central and conciliatory role in the area of his Medresetü'z-Zehra, which he had worked for in eastern Turkey for so many years. That is, he was urging the Democrats to strengthen feelings of "Islamic nationhood" in place of the divisive racialist nationalism of the former regime.

Bediuzzaman's attitude towards the West also changed following the Second World War, for such countries as Britain, France, and America should no longer be opposed to Islamic Unity; in the face of the anarchy arising from communism and atheism, they were now in need of it. [^5] Particularly post-war America, which he saw as working for religion in a serious manner, he regarded in friendly terms. [^6] With a number of Islamic countries gaining their independence from the colonial powers in the late 1940's and the 50's, and new Islamic states being formed, together with other indications, he once again started to speak of the forthcoming ascendancy of the Qur'an and Islam, which he had foretold in the early years of the century. He even foresaw the Islamic countries as a federation, "the United Islamic States". [^7]

[^5]:Ibid., 24.

[^6]:Ibid., 178.

[^7]:-

On occasion Bediuzzaman called the Democrats "Ahrarlar," sometimes translated as liberals, but by which he meant supporters of hürriyet-i şer'iye, the "freedom in accordance with the Shari'a" the establishment of which he had worked for during the Constitutional Period in the early decades of the century, and which path he hoped they would take. That is to say, Bediuzzaman supported gradual change and the gradual achievement of what he believed was the inevitable future supremacy of Islam and the Qur'an. He saw democracy as a licit means of achieving this, and attached the greatest importance to the maintenance of public order and security. As he frequently pointed out, despite all the provocation and attempts to implicate and involve Risale-i Nur Students in disturbances by those who made it their business to disrupt order, none had been recorded. The way of the Risale-i Nur and its Students was service to belief and the Qur'an by peaceful means and "positive action". It was peaceful struggle or "jihad of the word" (jihad-ı mânevî) in the face of the moral and spiritual depradations of atheism and unbelief, to instil certain belief in hearts and minds. While in many Muslim countries violent change had been brought about by revolution in which thousands of innocents were killed, the Risale-i Nur's method was "the positive service of belief which results in the preservation of public order and stability." The destruction caused by atheism and unbelief was of a moral, spiritual or non-material nature (mânevî), so