Bediuzzaman explained "an important reason" for their decision to print part of the Risale-i Nur in the new letters, although contrary to their intention, to do so "as though put the Risale-i Nur in an offensive position."

He wrote that the time had come or would shortly come to print the Risale-i Nur, that is, publish it on a large scale, "in order to repulse two fearsome calamities which were threatening the country, of which it was "a sort of saviour".

One of these calamities was communism, against the racing tide of which the Risale-i Nur "could perform the function of a Qur'anic barrier", while the second was "the severe objections" levelled at the Turkish people by the Islamic world, from which since the founding of the Republic, it had drawn away; The Risale-i Nur was "a miracle of the Qur'an" that could be the means of restoring former love and brotherhood. [^284]

[^284]:Ibid., 101.

Bediuzzaman believed the threat to the Turkish nation of these "calamities" to be so real that not only did he consider that rather than trying to suppress the Risale-i Nur, "patriotic politicians" should have it published officially in order to counter the threat, but also, unlike the previous twenty years of his exile and captivity, he wrote letters and petitions to high government officials describing their nature and severity, and possible dire consequences, and urging them to counter them by returning to Islam and publishing the Risale-i Nur.

In essence this was a continuation of the same struggle he had been pursuing since his youth, for Islam and the Qur'an to be accepted by the country's rulers as the source of true progress and civilization, rather than the West and its philosophy. On coming to power after the War of Independence, the new leaders had adopted the path of Westernization, which had already been followed to some degree for over a century. Only, their aim was total Westernization, and demanded complete secularization and that Islam was rendered ineffectual, as we have seen. What emerged was a battle between belief and unbelief. Up to this time during his years of exile, his role in this battle had been "defensive"; he had written numbers of treatises explaining and proving the basic truths of belief which were then subject to fierce attacks in the name of science, philosophy, and atheism. He had sought to defend Islam and belief against these orchestrated onslaughts which had been conducted on many fronts: the press, and publications of all sorts, education in schools, adult education programmes, and so on. In a very low key and unobtrusive manner, Bediuzzaman's treatises, the Risale-