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 Eskişehir 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.
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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