sun. Concerning this point, I say with all certainty that I would have liked to go to Samsun to visit my brothers of the hereafter who are linked to the Büyük Cihad and the Nur students in the region, but as stated by the doctor's report, my infirmity is so advanced that for one and a half years I have been unable to attend for five minutes even the court that was holding the trial, although it had summoned me, The public prosecutor and examining magistrate who was acting as judge were compelled to come to me. They brought with them the newspaper that was the subject of their questioning. The paper had mixed in some of its own words with mine. I gave them the necessary replies. If the Criminal Court attaches so much importance to this case, it should allow my trial to be transferred to Eskişehir, for there I can appear in person since I have a two-month report from the health committee stating that I am severely ill from poison. It is otherwise quite impossible.

Third Point: Basing it on Article 163 of the Criminal Code, the prosecutor and examining magistrate accuse Said Nursi of exploiting religion for politics and disturbing public order. The truth about this point is that five or six courts over the past twenty-nine years and the police of five or six provinces have found nothing indictable apart from two matters in the one hundred and thirty-three parts of my books and all my thousands of letters which they had seized, despite the provocations of some irreligious secret societies and their deceiving certain naive officials. Evidence for this are the facts that Denizli Criminal Court and Ankara Criminal Court and the Court of Appeal all agreed on my acquittal and the return of all my books, and in five or six provinces only one court wanted to impose a light sentence on the pretext of my expounding a Qur'anic verse about Islamic dress. In the face of my decisive and powerful reply, they were obliged to alter the verdict into one of discretion, That is to say, they could find nothing to convict me of either. For further elucidation of this point, I am sending you also the petition I sent to the chairman of Afyon Court.

In Short: The same palaver was repeated in five or six courts yet they could find nothing that constitutes an offence, Now the Samsun prosecutor and examining magistrate are repeating the same palaver of twenty-eight years: "He is conducting campaigns of propaganda to secure personal influence and is exploiting religion for political ends," I refer them to my unrefuted defence speeches of four hundred or so pages which I have delivered during five trials. Let them take a look at them rather than making me speak.

S a i d   N u r s i