Some of the high officials asked me: "Why didn't you accept Mustafa Kemal's offer of the post of General Preacher in Kurdistan and the eastern provinces in place of Shaykh Sanusi, with a salary of three hundred liras? If you had, it would have saved the lives of the hundred thousand people who were killed in the Revolt."

In reply I told them: The Risale-i Nur has been a means saving the lives in the hereafter of hundreds of thousands of citizens, each lasting millions of years, in place of the twenty or thirty years of worldly life. If I had accepted the offer, the Risale-i Nur would not have come into being, which can be the tool of nothing and follows nothing and bears the mystery of sincerity. If fact, I told my esteemed brothers in prison: If the belief is saved through the Risale-i Nur of those persons who sentenced me to death because of the severe blows it has dealt them - which had been sent to Ankara, you bear witness that I forgive them with all my heart and spirit!

After our acquittal in Denizli I told those who were pestering me with their surveillance and the high-ranking officers and police chief:

It is an undeniable wonder of the Risale-i Nur that in seven months of investigation into the hundreds of letters and writings of my twenty-year life of oppression, and into those of my thousands of students, absolutely no document has been found or connection with any movement, any association, or with any society at home or abroad. Could any ideas or precautions have secured this wondrous situation? If the private affairs and secrets of a single person over twenty years are made public, certainly twenty matters will emerge that might incriminate or shame him. Since the fact of the matter is this, of course you will say either that an extraordinary, insuperable intelligence is organizing the matter, or that it is an instance of

solicitous divine protection. It would surely be mistaken to contest such a genius, and extremely damaging to the nation and country, and arrogant obduracy to oppose such divine protection and dominical favour.

If you say: If we release you and do not hold you under surveillance, you may contaminate the life of our society with your teachings and hidden secrets.

I reply: Without exception, all my teachings are in the possession of the government and judiciary, and not one thing has been found that would necessitate even a day's punishment. Although forty to fifty thousand copies of the treatises expounding those teachings have been circulating among the people and have been read attentively and no one has received any harm, only benefits; and since both the former and the recent courts could find nothing incriminating, the recent one unanimously ruled for our acquittal and the former one, for the sake of an important personage in this world, on the pretext of five or ten words out of one hundred and thirty treatises, were able to give only a six-month sentence to fifteen of the one hundred and twenty arrested brothers. These facts form a decisive proof that it is a meaningless anxiety and ugly injustice to attack myself and the Risale-i Nur. Anyway I do not have any new writings and none of my secrets have remained hidden that you should try to correct them by holding me.

I am in great need of my freedom. Enough now of these twenty years of unnecessary, unjust, and useless surveillance. My patience is exhausted. It is possible that out of the weakness of old age I shall utter the curses that I have never uttered uptil now. The saying: "The sighs of the oppressed rise up to the divine throne" {[*]:} is a powerful truth.

Then those cruel wretches who occupy high worldly positions said: "These last twenty years not once have put one of our hats on your head, and you haven't attended the courts bareheaded but have appeared in your garb of the former era. But seventeen million people have adopted the new dress."

I told them: "I prefer to adhere to the Shari'a and out of fear of God wear the dress of seven thousand million people rather than under the force of law and although permitted by the Shari'a, adopt the dress of not seven-teen million or even seven million, but on their own wish and acceptance of only seven thousand Europe-smitten drunkards!"

It cannot be said of someone like me who has abandoned social life for the last twenty-five years: "He is obstinately opposing us!" Even supposing it is obstinacy, seeing that neither Mustafa Kemal could break it, nor two courts or the governments of three provinces, who are you that you should strive to break it to the harm of both the nation and the government? Even if he were a political opponent, since you have affirmed that he has had no relations with the world for twenty years and has been as good as dead, it is crazy to imagine that he would come to life and embark on a political career that would be of no benefit to him; indeed, extremely harmful. It is crazy to talk seriously with crazy people, so I'm not going to talk to people like you. I said: "Do whatever you like, I'm not obliged to you!" and both annoyed them and shut them up.

My last word: «God suffices us and He is the best Disposer of Affairs» (Q 3:173). * «The Best of Friends and the Best of Helpers» (Q 8:40).

My Dear, Loyal Brothers!

You may write out this piece at the head of the collection of treatises and letters that confirm the Risale-i Nur's acceptance; or if not the collections, at least at the head of the First Ray. Don't worry about me; since the rewards for suffering difficulties are copious, it makes me love them in a way. Anyway, they open up possibilities for the Risale-i Nur's dissemination in other fields.

I send greetings to each and every one of you.

It is the first of the eight pieces that affirm the Risale-i Nur's acceptability and give news of it with hidden signs. Their all indicating unanimously the same matter and same objective is virtually explicit. The signs strengthen and corroborate each other since the matters are the same. Three of the eight concern Imam 'Ali giving news of the Risale-i Nur with his wondrous insight into the Unseen. The Ankara experts' committee studied these eight pieces and did not object to them, they only said that they should not have been written since people with such powers should not broadcast them. So I wrote in reply to them:

This is the Risale-i Nur's wonder-working, not mine. They were silent, which meant they accepted it. Actually it would be better not to describe divine gifts of this sort, but in the face of so many opponents and powerful, numerous enemies, it was definitely necessary to strengthen with assistance from the Unseen the morale of us who are so few, weak, and wanting,

and to encourage us to be steadfast and strong. So I wrote them down, It does not matter if to do so inflated my ego or caused my fall even. I am more than happy if I have to sacrifice my life in this world and in the next for this work; that is, to save the believers from absolute misguidance. I would agree to go to Hell even so that my thousands of friends and brothers might enter Paradise.