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In His Name, be He glorified!

And there is nothing but it glorifies Him with praise.(17:44)

Peace be upon you and upon your companions.

My Dear Brothers!

You asked me a question that night and I did not reply, because it is not permissible to argue over questions of belief. Your discussion of them had turned into a dispute. For now I am writing very brief replies to your three questions, about which you were arguing. You will find the details in The Words; the chemist wrote down which. But it did not occur to me to mention the Twenty-Sixth Word, about divine determining and man’s faculty of will; have a look at that too, but don’t read it like a newspaper. The reason I advised the chemist to study of those Words is this:

doubts about matters of that sort arise from weakness of belief in the pillars of faith. Those Words prove all of them.

FIRST QUESTION

What wisdom does it spring from, Adam (Upon whom be peace) being expelled from Paradise and some of mankind, the sons of Adam, being sent to Hell? What was the reason for it?

The Answer:The reason for it concerns the charging of duties: the duty with which Adam was charged yielded such results as the unfolding of all human spiritual progress and the revealing of all human potentialities and man’s essential nature being a comprehensive mirror to all the divine names.

If he had remained in Paradise, his rank would have been fixed like that of the angels; man’s potentialities would not have been disclosed. In any case, the angels, with their unchanging ranks, are numerous and there is no need for man to perform their sort of worship. Since divine wisdom required a realm of accountability commensurate with the potentialities of man, who would traverse infinite degrees, he was expelled from Paradise for his well- known sin, sin being the requirement of human nature and contrary to that of the angels.

That is to say, just as it was pure wisdom and pure mercy that Adam should be expelled from Paradise, so is it just and right that the unbelievers should be sent to Hell.

As is mentioned in the Third Indication in the Tenth Word, the unbeliever only committed only one sin in his short life, but the sin comprised infinite wrongdoing. For unbelief is an insult to the whole universe; it negates the value of all beings, it denies the testimony to divine unity of all creatures, and is contempt towards the divine names, the manifestations of which are to be seen in the mirrors of beings.

Therefore, in order to avenge the rights of beings on the unbeliever, their monarch, the All-Compelling One of Glory, casts the unbelievers into Hell, and this is pure right and justice. For an infinite crime demands infinite punishment.

SECOND QUESTION

Why are devils created? Almighty God created Satan and evil; what is the wisdom in it? Isn’t the creation of evil, evil, and the creation of bad, bad?

The Answer: God forbid, the creation of evil is not evil, the acquisition of (kesb) or desire for evil, is evil. For creation and bringing into existence look to all the consequences, whereas such a desire looks to a particular result, since it is a particular relation.

For example, there are thousands of consequences of rain falling, and all of them are good. If due to misuse of their wills some people receive harm from the rain, they cannot say that the creation of rain is not mercy or that it is evil. For it is evil for them due to their mischoice and inclinations. Also, there are numerous benefits in the creation of fire and all of them are good. But if some people are harmed by fire due to their misuse of it and their wills, they cannot say that the creation of fire is evil; because it was not only created to burn them. Rather, they made a wrong choice and thrust their hands into the fire while cooking the food, and made that servant inimical to themselves.

In Short: A lesser evil is acceptable for a greater good. If an evil which will lead to a greater good is abandoned so that a lesser evil should not occur, a greater evil will have been perpetrated. For example, there are certainly some minor material and physical harms and evils in sending soldiers to fight a jihad, but the jihad leads to a greater good whereby Islam is saved from being conquered by infidels. If the jihad is abandoned due to those lesser evils, the greater evil will come after the greater good has gone, and that is absolute wrong. Another example: to amputate a finger which is infected with gangrene and has to be amputated is good and right, although it is apparently an evil. For if it is not amputated, the hand will be amputated and that would be a greater evil.

Thus, the creation and bringing into existence of evils, harms, tribulations, satans, and harmful things, is not evil and bad, for they are created for the many important results they yield. For example, satans have not been set to pester the angels, and the angels cannot progress; their degrees are fixed and deficient. However, in the world of humanity the degrees of progress and decline are infinite. There is an extremely long distance through which to progress, from the Nimrod’s and Pharaoh’s as far as the veracious saints and the prophets.

Thus, because of the creation of satans and the mystery of man’s accountability and the sending of prophets, an arena of trial and examination and striving and competition has been opened so that coal-like base spirits may be differentiated and separated out from diamond-like elevated spirits. If there had been no striving and competition, the potentialities in the mine of humanity, resembling diamonds and coal, would have remained equal. The spirit of Abu Bakr the Veracious at the highest of the high would have remained on a par with Abu Jahl at the lowest of the low.

This means that since the creation of satans and evils looks to vast, universal results, it is not evil or bad. The evils and instances of bad that arise from abuses and the particular causes known as man’s acquisition pertain to his voluntary actions not to divine creation.

If you ask?The majority of humanity become unbelievers due to the existence of Satan; they embrace unbelief and suffer harm, despite the sending of prophets. If, according to the rule “The majority has the word,” the majority suffers evil as a result, then the creation of evil is evil and it may even be said that the sending of prophets is not a mercy. Isn’t that so?

The Answer: Quantity has no importance in relation to quality. The true majority looks to quality.

For example, if a date-palm has a hundred seeds and they are not planted in the earth and watered and so do not undergo a chemical reaction and manifest the struggle for life, they remain a hundred seeds worth virtually nothing. But if they are watered and are subject to the struggle for life, and then eighty out of the hundred rot due to their faulty make-up, but twenty become fruit- bearing trees, can you say that watering them was evil because most of them rotted? Of course you cannot say that, for the twenty have become twenty thousand. A person who loses eighty and gains twenty thousand suffers no loss, so it cannot be evil.

Another example: a peahen lays one hundred eggs and they are worth five hundred kurush. If the hen sits on the hundred eggs and eighty go bad and twenty hatch into peacocks, can it be said that the loss was high and the affair, evil; that it was bad to put the broody hen on the eggs and an evil occurred? No, it was not thus, it was good. For the peacock species and egg family lost eighty eggs worth four hundred kurush, but gained twenty peacocks worth eighliras.

Thus, through the sending of prophets and the mystery of man’s accountability, and through striving and fighting with satans, in return for the hundreds of thousands of prophets and millions of saints and thousands of millions of purified scholars they have gained, who are like the suns, moons, and stars of the world of humanity, mankind has lost the unbelievers and dissemblers, who are numerous in regard to quantity, insignificant in regard to quality, and like pernicious beasts.

THIRD QUESTION

Almighty God sends calamities and inflicts tribulations; isn’t this an injustice towards the innocent in particular, and animals even?

The Answer: God forbid, sovereignty is His. He holds sway over His possessions as He wishes. Moreover, a skilful craftsman makes you a model in return for a wage and dresses you in a bejewelled garment that he has artistically fashioned. Then in order to display his art and skill, he shortens it and lengthens it, measures it and trims it, and he makes you sit down and stand up. Can you say to him: “You have made the garment that makes me beautiful ugly. You have caused me trouble, making me sit down and stand up.”? Of course, you cannot say that. If you did, you would be crazy.

In just the same way, the All-Glorious Maker has clothed you in an artistically wrought being bejewelled with such faculties as the eye, the ear, and the tongue. To display the embroideries of various of His names, He makes you ill, He afflicts you with tribulations, He makes you hungry, He fills you, He makes you thirsty; He makes you revolve in states like these. To strengthen the essence of life and display the manifestation of His names He makes you pass through numerous such conditions. As is indicated in the comparison, if you ask: “Why do you inflict these calamities on me?” a hundred instances of wisdom will silence you.

In any event, calm, repose, idleness, monotony, and arrest from motion are forms of non-existence, and harm. Motion and change are existence and good. Life finds its perfection through motion, it progresses by means of tribulations. Life performs various motions through the manifestation of the divine names; it is purified, finds strength; it unfolds and expands; it becomes a mobile pen to write its own appointed course; it performs its duty and acquires the right to receive reward in the hereafter.

Briefly, these are the answers to the three questions you were arguing over. Explanations of them are to be found in the thirty-three Words.

My Dear Brother! Read this letter to the chemist and to any of those who heard the argument you deem suitable. And convey my greetings to my new student, the chemist, and tell him the following:

It is not permissible to have a heated discussion about subtle matters of belief like these in a social gathering. If it turns into an uncontrolled contest, while being a panacea it becomes poison. It is harmful for both those who speak and those who listen. It is permissible to discuss such matters moderately and fairly, exchanging ideas.

And tell him that if doubts occur to him about matters of this sort and he cannot find the answer in The Words, he may write to me privately.

Hem Eczacıya de ki: Merhum pederi hakkında gördüğü rüya için hatırıma şöyle bir mana geldi ki: Merhum pederi doktor olmak münasebetiyle, çok salih ve mübarek, belki veli insanlara faydası dokunmuş ve ondan memnun olan ve menfaat gören o mübareklerin ervahları, onun vefatı hengâmında kuşlar suretinde en yakın akrabası olan oğluna görünmüş, onun ruhuna şefaatkârane bir hoşâmedî nevinden bir istikbal ettikleri hatırıma geldi.

O gece burada beraber bulunan bütün dostlara selâm ve dua ederim.

اَل۟بَاقٖى هُوَ ال۟بَاقٖى

Said Nursî

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