Bediuzzaman goes on to make a point which is fundamental to his ideas and that has been mentioned in several places in the present work so far. This is that the modern age is the mass age or age of the community or social group. Communities give rise to collective personalities or spirits. In the case of government or authority, in this complex modern age, they can only function adequately by means of collective personalities of this sort. He mentions this here in regard to the Caliphate.
The present is the time of community. The collective personality of a community, which is its spirit, is firmer and more capable of carrying out the ordinances of the Shari'a. The person of the Caliph can only undertake his duties through relying on [such a collective personality]. If a collective personality, the spirit of a community, is righteous, it is more brilliant and perfect [than that of an individual]. But if it is bad, it is exceedingly bad. Both the goodness and badness of an individual are limited, but those of a community are unlimited. Do not spoil the goodness you have gained in the face of external [enemies] through internal badness. You know that your perpetual enemies and opponents and foes are destroying the practices and marks of Islam. Therefore, your essential duty is to revive and preserve them. Otherwise, unconsciously you will be helping the conscious enemy. Contempt for the practices and marks of Islam shows weakness of nationhood, and as for weakness, it does not arrest the enemy, it encourages him. "God is enough for us, and how excellent a Guardian is He" (Qur'an, 3:173). [^375]
[^375]:Tarihçe, 125-7; Şahiner, Said Nursi, 242-8; Nursi, "Hubab," in Mesnevi-i Nuriye, 92-3.
This exhortation had a considerable effect; it added around sixty to the number of deputies who performed the prayer regularly and the room used as a mosque had to be changed for larger one. However, it drew an unfavourable reaction from the president of the Assembly. One day in the presence of a large number of deputies in the Assembly, he shouted angrily at Bediuzzaman: "We are in need of heroic hojas like you. We called you here in order to benefit from your elevated ideas, but you came here and immediately started writing things about the prayers, and have caused differences amongst us." Bediuzzaman countered this with a few words, then himself in anger, he jabbed his fingers and said:
"Pasha! Pasha! After belief, the most elevated truth in Islam is the obligatory prayers. Those who do not perform the prayers are traitors, and the opinions of traitors are to be rejected." [^376]
[^376]:Tarihçe, 128.