Bediuzzaman in Eskişehir and visit him.

There was an optician in Aydın called Şevket Gözaçan. Because he had treated the eyes of one of Bediuzzaman's students, Bediuzzaman wrote him a short note to thank him three or four lines long. They sent Şevket Bey to Eskişehir Prison because of this.

And again, a Student called Ahmed Feyzi Kul had written Bediuzzaman a letter in Barla and signed it "The Müftü of Aydın" [by way of a joke, aydın means enlightened, as well as being a place-name]. When the affair erupted, they sent the real Müftü of Aydın to Eskişehir although he was not connected in any way. Müftü Mustafa Efendi stayed in prison for months together with me. Eskişehir was a mass of crazy mix-ups like this. [^110]

[^110]:-

Perhaps the most crazy was the case of Bediuzzaman's treatise on the wisdom of fasting in the month of Ramadan. When searching the houses of Bediuzzaman and his students for copies of the Risale-i Nur, the police had come across this treatise, called in Turkish, Ramazan'a Ait, which can mean either Belonging to Ramadan, or Concerning Ramadan. Besides the holy month of fasting, in Turkey it is a man's name. Thus, the police started searching the villages of Isparta for someone with the name. During the operation it was learnt that the neighbour of a house searched in some remote village was called Ramazan. So they came and clapped handcuffs on the unfortunate villager who knew neither how to read nor write, and sent him to Eskişehir Prison, despite his bewildered protestations of innocence, And there he remained for two months until the authorities admitted their mistake and released him. [^111]

[^111]:Şahiner, Said Nursi, 318-19.

#### "The Prison Became Like a Mosque

"The Prison Became Like a Mosque"

The prison authorities did not neglect to plant an informer in the ward where Bediuzzaman's students were. Postman Kâmil as he was called was doing his military service as a gendarme in Eskisehir when he was assigned to the job. Bediuzzaman sent his students a note one day stuck to the bottom of the teapot warning them not to speak against the government as there was an informer amongst them. In the event, Postman Kâmil was so impressed by Bediuzzaman and these completely innocent people that he himself began to perform the obligatory prayers and in his reports wrote that they were innocent. When describing these days to Necmeddin Şahiner in 1985, he told him:

While serving in the prison, I was startled by some sudden news: 'Some