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In His Name!

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

Peace on those who follow guidance, and may those who follow their own desires be censured!

My Dear Brothers!

You frequently ask about my situation and how I am, and why I have not applied for my release papers, and concerning my indifference towards politics and the state of the world. Since you have asked these questions on numerous occasions, and also ask them implicitly, I am compelled to reply not as the New Said, but in the language of the Old Said.

YOUR FIRST QUESTION

Are you comfortable? How are you?

The Answer:I offer endless thanks to the Most Merciful of the Merciful that He has transformed the various wrongs the worldly(*)perpetrate against me into various forms of mercy. It is like this:

Having given up politics and withdrawn from the world, I was living in a mountain cave and thinking of the hereafter when the worldly wrongfully plucked me from it and sent me into exile. The All-Compassionate and Wise Creator turned the exile into mercy; He transformed the solitude on the mountain, which was unsafe and exposed to factors that would harm sincerity, into a retreat in the safe and sincere mountains of Barla. While a prisoner-of-war in Russia I made up my mind to withdraw into a cave towards the end of my life and prayed for it. The Most Merciful of the Merciful made Barla the cave and bestowed the benefits without burdening my weak self with the difficulties and troubles of a cave.

Only, in Barla there were two or three distrustful people, and I suffered torments because of their groundless fears. It was as though those friends of mine were thinking of my comfort, but because of their suspicions, they harmed both my heart and our service of the Qur’an.

Moreover, although the worldly gave the document in question to all the exiles, and released the criminals from prison and offered them an amnesty, they wrongfully did not give it to me. However, in order to further employ me in the service of the Qur’an and make me write to a greater extent the lights of the Qur’an called the Words, my Compassionate Sustainer left me untroubled in this exile and transformed it into a great instance of compassion.

In addition, although the worldly left all the influential, powerful leaders and shaikhs who could interfere in their world in the towns and cities and permitted them to meet with their relatives and everyone, they unjustly isolated me and sent me to a village. With one or two exceptions they allowed none of my relatives and fellow- countrymen to visit me. But my All-Compassionate Creator transformed that isolation into a vast mercy for me, for it left my mind clear and I was able to receive the effulgence of the All-Wise Qur’an as it is, free of malice and ill-will.

Also, the worldly deemed excessive the two commonplace letters I wrote in two years at the beginning of my exile. And now even, they are displeased at one or two people visiting me purely for the sake of the hereafter once every week or two or once a month; and they have harassed me because of this. But my Compassionate Sustainer and All-Wise Creator transformed their tyranny into mercy

for He transformed it into a desirable solitude and acceptable retreat for me during these Three Months,(*)which may gain for a person ninety years of spiritual (manevî) life.

All thanks be to God for all situations, my situation and comfort are thus.

YOUR SECOND QUESTION

Why don’t you apply for your release papers?

The Answer:I have been sentenced by divine determining (kader) in this matter, not by the worldly, so I apply to it. Whenever it gives permission, whenever it cuts off my sustenance here, then I shall go.

The reality of this is as follows: there are two causes of everything that befalls one, one apparent and the other, real. The worldly are the apparent cause; they brought me here. As for divine determining, that was the true cause; it sen tenced me to this isolation. The apparent cause acted wrongfully, whereas the true cause acted with justice. The apparent one thought like this: “This man performs strenuous services to learning and religion; he may interfere in our world.” Because of this possibility, they exiled me and perpetrated a threefold wrong. Then divine determining saw that my service of religion and learning was not really sincere, so it sentenced me to this exile. It transformed their compounded tyranny into a multiple mercy.

Divine determining governs in the question of my exile and it is just, so I have recourse to it. The apparent cause certainly has some ostensible reasons and things, but they make it meaningless to apply to them. If they possessed some right or some powerful cause, then application could have been made to them too.

I have completely given up their world – may it be the end of them – and their politics – may it rebound on them – so I do not want to imbue their suspicions with reality by applying to them, since the pretexts and suspicions they think up are of course baseless. If I had felt any appetite to meddle in world politics, the reins of which are held by Westerners, it would not have remained thus secret for eight hours let alone eight years; it would have leaked out and become known. However, for eight years I have felt no desire to read a newspaper, and I have not read one. And for four years I have been here under surveillance, and there has not been the slightest sign that I have meddled in politics.

That is to say, service of the All-Wise Qur’an is superior to all politics so that it does not let a person condescend to [concern himself with] world politics, which consists mostly of falsehood.

The second reason for my not applying is this: to claim a right before those who suppose wrong to be right, is a sort of wrong. I do not want to perpetrate such a wrong.

YOUR THIRD QUESTION

Why are you so indifferent towards world politics? You don’t change your attitude at all, even though so many things are happening. Does this mean you consider them to be good, or are you frightened, so remain silent?

The Answer:Service of the All-Wise Qur’an severely prohibited me from the world of politics. It even made me forget about it. For the whole story of my life testifies that fear has never taken me by the hand and held me back from taking a way I deemed right, nor could it.

And why should I be frightened? I have no connection with the world apart from the appointed hour. I have no family or children to think of, nor any property. I don’t belong to a noble family that I should consider its honour. I would not want to preserve worldly glory and renown which consists of hypocritical, undeserved fame; may God bless those who help in destroying it! So all that remains is my death and that is in the hands of the All-Glorious Creator. Who has the power to intervene in it before the time of its coming? Anyway we are one of those who prefer honourable death to degradation in life. Someone resembling the Old Said spoke the following lines:

“We are those for whom there is no middle way; For us is either a place of honour among the people, or the grave.”(*)

In any event, service of the Qur’an prohibits me from thinking of socio-political life.

It is like this: human life is a journey. I saw at this time through the light of the Qur’an that the way has entered a swamp. The caravan of mankind is stumbling forward in stinking, filthy mud. Part of it is travelling a safe way. Another part has found certain means to save itself as far as is possible from the muddy swamp. But the great majority are travelling in darkness in the midst of it. Twenty per cent suppose the filthy mud to be musk and ambergris because they are drunk, and are smearing it over their faces and eyes; they stumble on till they drown in it. However, eighty per cent understand it is a swamp and realize it is stinking and filthy, but they are bewildered and cannot discern the safe way.

There are two solutions:

The First: to bring the drunken twenty per cent to their senses with a club.

The Second to point out the safe way to the bewildered by showing them a light.

I look and see that eighty people are brandishing clubs at the twenty per cent, while the light is not properly shown to the unhappy, bewildered eighty. Even if it is shown, since those showing it hold both the club and the light in the same hand, it does not inspire confidence. The bewildered person anxiously wonders: “Does he want to attract me with the light then hit me with the club?” And sometimes when, due to some defect, the club is broken, the light flies away too or else is extinguished.

Thus, the swamp is mankind’s dissolute social life, which breeds heedlessness and misguidance. The drunkards are those obdurate people who take delight in misguidance, while the bewildered ones are those who detest misguidance but cannot extract themselves from it. They want to be saved, but cannot find the way; they are confused. As for the clubs, they are the political currents, and the light, the truths of the Qur’an. Light can not be disputed, nor can enmity be felt towards it. No one can detest it apart from Satan the Accursed.

So that I might take up the Qur’an’s light, I declared: “I seek refuge with God from Satan and from politics” and threw away the club of politics; I embraced the light with both hands. I saw that among the political movements are lovers of those lights in both the opposition and the supporters. No side or group should cast aspersions on or hold back from the lights of the Qur’an that are held up, or from the teachings of the Qur’an, which are far superior to all political currents and partisanship and are exempt from and free of all their biased considerations. Only satans in human form or animals in human dress would do so since they imagine irreligion and atheism to be politics and support them.

All praise be to God, because I withdrew from politics, I did not reduce to the value of glass fragments the truths of the Qur’an, which are as precious as diamonds, and leave myself open to accusations of political propaganda. Indeed, the diamonds increase their value in the view of all groups in brilliant fashion.

And they shall say: “All praise be to God, who has guided us to this [felicity]; never could we have found guidance, had it not been for the guidance of God; indeed it was the truth that the prophets of our Sustainer brought to us!”(7:43)

The Eternal One, He is the Eternal One!

Said Nursî

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