteous worshippers, and perhaps thousands of millions, testifies in truly powerful fashion to his messengership, affirming it.
SECOND INDICATION
The following indicates more than twenty testimonies, which I always ponder over reflectively in the course of my invocations:
Muhammad is the Messenger of God, ever faithful to his promise, through the testimony of his sudden appearance with a perfect religion, Islam, and Shari‘a despite being unlettered, with the firmest belief, faith, and worship, the most elevated cause, supplications, and prayers, the most general message, utter steadfastness, and wondrous fruitfulness, all without equal.
A translation of the above15 and a brief exposition of its meaning are the following testimonies to the messengership of Muhammad (PBUH).
The First is a proof of prophethood proceeding from eleven of his attributes and states. Yes, his appearing —despite being unlettered— suddenly and without experience with a religion which has left in amazement the learned men and philosophers of fourteen centuries and has won first place among the revealed religions is an attribute without equal.
Also unequalled is the fact that Islam, which emerged from his words, actions, and conduct, has at all times educated and trained the spirits, souls, and minds of three hundred and fifty million people, taking them to spiritual advancement.
Moreover, he appeared with such a Shari‘a that for fourteen centuries it has ruled with its just laws one fifth of mankind, leading it to material and spiritual progress.
So too that Being (PBUH) appeared with such a faith and creed, and such strength of belief that all the people of reality have unanimously affirmed that, since they receive perpetual effulgence from it, his belief was at the highest and strongest degree. The opposition of his innumerable opponents at that time not causing him the slightest anxiety, doubt, or scruple, shows too that the strength of his belief was without equal or like.
He also displayed such worship of God and servitude to Him that bringing together the beginning and end of worship, imitating no one, he saw and conformed to the subtlest mysteries of worship, and fulfilled them even in times of greatest disturbance. This was an incomparable attribute, as was his offering such prayers, supplications and entreaties to his Creator that up to the present his degree has not been reached, even with the meeting of many minds. For example, in the supplication Jawshan al-Kabir, taking as intercessor a thousand and one Divine Names, he so describes and acquaints his Creator that it has no like. Thus, no one has attained to his knowledge of God.
He called people to religion with such steadfastness and announced his prophethood with such boldness that although his people, his uncle, the great powers of the world, and the followers of the former religions were all opposed and hostile to him, he did not fear or hold back even a jot, but challenged them all and successfully accomplished his task. This too was an unparalleled attribute.
Thus, these eight wondrous, matchless attributes form a truly powerful testimony to his veracity and prophethood. They show too that there is complete certainty concerning his utter seriousness, trustworthiness, veracity, and truthfulness. Every day in the tashahhud with millions of tongues the World of Islam declares: “Peace be upon you, O Prophet! And may God’s mercy and blessings be upon you.” It submits to the function with which he was charged, and affirming the good news of the eternal happiness which he brought, it gratefully says: “Peace be upon you, O Prophet!” in the face of the sure way leading to eternal life which mankind seeks and yearns for with an innate, profound longing, thus meeting with him in spirit and congratulating him in the name of three hundred million, indeed, thousands of millions.
The Second Testimony, which comprises twenty universal testimonies, as well as many others: Through the testimony to his veracity of all truths of the pillars of belief.
That is, the truths, realities, and veracity of the six pillars of belief testify decisively to Muhammad’s (PBUH) messengership and veracity. For the collective personality of his life as Messenger and the basis of all he claimed and the essence of his prophethood were those six pillars. In which case, all the evidences verifying the pillars of belief proved the truth of Muhammad’s (PBUH) messengership, and his veracity. The evidences for the hereafter of the other pillars of faith are set forth in The Fruits of Belief (Meyve Risalesi) and the Addenda of the Tenth Word; and all the pillars together with their proofs form a proof of his messengership.
The Third Universal Testimony, which comprises thousands of testimonies: Through the testimony of his self (Peace and blessings be upon him), through his thousands of miracles, perfections, and fine morality.
That is: he was a proof of himself as brilliant as the sun, through the powerful testimony to his messengership and veracity of his thousands of miracles, attainments and perfections, and his elevated character and fine morality. Yes, as is proved in the wondrous treatise of The Miracles of Muhammad (PBUH) through more than three hundred sound narrations, in accordance with the explicit verses
And the moon split,16
and
And when you threw, it was not you who threw; it was rather God that threw,17
the moon splitting in two at the sign of a single finger of his hand; and water flowing forth in five springs from the five fingers of the same hand, and an entire thirsty army drinking from these and testifying to it; and his casting a handful of dust with the same hand at an attacking enemy army, and their turning tail and fleeing when the dust entered the eyes of all of them; and small pebbles uttering glorifications in the same hand, as though they were human, saying: “Glory be to God!” —hundreds of incidents such as these, which are related in ‘sound’ narrations; and some about which there are unanimous reports described in the histories, and miracles, which according to exacting scholars numbered around a thousand, appearing at his hand; and according to friend and foe alike his fine attributes and good character being of the very highest degree;18 and the unanimous agreement —at the degree of ‘absolute certainty’— of all the people of reality, who have attained to spiritual perfection through following him and reached ‘the vision of certainty’ in the realities, that Muhammad’s (PBUH) perfections and attainments were of the very highest level; and the spiritual achievements of the World of Islam, which proceeds from his religion; as well as the truths of mighty Islam — all these furnish evidence for his wondrous perfections. This surely means that this Being (PBUH) testified in most brilliant and universal fashion to his own messengership.
The Fourth Testimony, which comprises numerous powerful testimonies: Through the testimony of the Qur’an, with all its truths and proofs. That is, the Qur’an of Miraculous Exposition testifies to his messengership and veracity with its innumerable truths and proofs.
Yes, with all its veracious truths, the Qur’an of Mighty Stature, which as is proved Zülfikâr is miraculous in forty respects, has illumined fourteen centuries and governed through its unchanging laws one fifth of mankind; and from that time to this has challenged all those who have opposed it; and not even one of the suras of which anyone has dared to produce the like of; and as is proved in The Supreme Sign, whose six aspects are luminous and cannot be penetrated by doubts; and whose veracity is endorsed by six supreme ‘stations’; which is based on six unshakeable truths; and is eagerly and respectfully recited every moment by hundreds and millions of tongues, and is inscribed with its sacredness on the hearts of hafizes; and from whose testimony proceeds all the testimony and belief of the World of Islam; and from whose source flow forth all the sciences of belief and of Islam; and just as it affirms all the previous revealed scriptures, so is it affirmed by them; — with all its truths and all its proofs of its veracity, the Qur’an of Mighty Stature testifies to the truthfulness and messengership of Muhammad (Peace and blessings be upon him).
The Fifth, Sixth, Seventh, and Eighth Universal Testimonies:
Through the testimony of Jawshan al-Kabir, and the sacredness of its allusions; and the Risale-i Nur, and the power of its proofs; and the past, and the unanimity of its signs of a forthcoming prophet; and the future, and the confirmation of thousands of its events.
That is to say, Jawshan al-Kabir, which looks both explicitly and allusively to a thousand and one Divine Names; is a wondrous supplication that in one respect proceeds from the Qur’an; is superior to all the other invocations recited by those who advance in knowledge of God; which was brought as revelation by Gabriel during a military expedition, who said: “Cast away your armour and in its place read this Jawshan!” — the truths it contains and its perfectly accurate descriptions of the Sustainer testify to Muhammad’s (PBUH) messengership and veracity. So too, through proving rationally and logically as a single proof with its one hundred and thirty parts all the truths of the messengership of Muhammad (PBUH), and teaching matters which in the view of philosophy are remote from reason in the most reasonable and easy fashion as though they were before one’s very eyes, the Risale-i Nur —which in one respect received effulgence from the Jawshan and was born of it— testifies in universal fashion to Muhammad’s (PBUH) messengership and veracity.
Also, the past was a universal witness to his messengership, for numerous incidents which occurred before the commencement of his prophethood called irhasat, and wonders which were counted as miracles of the coming prophet and are related unanimously in the histories and books of biography, testify in authentic fashion to his messengership. These are of many different sorts. A part of them are described in the coming ‘Testimonies’ below, and others are related in the form of sound narrations in Zülfikâr and in books of history.
For example, close to the time of the Prophet’s (PBUH) birth stones being rained down from the claws of the ababil birds on the heads of Abraha’s soldiers, who had come to destroy the Ka‘ba; and on the night of his birth the idols in the Ka‘ba all toppling over; and the palace of Chrosroes the Persian being destroyed; and the fire-worshipping Zoroastrians’ fire being extinguished that night, which had been burning continuously for a thousand years; and on the certain reports of Bahira the Monk and Halima al-Sa‘diya, clouds throwing shadows around his head; numerous events like these gave forewarning of his prophethood before its commencement.
Also, there were very many events of differing kinds that he predicted would occur in the future, that is, after his death. Some were prophecies about his Family and Companions, and the conquests of Islam, which are given in The Miracles of Muhammad in Zülfikâr, together with their authentic sources. Others were eighty accurate predictions, including ‘Uthman (May God be pleased with him) being martyred while reading the Qur’an, Husayn (May God be pleased with him) being martyred at Karbala, the conquests of Syria and Iran and Istanbul, and emergence of the ‘Abbasid dynasty, and Jenghiz and Hulagu defeating and destroying it, have all been described in detail on the basis of sound narrations and the books of history and the Prophet’s biography. This means that numerous predictions of future events, and the future, which proved Muhammad’s (PBUH) veracity, testify also in powerful and universal fashion to Muhammad’s messengership and its veracity.
The Ninth, Tenth, Eleventh, and Twelfth Testimonies:
Through the testimony of Muhammad’s Family to his veracity through the power of their certain belief at the degree of ‘absolute certainty;’ and of his Companions, through their perfect belief at the degree of ‘the vision of certainty;’ and of the purified scholars through the power of their investigations at the degree of ‘knowledge of certainty;’ and of the spiritual poles, through the conformity of their illuminations and unfoldings with his messengership and its certainty.
That is, of the universal testimonies to Muhammad’s (PBUH) truthfulness and veracity,
The Ninth: With their unanimous and absolutely certain belief, and their unfoldings and illuminations, and the extraordinary guidance they gave the Umma and their wonder-working, the great saints of Prophet’s (PBUH) Family, who in benedictions for the Prophet are held equal to the descendants of Abraham (Peace be upon him), who manifested the meaning of “The scholars of my community are the equivalent of the prophets of the Children of Israel,”19 and ‘Ali, Hasan, Husayn, and the twelve Imams of the Prophet’s Family, and the spiritual poles and leaders like Gawth al-A‘zam, Ahmad al-Rufa’i, Ahmad al-Badawi, Ibrahim al-Dassuqi, and Abu’l-Hasan al-Shazali all ratified through their belief and testimonies the messengership, veracity, and truthfulness of Muhammad (PBUH).
The Tenth: The Companions of the Prophet, regarded as the most elevated and esteemed group after the prophets, through the light of Muhammad (PBUH) came in a short time to govern with justice from east to west despite being illiterate nomads, and becoming advanced, educated, civilized masters, teachers, diplomats and just judges, they defeated world powers and made that century into an age of happiness. After scrutinizing every aspect of his conduct, through the power of the many miracles they witnessed with their own eyes, they abandoned their former enmities and the ways of their forefathers, and many of them such as Khalid ibn al-Walid and Ikrima Ibn Abu Jahl gave up the tribalism of their fathers. Their embracing Islam in truly devoted and self-sacrificing manner, and believing in Muhammad’s veracity and messengership at the degree of ‘vision of certainty’ forms an unshakeable universal testimony.
The Eleventh: The belief in Muhammad’s messengership and veracity in reasoned, logical manner at the degree of ‘knowledge of certainty’ of the mujtahids, imams, and authoritative scholars, who are known as the purified ones and veracious ones, and of the thousands of investigative scholars such as the brilliant philosophers Ibn Sina and Ibn Rushd, based on thousands of categorical arguments and definitive proofs, each following his own way, forms a testimony so universal that only one with the intelligence of all of them could oppose them.
One of those innumerable witnesses at the present time is the Risale-i Nur, before which the deniers have found themselves helpless, so deceiving the police and judiciary, have tried to silence it by means of the courts.
The Twelfth: In their spiritual progress, the profoundest people of reality and researchers into the realities known as spiritual poles, each of whom drew into the circle of his instruction a significant part of the Umma in the World of Islam, and through his wondrous guidance and wonder-working caused those people to advance spiritually, and whose progress was based on illumination and disclosing the realities in place of proofs —they saw ‘experientially’ through their illuminations Muhammad’s (PBUH) messengership and truthfulness and that his veracity was of the very highest degree. Their unanimous and mutually conforming testimony to his prophethood forms such a signature that no one who does not attain to a degree of perfections as elevated as all of them can erase it.
The Thirteenth Testimony, which consists of four universal, most extensive and definite proofs:
Through the testimony of the past and the agreement in the tidings of the soothsayers, the voices from the Unseen, and the gnostics in all the periods of the past, and the testimony of the tidings of the prophets and Divine messengers, Peace be upon them, and the good news of the messengership of Muhammad, Peace and blessings be upon him, in the previous holy scriptures.
A brief explanation of the above passage will be given here, for there are precise details together with the chains of authorities in the end section of The Miracles of Muhammad, in Zülfikâr.
It is recorded with sound narrations, and in part with unanimous reports, in the histories and books of Hadith and the Prophet’s biography that among the most prominent and famous of mankind in past times, foremost the prophets and the gnostics, soothsayers, and ‘voices from the Unseen’ foretold Muhammad’s (PBUH) messengership and coming unanimously, explicitly and repeatedly in the form of irhasat. Since the most powerful and certain of those thousands of predictions are described in detail in The Miracles of Muhammad, we refer you to that and here only say by way of a brief indication: out of hundreds in the revealed scriptures of the Torah, Gospels, and Psalms, brought by the prophets, twenty verses about the prophethood of Muhammad (PBUH) which are close to being explicit are written in the Nineteenth Letter (The Miracles of Muhammad). While Husayn al-Jisri found a hundred verses about Muhammad’s prophethood, despite the numerous corruptions in their texts made by Jews and Christians, and wrote them in his book.20
According to a sound narration concerning which were unanimous reports, the soothsayers, and foremost Shiqq and Satih, who by means of jinns and spirit beings gave information about the Unseen and are now called mediums, foretold explicitly the coming of God’s Messenger (PBUH) and that he would wipe out the Persian Empire. They stated repeatedly in a way that could not be doubted that a prophet was shortly to appear in the Hijaz.
Similarly, Ka‘b ibn Lu’ayy, one of the Prophet’s forefathers and a gnostic, and many other gnostics and the saints of that time such as the rulers of Yemen and Abyssinia, Sayf ibn Dhi Yazan and Tubba, foretold clearly Muhammad’s (PBUH) messengership, and proclaimed it in their poetry. The most important and certain of these are included in the Nineteenth Letter. One of those kings even said: “I would choose to be Muhammad’s (PBUH) servant in preference to ruling this kingdom.” Another said: “If I had lived to see him, I would have been his cousin.” That is, I would have been a devoted servant and minister of his like ‘Ali (May God be pleased with him). The histories and books of biography have published all these prophecies, showing that the gnostics affirmed Muhammad’s (PBUH) messengership and veracity with a powerful, universal testimony.
Similarly, spirit beings called ‘hatif,’ which are heard but not seen, made predictions about Muhammad’s messengership, the same as the gnostics and soothsayers, foretelling his prophethood in most explicit fashion. Also, by foretelling his prophethood, many other things affirmed his messengership and veracity, such as animals sacrificed to idols, idols, and gravestones, testifying through the tongue of history.
The Fourteenth Testimony: The following Arabic piece alludes to the universe’s powerful testimony:
Through the testimony of the universe to the comprehensive messengership of Muhammad (PBUH) through its aims and the Divine purposes in it, which would otherwise come to nothing, for through the sending of man and particularly of Muhammad its value and duties were established, and its beauties and perfections became clear, and the wisdom in its truths were realized. For his messengership revealed them and was the means of their realization. If it had not been for his messengership, this perfect universe, this eternal and meaningful mighty book, would have gone for nothing, its meanings would have vanished and its perfections declined utterly, which is impossible in numerous respects.
In The Supreme Sign, the above is interpreted as follows:
Just as the universe points to its Maker, Writer, and Inscriber, Who creates, administers, and organizes it, and Who decorating, determining, and planning it, has disposal over it as though it was a palace, a book, an exhibition, or place of display; so it requires and demands an elevated herald, a truthful discoverer, an exacting master, a faithful teacher, who will know the Divine purposes in its creation, and make them known, and will teach the instances of dominical wisdom in its changes, and announce the results of its dutiful motions, and proclaim its value and the perfections of the beings within it. Since this is so and it points to his existence, surely testifying in powerful and universal fashion to the veracity of Muhammad (Peace and blessings be upon him), who performed these duties better than anyone, and to his being the highest and most loyal official of its Creator, it declares: “I testify that Muhammad is the Messenger of God.”
Yes, through the Light Muhammad (PBUH) brought the universe’s nature, value, and perfections, and the duties, results, and value of the beings within it and the fact that they are officials, all became known and were realized. From top to bottom it became Divine missives full of meaning, an embodied dominical Qur’an, and a magnificent exhibition of Divine works. If not for his Light, it becomes a mere desolate ruin, confused, a terrible place of mourning, toppling over into the darknesses of non-existence, nothingness, death, and obliteration. It is in consequence of this truth that the universe’s perfections, purposeful transformations, and eternal meanings declare in powerful fashion: “We testify that Muhammad is the Messenger of God!”
The Fifteenth Testimony: The following is an Arabic piece which comprises numerous sacred testimonies. It indicates the sacred testimony to Muhammad’s (PBUH) messengership given through the acts of the dominicality and deeds of mercifulness of the Necessarily Existent One Who has disposal over the universe, and through Whose will, command, and power occur all change and transformation, motion and rest, from minute particles to the planets, and all the disposals of life and death.
Through the testimony of the universe’s Owner, its Creator and Disposer, to the messengership of Muhammad, through the deeds of His mercifulness and acts of His dominicality; such as the mercy of revealing to him the Qur’an of Miraculous Exposition; and displaying many varieties of miracles at his hand; and assisting him and protecting him in all circumstances; and through perpetuating his religion together with all its truths; and by raising him to a position of high respect and honour and bestowal over all creatures, as is to be seen and observed; and His act of dominicality of making Muhammad’s messengership a spiritual sun in the universe, and making his religion the index of the perfections of His servants; and making his reality a comprehensive mirror to the manifestations of His Godhead; and His entrusting him with duties necessary for the existence of creatures in the universe such as mercy, wisdom, and justice, as necessary as food and water, and air and light.
Referring details of this most extensive, certain, and sacred testimony to the Risale-i Nur, here we shall merely take a look at a brief and concise meaning of it.
Since —in accordance with the justice and wisdom, mercy, favour, and protection which we see in the regular, orderly disposals in the universe— it is the practice of dominicality to always protect the good and deal blows at the bad and liars, as demanded by ‘the acts of His mercifulness,’ this world’s Disposer and Administrator revealed the Qur’an of Miraculous Exposition to Muhammad (PBUH); and He bestowed on him nearly a thousand miracles of very many sorts; and compassionately preserved him in all circumstances and dangerous situations, even by means of a pigeon and a spider; and gave him complete success in all his duties; and perpetuated his religion together with all its truths; and caused his religion of Islam to spread over all the earth and to all mankind; and by raising him to a position of honour above all creatures and a permanent rank of acceptance superior to all the pre-eminent of mankind and, as is agreed by friend and foe alike, bestowed on him the highest character and qualities, and made one fifth of mankind his community — all of which testify most decisively to his faithfulness and messengership; so we see from the point of view of ‘the acts of dominicality’ that this world’s Disposer and Administrator made Muhammad’s (PBUH) messengership a sun in the universe, and as is proved in the Risale-i Nur, caused it to dispel all kinds of darknesses and show its luminous truths, and make happy all conscious beings, indeed the universe, with the good news of eternal life; and He made his religion an index of perfections for all the acceptable people of worship and a sound programme for their acts of worship; and as is indicated by the Qur’an and Jawshan, He made Muhammad’s Reality, which is his collective personality, a comprehensive mirror to the manifestations of His Godhead; and as is indicated by the above-mentioned truths, and by the fact that every day for fourteen centuries he has gained the equivalent of all the good works of all his community, and by his works and traces in man’s social and spiritual life, He made him the highest leader, master, and authority of mankind; and sent him to the assistance of mankind with sacred, sublime duties, and made men as needy for his religion, his Shari‘a, and the truths of Islam21 as they are for mercy, wisdom, justice, food, air, water, and light; thus offering sacred testimony to Muhammad’s (PBUH) messengership with twelve universal, decisive proofs — since this is so, is it at all possible that the messengership of Muhammad (PBUH), which thus manifests these universal, extensive testimonies of the universe’s Owner, Who is not indifferent to the ordering of the wing of a fly even or a flower, should not be a Sun of the universe?
Each of these fifteen Testimonies comprise numerous testimonies, and through the tongue of miracles the Second even comprises thousands, thus proving the profession “I testify that Muhammad is the Messenger of God” most powerfully and definitely and proclaiming its reality, value, and importance, so that every day five times in the tashahhud the World of Islam announces it to the universe with millions of tongues. So too, thousands of millions of believers unhesitatingly accept and affirm that the Muhammadan (PBUH) Reality, which is the basis of that profession, is the original seed of the universe, a reason for its creation, and its most perfect fruit. And the universe’s Owner (May His Glory be exalted) made that collective personality of Muhammad (PBUH) the loudest herald of the sovereignty of His dominicality; the accurate discloser of the talisman of the universe and riddle of creation; a shining exemplar of His favour and mercy; an eloquent tongue of His compassion and love; the most powerful bringer of the good tidings of everlasting life and happiness in the eternal realm; and of His messengers, His final and greatest Prophet.
It may be seen from this what a great error, foolishness, and crime those people commit who do not accept a truth such as this, or attach no importance to it, and what a terrible loss they suffer.
Thus, as indicated in Part Two, Sura al-Fatiha in the ritual prayers demonstrates with decisive proofs the affirmation of Divine unity in the profession “I testify that there is no god but God,” which is said in the tashahhud, setting innumerable signatures to it; so too this Third Part sets forth powerful testimonies to the reality of messengership claimed in “I testify that Muhammad is God’s Messenger,” again stated in the tashahhud, stamping it with innumerable confirmatory signatures.
O Most Merciful of the Merciful! In veneration of Your Most Noble Messenger (PBUH) allow us his intercession, give us success in following his Sunna, and make us neighbours to his Family and Companions in the Realm of Bliss! Amen. Amen. Amen.
O God! Grant him blessings and peace, and to his Family and Companions, to the number of the letters of the Qur’an, both those recited and those written. Amen.
Glory be unto You! We have no knowledge save that which You have taught us; indeed, You are All-Knowing, All-Wise.22

The Shining Proof
Second Station
In the Name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate
And from Him do we seek help
[One of the truths contained in the last verse of Sura al-Fatiha, which indicates the comparison of the people of guidance and the straight path and the people of misguidance and rebellion, and is the source of all the comparisons in the Risale-i Nur, is expressed also in wondrous and miraculous fashion by the verse of Sura al-Nur:
God is the Light of the heavens and the earth. The parable of His light is as if there were a niche and within it a lamp; the lamp enclosed in glass; the glass as it were a brilliant star; lit from a blessed tree, an olive, neither of the east nor of the west, whose oil is well-nigh luminous, though fire scarce touched it: Light upon Light! God guides whom He will to His Light; God sets forth parables for men; and God knows all things.23
and a subsequent verse:
Or [the unbelievers’ state] is like the depths of darkness in a vast deep ocean, overwhelmed with billow topped by billow, topped by [dark] clouds...(to the end of the verse)]24
It is proved in the First Ray that the first verse above, the Light Verse, contains ten allusions to the Risale-i Nur; it miraculously foretells that Qur’anic commentary. This was the main reason the name ‘Nur’ (light) was given to the Risale-i Nur. In consequence of the description in the comparison of a journey of the imagination in a section of the Twenty-Ninth Letter, of a miracle resembling that of the “Nun of Na‘budu” in the word “Nur” in this extraordinary verse, the traveller in The Supreme Sign (Âyetü’l-Kübra) questioned the whole universe and every sort of being in order to seek, find, and learn about his Creator. He came to know Him through thirty-three ways and cogent proofs with ‘the certainty of knowledge’ and ‘the vision of certainty.’ The untiring, insatiable traveller journeyed too with his mind, heart, and imagination through the centuries and the levels of the heavens and earth, and seeing and inspecting the whole world as a city, he mounted his reason sometimes on the wisdom of the Qur’an, sometimes on philosophy, and gazing at the most distant levels through the powerful telescope of imagination, he saw reality as it is, and in part informed us of it in The Supreme Sign.
Now, of those many worlds and levels he entered on his journey of the imagination, which had the meaning of a comparison and was completely in conformity with reality, we shall explain by way of example only three levels, extremely concisely, in order to illustrate the comparison at the end of Sura al-Fatiha. However, this will be only from the point of view of the power of reason. We refer you to the Risale-i Nur for the other observations and comparisons.
The First Example is like this:
The traveller, who had come into the world solely to find his Creator and become acquainted with Him, said to his reason: “We have asked everything concerning our Creator and have received perfectly satisfying answers. In order to learn about the Sun one has to ask the Sun itself, so now we shall make a further journey in order to find and become acquainted with our Creator through the manifestations of His sacred attributes of knowledge, will, and power, and through His visible works, and through the manifestations of His Names.” So he entered the world. Then the people of misguidance, a second current, embarked on the ship of the earth. The traveller put on the spectacles of the science and philosophy which does not follow the wisdom of the Qur’an, and looking in accordance with the programme of the geography that does not read the Qur’an, saw that the earth was travelling seventy times faster than a cannon-ball, covering a twenty-thousand-year distance in one year in an orbit in the midst of the infinite void. It had taken upon itself myriad species of wretched, helpless living beings. He realized that if it confused its way even for a minute, or if a stray star collided with it, it would disintegrate, pouring all those wretched creatures into nothingness and non-existence. Perceiving the awesome calamity of the currents of
Not those who have received Your anger, nor those who have gone astray,25
and the suffocating darkness of
Or [the unbelievers’ state] is like the depths of darkness in a vast deep ocean,26
he exclaimed: “Alas! What have we done? Why did we board this terrible ship? Is there any way of being saved from it?” Then smashing the spectacles of blind philosophy, he joined the current of “Those whom You have blessed.”27
Suddenly the wisdom of the Qur’an came to his assistance. Giving to his reason a telescope which shows reality, it told him to look through it. He looked and saw the Name of Sustainer of the Heavens and Earth28 rising like a sun in the constellation of
It is He who has made the earth subservient to you, so traverse you its tracts, and eat of its sustenance.29
The Sustainer had made the earth an orderly, safe ship, and filled it with living beings together with their sustenance, causing it to journey around the sun in the seas of the universe for numerous benefits and instances of wisdom, bringing the produce of the seasons to those who wished for sustenance. Two angels called Thawr and Hut had been appointed captains of the ship, and they took it on its voyage through the magnificent dominical regions for the enjoyment of the Glorious Creator’s creatures and guests. The traveller understood that this showed the reality of “God is the Light of the heavens and the earth,” making known his Creator through this Name. With all his heart and spirit he exclaimed: “All praise be to God, the Sustainer of All the Worlds,” and joined the group of “Those whom You have blessed.”
The Second Sample of what the traveller saw on his journey through the worlds:
The traveller alighted from the ship of the earth and entered the world of animals and men. He looked at that world through the spectacles of the natural science which does not receive its spirit from religion, and saw that although those innumerable animate creatures had endless needs and were assaulted by numberless vexatious enemies and pitiless events, their capital was only a thousandth, or even a hundred thousandth of what they needed. Their power too was perhaps a millionth of what was necessary to combat those harmful things. Being connected to them through his intelligence and out of compassion for his fellow beings, he so pitied them in their ghastly plight, and feeling a hellish pain was so sorry and despairing, that he regretted a thousand times over his ever having come to that wretched world. Then suddenly Qur’anic wisdom came to his assistance, and handing him the telescope of “Those whom You have blessed,” it told him to look through it. He looked and saw that through the manifestation of “God is the Light of the heavens and the earth,” numerous Divine Names such as Most Merciful, All-Compassionate, Provider, Bestower, Munificent, and Preserver, each rose like the sun in the constellations of such verses as:
And there is no living thing but He has hold of its forelock.30 * The beasts do not carry their own sustenance; God sustains them, and you.31 * And we have ennobled the sons of Adam.32 * And the pious shall be in bliss.33
They filled the world of men and beasts with mercy and bounties, transforming it into a temporary Paradise. He understood that they make known perfectly the generous host of this fine, instructive guest-house, which is well worth being gazed upon, and a thousand times he repeated: “All praise be to God, the Sustainer of All the Worlds!”
The Third Example of the hundreds of his observations during his journey:
The traveller from the world, who wanted to know his Creator through the manifestations of His Names and attributes, turned to his mind and imagination and said: “Come! Like the spirits and angels we shall leave our bodies behind and ascend to the skies. We shall question the inhabitants of the heavens concerning our Creator.” His spirit mounted his imagination, and his mind mounted his thought, and together they rose to the heavens. They took astronomy as their guide, and looked with the view of the philosophy which does not heed religion, and the currents of “Those who have received Your wrath” and “Those who have gone astray.” He saw thousands of heavenly bodies and fiery stars, a thousand times larger than the earth and travelling a hundred times faster than a cannon-ball, speeding one within the other, unconscious, lifeless, and aimless. If by chance one of them had confused its way for a second, it would have collided with another unconscious globe in that boundless, empty, infinite world, causing utter confusion and chaos, like doomsday.
Whichever direction he looked, the traveller was filled with terror and bewilderment; he was sorry a thousand times over he had ascended to the skies. His mind and imagination went utterly to pieces. They declared: “Our duty is to see and point out fine truths. We resign then from observing and understanding such infernally ugly and painful things. We do not want any such thing.” Then suddenly, through the manifestation of “God is the Light of the heavens and the earth,” numerous Names like “Subjugator of the sun and moon,” and “Sustainer of all the worlds,” each rose like suns in the constellations of verses such as:
And We have adorned the lower heavens with lamps,34
and
Do they then not look at the heavens above them, how We have raised them and adorned them,35
and,
Then he withdrew to the sky and formed it into seven heavens.36
They filled all the heavens with light and with angels, transforming it into a huge mosque or military encampment. The traveller entered the current of “Those whom You have blessed.” He was saved from that of “Those who have gone astray” and “Or [the unbelievers’ state] is like the depths of darkness in a vast deep ocean.” He saw a magnificent land, as beautiful and well-ordered as Paradise. Observing that on all sides its inhabitants were making known the All-Glorious Creator, the value of his mind and imagination was increased a thousandfold, and their duties advanced likewise.
Referring to the Risale-i Nur the other observations of the traveller through the universe, which are comparable with these three examples out of hundreds, together with knowledge of the Necessarily Existent One through the manifestations of His Names, here we suffice with these brief indications and cut a long story short. Now, like that traveller through the world, we shall try to know the Creator of the universe through the works and manifestations of only three of His sacred ‘seven attributes:’ knowledge, will, and power. For details, we refer you to the Risale-i Nur.
The following piece in Arabic is the sum and substance of the Arabic Hizb al-Nuri,37 which I constantly recite reflectively. It expounds three of the thirty-three degrees of the phrase “God is Most Great” (Allahu Akbar). This is followed by a sort of translation of the Arabic piece, consisting of brief indications, which opens up the way to acquiring belief in Divine knowledge, will, and power at the degree of ‘the vision of certainty’ through pointing out their manifestations in the universe, a subject which greatly preoccupied the scholars of theology and of the tenets of belief. Through pointing out the manifestations of knowledge, will, and power, the following indications thus open up the way to complete belief —at the degree of knowledge of certainty— in the Necessarily Existent One’s existence and unity, and to the affirmation of that belief.
In the Name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate.
Say: “Praise be to God, Who begets no son, and has no partner in [His] dominion; nor [needs] He any to protect Him from humiliation; Yes, magnify Him for His greatness and glory!”38
God is greater than everything in respect of power and knowledge, for He is knowing of all things with all-encompassing knowledge necessary to His Essence.39 Nothing can be hidden from His knowledge because of the mystery of its presence and witnessing and all-encompassing luminosity; existence necessitates universality, and the light of knowledge encompasses all the world of existence. Yes, the balanced order, and regular balances, and general, purposeful wisdom, and all-embracing, particular favours, and the well-ordered decrees, and fruitful determining, and specified appointed hours of death, and the regular sustenance, and the wise skills, and the adorned solicitude, and the utterly perfect order, harmony, arrangement, proficiency, and balance, and absolute distinction with absolute ease all point to the all-encompassing knowledge of the One All-Knowing of the Unseen.
Should He not know, He that created? And He is the One Who understands the finest mysteries [and] is well-acquainted [with them].40
The comparison between man’s fine art, which points to his consciousness, and the fine creation of man, which points to man’s Creator, is the comparison between the tiny glimmer of a fire-fly on a dark night and the splendour of the sun at full noon.Offering a concise translation of the above, we shall make brief indications to Divine knowledge, this most important truth of belief, and refer detailed discussion of it to the Risale-i Nur.41Yes, just as mercy shows itself as clearly as the sun through the wonders of sustenance and proves decisively a Most Merciful and Compassionate One behind the veil of the Unseen; so too, through the wisdom, purposes, and fruits of order and balance in things, knowledge, which is mentioned in hundreds of Qur’anic verses and in one respect is the chief of the sacred seven attributes, displays itself like the light of the sun, making known with certainty the existence of One Knowledgeable of All Things. Yes, the comparison between ordered, measured art, which points to man’s consciousness and knowledge, and man’s fine creation, which indicates the knowledge and wisdom of man’s Creator, resembles the comparison between the tiny glow of the fire-fly on a dark night and the encompassing light of the sun at noon.Now, before explaining the evidences of Divine knowledge, we shall mention briefly the sacred conversation which took place during the Prophet’s Ascension. For Muhammad’s (PBUH) Ascension indicates and testifies that, through its manifestations in the universe, the sacred attribute of knowledge shows the Most Pure and Holy One most clearly. When on that night he received the Divine address in God’s presence, since he had been sent as an envoy on behalf of all living beings and every sort of creature, instead of giving the greeting (al-salam) of conscious beings, he said: “Salutations, blessings, benedictions and supplications, and good words — all are God’s,”42 thus offering to his Creator the creatures’ gifts, showing the manner they make known their Sustainer through the manifestations of the attribute of knowledge. That is, with the four words “Salutations, blessings, benedictions and supplications, and good words” he was alluding to the salutations, congratulations, worship, and recognition of the One All-Knowing of the Unseen of the four main groups of living beings which they offer through the manifestations of pre-eternal and post-eternal knowledge. For this reason, the recitation of this sacred conversation of the Ascension in its broad meaning has become an obligatory part of the tashahhud for all Muslims. Referring detailed exposition of that sacred conversation to the Risale-i Nur, we shall explain one meaning of it in the form of four very brief indications.
The First is “Salutations to God” (al-tahiyyatu lillah). Briefly, its meaning is this: for example, a master craftsman invents a wonderful machine with his profound knowledge and miraculous intelligence, and everyone who sees it applauds and congratulates the craftsman, and praising and saluting him, offers him gifts both material and immaterial. The machine too, by displaying the craftsman’s wondrously subtle art, and skill and knowledge, and working perfectly in exactly the way he wanted, aapplauds him through the tongue of its being, in effect greeting him and offering him immaterial gifts. In exactly the same way, all the species of living beings in the universe, together with all their individual members, are in every respect miraculous, wonderful machines, which —like conscious beings, men, and jinn and angels, applaud and salute their Maker verbally— through the tongues of their beings and lives applaud and salute their craftsman, the All-Glorious Maker, Who makes Himself known through the profound and subtle manifestations of His all-comprehending knowledge, which sees the relationship of everything with everything else, and knows all the things necessary for the life of each and conveys them to it at the right time. Greeting Him, the beings declare: “Salutations to God!” They worshipfully offer the price of their lives directly to their Creator, Who knows all creatures together with all their states. On the night of the Ascension, in the name of all living creatures, Muhammad (Peace and blessings be upon him) said “Salutations to God!” instead of the greeting of peace in the presence of the Necessarily Existent One, and offered the salutations, gifts, and greetings of all those species of living beings.
Yes, just as with its order and balance, an ordinary regular machine undoubtedly shows a painstaking, skilful craftsman; so each of the numberless living machines which fill the universe displays a thousand and one miracles of knowledge. Whatever the comparison between the light of the sun and the feeble glow of the fire-fly, that is the comparison of the former and the brilliance with which, through the manifestations of knowledge, the living beings testify to the necessary existence of their eternal Maker and Craftsman, and His fitness to be worshipped.
Tbe Second Sacred Word from the Ascension is “blessings” (al-mubarakat). Since according to Hadiths, the ritual prayers are the believer’s ascension43 and receive the manifestation of the supreme Ascension; and since the traveller found in every world his Creator, the One Knowing of the Unseen, through His attribute of knowledge; accompanying the traveller, we shall enter the broad world of blessed things and “blessings,” which make those who behold them declare: “How great are God’s blessings!” Like the traveller, we shall behold that world of “blessed beings” and foremost the innocent, blessed infants of beings with spirits, and the seeds of animate creatures, which are the tiny containers of the programmes of their lives, and through studying them shall attempt to know our Creator with ‘the knowledge of certainty,’ through the miraculous, subtle manifestations of His sacred attribute of knowledge.
Yes, with our own eyes we see that through the knowledge of an All-Wise and Knowledgeable One, all those innocent young and blessed minute treasuries and boxes, —both altogether and singly— suddenly awaken and stir into motion, and proceed towards the aim of their creation. They cause those who see them as they are in reality to exclaim: “May God bless these a thousand times over! What endless wonders God has willed!”
For example, all seeds, eggs, sperm, and grains have a precise order which springs from knowledge; and the order is within a perfect balance, which arises from skill; and the balance is within a constant reordering, and the reordering is within a constant measuring and balancing; and the measuring and balancing are within a distinguishing and nurturing, each possessing marks intentionally distinguishing it from its fellows; and this distinguishing and nurturing are within an artful decorating and adorning; and this adorning is within the giving of wise, appropriate, perfect forms and members; and this giving of form is together with differences in the flesh and edible parts of those creatures and fruits, for the purpose of generously gratifying the tastes of those desiring sustenance; and this is within miraculous embroideries and adornments which reflect knowledge and are all different; and this is together with pleasing smells and delicious tastes which are all different. Thus, through the unfolding and development of all these forms with perfect orderliness and distinction, and while being different, without fault or error in absolute profusion, and with absolute speed and over an infinite area, and with this wondrous situation continuing throughout the seasons; all those blessed beings, singly and altogether, demonstrate visibly through the above fifteen tongues the marvels of their Craftsman’s skills and His miraculous knowledge, making known as clearly as the sun the One All-Knowing of the Unseen, their Necessarily Existent Maker. It was because of this truly brilliant and extensive testimony of theirs and congratulations of their Maker, that on the night of the Ascension when speaking on behalf of all creatures, Muhammad (PBUH) used the word “blessings” instead of the greeting of peace.
The Third Word is “benedictions” (al-salawat). This sacred word, which was spoken during the supreme Ascension of Muhammad (PBUH), hundreds of millions of believers offer to the Divine Court every day at least ten times in the tashahhud during the obligatory prayers, which are the believers’ ascension. They proclaim it to the universe. Since all the truths of the Ascension have been proved in the Thirty-First Word in most powerful and decisive fashion, even to obdurate, atheist deniers, which it in part addresses, for the proofs and details we refer you to that Word, and here, extremely concisely, we shall take a look at the strange world of the various sorts of conscious beings and beings with spirits, which illustrates the broad meaning of this Third Word of the Ascension. We shall also try to understand by means of the manifestation of His pre-eternal knowledge, the perfect mercy and compassion of our Creator, and the vastness of His power and all-encompassing will, within His existence and unity.
Yes, we see in this world that even if not consciously and with their minds, by nature all beings with spirits feel and perceive that despite their boundless impotence and weakness, they have innumerable enemies and things detrimental to them, and despite their infinite want and need, they have endless needs and desires. Since their power and capital are insufficient to meet even a thousandth of these, they cry out and weep with all their strength, and by their nature implore and entreat. Each with its own particular voice and tongue offers supplications, entreaties, prayers of a sort, and benedictions to One All-Knowing and All-Powerful. Then while seeking refuge His Court, we see that suddenly an All-Wise and Powerful One Who is Absolutely Knowing and perceives all the needs of those crying out, understands their plaints and plight, and hears their innate petitions and supplications, comes to their assistance and does all that they wish. He transforms their weeping into smiles and their cries into thanks. This wise, knowing, compassionate assistance makes known in truly brilliant fashion through the manifestations of knowledge and mercy, an Assisting Answerer of Prayer, a Munificent and Compassionate One. During the Supreme Ascension, Muhammad (Peace and blessings be upon him), and during the prayers, the lesser ascension, his community, all declare “Benedictions and supplications, and good words —all are God’s,” which has the meaning of offering specifically to Him all the benedictions and worship of the world of beings with spirits.
The Fourth Sacred Word is “Good words—all are God’s!” (al-tayyibat lillah). Since many of the truths of the Risale-i Nur have been imparted to me while reciting the tesbihat following the prayers, quite simply I have been driven involuntarily to explain by means of brief indications the truths associated with both Sura al-Fatiha, and the words of the tashahhud.
The sacred word “good words,” which was spoken during Muhammad’s (PBUH) Ascension, refers to the good words and deeds and worship of those with knowledge of God and the believers, and of men, jinn, angels, and spirit beings, who possess universal consciousness, with which they beautify the universe. They look to the world of beauties, and understand fully the infinite beauties of the eternal Absolutely Beauteous One and the perpetual beauties of His Names, which adorn the universe, and they respond to them with passion and ardour and universal worship. This word refers to the endless good words they utter to their Creator through the fragrant odours of their shining belief, extensive knowledge of Him, and praise and laudation. Since good words in this meaning were spoken during the Ascension, every day without wearying the whole Umma repeats that sacred word in the tashahhud.
Yes, the universe is the mirror of an infinite, sempiternal beauty and loveliness, and consists of manifestations of it. All the beauties and perfections of the universe come from that eternal beauty and become beautiful through their connection with it, and increase in value. The universe would otherwise be a ruin, a house of sorrows, a place of utter confusion. Their connection with that beauty is understood through the knowledge and affirmation of men, angels, and spirit beings, who are the heralds and announcers of the sovereignty of the Godhead. It was even imparted to me that there is a strong possibility that in order to broadcast everywhere the beautiful, sweet praise and laudation of those heralds and their extolling the One they worship, and to send them up to the Sublime Throne and present those good words at the Divine Court, the element of the air has been given a truly strange and wondrous state whereby its particles, like soldiers under orders, are miniscule tongues and ears.
Thus, just as through their belief and their worship, men and the angels make known the All-Glorious All-Worshipped One; so through making each of those announcers a microcosm connected to the whole universe through the comprehensive capacities, wondrous faculties, and subtleties of knowledge He has given them, that All-Glorious and Wise One makes Himself known in brilliant fashion. For example, He shows Himself and clearly as the sun by creating numerous wonderful machines in a space the size of a walnut in man’s tiny head such as his faculties of memory, imagination, and thought, and by making his memory into a large library.44
We shall now allude to a very brief meaning of the Arabic piece mentioned above which points out universal proofs of all-encompassing knowledge, comprises innumerable proofs, bringing them together and making them one extensive proof, and demonstrates all-encompassing knowledge through fifteen evidences. We shall give a sort of translation of the piece.
The First of Fifteen Evidences: “The balanced order”
The measured regularity and balanced order observed in all creatures testify to an all-encompassing knowledge. Yes, there being in all things —from the universe, which resembles an orderly palace, and the solar system, and the page of the air, whose particles display an astonishing order in the broadcasting of words and sounds, and the face of the earth, which every spring with perfect order and regularity raises three hundred thousand different species, to the members, cells, particles, and bodily systems of all living beings— a balanced order and perfect regularity, which are the works of a profound, comprehensive, unfailing knowledge, means that they testify in extremely clear and decisive manner to an all-encompassing knowledge.
The Second Evidence: “And regular balance”
In all the creatures in the universe, particular, universal, from the planets to the red and white corpuscles in blood, in everything, there is an exceedingly orderly measure and appropriate balance which point self-evidently to an all-encompassing knowledge and testify to it decisively. Yes, we see for instance that the members and bodily systems of a fly or human being, and even the cells of the body and red and white corpuscles in the blood, are placed with so sensitive a balance and fine a measure, and they are so fitting and suitable for each other, and their mutual proportion with the other members of the body is so orderly, and they are in such harmony with them, that it is in no way possible that one lacking infinite knowledge could have given them those situations.
Similarly, a balance so perfect and measure so regular and unfailing govern in all living creatures and sorts of creatures from minute particles to the planets of the solar system that they prove conclusively an all-encompassing knowledge and testify to it with complete clarity. This means that all the evidences for knowledge are evidences also for the existence of the All-Knowing One. Since it is impossible and precluded that there should be an attribute without the one it qualifies, all the proofs of knowledge form a powerful and completely certain supreme proof of the Pre-Eternal All-Knowing One’s necessary existence.
The Third Evidence: “And the general, purposeful wisdom”
In all the creativity and activity in the universe, and in all the changes, raising to life, employing in duties and discharging from them, all creatures and all species of creatures have functions, uses, and purposes which are so intentional and knowing that they leave no room for chance. We see that with respect to creation one who does not possess all-encompassing knowledge could in no way lay claim to any of them. For example, although it is only a piece of flesh, together with its two main functions, the tongue, which is one of man’s hundred members —man being only one of innumerable animate creatures— is the means to hundreds of instances of wisdom, results, fruits, and uses. Its functions of tasting foods, recognizing all their different savours, informing the body and the stomach, being an exacting inspector of the kitchens of Divine mercy, and an accurate interpreter and telephone exchange for the heart, spirit, and mind in the function of speech all point in most brilliant and decisive manner to all-encompassing knowledge. If through its purposes and fruits a single tongue furnishes such evidence, innumerable tongues and innumerable living beings, infinite creatures, point to and testify to an infinite knowledge with the clarity and certainty of the noonday sun. They proclaim that there is nothing at all outside the bounds of the knowledge of the One All Knowing of the Unseen, or outside His wisdom and will.
The Fourth Evidence: “And all-embracing, particular favours”
The favours and instances of compassion and protection bestowed on all living creatures in the world of conscious beings, on every species and individual, particularly and appropriately, point self-evidently to an all-encompassing knowledge, and offer innumerable testimonies to the necessary existence of One Gracious and All-Knowing Who knows those who receive the favours and their needs.
NOTE: The explanation of the words of the Arabic piece, which is the summary and essence of the Risale-i Nur, indicates the truths which the Risale-i Nur —being distilled from the Qur’an— has taken from the flashes of Qur’anic verses, and particularly the proofs and evidences for knowledge, will, and power. For the Risale-i Nur expounds the scholarly proofs which the Arabic words indicate. This means that rather than being elucidations, explanations, and translations of those Arabic words, each of these scholarly proofs explains an indication and fine point made by numerous Qur’anic verses.
To return to our main question. Yes, with our own eyes we see that there is an All-Knowing and Compassionate One Who knows us and all beings with spirits, and knowing them, protects them, and knows all their needs and plaints, and knowing them comes to their assistance with His favours. One out of numberless examples: the general and particular favours bestowed on man as sustenance, medicines, and the minerals he needs point most clearly to an all-encompassing knowledge, offering testimonies to a Most Merciful and Compassionate One to the number of foods, medicines, and minerals. Yes, wise and purposive works like the feeding of man, and particularly of the helpless and infants, and especially their conveying from the kitchen of the stomach the nutrients necessary for all their members and even their cells, and the mountains being pharmacies and stores of all the minerals necessary for man, could only occur through an all-encompassing knowledge. Aimless chance, blind force, deaf nature, and lifeless, unconscious causes and the simple, overwhelming elements could in no way interfere in this feeding, administering, preservation, and planning, which is knowing, percipient, wise, compassionate, and gracious. Apparent causes such as those are merely employed and utilized within the bounds of the knowledge and wisdom of One possessing absolute knowledge, and at His command and with His permission, as a veil to the dignity of Divine power.
The Fifth and Sixth Evidences: ‘And the regular decrees and fruitful determining’
The forms and proportions of all things, particularly plants, trees, animals, and men have been cut out with skilful art according to the principles of Divine decree and determining, which are two sorts of pre-eternal knowledge, sewn in a way entirely appropriate to the stature of each, and clothed on them perfectly. Each is given most well-ordered, regular, and wise shapes. These singly and all together point to an infinite knowledge and testify to their number to an All-Knowing Maker.
Yes, out of innumerable examples, we look at only a single tree and a human individual, and we see that both outwardly and inwardly the fruit-bearing tree and multi-membered man have been delimited by unseen compasses and a subtle pen of knowledge, and that each of their members have been given perfectly ordered fitting forms so that they may produce the required fruits and results and perform the duties of their natures. As for this, since it could occur only through infinite knowledge, they testify to the number of plants and animals to the necessary existence and boundless knowledge of a Maker and Giver of Form, an All-Knowing Determiner Who knows the relationships of everything with everything else and keeps these in view, and knows the definition through the compasses and pen of the decree and determining of pre-eternal knowledge of the outsides and insides of their fellow-men and fellow-trees and their species, and of their measured proportions and form, and they testify to the One Who does this.
The Seventh and Eighth Evidences: ‘And the specified appointed hour of death and fixed, regular sustenance’
Superficially, the appointed hour and sustenance appear to be un-known and unspecified, but for an important instance of wisdom under the veil of vagueness, the appointed hour is determined and specified on the page of every living being’s destiny in the notebook of pre-eternal Divine decree and determining; it can be neither brought forward nor delayed. There are numerous evidences that the sustenance of every living being is also appointed and determined and inscribed on the tablets of decree and determining. For example, a huge tree leaving behind when it dies its seed, which is its spirit of a sort, to continue its duties in its place, and this occurring through the wise law of an All-Knowing Preserver; and milk, the sustenance of infants and young, flowing forth from breasts, and its appearing from between blood and execrement, and pouring into their mouths pure and clean without being polluted; reject decisively the possibility of chance and shows clearly that they occur through the compassionate law of an All-Knowing and Compassionate Provider. You can make an analogy with these two small examples for all living creatures and beings with spirits.
This means that in reality both the appointed hour of death is specified and determined, and each person’s sustenance has been determined and recorded in the notebook of his destiny. But for most important instances of wisdom, both the appointed hour and sustenance are concealed behind the veil of the Unseen, and appear to be to be vague, unspecified, and apparently bound to coincidence. For if the appointed hour had been specified like the setting of the sun, the first half of life would be passed in absolute heedlessness and be lost by not working for the hereafter, and the second half would passed in ghastly terror, as one was as though every day taking one more step towards the gallows of death, exacerbating the calamity of death a hundredfold. For which reason the calamities one suffers, and the resurrection of the dead, which is the world’s appointed hour of death, have mercifully been left in concealment in the Unseen.
As for sustenance, since after life itself it is the greatest treasury of bounties, and the richest source of thanks and praise, and the most comprehensive mine of worship, supplication, and entreaty, it has apparently been left vague and shown to be tied to chance. For in this way the door of seeking sustenance through the intercession of continuously seeking refuge at the Divine Court, and pleading and beseeching, and praise and thanks, is not closed. For if it had been clearly specified, its nature would have been altogether changed. The doors of thankful, grateful supplications and entreaties, indeed of humble worship, would have been closed.
The Ninth and Tenth Evidences: ‘And the regular excellence and careful adornment’
All the beautiful creatures which display the manifestations of an eternal beauty and loveliness especially in the spring on the face of the earth, for instance the flowers, fruits, small birds and flies, and especially the gilded, sparkling flying insects — in their creation, forms, and members are such a miraculous skill and precision, such a wonderful art, mastery, and excellence, and all sorts of shapes and tiny machines which show their craftsman’s wondrous proficiency, that they point decisively to a truly comprehensive knowledge, and —let there be no mistake in the expression— an extremely skilful, scientific innate knowledge, and testify that it is impossible that aimless chance and unconscious, confused causes could interfere. While the phrase “and careful decoration” means that those fine artefacts are adorned in a way so agreeable, are decorated in a way so sweet, display a beauty and art so attractive, that their maker could create these works only through an infinite knowledge. He knows the best manner of everything, and wishes to display to conscious beings the beauty of exquisite craftsmanship and the perfection of its beauty. For He creates and decorates the most insignificant flower and tiniest fly with the greatest care, skill, and art, giving them the greatest importance. This attentive adorning and beautifying self-evidently point to a boundless and all-encompassing knowledge, and testify to the number of those beauties to the necessary existence of an All-Knowing and Beauteous Maker .
The Eleventh Evidence, which comprises five universal evidences and proofs: ‘The utterly perfect order, balance, and total distinction with absolute ease, and the creation of things in unlimited abundance with absolute skill and speed with absolute balance, to an unrestricted extent with perfect beauty and art, over infinite distances with complete congruence, with unlimited intermingling yet with complete distinction.’
This evidence is another and better form of the similar lines at the end of the Arabic piece above, but because of my severe illness it explains the five or six evidences it comprises in the form of a very brief indication only.
Firstly: Throughout the earth we see the making of wondrous living machines, some instantaneously and some in a minute or two, in orderly and measured fashion, each different from its fellows, with the greatest ease, arising from a thorough knowledge and skill, all of which point to an infinite knowledge and testify that the perfection of knowledge is proportionate to the ease resulting from the skill and knowledge in the art.
Secondly: Perfect creations of the greatest art within the greatest profusion and multitude, point to a boundless knowledge within an infinite power, and testify to their number to One Who is Absolutely Knowing and Powerful.
Thirdly: Creations which are of the finest balance and measure despite being made with absolute speed, point to a boundless knowledge and testify to their number to One Absolutely Knowing and Absolutely Powerful.
Fourthly: The making of innumerable animate beings on the broad face of the earth with the greatest craft, adornment, and beauty of art despite their wide extent, points to an all-encompassing knowledge which confusing nothing, sees all things together, and for which nothing is an obstacle to anything else. It testifies too that singly and altogether they are the artefacts of One Knowing of All Things, an Absolutely Powerful One.
Fifthly: The coming into being of the members of a species which are far from each other, with one in the east, one in the west, one in the north, and one in the south, in the same way, both resembling each other and differing, could occur only through the infinite power of One Absolutely Knowing and Absolutely Powerful Who governs the whole universe, and through His infinite knowledge, which encompasses all beings together with all their states, thus pointing to an all-encompassing knowledge and testifies to One All-Knowing of the Unseen.
Sixthly: The creation of a great multitude of living machines in confusing circumstances and dark places, for example seeds under the ground, without confusion, despite their similarity and all being mixed up together, in miraculous fashion without neglecting any single one of any sort, together with all their distinguishing features, points as clearly as the sun to pre-eternal knowledge and testifies as brilliantly as daylight to the creativity and dominicality of One Absolutely Powerful and Absolutely Knowing. For the details we refer you to the Risale-i Nur and here cut a long story short.
Now we begin the question of “Will,” which is in Hulâsatü’l-Hulâsa, the summary of The Supreme Sign:45, 46
This piece consists of one long universal proof of Divine will, which comprises many of the proofs of Will. In a short translation of it, we set out evidence proving decisively Divine will and choice and volition. All the above evidences for Divine knowledge are also evidences for will. For the manifestations and works of knowledge and will are apparent together in all creatures.
The meaning of the above Arabic piece in brief:
Everything exists through His will and volition. What He wills occurs, what He does not will does not occur. If He did not will it, nothing would occur. A proof is this:
We see that among infinite, confused possibilities and various fruitless ways, amid intervening and mutually opposing elements which flow like floods causing chaos, in the midst of numerous others resembling themselves, which is the cause of disorder, every creature with its own specific essence, particular attributes, individual character, and distinctive form, is taken within a precise, perfect, regular order; all its members and organs are weighed up with a sensitive, exact measure and balance and attached to it; its mutually opposing members are created living and with extreme art from simple, lifeless matter. For example, a human being is created with a hundred different organs from a droplet of fluid, and a bird is made with numerous different members and organs from a simple egg and clothed in a miraculous form, and a tree is drawn out of a tiny seed comprising simple, lifeless carbon, nitrogen, hydrogen, and oxygen, together with its branches and twigs and various members and parts, and dressed in an orderly, fruitful form. This self-evidently, indubitably, decisively, and necessarily proves that all those creatures together with all their parts and particles, form and nature, are given their particular perfect states through the will, choice, volition, and intention of One possessing Absolute Power. It proves too that everything is governed by an all-embracing will. These single creatures pointing in this indubitable way to Divine will shows that all creatures offer testimony to their number with a certainty as clear as the sun at noon to Divine will encompassing all things, and that they comprise numberless proofs of the necessary existence of an All-Powerful Possessor of Will.
All the evidences for Divine knowledge mentioned above are also evidences for Divine will, since both function together with power. One cannot be without the other. Just as all the correspondence and conformities between the members of species and sorts of beings indicate that their Maker is One and the same; so their features being distinctive and different from each other in wise and purposive fashion indicates definitely that their Single Maker of Unity acts with will and choice. He creates everything with will, choice, volition, and intention.
This marks the end of my explanations of the Arabic piece’s meaning, which sets forth one universal proof of Divine will. I had intended to write many more important points, as for the question of Divine knowledge, but my brain was exhausted due to the illness I was suffering as a result of being poisoned, so it was postponed to another time.
The Arabic piece about Divine power:
God is Most Great! Through His power and will, greater than all things. For He is powerful over all things with absolute, all-encompassing power, necessary and intrinsic to His Most Pure and Holy Essence. It is impossible that the opposite of His power should intervene in it, for it has no degrees; equal before it are particles and stars, particulars and universals, the part and the whole, the seed and the tree, the world and man — through the mystery of the observable utterly perfect order, balance, distinction, and precision, together with the ease in the absolute abundance, speed, and intermingling; and through the mysteries of luminosity, transparency, reciprocity, balance, order, and obedience; and through the mysteries of the assistance of unity, facility of unity, and the manifestation of oneness; and through the mysteries of necessity, total detachment, and complete otherness of essence; and through the mysteries of unrestrictedness, not being bound by space, and indivisibility; and through the mysteries of the transformation of obstacles and obstructions into means of facility; and through the mystery of the intuition that the particular, the part, the seed and man are not inferior as regards art and eloquence to the star, and that the Creator of the universal, the whole, the tree, and the world is the Creator of the former; and through the mystery of the surroundings and wholes inevitably being in the grasp of the Creator of the things which are surrounded and the parts, like the miniature inscribed beings similar to them, or ‘milked,’ extracted droplets, for they and their likes are included in the former with the balance of His knowledge, or are ‘milked’ from them in accordance with the principles of His wisdom; and through the mystery of a Qur’an of Dignity inscribed with particles of ether on an atom or minutest particle not being of less eloquence or wondrous art than a Qur’an of Grandeur written with the ink of the stars and suns on the page of the heavens; similarly, through their relation to the power of the universe’s Creator, the blooming rose not being of less eloquence and art than the star Venus; nor the ant being inferior to the elephant; nor the microbe inferior to the rhinoceros, nor is the bee inferior to the date-palm. Moreover, the extreme ease and speed in the creation of things causes the people of misguidance to confuse formation with self-formation, which necessitates innumerable impossibilities and is a delusion; while it proves to the people of guidance that in relation to the power of the universe’s Creator particles and the stars are equal, may His glory be exalted, for there is no god but He; God is Most Great!
Before giving a translation of this Arabic piece from the point of view of the truly vast question of Divine power, and a brief meaning of it, I shall disclose a truth which was imparted to me. It was like this:
The existence of Divine power is more certain than the existence of the universe. Indeed, singly and all together creatures are the embodied words of power; they demonstrate its existence with ‘the vision of certainty.’ They testify to their number to the Absolutely Powerful One, the One qualified by it. There is no need to prove that power with further proofs. But because it is one of the most important bases of faith, and the most necessary means to understanding the Qur’anic truths, and as claimed by the verse,
Your creation and your resurrection is but as a single soul,47
and because not everyone has found the way to it through the use of reason, some people have remained bewildered and uncomprehending before power and others have denied it, and it is therefore necessary to prove an awesome truth concerning it.
As for the above-mentioned basis, foundation, means, assertion, and truth, it is the meaning of the above verse. That is to say: “Men and jinn! The creation of all of you and your being resurrected and raised to life at the resurrection is as easy for My power as the creation of a single individual!” Divine power creates the spring as easily as it creates a single flower. For that power, there is no difference between particular and universal, small and large, many and few. It spins planets as easily as it spins particles.
In nine ‘Steps’, the above Arabic passage expounds a most conclusive, cogent proof of this awesome question. Very briefly, its meaning is as follows. The basis of the steps is indicated by this:
For He is powerful over all things with absolute, all-encompassing power, necessary and intrinsic to His Most Pure and Holy Essence; it is impossible that the opposite of His power should intervene in it, for it has no degrees; equal before it are particles and stars, particulars and universals, the part and the whole, the seed and the tree, the world and man.
That is, Divine power is such that it is powerful over all things, encompasses all things, is essential to the Necessarily Existent One, and according to logic, is “necessary” to Him; it is impossible that it should be separated from Him; there is no possibility that it could be. Since the Most Pure and Holy Essence possesses such necessary power, impotence, its opposite, could certainly in no way intervene in it. Impotence could not impinge on the All-Powerful Essence. Since the existence of degrees in a thing occurs through the intervention of its opposite —for example, the degrees and levels of heat occur through the intervention of cold, and the degrees of beauty, through the intervention of ugliness— impotence, the opposite of this essential power, can in no way approach it; there is no possibility whatsoever that it could. There can be no degrees in that absolute power. Since there can be no degrees in it, stars and particles are equal to that power, and there are no differences for it between the part and the whole, or an individual and a species. The raising to life of a seed and a huge tree, and the universe and man, and one individual and all beings with spirits at the resurrection of the dead is equal in relation to that power, and all are equally easy. There is no difference between great and small, many and few. Decisive witnesses to this truth are the perfect art, order, balance, distinction and profusion that we see in the creation of things with absolute speed, absolute ease, and complete facility.
First Step
Through the mystery of the observable utterly perfect order, balance, distinction, and precision, together with the ease in the absolute abundance, speed, and intermingling.
For the meaning of this, see the above truth.
Second Step
Through the mysteries of luminosity, transparency, reciprocity, balance, order, and obedience.
For detailed explanation of this we refer you to the end of the Tenth Word, the Twenty-Ninth Word, and the Twentieth Letter, and here make only a brief allusion. Just as with respect to luminosity and through dominical power, the sun’s light is reflected as easily on the surface of the sea and in all its bubbles as is it on a single fragment of glass; the two are equal; so it is as easy for the luminous power of the Light of Lights to create and rotate the heavens and stars as it is to create flies and particles and rotate them; neither presents any difficulties for it.
Also, just as through the quality of transparency and through Divine power, the sun’s image is present with the same ease in a tiny mirror or in the pupil of the eye as, through the Divine command, its light is reflected on all shining things and droplets, and translucent motes, and on the surface of the sea; so too, since the inner faces of the essences of things are transparent and shining, the manifestation and effect of absolute power creates all living beings with the ease of creating a single individual; there is no difference between many and few, great and small.
Also, if two walnuts of equal weight were placed on a pair of scales which were absolutely precise and large enough to weigh mountains, and a tiny seed was added to one of the walnuts, it would raise one of the pans to the height of a mountain-top and lower the other to the bottom of the valley with the same ease as raising one pan to the skies and lowering the other to the valley bottom if two mountains of equal weight had been placed in the pans and a walnut added to one. In exactly the same way, in the terminology of the science of theology (kalam), contingency is equal in regard to existence and non-existence. That is, if there is nothing to cause their existence, things which are not necessary but contingent are equal in regard to existence and non-existence; there is no difference. Few or many, big or small are the same in regard to this contingency and equality. Thus, creatures are contingent, and since within the sphere of contingency their existence and non-existence are equal, it is as easy for the boundless pre-eternal power of the Necessarily Existent One to give existence to a single contingent being as to give all contingent beings existence and clothe everything in an appropriate being, spoiling the balance of non-existence. And when the being’s duties are completed, He takes off its garment of external existence and sends it apparently to non-existence, but in fact to an existence within the sphere of His knowledge. This means that if things are ascribed to the Absolutely Powerful One, the raising to life of the spring becomes as easy as that of a flower, and the raising to life of all mankind at the resurrection of the dead as easy as raising to life a single soul. Whereas if they are ascribed to causes, a flower becomes as difficult as the spring, and a fly as difficult as all living beings.
Also, through the mystery of order, the setting in motion of a large ship or an aeroplane through pressing a button with one’s finger is as easy as setting in motion the mainspring of a clock by turning the key with one’s finger. So too since through the principles of pre-eternal knowledge, and laws of eternal wisdom, and universal manifestations of dominical will and its specified principles, all things, universal and particular, large and small, many and few, have been given an immaterial mould, particular measure and proportions, and sheer limits, they are entirely within the order of Divine knowledge and laws of Divine will. Certainly, it is as easy for the Absolutely Powerful One to rotate the solar system and cause the ship of the earth to voyage around its annual orbit through His infinite power as it is for Him to make blood circulate in a body in orderly and wise fashion and the red and white corpuscles circulate in the blood, and the particles circulate in the tiny corpuscles, for without difficulty He creates a human being together with his wondrous organs from a droplet of fluid on the pattern of the universe. This means, if ascribed to that pre-eternal, infinite power, the creation of the universe is as easy as the creation of a single human being. But if not ascribed to that power, it becomes as difficult to create a single human being together with his wondrous organs, members and senses as to create the universe.
Also, through the mystery of obedience, compliance, and conforming to commands, with the command of “Forward march!” a commander impels a single soldier to attack, and with the same command he drives forward to the attack a large, disciplined army. So too, with innate desire and eagerness resembling soldiers totally obedient to the laws of Divine will and subservient to the signs of the dominical creational commands, creatures are a thousand times more obedient than the soldiers of an army —within the bounds of the line of action determined by pre-eternal knowledge and wisdom— and are completely compliant and subservient. It is therefore as easy through the dominical command of “Come into existence out of non-existence and get down to your business!” and in the manner determined by knowledge and in the form specified by will, for power to clothe an individual animate being in an existence particular to it, and take it by the hand and bring it into being as it is to create the army of living beings of the spring and to assign them their duties. That is to say, if everything is attributed to that power, the creation of the entire army of minute particles and divisions of stars is as easy and free of trouble as the creation of a single particle and single star. Whereas if attributed to causes, the creation of a particle in the pupil of a living being’s eye or in its brain together with its ability to perform its wondrous duties, would be as difficult and troublesome as that of the army of animals.
Third Step
Through the mysteries of the assistance of unity, facility of unity, and the manifestation of oneness.
We shall look at the meaning of this by means of brief indications. That is, due to the unity of sovereignty and all his subjects acting in conformity to his commands alone, it is as easy for a ruler and commander-in-chief to govern a large country and numerous nation as it is to govern the people of a village. For due to the unity of his decree, the members of the nation become a means of facility just like the soldiers, and his com-mands and laws are easily executed. Whereas if it was left to various rulers, in addition to sinking into confusion, to govern a village, or even a household, would be as difficult as governing the country. And since the obedient nation is attached to the single commander, like individual soldiers, through the strength of relying on the commander’s strength, and his ammunition stores and army, each may take an enemy king captive and perform works far exceeding his own individual strength. His connection with the ruler obtains for him an infinite strength and power, so that he may perform great works. But if the relation is severed, he loses that vast strength, and with his own petty strength performs works only to the extent of the arms and ammunition on his back. For if it was required of him to perform all the works he carried out relying on the power of his connection with the ruler, he would have to have in his arm the strength of the army and on his back all the ruler’s stores of arms and ammunition.
In exactly the same way, due to the unity of His sovereignty and absolute rulership, the Monarch of Pre-Eternity and Post-Eternity, the All-Powerful Maker, creates the universe as easily as a city, and raises to life the spring as easily as a garden, and raises to life all the dead at the resurrection as easily as creating the leaves, flowers, and fruits of the garden’s trees in the spring. He easily creates a fly on the pattern of an eagle. He easily makes man the microcosm. Whereas if ascribed to causes, a microbe would be as difficult as a rhinoceros, and a fruit as difficult as a mighty tree. Perhaps too, every particle which performs its wondrous tasks in the body of a living creature would have to be given an eye that sees all things and knowledge that knows all things so that it could carry out those subtle and perfect vital duties.
Also, ease and facility reach such a degree in unity that they become necessary. For if the equipping of an army is from one hand, from one factory, it becomes as easy as equipping a single soldier. Whereas if numerous different hands interfere and the various parts of the equipment are all brought from different factories, quantitively a single soldier’s equipment could be prepared only with a thousand difficulties; since numerous officers interfered, it would be as difficult as a thousand soldiers. Also, if the management and command of a thousand soldiers is given to a single officer, in one respect it becomes as easy as a single soldier, whereas if they were assigned to ten officers or the soldiers themselves, it would result in confusion and great difficulty.
In exactly the same way, if all things are attributed to the Single One of Unity, they become as easy as a single thing. But if they are attributed to causes, a single living creature becomes as difficult as the whole earth, and perhaps impossible. This means that in unity ease and facilty are at the level of necessity. And with the interference of numerous hands, the difficulties amount to impossibility.
As it is said in Letters (Mektûbat), if the alternations of day and night, and the motions of the stars, and the seasons of the year, the autumn, winter, spring, and summer, are left to a single officer and organizer, that commander-in-chief commands the globe of the earth, which is a soldier: “Rise up, rotate, and travel!” Out of joy and delight at receiving the command, with two motions like a Mevlevi dervish in ectasy, it is easily the means to the daily and annual changes and the apparent, imaginary movements of the stars, thus demonstrating the total ease and facility of unity. But if it is left not to the single commander but to causes and the caprices of the stars, and earth is told: “You stop in your place and don’t travel!”, every night and every year thousands of stars and suns thousands of times larger than the earth would have to cut distances of thousands of millions of years, so that through their travelling, the situations of the earth and heavens such as the seasons and day and night, might come about. But it would be so difficult as to be impossible.
The phrase And the manifestation of oneness alludes to a vast and extremely subtle, profound, and extensive truth. Referring explanation and proof of it to the Risale-i Nur, we shall here set out a single point by means of a comparison.
Yes, just as through its light the sun illuminates the whole earth and is an example of unity, so through its image, reflection, seven-coloured light, and shape appearing in all the transparent things that face it, such as mirrors, it forms an example of oneness. If the sun possessed knowledge, power, and will, and the fragments of glass and droplets and bubbles in which the tiny suns appeared had the capacity, through the law of Divine will, in each and next to each a complete sun would be present together with its image and attributes, as well as in all the other places. There being no deficiency in its power of disposal, through the command, effect, and word of dominical power, it would be the cause of truly extensive manifestations, thus demonstrating the extraordinary ease and facility of oneness.
In exactly the same way, just as in respect of His unity, the All-Glorious Maker looks through His knowledge, will, and power, which encompass all things, and is all-present and all-seeing everywhere, so with respect to His oneness and through its manifestation, He is present together with His Names and attributes with all things, and particularly living things, so that easily, in an instant, He creates a fly on the pattern of an eagle and a human being according to the system of the universe. He creates living creatures in a way so miraculous that if all causes were to gather together, they could not make a nightingale or a fly. And the One Who creates the nightingale, is the One Who creates all birds; and the One Who creates a human being could only be the One Who creates the universe.
The Fourth and Fifth Steps
Through the mysteries of necessity, total detachment, and complete otherness of essence; and the mysteries of unrestrictedness, not being bound by space, and indivisibility.
It being very difficult to express the reality of these two steps to everyone, their meaning will be explained in one or two very brief points. That is, in relation to the power of an Absolutely Powerful One Whose existence is at the degree of necessity, the most powerful and stable of the degrees of existence, and is pre-eternal and post-eternal, and Who is totally detached from and free of materiality, and Whose holy nature is totally different to all other natures, — in relation to His power, the stars are like minute particles, and the resurrection of the dead like the spring, and to raise to life all men at the resurrection is as easy as raising to life a single soul. For as much as a fingernail from the levels of existence that are powerful may hold a mountain from an insubstantial level of existence, and may manipulate it. For example, a mirror and faculty of memory from the level of powerful, external existence may hold a hundred mountains and a thousand books from the level of existence of the World of Similitudes and non-material existence, which are weak and insubstantial, and they may have disposal over them. Thus, however inferior as regards power the level of existence of the World of Similitudes is to the level of external existence, the created, accidental existences of contingent beings are thousands of times more inferior and weaker than a pre-eternal, everlasting, necessary existence, so that through the manifestation of a particle He can manipulate a world from the worlds of contingent beings. Regretably, for the time being, three important reasons do not permit me to explain this lengthy truth and its fine points in full, so we refer it to the Risale-i Nur and another time.
Sixth Step
Through the mystery of the transformation of obstacles and impediments into means of facility.
Through a law of the manifestation of Divine will called in science “the knot of life,” and of the creational command, and through the command and will being turned towards them, the unconscious branches and hard twigs of a huge tree do not form obstacles or impediments to the necessary substances and foods which pass to its fruits, leaves, and flowers from the “knot of life,” which is like the tree’s mainspring and stomach; indeed, they facilitate the process. In just the same way, since all [potential] obstacles in the creation of the universe and creatures cease being obstacles in the face of a manifestation of will and regard of the dominical command and become means of facility, eternal power creates the universe and all the species of creatures on the earth as easily as creating a single tree. Nothing at all is difficult for it. If all those acts of creation are not ascribed to that power, then the creation and administration of the single tree would be as difficult as the creation and administration of all trees, indeed, as the universe. For then everything would become obstacles and obstructions, and if all causes were to gather together, they could not send the necessary sustenance to the fruits, leaves, branches and twigs in orderly, regular fashion from the stomach and mainspring of a tree’s “knot of life,” which proceeds from command and will. Unless all the parts of the tree, and all its particles even, were given an eye, all-encompassing knowledge, and wondrous power which would see the entire tree together with its parts and particles, and know them and assist them.
So climb these five steps and take a look; see what difficulties —indeed, impossibilities— are present in unbelief and associating partners with God, and how distant they are from reason and logic, and how precluded they are. Then see what ease there is on the way of the Qur’an, indeed, that its facility is at the degree of necessity, and how acceptable and reasonable it is, and what certain and satisfying truth is found on its way, so certain as to be necessary. Understand this and say: “All praise be to God for the bounty of belief!”
(The difficulties I was suffering and my indisposition caused the remaining part of this important step to be postponed.)
Seventh Step
And through the mystery that the particular, the part, the seed and man are not inferior as regards art and eloquence to the star, the universal, the whole, the tree, and the world.
[NOTE: The basis, mine, and sun of the truths contained in these nine Steps are the verses: Say, He is God, the One; * God, the Eternal and Ever-Besought.48 They are brief indications to flashes from the manifestation of Divine oneness and eternal besoughtedness. Making one or two points, we shall take a very brief look at the meaning of this Seventh Step, and for the details refer you to the Risale-i Nur.]
That is, a particle which performs wonderful duties in the eye or brain is not inferior to a star; nor is a part inferior to the whole; for instance, the brain and eye are not inferior to the human being as a whole; nor with regard to beauty of art and the marvels of its creation is a particular individual inferior to a universal species; nor with his strange members and faculties is a man inferior to all the animal species; nor in regard to fine craftsmanship and being treasury-like, and resembling an index, programme, and memory, is a seed inferior to a mighty tree; nor in regard to his creation, and wondrous, comprehensive organs and faculties created so as to perform thousands of amazing duties, is a man, the microcosm, inferior to the universe. This means that the One Who creates the particle cannot lack the power to create the star. And the One Who creates an organ like the tongue, certainly easily creates man. And the One Who creates a single man thus perfectly surely can create all animals, and this He does before our eyes. And the One Who creates a seed as a list, an index, a notebook of the laws issuing from the Divine command, and as a “knot of life,” is certainly the Creator of all trees. And the One Who creates man as a sort of seed of the world and as its comprehensive fruit, and makes him the mirror to all the Divine Names, and connected to all the universe, and His vicegerent on earth, most certainly possesses such power that He creates the universe as easily as He creates man, and sets it in order. In which case, whoever is the Creator, Maker, and Sustainer of the particle, part, particular individual, seed, and man must be the Creator, Maker, and Sustainer of the stars, species, the whole, universals, trees, and the whole universe. That it should be otherwise is impossible and precluded.
Eighth Step
Through the mystery of the surroundings and wholes inevitably being in the grasp of the Creator of the things which are surrounded and the parts, like the miniature inscribed beings similar to them, or ‘milked,’ extracted droplets, for they and their likes are included in the former with the balance of His knowledge, or are ‘milked’ from them in accordance with the principles of His wisdom.
That is, the relation to the large universals which encompass them of the particulars which are encompassed, and of individuals, seeds, and grains which are within universals and wholes, is as tiny miniatures, and as the identical samples of the universal and wholes, inscribed in miniature in the very finest writing. Since this is so, the encompassing universal must be within the grasp of the Creator of the particulars and completely under His disposal so that through the balances of His knowledge and its fine pens He can include that huge all-encompassing book in hundreds of miniscule sections and notebooks. The relation and comparison, then, of the encompassed parts and particulars with their surroundings is as droplets ‘milked’ from what encompasses them, like milk, or as if someone squeezed the surroundings and those points dripped from them. For example, a melon seed is a droplet milked from all its surroundings or a point in which is written the whole book, for it contains its index, list, and programme. Since it is thus, the encompassing wholes and universals must be within the hand of the Maker of those particulars, droplets, and points so that He can milk the individuals, droplets, and points from them with the sensitive principles of His wisdom. This means that the One Who creates the seed and individual must the One Who creates the whole and the universals, and the other universals and sorts, which encompass the latter and are bigger than them; it could not be anyone else. In which case, the One Who creates a single soul can only be He Who creates all mankind. And the One Who raises to life one dead person, can raise to life all jinn and men at the resurrection of the dead, and will raise them to life. So see, what is claimed and stated by the verse,
Your creation and your resurrection is but as a single soul49
is most definitely and brilliantly pure truth and reality.
Ninth Step
And through the mystery of a Qur’an of Dignity inscribed with particles of ether on an atom or minutest particle not being of less eloquence or wondrous art than a Qur’an of Grandeur written with the ink of the stars and suns on the page of the heavens; similarly, through their relation to the power of the universe’s Creator, the blooming rose not being of less eloquence and art than the star Venus; nor the ant being inferior to the elephant, nor the microbe inferior to the rhinoceros, nor the bee inferior to the date-palm. Moreover, the extreme ease and speed in the creation of things causes the people of misguidance to confuse formation with self-formation, which necessitates innumerable impossibilities and is a delusion; while it proves to the people of guidance that in relation to the power of the universe’s Creator particles and the stars are equal, May His glory be exalted, for there is no god but He; God is Most Great!
[I wanted to explain the meaning of this last step at length, but regretably I have been prevented by my extreme distress, arising from arbitrary oppression and harassment, and my weakness and serious ssicknesses, resulting from poisoning. I have therefore have been compelled to suffice with a brief indication.]
That is, if a Qur’an of Mighty Stature was written on a particle which is supposed to be indivisible and called in the science of theology (kalam) and in philosophy “jawhar-i fard,” in particles of ether, which is matter even finer, and if another mighty Qur’an was written in stars and suns on the pages of the heavens, then the two were compared, the microscopic Qur’an written in particles would not be inferior in respect of marvels and miraculous art than the vast Qur’an gilding the face of the heavens; indeed, in some ways it would be superior.
In exactly the same way, from the point of view of the originality and eloquence in their creation, in relation to the power of the universe’s Creator, the rose is not inferior to the star Venus, the ant is not inferior to the elephant, and a microbe is more wondrous as regards its creation than a rhinoceros, and with its marvellous inborn faculties the bee is superior to the date-palm. This means that the One Who creates the bee can create all animals. The One Who raises a single soul to life can raise to life all men at the resurrection of the dead and gather them together in the arena of the Great Gathering, and will gather them together. Nothing at all is difficult for Him, for before our eyes every spring He creates a hundred thousand samples of the resurrection with the greatest ease and speed.
Very briefly, the meaning of the final Arabic sentence is this: since the people of misguidance do not know the unshakeable truths of the above ‘Steps,’ and since creatures come into existence extremely easily and extremely quickly, they imagine their formation and creation through a Maker’s infinite power to be self-formation and that they come into existence of themselves. They have thus opened for themselves the door of in every way impossible and precluded superstitions, which no mind, and not even delusion, could accept. For example, in that case, every single particle of every animate creature would have to be ascribed an infinite power, knowledge, and eye that sees everything, and power sufficient to execute every art and skill. Thus, by not accepting a single God, they are bound by their ways to accept gods to the number of particles, and thus deserve to enter among the lowest of the low of Hell.
As for the people of guidance, the powerful truths and irrefutable proofs of the above ‘Steps’ afford to their sound hearts and straight minds the firmest conviction and most powerful belief and assent at the level of ‘the vision of certainty,’ so that they believe without doubt or misgiving and with peace of mind that in relation to Divine power there is no difference between stars and particles, or the smallest and the largest, for all these wondrous things occur before our very eyes. And every marvel of art confirms the assertion of the verse,
Your creation and your resurrection is but as a single soul,
and testifies that what it states is pure truth and reality, and through the tongues of their beings they declare: “God is Most Great!” We too declare: “God is Most Great!” to their number. And with all our strength and conviction we affirm the verse’s claim, and we testify with innumerable proofs that what it states is pure truth and reality.
Glory be unto You! We have no knowledge save that which You have taught us; indeed, You are All-Knowing, All-Wise.50
O God! Grant blessings and peace to the one whom You sent as a Mercy to all the worlds, and all praise be to God, the Sustainer of All the Worlds.
***
[A Eulogy which answers the questions: What is the Risale-i Nur? What is its true nature, and what is the true nature of its Interpreter?]
The high servants of religion who are described in Hadiths as coming at the start of every century are not innovators, they are followers. That is to say, they do not create anything new themselves, they do not bring any new ordinances; they adjust and strengthen religion by way of following to the letter the fundamentals and ordinances of religion and the Sunna of the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH); they proclaim the true and original meaning of religion; they remove and render null and void the baseless matters which have been mixed up with it; they reject and destoy the attacks made on religion; they establish the Divine commands, and proclaim and make known the nobility and exaltedness of the Divine ordinances. Only, without spoiling the basic position or damaging the original spirit, they carry out their duties through new methods of persuasion appropriate to the understand of the age, and in new ways and with new details.
These dominical officials confirm their positions through their actions and deeds. They carry out their duty of reflecting the firmness of their belief and their sincerity. They display in their actions their degree of faith. They show that they follow to the letter the practices of Muhammad (PBUH) and that truly they have been invested with the Prophetic robe. In short: for the community of Muhammad (PBUH) they form perfect models in respect of deeds and morality and following and adhering to the Prophet’s Sunna; they are examples worthy of being followed. The works they write expounding God’s Book and elucidating the injunctions of religion, and their presenting these in accordance with the understanding of the age and its degree of learning, are not the products of their own elevated, fertile minds; they are not the result of their own intelligence and knowledge. They are directly the inspirations and promptings of the Pure Essence of Messengership (PBUH), who is the source of revelation. Jaljalutiyya, Mathnawi-i Sharif, and Futuh al-Ghayb and such works are all of this sort. Those holy persons have a part in the ordering of those choice works, and in their manner of exposition; that is, they are the places where their meanings are manifested and reflected.
To come to the Risale-i Nur and its Interpreter: since in this lofty work are an elevated effulgence and endless perfection never before encountered in any similar work; and since it is observed that, in a way hitherto unseen in any work, it is the heir to the effulgences of the Qur’an, which is a Divine lamp and the sun of guidance and moon of happiness; it is a fact as clear as the sun that its basis is the pure light of the Qur’an and that it bears the effulgence of the lights of Muhammad (PBUH) to a greater extent than the works of the saints, and that the share in it, and concern with it, and sacred disposal over it of the Pure Essence of Messengership (PBUH) are greater than in the works of the saints, and the attainment and perfections of the one who is its Interpreter and place of manifestation is elevated and matchless to the same degree.
Yes, while still in his childhood and never having studied, in the space of three month’s study in order to be saved from externals, the Risale-i Nur’s Interpreter was made heir to the early and later sciences, mystic knowledge, the realities of things, the mysteries of the universe, and Divine wisdom, which had been bestowed on no one previously. With his learning and moral fortitude, consisting of his being embodied chastity, and his extraordinary courage and complete self-sufficiency, he was a miracle of creation, an embodiment of Divine favour; his abilities were God-given.
As a matchless scholar, an extraordinary prodigy, challenging the whole world of learning before reaching the age of puberty, he silenced all the scholars with whom he debated, answered absolutely correctly and without hesitation just about all the questions posed to him, bore the mantle of ‘master’ from the age of fourteen, and continuously irradiated the effulgence of knowledge and light of wisdom. With the subtlety and profundity of his exposition, the conciseness and loftiness of his explanations, and his insight, perspicacity and light of wisdom, he astonished the scholars and learned, deservedly earning the illustrious title of ‘Bediuzzaman’ (Wonder of the Age). As someone who with his elevated qualities and scholarly virtues propagated and proved most perfectly the religion of Muhammad (PBUH), he surely received the highest favours of the Lord of the Prophets (PBUH), and was under his lofty protection and auspices. Doubtless he was one of noble virtue who advanced at the decree of the Most Holy Prophet (PBUH), and acted under his command, and was the heir to his truths and reflected his lights.
As indicated by his making the lights and knowledge of Muhammad (PBUH) and radiance of the Divine Candle (Qur’an) shine most brilliantly, and the mathematical significances of the Qur’an and Hadith being fulfilled in him, and the mathematical expositions of verses expressing the prophetic utterances concentrating on himself, there is no doubt that he was a burnished mirror to the Divine Messengership in serving the cause of belief, and the final luminous fruit of the tree of Messengership, and the final mouth of reality in respect of the legacy of the tongue of Messengership, and a final happy bearer of ‘the Divine Candle’ in respect of serving belief.
Signed in the name of the Risale-i Nur students who attended the single ‘lesson’ of the third School of Joseph, consisting of The Shining Proof and Zühretü’n-Nur,
Ahmed Feyzi, Ahmed Nazif, Salâhaddin, Zübeyir, Ceylan, Sungur, Tabancali
They have accorded me a share far exceeding my due. But lacking the courage to offend these signatories, I remained silent, and accepted their eulogy in the name of the collective personality of the Risale-i Nur students.
S a i d N u r s i
***
In His Name, be He glorified!
And there is nothing but it glorifies Him with praise.
Peace be upon you and God’s mercy and blessings, for ever and ever!
Our Most Beloved, Blessed, Highly-Valued, Kindly Master!
Our revered Master, who has completely abandoned his own will and left all matters to dominical will, who sees the mercy and wisdom of Divine Determining in every apparent calamity and hardship, and with perfect trust and submission awaits in perfect patience the results of that dominical manifestation! In this terrible century when in some places the things on which the believers rely have begun to crumble, and with publications opposing the pillars of belief the deniers of God flaunt themselves openly and arrogantly, and to act in opposition to the Qur’an’s commands and not believe in spiritual forces, and to ascribe the right of creation to unconscious, blind, deaf nature are considered marks of civilization and of being ‘cultured’ and intellectual —at such a time, our gracious Master wrote the Risale-i Nur, a miracle of the Qur’an, and offering its soothing cures to agitated, wretched hearts needy for the water of life of belief, gave them the good news of eternal happiness. On its highway of reality which proves its teachings with decisive, categorical arguments and proofs, and through the mystery of our Illustrious Leader (PBUH), to whom refers “the cause is like the doer,” the equivalent of all the good deeds performed by hundreds of thousands of Risale-i Nur students who have saved their belief through the Risale-i Nur has passed to the register of his good deeds!
Just as in Denizli Prison Almighty God bestowed The Fruits of Belief, whose remedies were sufficiently efficacious to reduce to nothing the distress of the incarceration, and that rose’s sweet scent eliminated all the pains of its thorns, dispelling all our temporary distress; so too here in Afyon Prison, the physical discomforts of one day of which are equal to a month’s discomfort in Denizli Prison, the Most Munificent and Compassionate One of Beauty has bestowed at the hand of you our beloved Master sublime proofs affirming Divine unity and praise, and the messengership of Muhammad (PBUH), which are cures and antidotes. We most faulty students of yours, who through the effulgences of the Risale-i Nur have learnt to read and write, consider these three short treatises to be both conclusive proofs of the Risale-i Nur’s veracity and a sort of summary of it, in the same way that the programme and index of a mighty pine-tree is encapsulated in its seed.
We are incapable of describing the virtues of these three treatises, but on reading them our spirits experience a powerful relief, our physical sufferings are transformed into joy, and they bring us innumerable fruits from the garden of belief. With its eleven proofs of Divine unity, the first of them dispels the darknesses of disbelief, misguidance, and nature at this time. The second expounds with sacred proofs of belief Sura al-Fatiha, the source, basis, and master of all the comparisons in the Risale-i Nur. And the third explains brilliantly in a way that ensures complete certitude the part about the messengership of Muhammad (PBUH), which was imparted to you, our beloved Master, here in Afyon Prison.
Although we are in no way worthy of anything, we shall strive with all our power to publish these works, which we have received. Offering endless thanks to Almighty God, we pray to Him saying: “Most Merciful of the Merciful! May You be pleased with our Master for ever and ever!”
The Enduring One, He is the Enduring One!
In the name of the Risale-i Nur students,
Zübeyir, Ceylan, Sungur, Ibrahim
***
Introduction to the Turkish Translation of the Original Arabic ‘Damascus Sermon’
In His Name, be He glorified!
And there is nothing but it glorifies Him with praise
Peace be upon you and God’s mercy and blessings for ever and ever!
My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
[With a presentiment of the future, the Old Said perceived the truths expressed in this Arabic sermon, which, on the insistence of the Damascus religious authorities, he delivered forty years ago in the Umayyad Mosque to a congregation of close on ten thousand, which included a hundred religious scholars; he gave news of those truths with complete certainty as though they were going to be realized shortly. However, the two World Wars and twenty-five years of absolute despotism delayed their realization; it is now that the signs of this, which were predicted then, are beginning to be seen in the World of Islam. Therefore, if you consider it appropriate, you may publish the translation of this most important and instructive piece, not as an old, outdated sermon, but as fresh, pertinent instruction on social and Islamic questions addressing directly, in 1371 instead of 1327, the congregation of three hundred and seventy (now more than a million) million in the mosque of the Islamic world, rather than in the Umayyad Mosque.]
It is fitting here to write the most important answer to a most important question. For the Old Said spoke prophetically in that lesson of forty years ago as though he was seeing the wondrous teachings of the Risale-i Nur and its effects. It is for this reason that I am writing that question and answer here. It is like this:
Many have asked both me and the Risale-i Nur students: “Why is it that the Risale-i Nur is not defeated in the face of so much opposition and so many obdurate philosophers and people of misguidance? By preventing to an extent the dissemination of numerous valuable, true books on belief and Islam, and by means of their worldly pleasures and vices, they have deprived many youths and others of the truths of belief. But their most violent attacks, vicious treatment, lies and propaganda have been directed at the Risale-i Nur, to destroy it and to scare people away from it and make them give it up. Despite this, the Risale-i Nur has spread in a way never seen in any other work, six hundred thousand copies of its treatises being written out by hand with unflagging zeal and published secretly. How is it that it causes itself to be read with such enthusiasm, both within the country and abroad? What is the reason for it? In reply to the many questions of this sort, we say:
Being a true commentrary on the All-Wise Qur’an through the mystery of its miraculousness, the Risale-i Nur demonstrates that in misguidance is a sort of Hell in this world, while in belief is a sort of Paradise. It points out the grievous pains in sins, bad deeds, and forbidden pleasures, and proves that in good deeds and virtues and the truths of the Shari‘a are to be found pleasures like the pleasures of Paradise. In this way it saves the sensible among those who have fallen into vice and misguidance. For at this time there are two awesome conditions:
T h e F i r s t : Since man’s emotions, which are blind to the consequences of things and prefer an ounce of present pleasure to tons of future joys, have come to prevail over mind and reason, the only way to save the dissipated from their vice is to show them the pain present in their pleasure and to defeat their emotions. Although they are aware of the diamond-like bounties and pleasures of the hereafter, as the verse,
They deem lovable the life of this world51
indicates, while being believers, the people of misguidance choose worldly pleasures, which are like pieces of glass soon to be shattered. The only way of saving them from this love of the world and from the danger of succumbing to it is by showing them the hellish torments and pains they suffer even in this world. This is the way the Risale-i Nur takes. For at this time, due to the obduracy arising from absolute unbelief and the intoxication caused by the vice and misguidance arising from science, perhaps only one in ten or even twenty can be induced to give up his evil ways by proving the existence of Hell and its torments, after having told him of Almighty God. Having heard this, such people are likely to say: “God is Forgiving and Compassionate, and Hell is a long way off,” and continue in their dissipation. Their hearts and spirits are overcome by their emotions.
Thus, by showing through most of its comparisons the grievous and terrible results in this world of disbelief and misguidance, the Risale-i Nur makes even the most stubborn and arrogant people feel disgust at those inauspicious, illicit pleasures, leading them to repent. The short comparisons in the Sixth, Seventh, and Eighth Words, and the long one in the Third Stopping-Place in the Thirty-Second Word lead a person to feel repugnance at the vice and misguidance of the way he has taken, and cause him to accept what they teach. As an example, I shall recount briefly the situations I beheld on a journey of the imagination, which were in fact reality. Those wishing for a more detailed account may look at the end of Sikke-i Tasdik-i Gaybi (The Ratifying Stamp of the Unseen Collection).
When on that journey of the imagination I looked at the animal kingdom through the eyes of materialist philosophy and the people of misguidance and heedlessness, the innumerable needs of animals and their terrible hunger together with their weakness and impotence appeared to me as most piteous and grievous. I cried out. Then I saw through the telescope of Qur’anic wisdom and belief that the Divine Name of All-Merciful had risen in the sign of Provider like a shining sun; it gilded with the light of its mercy that hungry, wretched animal world.
Then I saw within the animal world another grievous world which was swathed in darkness and would make anyone feel pity and in which young were struggling in their need and powerlessness. I was sorry I had looked through the eyes of the people of misguidance. Suddenly, belief gave me other spectacles and I saw the Name of All-Compassionate rise in the sign of clemency; it transformed and lit up that pitiful world in joyous and beautiful fashion, changing my tears of complaint and sorrow into tears of joy and thanks.
Then the world of humanity appeared to me as though on a cinema screen. I looked through the telescope of the people of misguidance and saw that world to be so dark and terrifying that I cried out from the depths of my heart. “Alas!” I cried. For they had desires and hopes that stretched to eternity, thoughts and imaginings that embraced the universe, the earnest desire for everlasting happiness and Paradise, an innate capacity and powers on which no limit had been placed and which were free, yet despite their innumerable needs and their weakness and impotence they were exposed to the attacks of innumerable enemies and the blows of innumerable calamities. Under the perpetual threat of death, they lived out their brief and tumultuous lives in wretched circumstances. Ever looking to the grave, which for the misguided is the door to everlasting darkness, they suffered the continuous blows of death and separation, the most painful state for the heart and conscience. I saw that singly and in groups they were being thrown into that black well.
On seeing the world of humanity in this darkness I was about to cry out with my heart, spirit, and mind, and all my subtle inner faculties, indeed all the particles of my being, when the light and power of belief proceeding from the Qur’an smashed those spectacles of misguidance, giving me insight. I saw the Divine Name of All-Just rising like the sun in the sign of All-Wise, the Name of All-Merciful rising in the sign of Munificent, the Name of All-Compassionate rising in the sign of, that is, in the meaning of, All-Forgiving, the Name of Resurrector rising in the sign of Inheritor, the Name of Granter of Life rising in the sign of Bountiful, and the Name of Sustainer rising in the sign of Owner. They lit up the entire world of humanity and all the worlds within it. They dispelled those hellish states, opened up windows onto the luminous worlds of the hereafter, and scattered lights over the world of humanity. I declared: “Praise and thanks be to God to the number of particles in existence!” I understood with complete certainty that in belief is a sort of paradise in this world too and in misguidance, a sort of hell.
Then the world of the earth appeared. On that journey of the imagination, the dark, hypothetical rules of the philosophy which does not obey religion depicted a ghastly world. Voyaging through space on the ship of the aged earth —which travels seventy times faster than a cannon-ball a distance of twenty-five thousand years in one year, ever disposed to break up, its interior in a state of upheaval— the situation of wretched human kind appeared to me in a desolate darkness. My eyes darkened. I flung the spectacles of philosophy to the ground, smashing them. Then I looked with a view illumined with the wisdom of the Qur’an and belief, and I saw the Names of Creator of the Heavens and Earth, All-Powerful, All-Knowing, Sustainer, Allah, Sustainer of the Heavens and Earth, Subjugator of the Sun and Moon had risen like suns in the signs of mercy, grandeur, and dominicality. They lit up that dark, desolate, and terrifying world so that the globe appeared to my eye of belief as a well-ordered, subjugated, pleasant, and safe ship, or aeroplane, or train. It contained everyone’s provisions, and had been decked out for trade and enjoyment and to carry beings with spirits through the dominical realms around the sun. I exclaimed: “All praise be to God to the number of particles of the earth for the bounty of belief.”
This has been proved with many comparisons in the Risale-i Nur, that those who follow vice and misguidance suffer a hellish torment in this world too, while through the manifestations of belief, the believers and righteous may taste through the stomachs of Islam and humanity the pleasures of Paradise. They may benefit according to the degree of their belief. But in these stormy times, currents which numb the senses and scatter man’s attention on peripheral matters, plunging him into them, have deadened his senses and bewildered him. As a result of this the people of misguidance are temporarily unable to feel their torment, while the people of guidance are overwhelmed by heedlessness and cannot truly appreciate its pleasures.
The Second Awesome Condition This Age: In former times, compared with the present there was very little absolute disbelief, or misguidance arising from science, or the disbelief arising from perverse obstinacy. The instruction of the Islamic scholars of those times and their arguments were therefore sufficient, quickly dispelling any unbelief arising from doubts. Belief in God was general, and they could persuade most people to give up their misguidance and wrongdoing through teaching them about God and reminding them of Hell-fire. But now there are a hundred absolute disbelievers in one small town instead of perhaps one in a whole country. Those who lose their way due to science and learning and obstinately oppose the truths of belief have increased a hundredfold in relation to former times. With pride like that of the Pharaoh and their terrible misguidance these obdurate deniers oppose the truths of belief. A sacred truth is therefore much needed that will completely destroy the bases of their disbelief in this world, like an atom bomb, and will halt their aggression and bring some of them to belief.
All praise be to Almighty God that with its many comparisons, as the perfect remedy for the wounds of this time, the Risale-i Nur —a miracle of the Qur’an of Miraculous Exposition proceeding from its effulgence— has routed even the worst of those obdurate deniers with the diamond sword of the Qur’an. Its proofs and arguments to the number of the atoms of the universe demonstrating Divine unity and the truths of belief show that in twenty-five years it has not been defeated in the face of the severest attacks, but has itself prevailed and been victorious. Yes, with its comparisons of belief and unbelief, and guidance and misguidance, the Risale-i Nur proves those truths self-evidently. If note is taken, for example of the proofs and flashes of the Second Station of the Twenty-Second Word, the First Stopping-Place of the Thirty-Second Word, the ‘Windows’ of the Thirty-Third Letter, and the eleven proofs of The Staff of Moses (Asa-yi Musa), it will be understood that it is the truths of the Qur’an manifested in the Risale-i Nur that will smash and destroy absolute disbelief and perverse misguidance at this time.
In the same way that the parts of the Risale-i Nur which solve the greatest mysteries of religion and the riddles of the world’s creation have been collected together in The ‘Mysteries’ Collection (Tilsimlar Mecmuasi), the pieces which describe the hell in this world of the people of misguidance and the paradise-like pleasures of the people of guidance and show that belief is like a seed of Paradise while unbelief is a seed of the Zakkum-tree of Hell, will be put together in a small collection, God willing, and published.
S a i d N u r s i
In His Name, be He glorified!
And there is nothing but it glorifies Him with praise.
My Dear, Loyal, Unshakeable, Constant, Devoted, Faithful Brothers!
You know that the Ankara experts’ committee was unable to deny the instances of wonder-working and predictions looking to the Risale-i Nur; its members only wrongly supposed that I had a part in them, and objected saying: “Such things should not have been written in the book; wonder-working should not be made public.” In reply to this minor criticism, I said in my defence:
They are not mine and anyway I would not dare to lay claim to such wonders, they are rather distillations and flashes of the Qur’an’s miraculousness, which taking the form of wonders in the Risale-i Nur, which is a true commentary on it, are a sort of Divine bestowal (in order to strengthen the morale of its students). To make public Divine bestowal is thanks of a sort and permissible, and it is acceptable. Now, for an important reason, I shall elucidate my answer a little. I was also asked why I make them public and why I concentrate so much on this point, and why for the last few months I have gone much further in the subject. Most letters are related to the wonder-working.
T h e A n s w e r : Although at this time in the Risale-i Nur’s service of religious belief hundreds of thousands of ‘repairers’ are necessary in the face of the thousands of destructive forces; and although I have need of hundreds of scribes and assistants; and although the people and the authorities should appreciatively and encouragingly help us and get in touch with us rather than avoiding us and not having contact with us; and although the believers are obliged to give preference to the service of belief over the occupations of this worldly life and its benefits, since it looks to eternal life; taking myself as an example, I say this:
Because of our opponents preventing me from having contact with people and having helpers, and from everything; and their destroying the morale of my friends as much as they possibly can, and making them look coldly on me and the Risale-i Nur; and because of my being burdened with the duties of a thousand people despite being an aged, ill, weak, wretched stranger with no one; and because of my being compelled to avoid having contact with people and mixing with them due to a sort of physical illness caused by being isolated and oppressed; and because of their scaring off the people so effectively and destroying their morale; —because of all these and in the face of all those obstacles, I was made to write things of that sort in order to muster spiritual forces around the Risale-i Nur, and describe the Divine bestowals, which are a means of strengthening the morale of the Risale-i Nur students, and to show that on its own the Risale-i Nur is as powerful as an army (and is in no need of others). For to sell myself, God forbid, and make myself liked, and to boast and show off would be to damage the mystery of sincerity, which is an important principle of the Risale-i Nur. Just as, God willing, the Risale-i Nur will both defend itself and demonstrate its true value, so will it in effect also defend us, and be the means of having our faults pardoned.
Sending thousands of greetings to all my brothers and sisters, and particularly to the innocent and venerable elderly, whose prayers are acceptable, and offering prayers for all, we congratulate them on the month of Ramadan and request that they pray for us.
Your ill brother,
S a i d N u r s i
***
In His Name, be He glorified!
This powerless brother of yours says this both to that old friend who objected, and to the attentive, and to yourselves: through the effulgence of the Qur’an of Miraculous Exposition, the New Said puts forward proofs of the truths of belief so logical and correct that they compel not only the Muslim scholars, but also the most obdurate European philosophers to submit, and this they do. As for the signs and allusions of the Qur’an of Miraculous Exposition, from the level of its allusive meanings, attracting attention to the Risale-i Nur, which is one of its miracles at this time, it is a mark of the Qur’an’s miraculousness —similar to the allusive and symbolic prophecies of Imam ‘Ali (May God be pleased with him) and Gawth al-A‘zam (May God be pleased with him) concerning the Risale-i Nur’s importance and value. To do so is also necessitated by the miraculous eloquence of that tongue of the Unseen.
Yes, it was imparted to me in Eski_ehir Prison at a terrible time when we were in dire need of a sacred solace: “You cite the saints of olden times as testifying to the Risale-i Nur’s acceptability, but in accordance with the inner meaning of the verse,
Nor anything fresh or dry [green or withered], but is [inscribed] in a Record Clear,52
it is the Qur’an that should have the word in this matter. Does it find the Risale-i Nur acceptable? How does it look on it?” I was faced with this strange question. So I sought help from the Qur’an, and within the space of an hour I perceived that the Risale-i Nur was one element of the level of allusive meanings of thirty-three verses, from the level constituted by details of their explicit meanings (and included in the generality of the allusive meanings), and that there were powerful inferences to its inclusion and distinction. A part of these I saw in some detail, and a part I saw in summary form. In my view, no doubt, hesitation, suspicion, or misgiving remained. And I wrote that firm conviction of mine with the intention of strengthening the faith of the believers through the Risale-i Nur, and I gave it to my closest (has) brothers on condition it was held to be confidential. In the treatise, we do not say that this is the explicit meaning of the verse, lest the hojas say “he has been smitten by the evil-eye.” And we do not say that this is the generality of the allusive meaning. We say that underlying the explicit meaning are numerous layers or levels, one of which is the allusive and symbolic meaning, and that the allusive meaning is a generality. Every century, this has particularities. And this century the Risale-i Nur is one element in the generality of that level of its allusive meaning. Inferences drawn by means of the principles of jafr and numbers, practised since early times by the ‘ulama, indeed, proofs, show that that element is intentionally held in view and will perform an important function, and this does not harm the verse of the Qur’an or its clear meaning, but serves its miraculousness and eloquence. One who cannot deny the innumerable deductions made by the people of reality from Qur’anic allusions, should not deny this, and no one can deny it.
However, if the person who out of amazement deems it unlikely that such an important work should appear at the hand of an insignificant person like myself thinks of the creation of a pine-tree the size of a mountain out of a seed the size of a grain of wheat as being a sign of Divine power and grandeur, he is surely bound to say that the appearance of this work at such a time of intense need from someone as absolutely impotent and wanting as myself is evidence for the vast extent of Divine mercy. By the honour of the Risale-i Nur, I assure you and those who object, that these allusions and symbolic predictions and indications of the saints always drove me to offer thanks and praise and to seek forgiveness for my sins. I can prove to you through the glimpses you have had of my life, under your very eyes these twenty years, that at no time, not even for a minute, did they inflate my ego and make my evil-commanding soul proud and arrogant. Nevertheless, man is not free of fault or forgetfulness. I have numerous faults of which I am not aware. Also, perhaps my own ideas crept in and there are some errors in some of the treatises. But since they do not object to the false and corrupting interpretations of the people of misguidance, screened by setting up man-made translations in place of the sacred letters of the Qur’an, in the deficient letters of the new [Latin] script, and their harming the clear meanings of verses, they surely should not object to someone wretched and persecuted expounding a fine point of the Qur’an’s miraculousness in order to strengthen the belief of his brothers, to the extent of discouraging him in his service of belief, as not only the people of reality, anyone with even a grain of fairness would agree.
In addition I say this: in the face of the awesome attacks of misguidance at this time, the powerful, true ways, paths, and tariqats with millions of devoted followers have been apparently defeated. But a semi-literate person under constant surveillance living opposite the police-station, who is alone and the object of a many-sided campaign of slander in order to make everyone execrate him, cannot lay claim to the Risale-i Nur, which is more advanced than those other ways and has resisted the attacks more strongly, and that work cannot be the product of his skill, and he cannot take pride in it. It has rather been bestowed directly by Divine mercy as a miracle of the All-Wise Qur’an at this time. He laid hands on that gift of the Qur’an together with thousands of his friends. For sure the duty of chief interpreter fell to him, but evidence that it is not the work of his thought, knowledge, and intelligence is that in the Risale-i Nur are parts which were written in six hours, others that were written in two hours, others in one hour, and some in ten minutes even. I swear that even with the power of memory of the Old Said (May God be pleased with him)53 with my own thought I could not write in ten hours what was written in ten minutes. With my own mind and capacity I could not write in two days the treatise that was written in an hour. And neither myself nor the most exacting religious philosopher could research the matters of the Thirtieth Word and write it in six days, although it was written in one day in six hours. And so on.
That is to say, despite being bankrupt, I am the herald and servant of a wonderfully rich jeweller’s shop. Out of His grace and munificence may Almighty God make us and all Risale-i Nur students purely and sincerely constant in this service, and give us success. Amen. In veneration of the Lord of Messengers.
S a i d N u r s i
***
FOOTNOTES
1. According to Bediuzzaman, the aim of the Risale-i Nur is to gain for its readers or students ‘true, verified belief’ (iman-i tahkikî — Arabic: tahqiqi). This has been defined as: “To acquire certain knowledge of all the questions related to belief through close investigation, and to live that belief... Firm, unshakeable belief.” See, Abdullah Ye¤in, Yeni Lugat (3rd. ed.) Istanbul 1975, 271.
2. See, page 478, footnote 63.
3. Bukhari, Adhan, 155; Tahajjud, 21; ‘Umra, 12; Jihad, 133; Bad’ al-Khalq, 11; Maghazi, 29; Da’wat, 18, 52; Riqaq, 11; I’tisam, 3; Muslim, Dhikr. 28, 30, 74, 75, 76; Witr, 24; Jihad, 158; Adab, 101; Tirmidhi, Mawaqit, 108; Hajj, 104; Da’wat, 35, 36; Nasa’i, Sahw, 83-6; Manasik, 163, 170; Iman, 12; Ibn Maja, Tijara 40; Manasik, 84; Adab, 58; Du’a, 10, 14, 16; Abu Da’ud, Manasik, 56; Darimi, Salat, 88, 90; Manasik, 34; Isti’dhan, 53, 57; Muwatta, Hajj, 127, 243; Qur’an, 20, 22; Musnad, i, 47; ii, 5; iii, 320; iv, 4; v, 191; al-Hakim, al-Mustadrak, i, 538.
4. Qur’an, 17:42.
5. Qur’an, 2:117, etc.
6. Qur’an, 67:8.
7. Qur’an, 2:32.
8. Qur’an, 1:1-7.
9. Qur’an, 10:92.
10. Qur’an, 4:69.
11. Thus, if, according to his degree, an ordinary man receives a tiny share like a date-stone of this sacred truth, a perfected man who has advanced spiritually may receive a share like the palm-tree. But a person who has not advanced should not intentionally recall these meanings while reciting the Fatiha,* lest he impairs his sense of the Divine presence. When he advances to such a station, those meanings will anyway make themselves clear to him.
* We asked our Master what was meant by “intentionally” in the footnote above, and we are writing here exactly the answer we received:
I consider that to dwell on the comprehensive, elevated meanings of the Fatiha and tashahhud, not intentionally but indirectly, and not in detail, which induces a sort of heedlessness of the Divine presence, but concisely and briefly, dispels heedlessness and imparts a brilliance to the worship and invocations. This shows up completely the high value of the prayers, the Fatiha, and the tashahhud. What is meant by “not dwelling intentionally” at the end of the second part, is that sometimes to ponder over the meanings themselves in detail causes one to forget the prayers, lessening the sense of the Divine presence. But I feel that to dwell on them indirectly and concisely yields great benefits.
Signed in the name of the Risale-i Nur students of the third School of Joseph,
Ceylan
12. Qur’an, 2:32.
13. Qur’an, 48:28-9.
14. al-‘Ajluni, Kashf al-Khafa’, ii, 164; ‘Ali al-Qari, Sharh al-Shifa’, i, 26.
15. In the original, the above and the passages in italics at the head of the subsequent fifteen ‘Testimonies’ are in Arabic. [Tr.]
16. Qur’an, 54:1.
17. Qur’an, 8:17.
18. The hero ‘Ali (May God be pleased with him), whose courage was of the very highest order, said: “When we were frightened when fighting in battle, we used to hide behind God’s Messenger (PBUH).” The histories relate how even his enemies of that time corroborated that all his virtues were superior, the same as his courage.
19. al-‘Ajluni, Kashf al-Khafa’, ii, 64; Tecrid-i Sahih (Turk. trans.), i, 107.
20. Husayn al-Jisri, al-Risalat al-Hamidiyya [Turk. trans. Manastirli Ismail Hakki], Istanbul 1308, 4 vols.
21. In my old age and wretchedness, I perceived a millionth of the spiritual sustenance brought by Muhammad (PBUH). If I had been able, I would have thanked him by uttering benedictions for him with millions of tongues. It was like this:
I suffer greatly from separation and parting, but the world I love and the things in it leave me and depart. I know that I too shall depart. And it is only by hearing from Muhammad (PBUH) the good news of everlasting happiness and eternal life that I am saved from that severe pain and soul-searing despair and I find complete solace. In fact, when I say: “Peace be upon you, O Prophet, and God’s mercy and blessings!” in the tashahhud during the prayers, I am both paying allegiance to him, and declaring my submission and obedience to his rank, and offering him congratulations on his duty, and expressing a sort of thanks and response to the good news he brought of eternal happiness. All Muslims offer these greetings five times every day.
22. Qur’an, 2:32.
23. Qur’an, 24:35.
24. Qur’an, 24:40.
25. Qur’an, 1:7.
26. Qur’an, 24:40.
27. Qur’an, 1:7.
28. Qur’an, 13:16.
29. Qur’an, 67:15.
30. Qur’an, 11:56.
31. Qur’an, 29:60.
32. Qur’an, 17:70.
33. Qur’an, 82:13.
34. Qur’an, 67:5.
35. Qur’an, 50:6.
36. Qur’an, 2:29.
37. See page 501, footnote 78.
38. Qur’an, 17:111.
39. And God’s is the highest similitude: like all-encompassing light is necessary to the sun.
40. Qur’an, 67:14.
41. The remaining part of this treatise was written while I was suffering from a terrible illness, a result of being poisoned, such as I had never previously experienced in my life. My faults should therefore be looked on tolerantly. Husrev may modify, change, and correct any parts he considers inappropriate.
42. For further discussion, see The Sixth Ray, in the present work. [Tr.]
43. Bukhari, Salat, 39; Musnad, ii, 34, 36, 67, 129. (With the meaning of “The one who performs the prayers converses with his Sustainer.”)
44. My severe illness does not permit me to continue; this is only a source and assistant to Husrev’s duty of translation.
45. Since the Turkish is given for the Arabic piece here, the English translation of the Arabic is not given. [Tr.]
46. Hulâsatü’l-Hulâsa: The ‘sum and substance’ in Arabic of The Supreme Sign, which describes in thirty-three degrees how all the realms of creation testify to their Creator’s existence and unity. It is included in the collection of invocations and supplications called Hizb Anwar al-Haqa’iq al-Nuriyya, which includes Jawshan al-Kabir. [Tr.]
47. Qur’an, 31:28.
48. Qur’an, 112:1-2.
49. Qur’an, 31:28.
50. Qur’an, 2:32.
51. Qur’an, 14:3.
52. Qur’an, 6:59.
53. Intending it to be a prayer, some of the scribes wrote the phrase (May God be pleased with him) after this wretched Said’s name. I wanted to change it, but it occurred to me that since it is a prayer seeking God’s pleasure, it should not be interfered with, so I did not change it.

The Second Chapter of the Twenty-Ninth Flash
(On the phrase: All praise be to God!)
[This short treatise, called the Second Chapter, explains only nine of the countless lights and advantages of belief in God, which make man declare: “All praise be to God!”]
In the Name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate.
FIRST POINT
First of all, two things will be pointed out:
1. Philosophy is a pair of dark glasses which shows everything to be ugly and frightful. While belief in God is a transparent, clear, luminous pair of spectacles which shows everything to be beautiful and familiar.
2. Man is connected with all creatures, has a sort of commerce with all things, and by nature is compelled to meet, talk, and be neighbourly with the things that blockade him; so too he possesses six aspects: a left, right, upper, lower, front, and back aspect.
On wearing either of these two pairs of spectacles, man can see the creatures and things present in the aspects mentioned above.
Right Aspect: What is meant by this aspect is the past. When it is looked at through the spectacles of philosophy, what is seen is a vast, dark, terrifying, overturned graveyard, where the doomsday of the land of the past has come to pass. There can be no doubt that this sight casts man into great terror, fear, and despair.
However, when this aspect is looked at through the spectacles of belief, even if the land appears to have been turned upside down, as indeed it has, there has been no loss of life; it is understood that its crew and inhabitants have been transferred to a better world, one full of light. The graves and pits are seen to be underground tunnels, dug to lead to another, light-filled world. That is to say, the joy, relief, confidence, and peace of mind belief gives to man is a Divine bounty which makes him repeat thousands of times over: “All praise be to God!”
Left Aspect: When the future is looked at through the spectacles of philosophy, it appears in the form of a huge, black, terrifying grave which is going to rot us and make us prey to snakes and scorpions which will eliminate us. But when it is looked at through the spectacles of belief, it is seen in the form of a repast comprising every variety of the finest and most delicious foods and drinks which Almighty God, the Most Merciful and All-Compassionate Creator, has prepared for man. So it makes him repeat many thousands of times: “All praise be to God!”
Upper Aspect: This is the heavens. When a person looks at this aspect through the spectacles of philosophy, he feels an awful terror at the great speed and variety of the motions —like horse races or military manoeuvres— of the millions of stars and heavenly bodies in endless space. Whereas when a believer looks at them, he sees that just as those strange and wonderful manoeuvres are being carried out under the supervision of a commander and at his command, so the stars are adorning the world of the heavens and are light-giving lamps for him. As a result he feels not fear and fright at those horses racing, but familiarity and affection. It is surely little to say: “All praise be to God!” thousands of times for the bounty of belief which thus illuminates the world of the heavens.
Lower Aspect: This is the earth. When man looks at this world with the eye of philosophy, he sees it as an untethered, unhaltered animal wandering aimlessly around the sun, or like a holed and captainless boat, and he is carried away by fear and anxiety. But when he looks with belief, he sees it in the form of a ship of the Most Merciful One ploughing its course around the sun under the command of God Almighty, with all its food, drink, and clothing on board, for the pleasure of mankind. So he starts to declare with great feeling: “All praise be to God!” for this great bounty which springs from belief.
Front Aspect: If a person who indulges in philosophy looks at this aspect, he sees that all living creatures, whether human or animal, are disappearing group by group and with great speed towards it. That is to say, they are going to non-being and ceasing to exist. Since he knows that he too is a traveller on that road, he goes out of his mind with grief. But for a believer looking with the eye of belief, men journeying to that aspect are not passing to the world of non-existence, they are being transferred from one pasture to another like nomads, and migrating from a transitory realm to an everlasting one, and from a farm of service and labour to the wages office, and from a country of hardship and difficulty to one of plenty and ease. The believer meets this aspect with pleasure and gratitude.
Difficulties which occur on the road like death and the grave are sources of happiness by reason of their results. For the road which leads to the luminous worlds passes through the grave, and the greatest happiness is the result of the worst, most grievous disasters. For example, Joseph (PUH) attained the happiness of being ruler of Egypt only by way of being thrown into the well by his brothers and cast into prison at the slanders of Zulaikha. In the same way, a child coming into the world from his mother’s womb only reaches the happiness of this world as a result of the excruciating, crushing difficulties he experiences on the way.
Back Aspect: That is, since one who looks at those who have remained behind with the view of philosophy can find no answer to the question: “Where have they come from and where are they going, and why did they come to the land of this world?”, he naturally remains in a torment of bewilderment and doubt. But should he look through the spectacles of belief, he will understand that men are observers, sent by the Pre-Eternal Sovereign to contemplate and study the wonderful miracles of power displayed in the exhibition of the universe, and that after receiving their marks and ranks in conformity with the degree they have grasped the value and grandeur of those miracles of power and the degree to which the miracles point to the grandeur of the Pre-Eternal Sovereign, men will return to the Sovereign’s realm. So he will say: “All praise be to God!” for the bounty of belief which has given him this bounty.
Since the praise offered in saying: “All praise be to God!” for the bounty of belief, which thus banishes the above-mentioned layers of darkness, is also a bounty, praise should be offered for it too. And praise should be offered a third time for this second bounty of praise, and a fourth time for the third bounty of praise... That is to say, an infinite chain of praise is born of a single uttering of the phrase: “All praise be to God!”
SECOND POINT
One should say: “All praise be to God!” for the bounty of belief which illuminates these six aspects, for just as since it disperses the darkness of the six aspects, it may be considered a great bounty for the warding off of evil, so too since it illuminates them it may be thought of as a second bounty, for the attraction of benefits. Therefore, since man is by nature civilized, he is connected with all the creatures in the six aspects, and through the bounty of belief has the possibility of benefiting from the six aspects.
Thus, according to a meaning of the verse:
Wheresoever you turn, there is the countenance of God,1
man finds enlightenment in whichever of the six aspects he is found. In fact, someone who is a believer has a life which in effect stretches from the foundation of the world to its end. This life of his receives assistance from the light of a life which extends from pre-eternity to post-eternity. In the same way, thanks to the belief which illuminates the six aspects, man’s narrow time and space are transformed into a broad and easy world. This extensive world becomes like man’s house, and the past and the future like present time for his spirit and heart. The distance between between them disappears.
THIRD POINT
The fact that belief affords sources of support and assistance necessitates saying: “All praise be to God!”
Yes, because of their impotence and their multitudinous enemies, humankind are in need of a source of support to which they can have recourse to repulse those enemies. Likewise, because of the abundance of their needs and their extreme poverty, they need a source of assistance from which they may seek help, so that through it they may meet their needs.
O man! Your one and only point of support is belief in God. The only source of assistance for your spirit and conscience is belief in the hereafter. One who does not know of these two sources suffers constant fear in his heart and spirit, and his conscience is perpetually tormented. While the person who seeks support from the first point and help from the second, experiences many pleasures and delights in his heart and spirit, so that he is both consoled, and his conscience is at ease.
FOURTH POINT
Through showing that similar pleasures exist and will be bestowed, the light of belief removes the pain that occurs when lawful pleasures start to fade. Furthermore, through pointing out the source of bounties, it ensures that the bounties continue and do not diminish.
Similarly, through showing the pleasure of renewed acqaintance, it removes the pain of separation and parting. That is to say, while many pains occur at the thought of the passing of a single pleasure, belief removes them by calling to mind the recurrence of the pleasure. In any event there are further pleasures in the renewal of pleasure. If a fruit has no tree, its pleasure is restricted to and ceases on its being eaten, and its ceasing is the cause of sorrow. But if the fruit’s tree is known, there is no pain when the fruit ceases to exist, for there are others to come in its place.
At the same time, renewal is in itself a pleasure. For what troubles the human spirit most are the pains arising from separation. Whereas the light of belief removes those pains through the hope of renewed meeting and the recurrence of similar encounters.
FIFTH POINT
The things among these beings man imagines to be hostile and foreign, and lifeless and lost as though orphans or dead, the light of belief shows to him as friends and brothers, as living, and as glorifying God. That is to say, a person who looks with the eye of heedlessness supposes the beings in the world to be harmful like enemies, and he takes fright; he sees things as foreign. For in the view of misguidance, there are no bonds of brotherhood between the things of the past and those of the future. There is only an insignificant, partial connection between them. As a consequence, the brotherhood of the people of misguidance is only for one minute within thousands of years.
In the view of belief, all the heavenly bodies appear as living and as familiar with one another. Belief shows each of them to be glorifying its Creator through the tongue of its being. It is in this respect that all the heavenly bodies possess a sort of life and spirit according to each. There is no fear and fright therefore when the heavenly bodies are considered with this view of belief; there is familiarity and love.
The view of unbelief sees human beings, powerless as they are to secure their desires, as ownerless and without protector; it imagines them to be grieving and sorrowful like weeping orphans on account of their impotence. The view of belief on the other hand, sees them as living creatures; not as orphans but officials charged with duties; as servants glorifying and extolling God.
SIXTH POINT
The light of belief depicts this world and the hereafter as two tables displaying numerous varieties of bounties from which a believer benefits through the hand of belief, his inner and external senses, and his subtle, spiritual faculties. In the view of misguidance, the sphere from which a living being may benefit diminishes and is restricted to material pleasures. While in the view of belief, it expands to a sphere which embraces the heavens and the earth. Yes, a believer considers the sun to be a lamp hanging in the roof of his house, and the moon to be a night-light. They thus become bounties for him, and the sphere from which he benefits is broader than the heavens. With the eloquent verses,
And He has made subject to you the sun and the moon,2
and,
He it is Who enables you to travel the land and the sea,3
the Qur’an of Miraculous Exposition alludes to these wonderful bounties and blessings which arise from belief.
SEVENTH POINT
It is known through belief that God’s existence is a bounty surpassing all other bounties, a great bounty which is a source, a fountain, containing endless varieties of bounties, innumerable sorts of blessings, and uncountable kinds of gifts. It is consequently incumbent on man and a debt to offer praise and laudation for the bounties of belief to the number of particles in the world. A number of these have been shown in various parts of the Risale-i Nur; discussing belief in God, they raise the veil from these bounties and point them out.
One of the bounties for which praise should be offered with all the praise that the phrase “All praise be to God!” indicates with the ‘Lam of specification,’4 is the bounty of Divine mercy. Indeed, mercy comprises bounties to the number of living beings which manifest Divine mercy. For man in particular is connected with all living creatures, and in this respect is gladdened by their happiness and saddened by their pain. Thus, a bounty found in a single individual is a bounty also for his fellows.
Another which comprises bounties to the number of children which are blessed with their mother’s tenderness, and which deserves praise and laudation, is Divine compassion. Yes, a person with conscience who feels sorrow and pity at the weeping of a motherless, hungry child, surely feels pleasure at a mother’s compassion for her child, surely he is pleased and happy. Thus, pleasures of this sort are each a bounty and require praise and thanks.
Another of the bounties requiring praise and thanks to the number of all the varieties and instances of wisdom contained in the universe is Divine wisdom. For just as man’s self is endowed with the manifestation of Divine mercy and his heart with the manifestation of Divine compassion, so too does his intellect take pleasure at the subtleties of Divine wisdom. So in this respect they require endless praise and laudation through the declaring of “All praise be to God!”
Another is the bounty of preservation, for which praise should be offered to the number of manifestations of the Divine Name of Inheritor, and the number of descendants who endure after the passing of their forbears, and the number of the beings of the next world, and the number of men’s actions which are preserved so as to be the means of their receiving their rewards in the hereafter; praise should be offered with so great an “All praise be to God!” that it fills all space with its sound. For the continuation of a bounty is more valuable than the bounty itself. The perpetuation of pleasure is more pleasurable than the pleasure itself. To abide permanently in Paradise is superior to Paradise itself; and so on. Consequently, the bounties which Almighty God’s attribute of Preserver comprise are greater and far superior to all the bounties existent in all the universe. Thus, this attribute requires an “All praise be to God!” as great as the world. You can compare the rest of the Divine Names with the four mentioned here, and since in each are endless bounties, each requires endless praise and thanks.
Likewise, the Prophet Muhammad (Peace and blessings be upon him), who is the means of attaining the bounty of belief and has the authority to open all the treasuries of bounty, is also such a bounty that mankind bears for all eternity the debt of praising and applauding him.
Likewise, the bounties of Islam and the Qur’an, which are the index and source of all varieties of bounties, material and spiritual, require and deserve unending, infinite praise.
EIGHTH POINT
Praise be to God, Whom, according to the Qur’an of Mighty Stature, which is its expounder, this mighty book known as the universe praises and extols with all its chapters and sections, all its pages and lines, all its world and letters — the Most Pure and Holy One, Whom it praises and extols through making manifest His attributes of beauty and perfection. It is as follows:
According to its capacity, whether great or small, each inscription in this mighty book praises and extols its Inscriber, Who is the Single and Eternally Besought One, through displaying His glorious attributes.
Likewise, each inscription in the book of the universe offers praise through exhibiting the attributes of Beauty of its Scribe, Who is the Most-Merciful and Compassionate One.
Likewise, through reflecting and mirroring the manifestations of the Most Beautiful Names, all the inscriptions and points and embroideries in this book utter the praises of the Most Pure and Holy One through lauding, glorifying, and exalting Him.
Likewise, each ode in this book of the universe extols and glorifies its Composer, Who is All-Powerful and All-Knowing.
NINTH POINT
... ... ...5
***
FOOTNOTES
1. Qur’an, 2:115.
2. Qur’an, 14:33.
3. Qur’an, 10:22.
4. ‘Lam of specification’; that is, the li in al-hamdulillah. [Tr.]
5. I do not have the key to these cyphers that I might decode them. Moreover, the head of one who is fasting can neither decypher them, nor disclose their meanings. Forgive me, I could do only this much, and that through the moral assistance of the author, the spiritual effulgence of the Night of Power, and being in the vicinity of Mawlana Jalaluddin.
The translator,
Abdülmecid Nursi

The Supplicant
My demolished grave in which are piled up1
Seventy-nine dead Said’s2 with his sins and sorrows.
The eightieth is a gravestone to a grave;
Altogether they weep at Islam’s decline.3
Together with my gravestone and moaning grave of dead Said’s
I go forward to the field of tomorrow’s future.
I am certain that the skies of the future and Asia
Will together surrender to Islam’s clean, shining hand.
For it promises the prosperity of belief;
It affords peace and security to mankind.

FOOTNOTES
1. This line is his signature.
2. Since the body is renewed twice every year, it means that [each year] two Said’s have died. Also, this year Said is in his seventy-ninth year. It means one Said has died every year, so that he will live to this date. [Bediuzzaman died in 1379 according to the Hijri calendar, and his grave was demolished and moved in 1380. —Tr.]
3. With a premonition of the future, he perceived its present state, twenty years later.