The Risale-i Nur collection is a six-thousand-page commentary on the Qur'an written by Bediuzzaman Said Nursi in accordance with the mentality of the age. Since in our age, faith and Islam have been the objects of the attacks launched in the name of so called science and logic, Bedizzaman Said Nursi therefore concentrated in the Risale-i Nur on proving the truths of faith in conformity with modern sciences, through rational evidence and by manifesting the miraculous aspects of the Qur'an that relate primarily to our century. This collection now has millions of readers both in and outside Turkey. Thanks to the Risale-i Nur, the Turks managed to maintain their religion despite the most despotic regimes of the past decades; although its author faced unbearable torments, prisons and exiles and no effort was spared to put an end to his service to faith, he was able to complete his writings comprising the Risale-i Nur and raise a vast group of believers who courageously opposed the oppression and preserved the dominance of Islam in the country.
WONDER OF THE AGE
Bediuzzaman Said Nursi was born a century ago, in 1873, in a village in eastern Anatolia, Nurs, from which he received the name Nursi. He received his basic education from the best-known scholars of the district. The extraordinary intelligence and capability of learning that he showed at a very early age made him popular with his teachers, colleagues and the people. When he was sixteen years old, he silenced the distinguished scholars who had invited him to a debate (debate was then a popular practice among scholars). This later recurred several more times with various groups of soholars, and he thereby began to be called Bediuzzaman (Wonder of the Age).
The time he spent in education paved the way in his mind for the thought that at a time when the world was entering a new and different age, where science and logic would prevail, the classical educational system of theology would not be sufficient to remove doubts concerning the Qur'an and Islam. He concluded that religious sciences should be taught at modern schools on the one hand, and modern sciences at religious schools on the other. "This way," he said, "the people of the school will be protected from unbelief, and those of the madrasa from fanaticism."
With this idea, he twice went to Istanbul-once in 1895, the second time in 1907-where he sought to convince the Sultan to establish a university in Anatolia, one that would teach religious and modern sciences together. But the sharp words in his conversation with the Sultan caused him to be court-martialed, and during his trial too he did not hesitate to use the same sharpness. Alarmed by this, the military judges thought it best to send him to a mental hospital, but the phisician who examined him reported, "If there is a grain of insanity in Bediuzzaman, then there must be no sane person in the whole world"
FIRST ACQUITTAL
To be the object of accusations contrary to his aim and intention was, in fact, an invariable feature of Bediuzzaman's fate. When the uproars of March 31, 1909, took place, he was arrested and court-martialed on the charge of inciting the uproar, although he had tried, and to a degree managed, to calm down the events. While the hanging bodies of the convicts executed were seen through the windows of the court-martial room, Bediuzzaman made a heroic defense and in the end was acquitted.
After the first of a series of acquittals, Bediuzzaman Said Nursi returned to eastern Anatolia, visited the remote proviences and explained to the people that the movement freedom that was beginning to emerge in the country was not contrary to Islam. He told them that all kinds of dictatorship were rejected by the Sacred Law, which would be nourished and would manifest its virtues in a free atmosphere. Her later collected these speeches in a book entitled the Debates.
In the winter of 1911, Bediuzzaman went to Damascus and gave a sermon at the Umayyad mosque to an audience including one hundred well-known scholars, explaining that the true civilisation contained in Islam would dominate the modern world. Afterwards he went to Istanbul once again, to continue his efforts to have a, university established in eastern Anatolia. As the representative of the Eastern provinces, he escorted Sultan Reþad on his journey in Rumelia and, when they were in Kosovo Metohija, where the Sultan was planning to establish a university, Bediuzzaman told him, "The East is in more need of a university, for it is the centre of the Muslim world." He thus convinced Sultan Resad to earmark a sum of nineteen thousand gold liras, and then went to Van and laid the foundation of the university. Unfortunately, the construction was not completed because of the World War which soon broke out.
THE FEAR OF THE RUSSIANS
In World War I, Bediuzzaman Said Nursi served as a commander of a volunteers' regiment on the Caucasian front and in eastern Anatolia. The heroism he demonstrated in battle was highly admired by the generals of the Ottoman army, including Enver Pa=FEa, Minister of Defense and Deputy Commander-in-Chief of the Ottoman Armed Forces. Together with his volunteers known as "the Felt Caps," he struck terror into the Russian and Armenian forces. In the meantime, he wrote his celebrated commentary on the Qur'an in the Arabic language, sometimes on horseback, sometimes on the front line and sometimes in the trench. This commentory, entitled the Signs of Miraculousness; received immense appreciation from eminent scholars.
In one of the battles against the invading Russian forces, Bediuzzaman and ninety other officers were captured. He was sent to a prisoners' camp in Kostroma, Northwestern Russia, where he spent over two years and once appeared before a firing squad, as a result of his insulting the Russian general Nicola Nicolaevich, the Commander-in-Chief of the Caucasian front and the Czar's uncle. One day the general came to the camp for inspection and, as he passed by Bediuzzaman, he did not stand up before the general. When asked, Bediuzzaman explained the reason why he had not stood up in these words:
"I am a Muslim scholar and have belief in my heart. Whoever has belief in his heart is superior to the one who does not. I cannot act against my belief."
He was court-martialed, sentenced to death, and, when the sentence was to be executed, he began his last duty, prayer, in front of the firing squad. The general witnessed the scene and came to Bediüzzaman, this time with an apology. He said that he had now realized that the act of Bediuzzaman was the result of his adherence to his faith; and that the sentence was withdrawn, and apologized to Bediuzzaman because he had bothered him. Sadly, this virtuousness of a Russian, the long-standing enemy of the Muslims, was never shown to him in his homeland by those who caused him a life full of torments of all kinds.
AGAINST THE BRITISH FORCES
Amid the uproars caused by the communist revolution, Bediuzzaman found a way of escaping and, after a long iourney, came back to Istanbul in 1908 He was rewarded with a war medallion and Enver Paþa, Minister of Defense, offered him some positions in the government. He refused all these offers; however, upon the suggestion of the army and without his knowledge, he was appointed to Dar-al-Hikmat al-Islamiya, the religious academy of the time. He did not object to this appointment, as it was a pure scientific position.
When the country was invaded by imperialist forces after the defeat in World War I, Bediuzzaman challenged the invading British in Istanbul with bitter attacks that almost cost him his life. He addressed them in his articles in daily newspapers with phrases such as, "O dog doggified from the atmost degree of dogness!" and "Spit at the shameless face of the damned British" These attacks made him the target of the British, but, with the help of God Almighty, he escaped all the plans against him and ran toward the new services that were awaiting him. In 1922, upon the invitations of the government that recurred eighteen times, Bediuzzaman Said Nursi went to Ankara and was received at the Grand National Assembly with a ceremony. However, he could not find in Ankara what he had anticipated; rather he saw the most of the representatives negligent in their religious obligations. On January 19, 1923, he issued a declaration to the representatives. Upon this declaration fifty to sixty of them began prayer.
Bediuzzaman spent eight months in Ankara and then left for Van. For two years he lived there in seclusion and was occupied only with meditation and prayer. Meanwhile the unfortunate events known as "the Eastern rebellion" broke out. The rebels sought Bediuzzaman's help, as he had a strong influence over people, but Bediuzzaman refused their requests, saying, "Sword is to be used against the outside enemy; it is not to be used inside. Give up your attempt, for it is doomed to failure and may end up in the annihilation of thousands of innocent men and women because of a few criminals." But once again Bediuzzaman was charged falsely and sent into exile in Burdur, western Anatolia. There he was kept under strict surveillance and oppression, but this did not prevent him from teaching the truths of faith to the people around him and from collecting his writings secretly in a book. His activities were reported to Ankara , and then a plan was prepared to silence him. They sent him to Barla, an out-of-the-way place in central Anatolia surrounded by mountains, with the thought that Bediuzzaman would eventually die there from impotence and loneliness.
THE EMERGENCE OF THE RISALE-I NUR
In reality, the dissemination of the truths of faith was nothing to be alarmed about, nor was it a crime that would be the cause of plots against a man's life. However, it was an unforgiveable crime under the circumstances of the time! For those were the days when despotism had fallen down over the nation with all its darkness and awesomeness; a ban had been put over adhan; hundreds of mosques were being used for nonreligious purposes; the plans to cut off all that connects the nation with its past and its moral values were in process; and the mere mention of religion was a matter of great courrage. The head of the press department of the government could order the editors of newspapers to cut within ten days all the serials that directly or indirectly. mentioned religion, as "it was considered harmful to lead to the emergence of the concept of religion in the minds of youths."
Such were the circumstances under which Bediuzzaman Said Nursi entered the second part of his life which he called the New Said and which was dedicated to the waiting and dissemination of the truths of faith. Taking as the aim the revival of faith, which is the first and most important truth of the cosmos, Bediuzzaman Said Nursi, "I will demonstrate to the world that the Qur'an is a spiritual sun that shall never set and shall never be extinguished." And indeed so he did. Bediuzzaman did not die in Barla, where he had been sent to die alone, but a new Said emerged there, and with it emerged a sun over the world of science and culture, .one that has since been illuminating millions. In Barla too, an awesome oppression and surveillance were waiting for Bediuzzaman. It appeared that his enemies had not yet come to know him, who, in the World War had been the fear of the Russians, in Istanbul had spat at the face of the British who were in his pursuit, and had several times returned from the gallows. Nevertheless, they later had enough time to know him and in the end found themselves having to say, "Despite all we have done in the past twenty-five years, we have not been able to prevent Said Nursi from his activities." During the eight years and a half that he spent under absolute oppression in Barla, Bediuzzaman wrote three quarters of the Risale-i Nur collection: The treatises were being multiplied by handwriting, as neither the author nor his students could afford the printing costs. Even if they had been able to, then again they did not have the freedom. Handwriting was also a dangerous task, for the scribes were being tortured in prisons and police stations, and every attempt was being made to prevent people from contact with Bediuzzaman.
600.000 COPIES WRITTEN BY HAND
Here it must be noted that at that time the writing or dissemination of even a single religious treatise was not anything that anybody dared try, let alone the firm, courageous and continuous struggle that Bediuzzaman Said Nursi and his students carried out. When these circumstances under which the Risale-i Nur was written and spread all over Anatolia are taken into consideration, one cannot find difficulty in realizing how right was Maryam Jameelah, the well-known American Muslim writer, when she said, "It is no exaggeration to claim that whatever Islamic fait h remains in Turkey is due to the tireless efforts of Bediuzzaman Nursi." Indeed, those instructed by the Risale-i Nur in lessons of the faith of realization strengthened, in so doing, their beliefs and attained an impregnable Islamic courage and heroism. With Bediuzzaman, who represented in his person the spiritual personality of the Risale-i Nur, as their leader, those hundreds of thousands-now millions-of students of Nur set a pattern for other Muslims and constituted a support for them in those perilous days like brave commanders encouraging an army with their states. The strength of their beliefs and their continuous struggle against irreligion had wide effects on people, and they thus removed the fears and misgivings from the hearts, rallied the morale of the nation, brought about hope and relief and delivered the Muslims from desperation.
Bediuzzaman was arrested in 1930 with 125 students of his and tried at the Eskiþehir Criminal Court. In Eskiþehir prison where they spent eleven months during the trial, they had to put up with unbearable torments. They were released the next spring but not Ieft in peace. This time, ,again escorted by gendarmes, Bediuzzaman was sent into exile in another city , Kastamonu. There he spent the first three months at a police station, then was transferred to a house opposite to the police station.
Bediuzzaman lived in Kastamonu for seven years and countinued to write and disseminate the Risale-i Nur. Because he and his students were deprived of almost all kinds of freedom, they therefore formed their own postal organization called the "Nur postmen." Through the "Nur postmen," 600,000 copies of treatises were multiplied by handwriting.
In 1943, he was arrested again and tried at the Denizli Criminal Court together with 126 students of his. The main reason for this was that Bediuzzaman had recently had a treatise concerning the existence of God printed secretly in Istanbul. In prison too he did not shrink from continuing his service, just as he never did when he was in exile. He was now reforming the criminals who were considered lost for society. He was also writing new treatises.
Paper and pen were not allowed into the prison, so the treatises were written on small pieces of paper torn from paperbags and smuggled out in matchboxes: This way Fruits from the Tree of Light came out. The trial ended in a unanimous acaquittal. But that did not mean that Bediuzzaman would be given back his freedom-upon an order from Ankara, he was sent to another town, Emirdað.
THE ACQUITTAL THAT CAME TOO LATE
For him Emirdað was just the same as it had been elsewhere again pursuits, pressures and plots, and despite these, a continuous, tireless service of faith... This period, in the usual fashion, ended in arrest. Together with fifty-three students, Bediuzzaman was sent to Afyon Criminal Court and spent twenty months in Afyon prison. The cruelties they encountered there were even worse than all those before. Bediuzzaman was then seventy-five years old and suffering from various illnesses. Yet he was isolated in a cell with broken windows where he spent two severe winters. And, as if it were not enough to leave him to die alone, he was poisoned too. When he was suffering from the effect of the poison, the students of his who dared to approach him in order to help him were ruthlessly bastinadoed. The sentences given were annulled by the Supreme Court; the court, however, took its time in deciding whether to withdraw the sentence or not. After Bediuzzaman and his students had spent in prison the terms specified in the annulled conviction, the court finally made up its mind and decided that they should be released. And eight years later came the final decision in 1956, the court announced that those who had under unbearable conditions spent almost two years in prison had now been found innocent!
When the first free and fair elections were held in Turkey in 1950 and the multiparty system was established, the despotism of the Republican People's Party which was known, and still is, for its hostile attitude toward religion-ended, and thereby freedoms began to be recognized. Thus a new era opened in the history of the Turkish Republic in the very first session of the new parliament, the ban over adhan was lifted. During the years that followed, Bediuzzaman had only one trial-the only one in which he was not arrested in Istanbul and was acquitted with a unanimous decision.
WITH HONOR, DIGNITY AND VICTORY
And, after completing a lifetime of almost a century, with every minute spent in the service of faith, Bediuzzaman Said Nursi departed from this world on the morning of March 23, 1960, with complete honor, dignity and victory, leaving behind him a work that would illuminate this and the forthcoming centuries and a love that would be handed over from generation to generation until eternity.
Jumat, 02 Mei 2008
Badiuzzeman Said Nursi (1877-1960)
Badiuzzam Said Nursi was born in 1877 in eastern Turkey and died in 1960 in Urfa (Turkey). During his long life, he saw the last days of the Ottoman Empire, its collapse after the First World War and the emergence of modern Turkish Republic. He also witnessed the twenty-five years of Republican Peoples’ Party’s harsh and authoritarian rule and ten years of “Democratic” rule during which conditions became a little easier for Bediuzzam.
A remarkable child endowed with a prodigious memory, Bediuzzam completed a traditional madrasah education at the early age of fourteen and then studies physical sciences, mathematics and philosophy. In the course of the second decade of his life, he became extremely convinced that the Turkish madrasah education was inadequate and his own interest in natural sciences led him to construct a new curriculum for the Islamic educational system. He prepared a blue print for the establishment of a university, Medrestu’z Zehra, (the Resplendent Madrasah) in the Eastern Provinces. In 1917, he arrived in Istanbul and met Sultan Abdul Hamid. Subsequently, he received some funding for the construction of the university and its foundations were laid in 1913. But the beginning of World War I and the subsequent events made it impossible for this project to materialize.
The end of World War I and that of the Ottoman Empire culminated the first phase of Bediuzzam’s life, the period of the “Old Said”, as he would later call it. During the War, he had led the militia forces on the Caucasian Front against the invading Russians for which he was later awarded a War Medal. He was taken prisoner in March 1916 and was held in Russia for two years. In early 1918, he escaped from the prison and made his way back to Istanbul via Warsaw, Berlin and Vienna.
It was during the first two years of War that he composed his first works on the Qur’an. Spoken while sitting on horseback, and dictated hese “commentaries” on various chapters of the Qur’an attempted to combine the religious knowledge with natural sciences. This was the beginning of his major work, Risale-i Nur. But the work was interrupted when Bediuzzaman was captured and imprisoned by the Russians.
The defeat of the Ottomans, the occupation of Istanbul and parts of Turkey by foreign forces and the bitter internal struggle that emerged after the War led to a profound change in Nursi. Despite his active involvement in public life, his association with Daru’l Hikmeti’l Islamiye, the learned body attached to the office of the Shauk ul-Islam, and his War services, Beddiuzzaman became increasingly dissatisfied with the world. He started to see the limits of human endeavor and concentrated on his spiritual training. Recognized for his services, he was invited to Ankara by Mustafa Kemal, who had emerged as the victorious General, to take part in the reconstruction of the New Turkey.
Beddiuzzaman spent almost eight months in Ankara during which he realized that the new Turkish military elite was attempting to establish a secular republic in which Islam was to be shunned. He was offered various posts in this new set up but he declined to be part of an establishment founded on materialistic and secular philosophy. He left Ankara for Van where he sought solace in spiritual practices and isolation.
But early in 1925, he was arrested on charges of taking part in a “rebellion” in eastern provinces although he had taken no part in it. He was sent into exile in western Anatolia along with hundreds of other Turks—thus began a twenty-five year period of oppression, imprisonment and privation. It was during this time, in the remote village of Barla in the mountains of Isparta province where Bediuzzaman had been sent, that Bediuzzaman resumed his work on Risale-i Nur.
Risale-i Nur is not a tafsir (commentary) on the Qur’an in the usual sense of the term; rather, it attempts to establish links between the Qur’anic verses and the natural world. It also attempts to show that there is no contradiction between religion and science (See selections for Risal-i Nur in the following section).
While in Barla, Bediuzzaman also wrote a treatise on Resurrection and thirty-three other pieces which were later collected as Sozler (The Words). This was followed by Maktubat (Letters), a collection of thirty-three letters of varying length written to his students. Bediuzzaman wrote two more works, Lem’alar (The Flashes) and Sualar (The Rays), the latter was completed in 1949. In addition, there are three collections of additional letters, Barla Lahikast, Kastmonu Lahikast, and Emirdag Lahikast from each of Bediuzzaman’s three places of exile.
Risale-i Nur is actually a collection of quickly uttered words, dictated to a scribe at high speed, without consulting any books or references, in the mountains and countryside places of exile. They were then copied by hand and secretly circulated because the new secularist regime had banned all religious works. The essays were then passed on from village to village by the Risale-i Nur students. It was only in 1946, that duplicating machines became available to the Risale-i Nur students and it was not until 1956 that The Words and other collections were printed in new Latin script that had been imposed on the Turkish language by the Kemalist regime. The figure given for hand-written copies is 600,000.[1]
Nursi thus became the founder of the Nurcu movement. Left without books, without his home and family, and restricted to a remote region of the country, Said Nursi was to make a remarkable impact on the lives of millions of Turkish men and women through his powerful writings and he continues to be a revered figure in Turkey and other Muslim lands. His works, now collectively called Risale-i Nur, clandestinely circulated and copied by hand, are now easily available in many languages. Nursi and his work provide an excellent example of the conditions in which the discourse on Islam and science progressed in Turkey during the early decades of the twentieth century and how politics and faith were intertwined in the discourse. His movement spread quietly until 1950 despite all efforts to crush it and then entered a new phase in which a great number of young Turks, who had gone through the state-run secular institutions of the Republic, openly responded to his call. Toward the end of his life, Nursi’s influence spread beyond Turkey. Today, there are several offshoots of this movement, some of which have become rather profane.
Said Nursi had considerable knowledge of modern science and he attempted to integrate it within a theistic perspective. For him, the Qur’an and modern physical sciences had no dissonance; rather, relating the truth of the Qur’an to modern men and women was even easier. Written during his exile, Risale-i Nur was later described as “a manevi tefsir, or commentary which expounds the truths of the Qur’an.”[2] In the course of his expressive prose, which pulsates with energy, Nursi substantiates Islamic faith on the basis of the certainties of modern physical sciences and reads the cosmic verses of the Qur’an in the light of modern science. As a religious scholar well grounded in traditional Islamic sciences, Nursi was aware of the apparent discrepancy between traditional cosmology articulated by Muslim philosophers and Sufis, and the Newtonian worldview, but instead of rejecting the mechanistic view of the universe presented by Newtonian science, he tried to appropriate it by appealing to the classical arguments from design. He saw no contradiction between the order and harmony of the universe and Newtonian determinism. Rather, through a radical recasting of God as the Divine artisan, he found support for the mechanistic view of the universe. He thought of the universe as a machine or clock, just like the nineteenth century deists, but he transformed this enduring symbol of the European tradition to lend support to the theistic claims of creation. For him, the Qur’anic themes of the regularity and harmony of the natural order, when combined with the predictability of Newtonian physics, disproved the triumph of the secularists and positivists of the nineteenth century and provided a solid rock on which to construct a new understanding of the message of the Qur’an.
Nursi’s approach to modern science needs to be interpreted with due consideration of the social and political conditions in which it was written; unlike many other reformers of the nineteenth century, there is an additional element here: the need to survive in an environment dominated by state sponsored harassment. Perhaps this is the reason for the emergence of a number of conflicting ways in which Nursi’s work has been judged; some take the work as if it was a scholar’s commentary on the Qur’an; others read it with due regard to the life of the writer and his social and historical conditions. There are those who take his work to be an attempt to deconstruct metaphysical claims of modern science by using the language of Newtonian physics, chemistry, and astronomy. And there are those who emphasize the influence of modern science and positivism on Nursi. In addition, the work itself is not a smooth and calm exposition and many additions have been made to it. Originally, it was not even written; it was “dictated at speed to a scribe, who would write down the piece in question with equal speed” and these handwritten copies would circulate clandestinely. There were no books for references. The Risale-i Nur collection is, in essence, a collection of dictations of an inspired mind, secretly written, for all religious teaching was forbidden. As such, Nursi’s work does not fall in the category of so-called al-tafsir al-`ilmi (scientific commentary); rather, in its style and purpose, the collection now known as Risale-i Nur is a collection of sermons—a title that is used for one of the “Words”, “The Damascus Sermon”, which was delivered at the historic Umayyad Mosque in early 1911 to a gathering “of ten thousand, including one hundred scholars…the text was afterwards printed twice in one week,”.[3] “The Damascus Sermon” is a sermon on hope, a commentary on Q. 39:53: Do not despair of God’s mercy, a diagnosis of the maladies that had afflicted Muslims and an impassionate appeal to act resolutely to change the conditions.
As we have seen in other cases, a heavy overlay of political and social conditions defined Nursi’s discourse. In order to appeal to an audience under the spell of rationalism, Nursi himself adopts a rationalistic style in many cases, but then the burden of his arguments makes it totally irrational, bordering on the ridiculous. For example, the verse …and We have created for them similar [vessels] on which they ride,[4] points to the railway and the “Light Verse” alludes to electricity, as well as to numerous other lights and mysteries.[5] And the verse: To Solomon [We made] the wind [obedient]: its early morning [stride] was a month’s [journey], and its evening [stride] was a month’s [journey],[6]
suggests that the road is open for man to cover such a distance in the air. In which case, O man! since the road is open to you, reach this level! And in meaning Almighty God is saying through the tongue of this verse: “O man! I mounted one of my servants on the air because he gave up the desires of his soul. If you too give up laziness, which comes from the soul, and benefit thoroughly from certain of my laws in the cosmos, you too may mount it…” the verse specified final points far ahead of today’s aeroplanes.[7]
And the miracle of Prophet Moses’ staff mentioned in the Qur’an (Q. 2:60), predicts the development of modern drilling techniques to dig out such indispensable substances of modern industry as oil, mineral water, and natural gas. The mention of iron in the Qur’an (Q. 34:10), which had been “softened for David”, becomes a sign of the future significance of iron and steel for modern industry. In its popular and cruder version, Said Nursi’s encounter with modern science has led his followers to establish one-to-one correspondences between new scientific findings and Qur’anic verses. His practice of using science as the decoder of the sacred language of nature has influenced numerous Turkish students, professionals, and lay persons who are making similar attempts. Nursi’s followers try to show the miracle of creation through comparisons between the cosmological verses of the Qur’an and new scientific discoveries. Every new scientific discovery is quickly adopted as yet another proof for the miraculous nature of the Qur’an. This has led to a gross profanation of the text of the Qur’an and a great injustice to the scientific data. These trends also gave birth to formal works of Qur’an interpretation in which modern science appears as the most important subject matter.
Nursi was followed by a large number of young people who were seeking spiritual fulfillment in a society where religion had been under attack. This characteristic Turkish dilemma has given birth to a society which is divided and at war with itself. Thus the Islam and science discourse in Turkey is not a calm academic discourse; it is a matter of life and death.
Muzaffar Iqbal
October 31, 2002
[1]. For this number and the above information, see, Nursi, Bediuzzaman (1995), The Flashes Collection (From the Risal-i Nur Collection 3), trans. from Turkish by Sukran Vahide,Sozler Nesriyat A. S., Istanbul, pp. 480-6).
[2]. Nursi, Said Bediuzzaman (1998), The Words, being the English translation of the Turkish Sözler, new revised edition, Sözler Neşriyat Ticaret ve Sanayi, Istanbul, p. 806.
[3]. As stated in the Publisher’s Preface to the second revised English translation, see Nursi, Bediuzzaman Said (1989), The Damascus Sermon, tr. from the Turkish by Şükran Vahide, Sözler Neşriyat ve Sanayi A. Ş, Istanbul.
[4]. Q. 36: 42.
[5]. Nursi (1998), p. 261.
[6]. Q. 34:12.
[7]. Nursi (1998), pp. 262-3.
A remarkable child endowed with a prodigious memory, Bediuzzam completed a traditional madrasah education at the early age of fourteen and then studies physical sciences, mathematics and philosophy. In the course of the second decade of his life, he became extremely convinced that the Turkish madrasah education was inadequate and his own interest in natural sciences led him to construct a new curriculum for the Islamic educational system. He prepared a blue print for the establishment of a university, Medrestu’z Zehra, (the Resplendent Madrasah) in the Eastern Provinces. In 1917, he arrived in Istanbul and met Sultan Abdul Hamid. Subsequently, he received some funding for the construction of the university and its foundations were laid in 1913. But the beginning of World War I and the subsequent events made it impossible for this project to materialize.
The end of World War I and that of the Ottoman Empire culminated the first phase of Bediuzzam’s life, the period of the “Old Said”, as he would later call it. During the War, he had led the militia forces on the Caucasian Front against the invading Russians for which he was later awarded a War Medal. He was taken prisoner in March 1916 and was held in Russia for two years. In early 1918, he escaped from the prison and made his way back to Istanbul via Warsaw, Berlin and Vienna.
It was during the first two years of War that he composed his first works on the Qur’an. Spoken while sitting on horseback, and dictated hese “commentaries” on various chapters of the Qur’an attempted to combine the religious knowledge with natural sciences. This was the beginning of his major work, Risale-i Nur. But the work was interrupted when Bediuzzaman was captured and imprisoned by the Russians.
The defeat of the Ottomans, the occupation of Istanbul and parts of Turkey by foreign forces and the bitter internal struggle that emerged after the War led to a profound change in Nursi. Despite his active involvement in public life, his association with Daru’l Hikmeti’l Islamiye, the learned body attached to the office of the Shauk ul-Islam, and his War services, Beddiuzzaman became increasingly dissatisfied with the world. He started to see the limits of human endeavor and concentrated on his spiritual training. Recognized for his services, he was invited to Ankara by Mustafa Kemal, who had emerged as the victorious General, to take part in the reconstruction of the New Turkey.
Beddiuzzaman spent almost eight months in Ankara during which he realized that the new Turkish military elite was attempting to establish a secular republic in which Islam was to be shunned. He was offered various posts in this new set up but he declined to be part of an establishment founded on materialistic and secular philosophy. He left Ankara for Van where he sought solace in spiritual practices and isolation.
But early in 1925, he was arrested on charges of taking part in a “rebellion” in eastern provinces although he had taken no part in it. He was sent into exile in western Anatolia along with hundreds of other Turks—thus began a twenty-five year period of oppression, imprisonment and privation. It was during this time, in the remote village of Barla in the mountains of Isparta province where Bediuzzaman had been sent, that Bediuzzaman resumed his work on Risale-i Nur.
Risale-i Nur is not a tafsir (commentary) on the Qur’an in the usual sense of the term; rather, it attempts to establish links between the Qur’anic verses and the natural world. It also attempts to show that there is no contradiction between religion and science (See selections for Risal-i Nur in the following section).
While in Barla, Bediuzzaman also wrote a treatise on Resurrection and thirty-three other pieces which were later collected as Sozler (The Words). This was followed by Maktubat (Letters), a collection of thirty-three letters of varying length written to his students. Bediuzzaman wrote two more works, Lem’alar (The Flashes) and Sualar (The Rays), the latter was completed in 1949. In addition, there are three collections of additional letters, Barla Lahikast, Kastmonu Lahikast, and Emirdag Lahikast from each of Bediuzzaman’s three places of exile.
Risale-i Nur is actually a collection of quickly uttered words, dictated to a scribe at high speed, without consulting any books or references, in the mountains and countryside places of exile. They were then copied by hand and secretly circulated because the new secularist regime had banned all religious works. The essays were then passed on from village to village by the Risale-i Nur students. It was only in 1946, that duplicating machines became available to the Risale-i Nur students and it was not until 1956 that The Words and other collections were printed in new Latin script that had been imposed on the Turkish language by the Kemalist regime. The figure given for hand-written copies is 600,000.[1]
Nursi thus became the founder of the Nurcu movement. Left without books, without his home and family, and restricted to a remote region of the country, Said Nursi was to make a remarkable impact on the lives of millions of Turkish men and women through his powerful writings and he continues to be a revered figure in Turkey and other Muslim lands. His works, now collectively called Risale-i Nur, clandestinely circulated and copied by hand, are now easily available in many languages. Nursi and his work provide an excellent example of the conditions in which the discourse on Islam and science progressed in Turkey during the early decades of the twentieth century and how politics and faith were intertwined in the discourse. His movement spread quietly until 1950 despite all efforts to crush it and then entered a new phase in which a great number of young Turks, who had gone through the state-run secular institutions of the Republic, openly responded to his call. Toward the end of his life, Nursi’s influence spread beyond Turkey. Today, there are several offshoots of this movement, some of which have become rather profane.
Said Nursi had considerable knowledge of modern science and he attempted to integrate it within a theistic perspective. For him, the Qur’an and modern physical sciences had no dissonance; rather, relating the truth of the Qur’an to modern men and women was even easier. Written during his exile, Risale-i Nur was later described as “a manevi tefsir, or commentary which expounds the truths of the Qur’an.”[2] In the course of his expressive prose, which pulsates with energy, Nursi substantiates Islamic faith on the basis of the certainties of modern physical sciences and reads the cosmic verses of the Qur’an in the light of modern science. As a religious scholar well grounded in traditional Islamic sciences, Nursi was aware of the apparent discrepancy between traditional cosmology articulated by Muslim philosophers and Sufis, and the Newtonian worldview, but instead of rejecting the mechanistic view of the universe presented by Newtonian science, he tried to appropriate it by appealing to the classical arguments from design. He saw no contradiction between the order and harmony of the universe and Newtonian determinism. Rather, through a radical recasting of God as the Divine artisan, he found support for the mechanistic view of the universe. He thought of the universe as a machine or clock, just like the nineteenth century deists, but he transformed this enduring symbol of the European tradition to lend support to the theistic claims of creation. For him, the Qur’anic themes of the regularity and harmony of the natural order, when combined with the predictability of Newtonian physics, disproved the triumph of the secularists and positivists of the nineteenth century and provided a solid rock on which to construct a new understanding of the message of the Qur’an.
Nursi’s approach to modern science needs to be interpreted with due consideration of the social and political conditions in which it was written; unlike many other reformers of the nineteenth century, there is an additional element here: the need to survive in an environment dominated by state sponsored harassment. Perhaps this is the reason for the emergence of a number of conflicting ways in which Nursi’s work has been judged; some take the work as if it was a scholar’s commentary on the Qur’an; others read it with due regard to the life of the writer and his social and historical conditions. There are those who take his work to be an attempt to deconstruct metaphysical claims of modern science by using the language of Newtonian physics, chemistry, and astronomy. And there are those who emphasize the influence of modern science and positivism on Nursi. In addition, the work itself is not a smooth and calm exposition and many additions have been made to it. Originally, it was not even written; it was “dictated at speed to a scribe, who would write down the piece in question with equal speed” and these handwritten copies would circulate clandestinely. There were no books for references. The Risale-i Nur collection is, in essence, a collection of dictations of an inspired mind, secretly written, for all religious teaching was forbidden. As such, Nursi’s work does not fall in the category of so-called al-tafsir al-`ilmi (scientific commentary); rather, in its style and purpose, the collection now known as Risale-i Nur is a collection of sermons—a title that is used for one of the “Words”, “The Damascus Sermon”, which was delivered at the historic Umayyad Mosque in early 1911 to a gathering “of ten thousand, including one hundred scholars…the text was afterwards printed twice in one week,”.[3] “The Damascus Sermon” is a sermon on hope, a commentary on Q. 39:53: Do not despair of God’s mercy, a diagnosis of the maladies that had afflicted Muslims and an impassionate appeal to act resolutely to change the conditions.
As we have seen in other cases, a heavy overlay of political and social conditions defined Nursi’s discourse. In order to appeal to an audience under the spell of rationalism, Nursi himself adopts a rationalistic style in many cases, but then the burden of his arguments makes it totally irrational, bordering on the ridiculous. For example, the verse …and We have created for them similar [vessels] on which they ride,[4] points to the railway and the “Light Verse” alludes to electricity, as well as to numerous other lights and mysteries.[5] And the verse: To Solomon [We made] the wind [obedient]: its early morning [stride] was a month’s [journey], and its evening [stride] was a month’s [journey],[6]
suggests that the road is open for man to cover such a distance in the air. In which case, O man! since the road is open to you, reach this level! And in meaning Almighty God is saying through the tongue of this verse: “O man! I mounted one of my servants on the air because he gave up the desires of his soul. If you too give up laziness, which comes from the soul, and benefit thoroughly from certain of my laws in the cosmos, you too may mount it…” the verse specified final points far ahead of today’s aeroplanes.[7]
And the miracle of Prophet Moses’ staff mentioned in the Qur’an (Q. 2:60), predicts the development of modern drilling techniques to dig out such indispensable substances of modern industry as oil, mineral water, and natural gas. The mention of iron in the Qur’an (Q. 34:10), which had been “softened for David”, becomes a sign of the future significance of iron and steel for modern industry. In its popular and cruder version, Said Nursi’s encounter with modern science has led his followers to establish one-to-one correspondences between new scientific findings and Qur’anic verses. His practice of using science as the decoder of the sacred language of nature has influenced numerous Turkish students, professionals, and lay persons who are making similar attempts. Nursi’s followers try to show the miracle of creation through comparisons between the cosmological verses of the Qur’an and new scientific discoveries. Every new scientific discovery is quickly adopted as yet another proof for the miraculous nature of the Qur’an. This has led to a gross profanation of the text of the Qur’an and a great injustice to the scientific data. These trends also gave birth to formal works of Qur’an interpretation in which modern science appears as the most important subject matter.
Nursi was followed by a large number of young people who were seeking spiritual fulfillment in a society where religion had been under attack. This characteristic Turkish dilemma has given birth to a society which is divided and at war with itself. Thus the Islam and science discourse in Turkey is not a calm academic discourse; it is a matter of life and death.
Muzaffar Iqbal
October 31, 2002
[1]. For this number and the above information, see, Nursi, Bediuzzaman (1995), The Flashes Collection (From the Risal-i Nur Collection 3), trans. from Turkish by Sukran Vahide,Sozler Nesriyat A. S., Istanbul, pp. 480-6).
[2]. Nursi, Said Bediuzzaman (1998), The Words, being the English translation of the Turkish Sözler, new revised edition, Sözler Neşriyat Ticaret ve Sanayi, Istanbul, p. 806.
[3]. As stated in the Publisher’s Preface to the second revised English translation, see Nursi, Bediuzzaman Said (1989), The Damascus Sermon, tr. from the Turkish by Şükran Vahide, Sözler Neşriyat ve Sanayi A. Ş, Istanbul.
[4]. Q. 36: 42.
[5]. Nursi (1998), p. 261.
[6]. Q. 34:12.
[7]. Nursi (1998), pp. 262-3.
Selasa, 18 September 2007
Minggu, 19 Agustus 2007
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