My Dear, Loyal Brothers!
Up until the present, covert dissemblers have attacked the Risale‑i Nur by deceiving members of the government, making use of the law and judiciary, and from the point of view of public security and administration. And we, when forced to, assumed a defensive position because we act positively. Now their plans have been confounded. Indeed, their assaults extended the Risale-i Nur's influence. Our intention now to print The Staff of Moses (Asâ-yi Mûsâ) in the new letters, seems as though the Risale-i Nur is being made to assume an offensive stance, outside our will. A significant reason for this must be as follows:
I reckon that because the Risale‑i Nur is a spiritual saviour of this blessed land, the time has come, or will come, for it to make an appearance in the world of publishing, and to give instruction, in order to repulse two awesome calamities.
One of Those Calamities is the awesome current of irreligion which has emerged to the north and breeds anarchy, and has defeated Christianity. It occurred to my heart that similarly to the barrier of Dhu'l‑Qarnayn, the Risale-i Nur might act as a Qur'anic barrier against the flood overrunning this blessed country, and that it had become necessary to speak with the printed word in order to reply to and dispel the fierce criticisms and accusations of the Islamic world against this country's people.
I am not informed about the state of the world, but just as the Risale‑i Nur's truths are a fortress withstanding the monstrous current which is overwhelming Europe and is not based on the revealed religions; so too those truths are a Qur'anic miracle which may dispel the present objections and accusations of the Islamic world and continent of Asia and regain their love and brotherhood. This country's patriotic politicians should come quickly to their senses and publish the Risale-i Nur officially, so that it may act as a shield against those two calamities.
I wonder, if it had not been for the Risale‑i Nur's so potently spreading certain affirmative belief in this blessed land these last twenty years, would this land have been able to preserve its Qur'an and belief from the terrible blows of the revolutions and explosions of this dreadful age? However. The Risale-i Nur may not attacked due to its allegedly harming the country and government; they can no longer get anyone to believe such a thing. But now, switching their front and behind the veil of religion, dissemblers are employing sly tricks to use simple-minded hojas or supporters of innovation or egotistical sufistically inclined people against the Risale-i Nur, as they did two years ago in Istanbul and in the region of Denizli; they are trying to attack the Risale-i Nur and its students on another front. God willing, they will not succeed. So acting with perfect caution and circumspection, the Risale-i Nur students should pay no attention when they are attacked and should not get drawn into arguments. If they are attacked by religious scholars or believers who have been deceived, they should be friendly towards them and pacify them saying: “We don't bother you, so don't you bother us!”
Secondly
Küçük Ali, small in name but great in spirit, a hero among the blessed who bears a resemblance to both Abdurrahman and Lütfi and Hâfız Ali the Elder, asks a question. Its answer, however, is written in a hundred places in the Risale‑i Nur. He asks: What is the reason for the great concentration of arguments concerning the pillars of belief in the Risale-i Nur? Our former teachers taught us that a great saint's belief is similar to that of an ordinary believer.
The Answer: Both in The Supreme Sign, in the discussion about the degrees of belief, and near its end, is the statement of Imam Rabbani, the Regenerator of the Second Millennium, which says: “The end and most important aim of all the Sufi paths is the unfolding of the truths of belief. Clarity and certainty in a single matter of belief is preferable to thousands of illuminations and instances of wonder‑working..” Also, the part of the letter right at the end of The Supreme Sign, taken from The Additional Letters, and the explanations of all of it, answer the question, as does the Tenth Topic of The Fruits of Belief, which is about repetition in the Qur'an, and the fact that the wisdom of the frequently repeated emphasis on divine unity and the pillars of belief in the Qur'an is present in just the same way in the Risale‑i Nur, which is a true commentary on it.
Furthermore, all the sections of the Risale‑i Nur which explain the nature of certain affirmative belief (îmân-ı tahkikî), imitative (taklidî) belief, abbreviated (icmâlî) belief, and detailed (tafsilî) belief, and demonstrate that belief will withstand and remain unshaken in the face of all assaults, misgivings, and doubts, form such an answer to Küçük Ali's letter that no need remains for me to add to them.
Second Aspect: Belief is not restricted to a brief and imitative assent; it has degrees and unfolds from being seed‑like to being a mighty date-palm, and from resembling the sun which appears in the mirror you hold in your hand to resembling its reflection on the surface of the sea, and even to the sun in the sky. Similarly, belief is related to the above number of truths, to thousands of divine names, and to the truths of the universe pertaining to the pillars of belief, It is for this reason that those who have penetrated to the realities have stated unanimously that the greatest of all sciences, knowledge, and human attainments and perfections are belief and the detailed sacred knowledge of God based on proof which springs from certain, affirmative belief.
Imitative belief may be swiftly overcome by doubts. Being much more powerful and comprehensive, certain affirmative belief contains numerous degrees. One of these is the degree of knowledge of certainty (ilmelyakîn), which may withstand thousands of doubts with the strength of its many proofs, whereas imitative belief may sometimes defeated by a single doubt.
There is also a degree of certain affirmative belief known as the vision of certainty (aynelyakîn), and that contains numerous degrees. Indeed, it contains degrees to the number of manifestations of the divine names; it reaches the degree at which the whole universe may be read as though it were a Qur'an.
Another of its degrees is absolute certainty (hakkalyakîn), which also contains numerous degrees. If troops of doubts assail persons with such belief, they cannot provoke any confusion. The thousands of books written by the scholars of the science of theology based on reason and logic have demonstrated only one way, based on proofs and reasoning, of that belief and knowledge of God. And the hundreds of books, based on illumination and spiritual unfolding, of the people of reality have depicted another aspect of that belief and knowledge of God. However, the truths of belief and sacred knowledge of God which the miraculous highway of the Qur'an points out, far surpasses in strength and loftiness those of the scholars and saints.
The Risale‑i Nur, then, expounds the latter all-embracing, universal, and elevated highway of knowledge, and replies in the name of the Qur'an and belief to the general destructive currents which for a thousand years have acted against the Qur'an on account of the worlds of non-existence to the detriment of Islam and humanity. It defends against them. It therefore certainly needs to muster innumerable forces so that, through the light of the Qur'an, it may be the means of withstanding those innumerable enemies, and of preserving the faith of believers.
It is written in a Hadith: “Should one person come to believe through you, it is better for you than a plain‑full of red sheep,” and that, “Sometimes a hour's reflective thought may be better than a year's worship.” In fact, the great importance the Naqshbandis attach to inward remembrance of God is in order to attain to reflective thought of this kind.
We send thousands of greetings to all our brothers and offer prayers for them.
Overlook any errors; this was written in haste. You may correct it.
The Enduring One, He is the Enduring One!Your brother,Saîd Nursî