The Flowers from the Seeds of Truth-4
Politics is diabolical in people’s minds; one should seek refuge in God from this
Modern politics sacrifices the minority for the comfort of the majority. Worse than this, the despotic minority sacrifices the majority of people for itself.
Qur’anic justice never sees the life of a single innocent person as being expendable; it never allows an individual’s blood to be spilled, even for all humankind, let alone for the majority in a particular jurisdiction.
The verse, He who kills a person unless it be (in legal punishment) for murder… will be as if he had killed all humankind (5:32), lays two mighty principles before our eyes.
One is pure justice. This sublime principle is that just as the individual and the community are equal in relation to the Divine Power, the Divine Justice also sees no difference between them.
This is a permanent, established Divine and Prophetic principle and practice. An individual may sacrifice their rights themselves, but the law cannot sacrifice them, not even for all humankind.
The canceling of one’s rights, or the spilling of one’s blood, or the annulment of one’s innocence is equal to the canceling of the rights of all of humanity, or the annulment of the innocence of all of humankind.
The second principle is this: if a self-centered person can murder an innocent person out of greed or passion, he may destroy the whole world if capable of that, should it be an obstacle to the fulfillment of his desires, and annihilate all humanity.
Weakness emboldens the enemy; God may try His servants, but they cannot try Him
O fearful, weak one! Your fear and weakness are futile and harmful to you; they embolden external influences and draw them toward you.
O you who suffer from doubts and delusions! A sure benefit should not be renounced for fear of potential harm. What you need is to take action; the outcome is with God.
One cannot interfere in God’s concerns. He takes His servant to the arena of trial and says: “If you do that, I’ll do this.”
But the servant can never try God. If he says, “Should God give me success, I’ll do this,” he is transgressing his limits.
Satan said to Jesus: “Since it is He Who does everything, and His Destiny does not change, then throw yourself down off the mountain, and see what He will do with you.”
Jesus replied: “O accursed one! God’s servants cannot put Him to the test!”29
Islamic politics should proceed from Islam; politics should not be instrumental for others. Partisanship causes hearts to be divided, not united
The politics of Istanbul at the present time resembles the Spanish flu, infecting people; indeed, it sometimes causes delirium.
Political madness is the product of a Byzantine (i.e. deceitful and clandestine) mindset; politics does not go round and round by itself; rather it does so by means of an external orientation.
Europe hypnotizes politics and whispers in its ears. Thus, one can say a play is being staged here.
As the whisper comes from outside, if it is negative, it has, like individual letters, no value in itself; it is only beneficial when combined with others.
Our free will no longer has a part in it, so even if we are well-intentioned, our good intentions are of no use.
If the external whisper is positive, its value, like words in a sentence, is first for itself, and then, indirectly, for others.
The political divergences here go in opposite directions, and they have no point of intersection in the country; it is not possible for them to come together anywhere on the entire face of the wide earth.
Since this is so, those who take a positive, constructive way should be educated and follow knowledge. As the weak ones or the minority cannot guard the Qur’an, the powerful hand or the majority should guard it.
They should love and adhere to it, for the Religion cannot be used negatively or for a negative result. The 31-March Event30 showed this.
It showed that even the least negative use of the Religion in the homeland yields a terrible result. Muslims came out of this as losers.
Do not overdo those things you like
The cure for one ailment may be harmful to another; what is an antidote for one becomes poison for another. If the cure is taken to excess, it causes illness and becomes fatal.
The eye of obstinacy perceives an angel as a devil
Obstinacy causes one to behave in this way: if a devil helps or supports one or their side, they hail them as “an angel” and call down blessings upon them.
But if they see an angel on the opposing side, they view them as a devil in the guise of an angel, and they call down curses on them out of enmity.
You sometimes receive help from places you did not expect
It is not rare that a mad person recovers when people repeatedly suggest to him that he is well, while a good person becomes bad when people repeatedly accuse them of badness.
Thus, the enemy of the enemy is a friend so long as they remain an enemy, and the friend of the enemy is an enemy so long as they remain a friend.
The Ape became a friend and helped, why should the Bear not do so? A swine strangles you, and a bear strangles it and becomes a friend to you.
Never prod at this bear or cause it to attack you. When you are burning in a fire, a great flood will come to extinguish you, thus becoming a friend for you.
Just as you did not become an ape (by receiving its help), so too you will not become a bear (by being friendly with it).
The catalyst of the life of a community is sound and sincere solidarity
A society in which there is solidarity is an instrument that has been created to stir up the inactive; while a community in which there is malicious envy is an instrument created to pacify the active.
If there is not a sound or sincere unity in a community, it will weaken as its numbers increase through mere population growth. It is like the multiplication of fractions. The number grows less in proportion to how many times they have been multiplied.
Even if non-acceptance is your right, refutation is not
O seeker after truth! If something is related to you (particularly concerning a truth of belief or in the form of a hadith (Prophetic Tradition),
What falls upon you is to accept it, if there is a proof for its accuracy. If there is not, you may avoid its acceptance, which is a doubt.
The non-existence of a proof is an argument for your non-acceptance of it, whereas your claim of its non-existence means refutation and denial, which requires proof.
Something which cannot be established with proof cannot be claimed to be non-existent without proof.
Non-acceptance of something’s existence is usually confused with the acceptance of its non-existence, though one is doubt and the other, denial. You have no right to denial.
It sometimes happens that there are many phrases related to the same incident and which are intended to convey the same meaning, or the meaning is something that has numerous indications or arguments.
If one or even ten of these are doubted or refuted, the existence of the narration and the intended meaning cannot thereby be refuted.
One should follow the majority of Muslims
O seeker after salvation and security! A hadith indicates that we should follow and keep the company of the majority of Muslims.31
The Umayyads were, in the beginning, not careful to follow the Religion, but after they joined the majority of the Muslim Community, they were eventually included among the Ahlu’s-Sunna wa’l-Jama‘a.
The Shi‘a were careful and steadfast in adherence to the Religion in the beginning, but a portion of them who were in the minority eventually formed the sect of Rafidis.
This is a significant, noteworthy reality.
After finding what is right, do not cause discord for the sake of something better
O seeker after truth! If there is consensus concerning what is good and true, and seeking what is better and truer causes disagreement and discord, then what is true is truer than what is truer, and what is good is better than what is better.
Islam is peace and reconciliation;
It wants no dispute or hostility within
O World of Islam! Your life lies in unity, and if you want unity, your guiding principle should be the following:
You should adopt the principle, “This is true,” rather than “This alone is true;” and “This is the best,” rather than “This is what is exclusively good.”
Every Muslim should say about their own school and way: “This is true; I do not interfere with others. Even if the others are good too, mine is the best.”
They should not say: “This alone is true, the others are all false. Only mine is good, the others are all wrong and unpleasant.”
The mindset of exclusiveness arises from self-love. It eventually becomes a disease and leads to dispute.
If the existence of numerous ills and cures is a rightful reality, right will also multiply. The variation of needs and foods is right, and right becomes diverse.
The multiplication of capacities and education is right, and this right will also multiply. A single substance is both poison and the antidote.
The truth is not fixed in the secondary matters of the Religion; it is relative and compounded according to the differences of temperament and circumstance.
The temperaments of those responsible for the conduct of such matters have a share in them, and they are concluded and formed accordingly.
The founders of the schools of law made judgments in non-specific terms, leaving the specification of the limits of their schools to the various temperaments that followed.
Bigoted attachment to a school causes the rulings of that school to be generalized, and partisanship arising from this leads to dispute.
The deep rifts between the classes of humanity before Islam, and the great distance between peoples and places demanded the existence of numerous Prophets at any one time, and a variety of Shari‘as, and numerous sects.
Islam caused a revolution among humankind, and peoples drew closer to each other. The different Shari‘as were summed up in a single Shari‘a, and there was one Prophet.
But the levels of humankind were not the same, so the schools of law multiplied. If a single system of training and education were sufficient and proper for all, then the schools could unite.
There is great wisdom in the creation and combination of opposites: the sun and a minute particle are equal in the hand of Power
O brother with an alert heart! The Power manifests Itself in the combining of opposites. There is pain in pleasure, evil within good, ugliness within beauty, harm within benefit, trouble within bounties, fire within light… do you know why this is so?
It is thus, so that relative truths may be established and so there may be many things within a single thing, and numerous various incidents of existence become apparent.
Swift motion makes a point look like a line. The speed of spinning makes a point of light look like a luminous circle.
There must be relative truths so that seeds may sprout in this world. These constitute the clay of the universe, the bonds of its order, the connections among its inscriptions. These relative realities will become truths in the Hereafter.
The degrees of heat are due to the existence of cold. The degrees of beauty come about through the intervention of ugliness. The apparent cause becomes as if the ultimate cause or raison d’être.
Light is indebted to darkness, pleasure is indebted to pain; there is no consciousness of health without illness.
If there was no Paradise, perhaps Hell would not be torment. Hell cannot exist without extreme cold. If there were no extreme cold (besides its heat), Hell would not burn.
The Ever-Living Creator has demonstrated His Wisdom in the creation of opposites and His Majesty has become apparent.
That Everlasting All-Powerful One has displayed His Power in the combining of opposites, and His Grandeur has become manifest.
However, since the Divine Power is essential to and inherent in the Divine Essence, It can comprise no opposites and therefore impotence cannot intervene in It; there can be no degrees in It; nothing can be difficult for it.
The sun has become a niche for the light of His Power. The surface of the sea is a mirror to the light of that niche and the eyes of dewdrops are all tiny mirrors.
The sun, reflected by the broad surface of the sea, is also reflected by the drops on the wrinkles on its forehead. The tiny eye of the dewdrop also shines with it, like a star; they hold the same identity.
From the perspective of the sun, the dewdrop and the sea are the same; its power makes them equal. The pupil of the dewdrop’s eye is a tiny sun.
The magnificent sun also is a tiny dewdrop; the pupil of its eye is a light received from the Sun of Power and it is the moon to that Power.
The heavens are an ocean; at a Breath of the All-Merciful, drops undulate in the wrinkles of its forehead, which are the stars and the suns.
The Power manifested Itself and scattered gleams on these drops. Every sun is a drop, every star a dewdrop;
Every gleam is a representation – that drop-like sun is a tiny reflection from this manifestation. It makes its polished glass a bulb for that gleam of manifestation, shinning like a pearl.
That dewdrop-like star has a place in its delicate eye for the gleam and the gleam becomes a lamp, with the filament as the eye – and its lamp is lit up.
Multiplicity manifests unity on either side of it
It is a manifestation of Divine Unity that the beginning and end of multiplicity are united at the same point, displaying the Divine Unity.
It is a manifestation of the Divine Power that the changeable power in the universe transforms unity into multiplicity;
Divine Power is distributed among particles and changes in nature, and it is from this that degrees or rays of gravity arise.
These rays are combined – the Maker makes them into a general gravity, which means multiplicity becomes unity.
If you have any merits or qualities, let them remain under the dust of concealment, so they may flourish
O one of renowned qualities! Do not be oppressive by exhibiting yourself; if you remain under the veil of concealment, you will be a source of favors and blessings for your brothers;
Also, you brothers will benefit from or have a share in your merits; it is even possible that every brother of yours will become like you – this will attract respect to each of them.
But if you emerge from concealment and exhibit yourself, although respected and magnanimous under it, you will become an oppressor in the open. There you were a sun, here you will overshadow others.
You will cause your brothers to lose respect. That means, self-manifestation and being distinguished individually are despotic attitudes.
If this is true of the manifestation of genuine qualities, what place remains for acquiring fame through lying artifice and hypocrisy? This is a profound mystery, and it is in accordance with this that the Divine Wisdom and the perfect order It has established
Draw the veil of concealment over an exceptional individual within their species, thus enhancing the value of the entire species and making it appreciable.
Examples for you: saints among humankind and the appointed hour within a lifetime are unknown, indefinite. Concealed within Friday is an hour when prayers are accepted.
Hidden in the month of Ramadan is the Night of Power and Destiny. Concealed among the All-Beautiful Names is the elixir of the Greatest Name.
It is their being undefined that creates the splendor in these examples
– the splendor of the whole of humanity thanks to the saints among it, the whole day of Friday due to the hour when prayers are accepted, and the entire month of Ramadan due to the Night of Power and Destiny.
This beautiful mystery also is made manifest through being undefined and is established through concealment. For example:
There is a balance in the fact that the appointed hour being undefined: in whatever state you are, it always maintains the balance between the two pans of fear and hope, working for the next world and for this. And the imagined permanent existence imparts a pleasure to life.
For a life of twenty years with an unknown end is preferable to one of a thousand years with a known end. For after half of it which has passed, with every passing hour you are taking a new step towards the gallows.
Your suffering increases proportionately; there would be no imagined permanence which would afford you solace and you would find no peace.
It is mistaken to feel mercy or wrath greater than God’s
One should not feel or show greater mercy than God’s, nor should one feel wrath greater than that of God.
So leave matters to the All-Just, the All-Compassionate One, for excessive compassion causes pain and excessive wrath is wrongful and blameworthy.
Worldly recompense proves punishment in the Hereafter
Everyone has experienced this at least once in their lifetime and concludes: “That person has done that evil and has met with what they deserve.” This is a principle in life.
This meaningful sentence is frequently expressed by people. The common point in evils of great variety is the very nature of evil.
This means, that an evil, by virtue of its very nature, is subjected to and requires punishment. Minor evils are punished here, while major ones are referred to the Hereafter.
The worldly recompense for evils is a proof of punishment in the Hereafter.
The ease of humankind is inversely proportionate to one’s will and power; provision is a broad, gradually-assembled body
O humankind addicted to evildoing! Your free will and power have become the source and reason of your deprivation and troubles. Provision comes in proportion to weakness and impotence.
Once I saw an animal, which was pathetic, skin-and-bones. An able mother had given birth to it together with several others.
While itself could hardly find a morsel to eat, pleasant, nutritious sustenance flowed forth from its mother’s teats; the Divine Power provided that sustenance.
That animate being was extremely weak and impotent while motionless in its mother’s womb, but there too it received the best, perfect sustenance.
It came to the world while still weak and impotent, and its sustenance was good and relatively perfect.
It grew a little and began to feel it had a certain degree of will-power. It also began confronting troubles and difficulties, therefore parental compassion was still provided to help it.
But when it found itself to have some power along with will-power, it was set free and left to its own devices. Whatever it attempted to do of its own volition caused nothing but confusion.
When it had been unaware of volition, the mechanism of its body, accustomed to working with perfect regularity, caused no confusion, either in its home or in its town.
But when its will-power began to intervene, the order in its life was destroyed and its will-power left it defective. Therefore, we should always say: “Our Lord! Do not leave us to our own devices in provision during our adulthood!”
And power should always say: “O my Lord! I have put my trust in You both at the beginning and end of everything in my life!”
In the sight of the Divine Power, the provision of an animate being has the same value as its life.
Just as the Power finds an “excuse” and gives that being its life, It also creates its provision and pours it out.
It is as if the Power works with a constant, intense effort, changing and transforming the world of death into that of life, and the dense into the transparent.
Just as It scatters the gleams of life, even into the lowliest of substances, It also sows and stores up providence in everything.
The dead atoms are set to move to meet with the light of life. Some form real bodies, while others form figurative ones.
Provision comes and is united with them. Provision is scattered wide and it is a broad body. In short, life has two bodies,
One is produced and composed, the other scattered. Provision and life are twins, having the same value in the sight of the Power.
It is the Power Which brings forth everything out of non-existence; Destiny arranges the first body in which it is clothed.
The Divine Favoring collects the provisions, the scattered body, and sends this creature to the existent being to be fed.
There is a difference between these two bodies: since life, the first body of the existing being, is a composition, it is visible in its totality.
Whereas provision is scattered and comes in a gradual process, so humankind worries about it. Unless the wrongful will-power of humankind intervenes, the rule is certainly true:
“There is no dying of hunger; a lack of provision does not cause death.” There are many reserves deposited in the body, each of which is full.
Many things are deposited in the form of fat. But before this fat is used up, death comes. Therefore, the reason for death is not a lack of provision.
This sustenance is sufficient for a hundred days, but death can come in ten days.
Perhaps a disease arising from altering or abandoning routine nourishment came and caused death while there was still provision.
Bediuzzaman Said Nursi
29 Ibnu’l-Jawzi, Talbisu Iblis, 344.
30 The 31 March Event was a revolt which broke out on April 13, 1909 in Istanbul. Its real nature and reasons have not yet been revealed. It resulted in the dethroning of Sultan Abdulhamid II and the coming into power of the Unity and Progress Party. (Tr.)
31 Muslim, “‘Imara” 59; at-Tirmidhi, “Fitan” 7; Abu Dawud, “Salah” 46.