ened of Bediuzzaman's going to Aya Sophia at the time of the Conquest celebrations, for there were rumours that he was going to walk there from Fatih. [^59] In fact, as the writer Münir Çapanoğlu wrote, the reason the authorities perpetually drove Bediuzzaman from exile to exile and prison to prison was that they were frightened of him. "They were frightened of Said Nursi… of his person, of his ideology, of the fact he would raise to life the Islamic cause... from the time of the Constitutional Revolution and ever after." [^60]

[^59]:Hüseyin Cahid Payazağa, in Son Şahitler, v, 269-70.

[^60]:Münir Çapanoğlu, in Şahiner, Nurs Yolu, 131.

Hüseyin Payazağa recalls too how in Draman there was a non-Muslim Greek grocer and it was there Bediuzzaman used to do his shopping. Dimitrios as he was called used to show Bediuzzaman great respect. He told Payazağa: "You don't know who this person is. If he was in Greece, they would make him a house out of gold." [^61] Muhsin Alev also relates how one day they went to Bakirköy to what was then open countryside to take some air, and there a Christian from Beirut called Suleyman hurried up to Bediuzzaman. Bediuzzaman did not turn the man away, but talked with him for a while, even accepting the coffee he gave him. [^62]

[^61]:Hüseyin Cahid Payazağa, Ibid., 270.

[^62]:Muhsin Alev, in Son Şahitler, i, 226.

It was the month of Ramadan while Bediuzzaman was in Istanbul, and Mehmet Fırıncı notes that he hardly slept for the whole month, spending the nights in worship and prayer while continuing his usual daily activities of reading the Risale-i Nur and teaching his students, correcting proofs, receiving visitors, and so on. At night the local people would gather in the house opposite to watch Bediuzzaman, as he continued his worship in bright electric light till the morning. On their finally closing the windows, the people objected saying, "Why have you closed them? We were reciting our prayers and supplications along with the Hojaefendi?" [^63]

[^63]:Mehmet Fırıncı, in Son Şahitler, iii, 235.

#### Isparta

Isparta

Bediuzzaman returned to Emirdağ towards the end of July, and after a week moved to the Yıldız Hotel in Eskişehir. In August, again towards the end of the month, he travelled to Isparta. Here, after staying a week in the hotel of one of his students, Nuri Benli, he moved to the rented house which, although he continued to return to Emirdağ and Eskişehir for visits, now became his base. Indeed, he loved Isparta above all places and wanted