Risale-i Nur, formed through the self-sacrificing sincerity of Bediuzzaman and its students. Indeed, Bediuzzaman described his life, himself, as a seed out of which in His mercy, Almighty God had created the valuable, fruit-bearing tree of the Risale-i Nur. "I was a seed; I rotted away and disappeared. All the value pertains to the Risale-i Nur, which is a true and faithful commentary on the Qur'an, and is its meaning." [^104]

[^104]:Ibid., 120-1.

#### Bediuzzaman's Will and His Wish for an Unknown Grave

Bediuzzaman's Will and His Wish for an Unknown Grave

It was for the same reason, to preserve this "maximum sincerity" wherein lay the Risale-Nur's power and the secret of its success, that on numerous occasions Bediuzzaman stated that he wanted the location of his grave to remain secret, known only by one or two of his closest students. He also had this written in his will.

Bediuzzaman made his will on a number of occasions, the first being in Emirdağ before being sent to Afyon in January 1948. Pointing out that it was a Sunna of the Prophet (PBUH) to make a will since the appointed hour was unknown he named a committee of his students to which he wished his personal effects and finest volumes of the Risale-i Nur to be left. [^105] In his later wills, he stipulates two points, one is the question of his grave being secret and the other, the payment of allowances to those of the Risale-i Nur Students who worked solely for the Risale-i Nur and had no other means of subsistence.

[^105]:Nursi, Emirdağ Lahikası, i, 132-3.

Bediuzzaman stated that those who wished to visit his grave should do so only in the spirit and recite the Fatiha for his soul from afar. For, "Like in olden times, out of the desire for fame and renown, the Pharaohs turned the attention of people to themselves by means of statues, pictures and mummies, so in this fearsome age, through the heedlessness it produces, egotism directs all attention to this world by means of statues, portraits, and newspapers, and the worldly attach more importance to the worldly fame and renown of the deceased through the worldly future they imagine has thus been obtained for them. They visit the deceased in this way, rather than visiting them for God's pleasure alone and their future in the hereafter. In order not to spoil the maximum sincerity of the Risale-i Nur and through the mystery of that sincerity, I enjoin that my grave is not made known." [^106] Just as he did not wish to receive visitors in this world, so he did not want his grave to be visited.

[^106]:Nursi, Emirdağ Lahikası, ii, 173.