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The Seventh Ray The Supreme Sign1
<< Not everyone will be able to understand all the matters discussed in this most significant treatise, but equally nobody will remain portionless. If somebody enters a garden, he will find that his hands cannot reach all the fruit it contains, but the amount that falls within his grasp will be enough for him. The garden does not exist for him alone; it exists also for those whose arms are longer than his. >>
Introduction
I created not jinn
and mankind except that they might worship me.8
According to the meaning of this mighty verse, the
purpose for the sending of man to this world and the
wisdom implicit in it, consists of recognizing the
Creator of all beings and believing in Him and
worshipping Him. The primordial duty of man and the
obligation incumbent upon him are to know God and believe
in Him, to assent to His Being and unity in submission
and perfect certainty. For man, who
by nature desires permanent life and immortal existence,
whose unlimited hopes are matched by boundless
afflictions, any object or accomplishment other than
belief in God, knowledge of God and the means for
attaining these, which are the fundament and key of
eternal life - any such object or accomplishment must be
regarded as lowly for man, or even worthless in many
cases. Since this
truth has been proven with firm evidence in the Risale-i
Nur, we refer exposition of it to that, setting forth
here, within the framework of four questions, only two
abysses that shake certainty of faith in this age and
induce hesitation. The means for
salvation from the first abyss are these two Matters: The First
Matter: As proven in detail in the Thirteenth Flash
of the Thirty-First Letter, in general questions denial
has no value in the face of proof and is extremely weak.
For example, with respect to the sighting of the crescent
moon at the beginning of Ramadan the Noble, if two common
men prove the crescent to have emerged by their
witnessing it, and thousands of nobles and scholars deny
it, saying: “We have not seen it,” their negation is
valueless and without power to convince. When it is a
question of proof each person strengthens and supports
the other, and consensus results. But when it is a
question of negation, there is no difference between one
man and a thousand. Each person remains alone and
isolated. For the one who affirms looks beyond himself
and judges the matter as it is. Thus in the example we
have given, if one says “The moon is in the sky,” and
his friend then points his finger at the moon, the two of
them unite and are strengthened. ____________________ 4. Qur’an, 51:56.
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - Introduction - p.126 The one who
engages in negation and denial, however, does not regard
the matter as it is, and is even unable to do so. For it
is a well-known principle that “a non-particularized
denial, not directed to a particular locus, cannot be
proven.” For example,
if I affirm the existence of a thing in the world, and
you deny it, I can easily establish its existence with a
single indication. But for you to justify your negation,
that is to establish the non-existence of the thing - it
is necessary to hunt exhaustively through the whole
world, and even to examine every aspect of past ages.
Only then can you say, “It does not exist, and never
has existed.” Since those
who negate and deny do not regard the matter as it is but
judge rather in the light of their own souls, and their
own intelligence and vision, they can in no way
strengthen and support each other. For the veils and
causes that prevent them from seeing and knowing are
various. Anyone can say, “I do not see it; therefore,
in my opinion and belief, it does not exist.” But none
can say, “It does not exist in actuality.” If someone
says this -particularly in questions of belief, which
look to all the universe- it is a lie as vast as the
world itself, and he who utters it will be incapable both
of speaking the truth and of being corrected. In
Short: The result is one and single in the case
of affirmation, and every instance of affirmation
supports all other instances. Negation by
contrast is not one, but multiple. Multiplicity arises
through each person’s saying concerning himself, “In
my opinion and view,” or “In my belief,” and leads
to multiplicity of result. Hence each separate instance
cannot support all other instances. Therefore,
with respect to the truth with which we began, there is
no significance in the multiplicity and apparent
predominance of the unbelievers and deniers who oppose
belief. Now it is necessary to refrain from introducing
any hesitation into the certainty and faith of a
believer, but in this age the negations and denials of
the philosophers of The Second
Matter: With respect to a problem subject to
discussion in science or art, those who stand outside
that science or art cannot speak
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - Introduction - p.127 authoritatively,
however great, learned and accomplished they may be, nor
can their judgements be accepted as decisive. They cannot
form part of the learned consensus of the science. For example,
the judgement of a great engineer on the diagnosis and
cure of a disease does not have the same value as that of
the lowliest physician. In particular, the words of
denial of a philosopher who is absorbed in the material
sphere, who becomes continually more remote from the
non-material or spiritual and cruder and more insensitive
to light, whose intelligence is restricted to what his
eye beholds - the words of such a one are unworthy of
consideration and valueless with respect to non-material
and spiritual matters. On matters
sacred and spiritual and concerning the Divine unity,
there is total accord among the hundreds of thousands of
the People of Truth, such as Shaykh Gilani (May his
mystery be sanctified), who beheld God’s Sublime Throne
while still on the earth, who spent ninety years
ad-vancing in spiritual work, and who unveiled the truths
of belief in all three stations of certainty. This being
the case what value have the words of philosophers, who
through their absorption in the most diffuse details of
the material realm and the most minute aspects of
multiplicity are choking and dazed? Are not their denials
and objections drowned out like the buzzing of a mosquito
by the roaring of thunder? The essence of
the unbelief that opposes the truths of Islam and
struggles against them is denial, ignorance, and
negation. Even though it may appear to be an affirmation
of some kind and a manifestation of being, it is in
reality negation and non-being. Whereas belief is
knowledge and a manifestation of being; it is affirmation
and judgement. Every negating aspect of belief is the
gate to a positive truth or the veil covering it. If the
unbelievers who struggle against faith attempt, with the
utmost difficulty, to affirm and accept their negative
beliefs in the form of acceptance and admission of
non-being, then their unbelief may be regarded in one
respect as a form of mistaken knowledge or erroneous
judgement. But as for non-accceptance, denial, and
non-admission -something more easily done- it is absolute
ignorance and total absence of judgement. In
Short: The convictions underlying unbelief are
then of two kinds: The First
pays no regard to the truths of Islam. It is an erroneous
admission, a baseless belief and a mistaken acceptance
peculiar to itself; it is an unjust judgement. This kind
of unbelief is beyond the scope of our discussion. It has
no concern with us, nor do we have any concern with it. The Second
Kind opposes the truths of belief and struggles
against them. It consists in turn of two varieties.
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - Introduction - p.128 The
First is non-acceptance. It consists simply of
not consenting to affirmation. This is a species of
ignorance; there is no judgement in-volved and it occurs
easily. It too is beyond the scope of our discussion. The
Second variety is acceptance of non-being. It is
to consent to non-being with one’s heart, and a
judgement is involved. It is a conviction and a taking
the part of something. It is on account of this
partiality that it is obliged to affirm its negation. The negation
comprises two types: The First
Type says: “A certain thing does not exist at a
certain place or in a particular direction.” This kind
of denial can be proved, and it lies outside of our
discussion. The Second
Type consists of negating and denying those doctrinal
and sacred matters, general and comprehensive, that
concern this world, all beings, the hereafter, and the
succession of different ages. This kind of negation
cannot in any fashion be substantiated, as we have shown
in the First Matter, for what is needed to substantiate
such negations is a vision that shall encompass the whole
universe, behold the hereafter, and observe every aspect
of time without limit. The Second
Abyss and the means for escaping from it: This too
consists of two matters. The
First: Intelligences that become narrowed by
absorption in neglect of God and in sin, or the material
realm, are unable to comprehend vast matters in respect
of sublimity, grandeur, and infinity; hence taking pride
in such knowledge as they have, they hasten to denial and
negation. Since they cannot encompass the extremely vast,
profound and comprehensive questions of faith within
their straitened and dessicated intellects, their corrupt
and spiritually moribund hearts, they cast themselves
into unbelief and misguidance, and choke. If they were
able to look at the true nature of their unbelief and the
essence of their misguidance they would see that,
compared to the reasonable, suitable and indeed necessary
sublimity and grandeur that is present in belief, their
unbelief conceals and contains manifold absurdity and
impossibility. The Risale-i Nur has proven this truth by
hundreds of comparisons with the same finality that
“two plus two equals four.” For example, one who does
not accept the Necessary Being, the pre-eternity, and the
comprehensiveness of attribute of God Almighty, on
account of their grandeur and sublimity, may form a creed
of unbelief by assigning that necessary being,
pre-eternity, and the attributes of Godhead to an
unlimited number of beings, an infinity of atoms. Or like
the foolish
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - Introduction - p.129 Sophists, he can
abdicate his intelligence by denying and negating both
his own existence and that of the universe. Thus, all the
truths of belief and Islam, basing their matters on the
grandeur and sublimity which are their requirement,
deliver themselves from the awesome absurdities, the
fearsome superstitions, and the tenebrous ignorance of
unbelief that confront them, and take up their place in
sound hearts and straight intellects, through utmost
submission and assent. The constant
proclamation of this grandeur and sublimity in the call
to prayer, in the prayers themselves and in most of the
rites of Islam, Allahu
akbar, God is Most Great! God is Most
Great! God is Most Great! the declaration of
the Sacred Tradition that “Grandeur is My shield and
Sublimity My cloak;”5 and the statement of
the Prophet (Peace and blessings be upon him) - his most
inspiring communing with God, in the eighty-sixth part of
Jawshan al-Kabir:6 O
You other than Whose Kingdom no kingdom exists; O You Whose
Praise cannot be counted by His slaves; O You Whose
Glory cannot be described by His creatures; O You Whose
Perfection lies beyond the range of all vision; O You Whose
Attributes exceed the bounds of all understanding; O You Whose
Grandeur is beyond the reach of all thought; O You Whose
Qualities man cannot fittingly describe; O You Whose
Decree His slaves cannot avert; O You Whose
Signs are manifest in everything -Be You
glorified; there is no god other than You- Protection,
protection, deliver us from the Fire! - all these
show that grandeur and sublimity constitute a necessary
veil. ____________________ 5. Muslim,
Birr, 136; Abu Da’ud, Libas, 25; Ibn Maja,
Zuhd, 16; Musnad, ii, 248, 376, 414, 427, 442; iv,
416; Ibn Hibban, Sahih, i, 272; vii, 473;
al-Hindi, Kanz al-‘Ummal, iii, 534. ba
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.130 The Supreme Sign The Observations
of a Traveller Questioning the Universe
Concerning His Maker In the Name of
God, the Merciful, the Compassionate. The seven heavens
and the earth and all that is in them extol and glorify
Him, and there is nothing but glorifies Him with praise,
but you understand not their glorifying; indeed, He is
Most Forebearing, Most Forgiving.7[This
Second Station, in addition to explaining the above
sublime verse, sets out the proofs, arguments, and
meaning of the First Station, which has been skipped.] Since this
sublime verse, like many other Qur’anic verses,
mentions first the heavens -that brilliant page
proclaiming God’s unity, gazed on at all times and by
all men with wonder and joy- in its pronouncement of the
Creator of this cosmos, let us too begin with a mention
of the heavens. Indeed, every
voyager who comes to the hospice and the realm of this
world, opens his eyes and wonders who is the master of
this fine hospice, which resembles a most generous
banquet, a most ingenious exhibition, a most impressive
camp and training ground, a most amazing and wondrous
place of recreation, a most profound and wise place of
instruction. He asks himself too who is the author of
this great book, and who is the monarch of this lofty
realm. There first presents itself to him the beautiful ____________________ 7. Qur’an,
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.131 face of the heavens,
inscribed with the gilt lettering of the stars. That face
calls him saying, “Look at me, and I shall guide you to
what you seek.” He looks then
and sees a manifestation of dominicality performing
various tasks in the heavens: it holds aloft in the
heavens, without any supporting pillar, hundreds of
thousands of heavenly bodies, some of which are a
thousand times heavier than the earth and revolve seventy
times faster than a cannon-ball; it causes them to move
in harmony and swiftly without colliding with each other;
it causes innumerable lamps to burn constantly, without
the use of any oil; it disposes of these great masses
without any disturbance or disorder; it sets sun and moon
to work at their respective tasks, without those great
bodies ever rebelling; it administers within infinite
space -the magnitude of which cannot be measured in
figures should they stretch from pole to pole- all that
exists, at the same time, with the same strength, in the
same fashion, manner and mould, without the least
deficiency; it reduces to submissive obedience to its law
all the aggressive powers inherent in those bodies; it
cleanses and lustrates the face of the heavens, removing
all the sweepings and refuse of that vast assembly; it
causes those bodies to manoeuvre like a disciplined army;
and then, making the earth revolve, it shows the heavens
each night and each year in a different form, like a
cinema screen displaying true and imaginative scenes to
the audience of creation. There is
within this dominical activity a truth consisting of
subjugation, administration, revolution, ordering,
cleansing, and employment. This truth, with its grandeur
and comprehensiveness, bears witness to the necessary
existence and unity of the Creator of the Heavens and
testifies to that Existence being more manifest than that
of the heavens. Hence it was said in the First Degree of
the First Station: There is no god
but God, the Necessary Being, to Whose Necessary
Existence in Unity the heavens and all they contain
testify, through the testimony of the sublimity of the
comprehensiveness of the truth of subjugation,
administration, revolution, ordering, cleansing, and
employment, a truth vast and perfect, and to be observed. Then that
wondrous place of gathering known as space or the
atmosphere begins thunderously to proclaim to that
traveller come as a guest to the world, “Look at me!
You can discover and find through me the object of your
search, the one who sent you here!” The traveller looks
at the sour but kind face of the atmosphere, and
listening to the awesome but joyous thunderclaps
perceives the following. The clouds,
suspended between the sky and the earth, water the garden
of the world in the most wise and merciful fashion,
furnish the inhabitants
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.132 of the earth with the
water of life, modify the natural heat of life, and
hasten to bestow aid wherever it is needed. In addition
to fulfilling these and other duties, the vast clouds,
capable of filling the heavens sometimes hide themselves,
with their parts retiring to rest so that not a trace can
be seen, just like a well-disciplined army showing and
hiding itself in accordance with sudden orders. Then, the very
instant the command is given to pour down rain, the
clouds gather in one hour, or rather in a few minutes;
they fill the sky and await further orders from their
commander. Next the
traveller looks at the wind in the atmosphere and sees
that the air is employed wisely and generously in such
numerous tasks that it is as if each of the inanimate
atoms of that unconscious air were hearing and noting the
orders coming from that monarch of the universe; without
neglecting a single one of them, it performs them in
ordered fashion and through the power of the monarch.
Thereby it gives breath to all beings and conveys to all
living things the heat, light, and electricty they need,
and transmits sound, as well as aiding in the pollination
of plants. The traveller
then looks at the rain and sees that within those
delicate, glistening sweet drops, sent from a hidden
treasury of mercy, there are so many compassionate gifts
and functions contained that it is as if mercy itself
were assuming shape and flowing forth from the dominical
treasury in the form of drops. It is for this reason that
rain has been called “mercy.” Next the
traveller looks at the lightning and listens to the
thunder and ses that both of these, too, are employed in
wondrous tasks. Then taking
his eyes off these, he looks to his own intellect and
says: “The inanimate, lifeless cloud that resembles
carded cotton has of course no knowledge of us; when it
comes to our aid, it is not because it takes pity on us.
It cannot appear and disappear without receiving orders.
Rather it acts in accordance with the orders of a most
powerful and compassionate commander. First it diasppears
without leaving a trace, then suddenly reappears in order
to begin its work. By the command and power of a most
active and exalted, a most magnificent and splendid,
monarch, it fills and then empties the atmosphere.
Inscribing the sky with wisdom and erasing the pattern,
it makes of the sky a tablet of effacement and
affirmation, a depiction of the gathering and the
resurrection. By the contriving of a most generous and
bountiful, a most munificent and solicitous sustainer, a
ruler who regulates and disposes, it mounts the wind and
taking with it treasuries of rain each as heavy as a
mountain, hastens to the aid of the needy. It is as if it
were weeping over them in pity, with
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.133 its tears causing the
flowers to smile, tempering the heat of the sun, spraying
gardens with water, and washing and cleansing the face of
the earth.” That wondering
traveller then tells his own intellect: “These hundreds
of thousands of wise, merciful and ingenious tasks and
acts of generosity and mercy that arise from the veil and
outer form of this inanimate, lifeless, unconscious,
volatile, unstable, stormy, unsettled, and inconstant
air, clearly establish that this diligent wind, this
tireless servant, never acts of itself, but rather in
accordance with the orders of a most powerful and
knowing, a most wise and generous commander. It is as if
each particle were aware of every single task, like a
soldier understanding and hearkening to every order of
its commander, for it hears and obeys every dominical
command that courses through the air. It aids all animals
to breathe and to live, all plants to pollinate and grow,
and cultivates all the matter necessary for their
survival. It directs and administers the clouds, makes
possible the voyaging of sailing ships, and enables
sounds to be conveyed, particularly by means of wireless,
telephone, telegraph and radio, as well as numerous other
universal functions. “Now these
atoms, each composed of two such simple materials as
hydrogen and oxygen and each resembling the other, exist
in hundreds of thousands of different fashions all over
the globe; I conclude therefore that they are being
employed and set to work in the utmost orderliness by a
hand of wisdom. “As the
verse makes clear, And the
disposition of the winds and the clouds, held in
disciplined order between the heavens and the earth,8 the one who through
the disposition of the winds employs them in countless
dominical functions, who through the ordering of the
clouds uses them in infinite tasks of mercy, and who
creates the air in this fashion - such a one can only be
the Possessor of Necessary Existence, the One Empowered
over All Things and Knowledgeable of All Things, the
Sustainer endowed with Glory and Generosity.” This is
the conclusion our traveller now draws. Then he looks
at the rain and sees that within it are contained
benefits as numerous as the raindrops, and dominical
manifestations as multiple as the particles of rain, and
instances of wisdom as plentiful as its atoms. Those
sweet, delicate and blessed drops are moreover created in
so beautiful and ordered a fashion, that particularly the
rain sent in the summertime, is despatched and caused to
fall with such balance and regularity ____________________ 8. Qur’an, 2:164.
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.134 that not even stormy
winds that cause large objects to collide can destroy its
equilibrium and order; the drops do not collide with each
other or merge in such fashion as to become harmful
masses of water. Water, composed of two simple elements
like hydrogen and oxygen, is employed in hundreds of
thousands of other wise, purposeful tasks and arts,
particularly in animate beings; although it is itself
inanimate and unconscious. Rain which is then the very
embodiment of Divine Mercy can only be manufactured in
the unseen treasury of mercy of One Most Compassionate
and Merciful, and on its descent expounds in physical
form the verse: And He it is Who
sends down rain after men have despaired, and thus
spreads out His Mercy.9 The traveller
next listens to the thunder and watches the lightning. He
understands that these two wondrous events in the
atmosphere are like a material demonstration of the
verse, The thunder
glorifies His praise,10 The brilliance of
His lightning almost robs them of their sight.11 They also
announce the coming of rain, and thus give glad tidings
to the needy. Yes, this
sudden utterance of a miraculous sound by the atmosphere;
the filling of the dark sky with the flash and fire of
lightning; the setting alight of the clouds that resemble
mountains of cotton or pipes bursting with water and snow
- these and similar phenomena are like a blow struck on
the head of the negligent man whose gaze is directed down
at the earth. They tell him: “Lift up
your head, look at the miraculous deeds of the most
active and powerful being who wishes to make himself
known. In the same way that you are not left to your own
devices, so too, these phenomena and events have a master
and a purpose. Each of them is caused to fulfil a
particular task, and each is employed by a Most Wise
Disposer.” The wondering
traveller hears then the lofty and manifest testimony to
the truth that is composed of the disposition of the
winds, the descent of the rains and the administration of
the events of the atmosphere, and says: “I believe in
God.” That which was stated in the Second Degree of the
First Station expresses the observations of the traveller
concerning the atmosphere: ____________________ 9. Qur’an, 42:28. 10. Qur’an, 11. Qur’an, 24:43. The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.135 There is no god
but God, the Necessary Being, to Whose Necessary
Existence in Unity the atmosphere and all its contains
testifies, through the testimony of the sublimity of the
comprehensiveness of the truth of subjugation, disposal,
causing to descend, and regulation, a truth vast and
perfect, and to be observed. Next the globe
addresses that thoughtful traveller, now growing
accustomed to his reflective journey: “Why are you
wandering through the heavens, through space and the sky?
Come, I will make known to you what you are seeking. Look
at the functions that I perform and read my pages!” He
looks and sees that the globe, like an ecstatic Mevlevi
dervish with its twofold motion, is tracing out around
the field of the Supreme Gathering a circle that
determines the succession of days, years, and seasons. It
is a most magnificent dominical ship, loaded with the
hundreds of thousands of different forms of food and
equipment needed for all animate beings, floating with
the utmost equilibrium in the ocean of space and circling
the sun. He then looks
at the pages of the earth and sees that each page of each
of its chapters proclaims the Sustainer of the Earth in
thousands of verses. Being unable to read the whole of
it, he looks at the page dealing with the creation and
deployment of animate beings in the spring, and observes
the following: The forms of
the countless members of hundreds of thousands of species
emerge, in the utmost precision, from a simple material
and are then nurtured in most merciful fashion. Then, in
miraculous manner, wings are given to some of the seeds;
they take to flight and are thus dispersed. They are most
effectively distributed, most carefully fed and nurtured.
Countless tasty and delicious forms of food, in the most
merciful and tender fashion, are brought forth from dry
clay, and from roots, seeds and drops of liquid that
differ little among each other. Every spring, a hundred
thousand kinds of food and equipment are loaded on it
from an unseen treasury, as if onto a railway waggon, and
are despatched in utmost orderliness to animate beings.
The sending to infants of canned milk in those food
packages, and pumps of sugared milk in the form of their
mothers’ affectionate breasts, is in particular such an
instance of solicitousness, mercy and wisdom that it
immediately establishes itself as a most tender
manifestation of the mercy and generosity of the Merciful
and Compassionate One. In
short: this living page of spring displays a
hundred thousand examples and samples of the Supreme
Gathering, and is a tangible demonstration of this verse, The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.136 So look to the
signs of God’s mercy: how He gives life to the earth
after its death, for verily He it is Who gives life to
the dead, and He has power over all things.12 Moreover, this
verse may be said to express in miraculous fashion the
meanings of the page that is spring. The traveller thus
understood that the earth proclaims through all its
pages, in fashion proportionate to their size: “There
is no god but He.”13 In expression
of the meaning beheld by the traveller through the brief
testimony of one of the twenty aspects of a single page
out of the more than twenty pages of the globe, it was
said in the Third Degree of the First Station: There is no god
but God, the Necessary Being, to Whose Necessary
Existence in Unity the earth with all that is in it and
upon it testifies, through the testimony of the sublimity
of the comprehensiveness of the truth of subjugation,
disposition, nurturing, opening, distribution of seeds,
protection, administration, the giving of life to all
animate beings, compassion and mercy universal and
general, a truth vast and perfect, and to be observed. Then that
reflective traveller read each page of the cosmos, and as
he did so his faith, that key to felicity, strengthened;
his gnosis, that key to spiritual progress, increased;
his belief in God, the source and foundation of all
perfection, developed one degree more; his joy and
pleasure augmented and aroused his eagerness; and while
listening to the perfect and convincing lessons given by
the sky, by space and the earth, he cried out for more.
Then he heard the rapturous invocation of God made by the
tumult of the seas and the great rivers, and listened to
their sad yet pleasant sounds. In numerous ways they were
saying to him: “Look at us, read also our signs!”
Looking, our traveller saw the following: The seas,
constantly and vitally surging, merging and pouring forth
with an inclination to conquest inherent in their very
nature, surrounded the earth, and together with the
earth, revolved, extremely swiftly, in a circle of
twenty-five thousand years in a single year. Yet the seas
did not disperse, did not overflow or encroach on the
land contiguous to them. They moved and stood still, and
were protected by the command and power of a most
powerful and magnificent being. Then looking
to the depths of the sea, the traveller saw that apart
from the most beautiful, well-adorned and symmetrical
jewels, there were ____________________ 12. Qur’an, 30:50. The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.137 thousands of
different kinds of animal, sustained and ordered, brought
to life and caused to die, in so disciplined a fashion,
their provision coming from mere sand and salt water,
that it established irresistibly the existence of a
Powerful and Glorious, a Merciful and Beauteous Being
administering and giving life to them. The traveller
then looks at the rivers and sees that the benefits
inherent in them, the functions they perform, and their
continual replenishment, are inspired by such wisdom and
mercy as indisputably to prove that all rivers, springs,
streams and great waterways flow forth from the treasury
of mercy of the Compassionate One, the Lord of Glory and
Generosity. They are preserved and dispensed, indeed, in
so extraordinary a fashion that it is said “Four rivers
flow forth from For example,
the blessed The traveller
saw, then, a thousandth part of the truths and
affirmations contained in the oceans and rivers. The seas
proclaim unanimously with a power proportionate to their
extent, “There is no god but He,” and produce
as witnesses to their testimony all the creatures that
inhabit them. This, our traveller preceived. Expressing and
conveying the testimony of the seas and the rivers, we
said, in the Fourth Degree of the First Station: There is no god
but God, the Necessary Existent, to the necessity of
Whose Existence in Unity point all the seas and the
rivers, together with all they contain, by the testimony
of the sublimity of the comprehensiveness of the truth of
subjugation, preservation, storing up, and
administration, vast and well-ordered, and to be
observed. ____________________ 14. See, Muslim,
Janna, 26. (The rivers, Sayhan, Jayhan, The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.138 Then the
traveller is summoned, on his meditative journey, by the
mountains and the plains. “Read too our pages,” they
say. Looking he sees that the universal function and duty
of mountains is of such grandeur and wisdom as to stupefy
the intelligence. The mountains emerge from the earth by
the command of their Sustainer, thereby palliating the
turmoil, anger, and rancour that arise from disturbances
within the earth. As the mountains surge upward, the
earth begins to breathe; it is delivered from harmful
tremors and upheavals, and its tranquillity as it pursues
its duty of rotation is no longer disturbed. In the same
way that masts are planted in ships to protect them from
turbulence and preserve their balance, so too mountains
are set up on the deck of the ship that is the earth, as
masts and stores, as is indicated by verses of the
Qur’an of Miraculous Exposition such as these: And the mountains
as pegs,15And We have cast down anchors,16And
the mountains He anchored them.17 Then,
too, there are stored up and preserved in the mountains
all kinds of springs, waters, minerals and other
materials needed by animate beings, in so wise, skilful,
generous and foreseeing a fashion that they prove that
they are the storehouses and warehouses and servants of
One possessing infinite power, One possessing infinite
wisdom. Deducing from these two examples the other duties
and instances of wisdom -as great as mountains- of the
mountains and plains, the traveller sees through the
general instances of wisdom in them and particularly in
regard to the fashion in which all manner of things are
stored up in them providentially, the testimony they give
and the Divine unity they proclaim declaring “There
is no god but He,” -a declaration as powerful and
firm as the mountains and vast and expansive as the
plains- and he too says, “I believe in God.” In expression
of this meaning, it was said in the Fifth Degree of the
First Station: There is no god
but God, to the Necessity of Whose Existence point all
the mountains and plains together with what is in them
and upon them, by the testimony of the sublimity of the
comprehensiveness of the truth of the storing up,
administration, dissemination of seed, preservation, and
regulation, a truth providential, dominical, vast,
general, well-ordered, and perfect, and to be observed. ____________________ 15. Qur’an, 78:7.
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.139 Then, while
that traveller was travelling in his mind through the
mountains and plains, the gate to the arboreal and
vegetable realm was opened before him. He was summoned
inside: “Come,” they said, “Inspect our realm and
read our incriptions.” Entering, he saw that a splendid
and well-adorned assembly for the proclamation of God’s
unity and a circle for the mentioning of His Names and
the offering of thanks to Him, had been drawn up. He
understood for the very appearance of all trees and
plants that their different species were proclaiming
unanimously, “There is no god but He.” For he
perceived three great and general truths indicating and
proving that all fruit-giving trees and plants with the
tongue of their symmetrical and eloquent leaves, the
phrases of their charming and loquacious flowers, the
words of their well-ordered and well-spoken fruits, were
testifying to God’s glory and bearing witness that “There
is no god but He.” The
First: In the same way that in each of the plants
and trees a deliberate bounty and generosity is to be
seen in most obvious fashion, and a purposive liberality
and munificence, so too it is to be seen in the totality
of the trees and plants, with the brilliance of sunlight. The
Second: The wise and purposive distinction and
differentiation, one that cannot in any way be attributed
to chance, the deliberate and merciful adornment and
giving of form - all this is to be seen as clearly as
daylight in the infinite varieties and species; they show
themselves to be the works and embroideries of an
All-Wise Maker. The
Third: The opening and unfolding of all the
separate members of the hundred thousand species of that
infinite realm, each in its own distinct fashion and
shape, in the utmost order, equilibrium and beauty, from
well-defined, limited, simple and solid seeds and grains,
identical to each other or nearly so - their emerging
from those seeds in distinct and separate form, with
utter equilibrium, vitality and wise purpose without the
least error or mistake, is a truth more brilliant than
the sun. The witnesses proving this truth are as numerous
as the flowers, fruits and leaves that emerge in the
spring. So the traveller said, “Praise be to God for
the blessing of belief.” In expression
of these truths and the testimony given to them, we said
in the Sixth Degree of the First Station: There is no god
but God, to the Necessity of Whose Existence in Unity
points the consensus of all the species of trees and
plants that are engaged in glorifying God and speak with
the eloquent and well-ordered words of their leaves,
their loquacious and comely flowers, their well-ordered
and well-spoken fruits, by the testimony of the
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.140 sublimity of the
comprehensiveness of the truth of bestowal, bounty, and
generosity, done in purposive mercy, and the truth of
differentiation, adornment, and decoration, done with
will and wisdom. Definite, too, is the indication given
by the truth of the opening of all their symmetrical,
adorned, distinct, variegated and infinite forms, from
seeds and grains that resemble and approximate each
other, that are finite and limited. As this
traveller through the cosmos proceeded on his meditative
journey, with increased eagerness and a bouquet of gnosis
and faith, itself like a spring, gathered from the garden
of the spring, there opened before his truth-perceiving
intellect, his cognitive reason, the gate to the animal
and bird realm. With hundreds of thousands of different
voices and various tongues, he was invited to enter.
Entering, he saw that all the animals and birds, in their
different species, groups and nations, were proclaiming,
silently and aloud, “There is no god but He,”
and had thus turned the face of the earth into a vast
place of invocation, an expansive assembly for the
proclamation of God’s glory. He saw each of them to be
like an ode dedicated to God, a word proclaiming His
glory, a letter indicating His mercy, each of them
describing the Maker and offering Him thanks and
encomium. It was as if the senses, powers, members and
instruments of those animals and birds were orderly and
balanced words, or perfect and disciplined expressions.
He observed three great and comprehensive truths
indicating, in decisive form, their offering of thanks to
the Creator and Provider and their testimony to His
unity. The
First: Their being brought into existence with
wisdom and purpose and their creation full of art in a
fashion that in no way can be attributed to chance, to
blind force or inanimate nature; their being created and
composed in purposive and knowledgeable manner; their
animation and being given life in a way that displays in
twenty aspects the manifestation of knowledge, wisdom,
and will - all of this is a truth that bears witness to
the Necessary Existence of the Eternally Living and
Self-Subsistent, His seven attributes and unity, a
witness repeated to the number of all animate beings. The
Second: There appears from the distinction made
among those infinite beings and from their adornment and
decoration in a fashion by which their features are
different, their shapes adorned, their proportions
measured and symmetrical, and their forms well-ordered -
there appears from this a truth so vast and powerful that
none other than the One Powerful over all things, the One
Knowledgeable of all things, could lay claim to it, this
comprehensive act which displays in every respect thou
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.141 sands of wonders and
instances of wisdom; it is impossible and precluded that
anything other than such a one could lay claim to it. The
Third: The emergence and unfolding of those
countless creatures, in their hundreds of thousands of
different shapes and forms, each of which is a miracle of
wisdom, their emergence from eggs and drops of water
called sperm that are identical with each other or
closely resemble each other, and are limited and finite
in number, all this in the most orderly, symmetrical and
unfailing fashion, is so brilliant a truth as to be
illumined with proofs and evidences as numerous as the
animals themselves. By the
consensus of these three truths, all the species of
animals are engaged together in testifying that “There
is no god but He.” It is as if the whole earth,
like a great man, were saying “There is no god but
He” in a manner befitting its vastness, and
conveying its testimony to the dwellers of the heaven.
The traveller saw this and understood it perfectly. In
expression of these truths, we said in the Seventh Degree
of the First Station: There is no god
but God, to Whose Necessary Existence in Unity points the
consensus of all animals and birds, that praise God and
bear witness to Him with the words of their senses, their
faculties and powers, words well-balanced, ordered and
eloquent; with the words of their limbs and members,
words perfect and persuasive; by the testimony of the
sublimity of the comprehensiveness of the truth of
bringing into being, making, and creating, according to
will, the truth of distinction and decoration according
to purpose, and the truth of proportioning and forming
according to wisdom. Definite too is the indication given
by the truth of the opening of all of their orderly,
distinct, variegated and infinite forms, out of identical
or similar eggs and drops of sperm, that are finite and
limited. That
meditative voyager, in order to advance farther in the
infinite degrees and countless luminous stages of
knowledge of God, then wished to enter the world of men,
the realm of humanity. Humanity, headed by the prophets,
invited him, and he accepted the invitation. Looking
first at the stopping-place of the past, he saw that all
of the prophets (Peace and blessings be upon him), the
most luminous and perfect of human kind, were reciting in
chorus, “No god but He,” and making
remembrance of God. With the power of their brilliant,
well-attested and innumerable miracles, they were
proclaiming God’s unity, and in order to advance man
from the animal state to angelic degree, they were
instructing men and summoning them to belief in God.
Kneeling down in that school of light, he too paid heed
to the lesson. The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.142 He saw that in
the hand of each of those teachers, the most exalted and
renowned of all celebrated human beings, there were
numerous miracles, bestowed on them by the Creator of All
Being as a sign confirming their mission. Further, a
large group of men, a whole community, had confirmed
their claims and come to belief at their hands; a truth
assented to and confirmed by these hundreds of thousands
of serious and veracious individuals, unanimously and in
full agreement, was bound to be firm and definitive. He
understood, too, that the people of misguidance, in
denying a truth attested and affirmed by so many
veracious witnesses, were committing a most grievous
error, indeed crime, and were therefore deserving of a
most grievous punishment. He recognized, by contrast,
those who assented to the truth and believed in it, as
being the most true and righteous, and a further degree
of the sanctity of belief became apparent to him. Yes, the
infinite miracles bestowed by God on the prophets (Peace
be upon them) each one being like a confirmation of their
mission; the heavenly blows dealt to their opponents,
each being like a proof of their truthfulness; their
individual perfections, each one being like an indication
of their righteousness; their veracious teachings; the
strength of their faith, a witness to their honesty;
their supreme seriousness and readiness to
self-sacrifice; the sacred books and pages held by their
hands; their countless pupils who through following their
paths attain truth, perfection and light, thus proving
again the truthfulness of the teachings; the unanimous
agreement of the prophets -those most earnest warners-
and their followers in all positive matters; their
concord, mutual support and affinity - all of this
constitutes so powerful a proof that no power on earth
can confront it, and no doubt or hesitation can survive
it. Our traveller
understood further that inclusion of belief in all the
prophets (Peace be upon them) among the pillars of
belief, represents another great source of strength. Thus
he derived great benefit of faith from their lessons, in
expression of which we said in the Eighth Degree of the
First Station: There is no god
but God, to the Necessity of Whose Existence in Unity
points the unanimity of all the prophets, through the
power of their luminous miracles, that both affirm and
are affirmed. That questing
traveller, having derived a lofty taste of truth from the
power of belief, found himself invited, while coming from
the assembly of the prophets (Peace be upon them) to the
classroom of those profound, original, exacting scholars
who affirm the claims of the prophets (Peace be upon
them) with the most decisive and powerful proofs and who
are known as the purified and most veracious ones.
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.143 Entering their
classroom, he saw thousands of geniuses and hundreds of
thousands of exact and exalted scholars proving all the
affirmative matters connected with faith, headed by the
necessity of God’s existence and His unity, with such
profound demonstrations as to leave not the least room
for doubt. Indeed, the fact that they are agreed in the
principles and pillars of belief, despite their
differences in capacity and outlook, and that each of
them relies on a firm and certitudinous proof, is in
itself such evidence that it can be doubted only if it is
possible for a similar number of intelligent and
perspicuous men to arrive at a single result. Otherwise
the only way for the denier to oppose them is to display
his ignorance -his utter ignorance- and his obstinacy
with respect to negative matters that admit neither of
denial nor affirmation. He will in effect be closing his
eyes but the one who closes his eyes is able to turn day
into night only for himself. The traveller
learned that the lights emitted in this vast and
magnificent classroom by these respected and profound
scholars had been illumining half of the globe for more
than a thousand years. He found in it moral and spiritual
force that the combined strength of all the people of
denial would be unable to shake or destroy. In brief
allusion to the lesson learned by the traveller in this
classroom we said in the Ninth Degree of the First
Station: There is no god
but God, to Whose Necessary Existence in Unity points the
agreement of all of the purified scholars, with the power
of their resplendent, certain and unanimous proofs. Our
contemplative traveller came forth from the classroom,
ardently desiring to see the lights that are to be
observed in the continuous strengthening and development
of faith, and in advancing from the degree of the
knowledge of certainty to that of the vision of
certainty. He then found himself summoned by thousands or
millions of spiritual guides who were striving toward the
truth and attaining the vision of certainty in the shade
of the highway of Muhammad (PBUH) and the ascension of
Muhammad (PBUH). This they were doing in a meeting-place,
a hospice, a place of remembrance and preceptorship, that
was abundantly luminous and vast as a plain, being formed
from the merging of countless small hospices and
convents. Upon entering, he found that those spiritual
guides -people of unveiling and wondrous deeds- were
unanimously proclaiming, “No god but He,” on
the basis of their witnessing and unveiling of the Unseen
and the wondrous deeds they had been enabled to perform;
they were proclaiming the necessary existence and unity
of God. The traveller observed how manifest and clear
must be a truth to which unanimously subscribe these
sacred geniuses and luminous
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.144 gnostics. For, like
the sun is known through the seven colours in its light,
the saints’ luminous colours, their light-filled hues,
their true paths and right ways and veracious courses are
manifested from the light of the Pre-Eternal Sun through
seventy colours, indeed, through colours to the number of
the Divine Names, and are all different. He saw that the
unanimity of the prophets and the agreement of the
purified scholars and accord of the saints forms a
supreme consensus, more brilliant than the daylight that
demonstrates the existence of the sun. In brief
allusion to the benefit derived by our traveller from the
Sufi hospice, we said in the Tenth Degree of the First
Station: There is no god
but God, to Whose Necessary Existence in Unity points the
unanimity of the saints in their manifest, well-affirmed
and attested divinations of the truth and wondrous deeds. Now our
traveller through the world, aware that the most
important and greatest of all human perfections, indeed
the very source and origin of all such perfections, is
the love of God that arises from belief in God and the
knowledge of God, wished with all of his powers, outer
and inner, to advance still farther in the strengthening
of his faith and the development of his knowledge. He
therefore raised his head and gazing at the heavens said
to himself: “The most
precious thing in the universe is life; all things are
made subordinate to life. The most precious of all living
beings is the animate, and the most precious of the
animate is the conscious. Each century and each year, the
globe is engaged in emptying and refilling itself, in
order to augment this most precious substance. It
follows, then, without doubt, that the magnificent and
ornate heavens must have appropriate people and
inhabitants, possessing life, spirit and consciousness,
for events relating to seeing and speaking with the
angels -such as the appearance of Gabriel (Peace be upon
him) in the presence of Muhammad (Peace and blessings be
upon him) and in the view of the Companions- have been
transmitted and related from the most ancient times.
Would, then, that I could converse with the inhabitants
of the heavens, and learn their thoughts on this matter.
For their words concerning the Creator of the cosmos are
the most important.” As he was thus
thinking to himself, he suddenly heard a heavenly voice:
“If you wish to meet us and hearken to our lesson, then
know that before all others we have believed in the
articles of faith brought by means of us to the prophets,
headed by the Prophet Muhammad (Peace and blessings be
upon him), who brought the Qur’an of Miraculous
Exposition.
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.145 “Then too
all of the pure spirits from among us that have appeared
before men have, unanimously and without exception, born
witness to the necessary existence, the unity, and the
sacred attributes of the Creator of this cosmos, and
proclaimed this with one accord. The affinity and mutual
correspondence of these countless proclamations is a
guide for you as bright as the sun.” Thus the
traveller’s light of faith shone, and rose from the
earth to the heavens. In brief
allusion to the lesson learned by the traveller from the
angels, we said in the Eleventh Degree of the First
Station: There is no god
but God, to Whose Necessary Existence in Unity points the
unanimity of the angels that appear to human gaze, and
who speak to the elect among men, with their mutually
corresponding and conforming messages. Then, that
ardent and inquisitive traveller, having learned from the
tongues of various realms of creation in the Manifest
Realm in their material and corporeal aspects, and from
the utterance of their modes of being, desired to study
and journey through the World of the Unseen and the
Intermediate Realm, and thus to investigate reality.
There opened to him the gate of upright and luminous
intellects, of sound and illumined hearts, that are like
the seed of man, who is the fruit of the universe, and
despite their slight girth can expand virtually to
embrace the whole of the cosmos. He looked and
saw a series of human isthmuses linking the realm of the
Unseen with that of the Manifest, and the contacts
between those two realms and the interchanges between
them insofar as they affect man, taking place at those
points. Addressing his intellect and his heart he said: “Come, the
path leading to truth from these counterparts of yours is
shorter. We should benefit by studying their qualities,
natures and colours concerning faith that we find here,
not by listening to the lessons given by the tongues of
disposition as was previously the case.” Beginning his
study, he saw that the belief and firm conviction
concerning the Divine unity that all luminous intellects
possessed, despite their varying capacities and
differing, even opposing, methods and outlooks, was the
same, and that their steadfast and confident certainty
and assurance was one. They had, therefore, to be relying
on a single, unchanging truth; their roots were sunk in a
profound truth and could not be plucked out. Their
unanimity concerning faith, the necessary existence and
unity of God, was an unbreakable and luminous chain, a
brightly lit window opening onto the world of the truth. He saw also
that the unanimous, assured and sublime unveilings and
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.146 witnessings of the
pillars of belief enjoyed by all those sound and luminous
intellects, whose methods were various and outlooks
divergent, corresponded to and agreed with each other on
the matter of the Divine unity. All those luminous
hearts, turned and joined to the truth and manifesting
it, each a small throne of dominical knowledge, a
comprehensive mirror of God’s Eternal Besoughtedness,
were like so many windows opened onto the Sun of the
Truth. Taken together, they were like a supreme mirror,
like an ocean reflecting the sun. Their agreement and
unanimity concerning the necessary existence and unity of
God was an unfailing and reliable most perfect guide,
most elevated preceptor. For it is in no way possible or
conceivable that a supposition other than the truth, an
untrue thought, a false attribute, should so consistently
and decisively be able to deceive simultaneously so many
sharp eyes, or to induce illusion in them. Not even the
foolish Sophists, who deny the cosmos, would agree with
the corrupt and dissipated intellect that held such a
thing possible. All of this our traveller understood, and
he said, together with his own intellect and heart, “I
have believed in God.” In brief
allusion to the benefit derived from upright intellects
and luminous hearts by our traveller, for knowledge of
belief, we said in the Twelfth and Thirteenth Degrees of
the First Station: There is no god
but God, to Whose Necessary Existence in Unity points the
consensus of all upright intellects, illumined with
congruent beliefs and corresponding convictions and
certainties, despite differences in capacity and outlook.
There also points to His Necessary Existence in Unity the
agreement of all sound, luminous hearts, with their
mutually corresponding unveilings and their congruent
witnessings, despite differences in method and manner. Then that
traveller looking closely at the World of the Unseen, and
voyaging in it with his intellect and his heart, knocked
inquisitively on the door of that world, thinking to
himself, “What does this world have to say?” The
following occurred to him: it is to be clearly understood
that behind the veil of the Unseen is one who wants to
make himself known through all these numerous finely
adorned artefacts full of art in this corporeal Manifest
World, and to make himself loved through these infinite
sweet and decorated bounties, and to make known his
hidden perfections through these innumerable miraculous
and skilful works of art, and who does this by act rather
than speech and by making himself known by the tongue of
disposition. Since this is so, of a certainty he will
speak and make himself known and loved through speech and
utterance just as he does through deed and state. In
which case, from his manifestations we must know him in
respect to the World of the Unseen. Whereupon he The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.147 entered that world
with his heart and saw the following with the eye of his
intellect: The truth of
revelations prevails at all instants over all parts of
the World of the Unseen, with a most powerful
manifestation. There comes with the truths of revelation
and inspiration proceeding from the One All-Knowing of
the Unseen, a testimony to His existence and unity far
stronger than testimony of the universe and created
beings. He does not leave Himself, His existence and His
unity, only to the testimony of His creatures. Rather, He
speaks with a pre-eternal Speech consonant with His own
being. The Speech of the One Who is all-present and
all-seeing everywhere with His Knowledge and Power is
also endless, and just as the meaning of His Speech makes
Him known, so does His discourse make Himself known
together with His attributes. The traveller
recognized that the truth, reality, and existence of
revelation has been made plain to the point of being
self-evident by the consensus of one hundred thousand
prophets (Peace be upon them), by the agreement among
their proclamations concerning the manifestion of Divine
revelation; by the evidences and miracles contained in
the sacred books and heavenly pages, which are the guides
and exemplars of the overwhelming majority of humanity,
confirmed and assented to by them, and are the visible
fruits of revelation. He understood further that the
truth of revelation proclaims five sacred truths. The
First: To speak in accordance with men’s
intellects and understandings, known as ‘Divine
condescension to the minds of men,’ is a form of Divine
descent. It is a requirement of God’s dominicality that
He endows all of his conscious creatures with speech,
understands their speech, and then participates in it
with His own speech. The
Second: The One Who, in order to make Himself
known, fills the cosmos with His miraculous creations and
endows them with tongues speaking of His perfections,
will necessarily make Himself known with His own words
also. The
Third: It is a function of His being Creator to
respond in words to the supplications and offerings of
thanks that are made by the most select, the most needy,
the most delicate and the most ardent among His beings -
true men. The
Fourth: The attribute of Speech, an essential
concomitant and luminous manifestation of both Knowledge
and Life, will necessarily be found in a comprehensive
and eternal form in the being Whose Knowledge is
comprehensive and Whose Life is eternal.
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.148 The Fifth:
It is a consequence of Divinity that the Being Who endows
men with impotence and desire, poverty and need, anxiety
for the future, love and worship, should communicate His
own existence, by way of His speech, to His most loved
and lovable, His most anxious and needy creatures, who
are most desirous of finding their Lord and Master. The evidences
for the existence in unity of the Necessary Existent
offered in unanimity by universal and heavenly
revelations, which contain the truths of Divine descent,
dominical self-proclamation, compassionate response,
Divine conversation, and eternal self-communication,
constitute a proof more powerful than the testimony for
the existence of the sun brought by the rays of sunlight. Our traveller
understood this then looked in the direction of
inspiration and saw that veracious inspiration indeed
resembles revelation in some respects and is a mode of
dominical speech. THE FIRST:
Revelation, which is much higher than inspiration,
generally comes by the medium of the angels, whereas
inspiration generally comes directly. So too a king
has two modes of speech and command. The first
consists of his sending to a governor a lieutenant
equipped with all the pomp of monarchy and the splendour
of sovereignty. Sometimes, in order to demonstrate the
splendour of his sovereignty and the importance of his
command, he may meet with the intermediary, and then the
decree will be issued. The second
consists of his speaking privately in his own person, not
with the title of monarch or in the name of kingship,
concerning some private matter, some petty affair, using
for this purpose a trusted servant, some ordinary
subject, or his private telephone. In the same
way the Pre-Eternal Monarch may either, in the name of
the Sustainer of All the Worlds, and with the title of
Creator of the Universe, speak with revelation or the
comprehensive inspiration that performs the function of
revelation, or He may speak in a different and private
fashion, as the Sustainer and Creator of all animate
beings, from behind the veil, in a way suited to the
recipient. THE SECOND
DIFFERENCE: Revelation is without shadow, pure, and
reserved for the elect. Inspiration, by contrast, has
shadow, colours intermingle with it, and it is general.
There are numerous different kinds of inspiration, such
as the inspiration of angels, the inspiration of men, and
the inspiration of animals; inspiration thus forms a
field for the multiplication of God’s words, that are
as numeous as the drops in the ocean. Our traveller
understood that this matter is, indeed, a kind of
commentary on
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.149 the verse, Were the sea to
become ink for the words of my Sustainer, verily the sea
would be exhausted before the words of my Sustainer.18
Then he looked at the nature, the wisdom, and the
testimony of inspiration and saw that its nature, wisdom
and result were composed of four lights. The
first: it is the result of God’s Lovingness and
Mercifulness that He makes himself loved through word,
presence and discourse, in the same way that He makes
Himself loved to His creatures through His deeds. The
second: it is a requirement of His
Compassionateness that just as He answers His servants’
prayers in deed, He should also answer them in word, from
behind veils. The
third: it is a concomitant of dominicality that
just as He responds in deed to the cries for help,
supplications, and pleadings of those of His creatures
who are afflicted with grievous misfortunes and
hardships, so too He should hasten to their help with
words of inspiration, which are like a form of speech. The
fourth: God makes His existence, presence and
protection perceptible in deed to His most weak and
indigent, His most poor and needy, conscious creatures,
that stand in great need of finding their Master,
Protector, Guardian, and Disposer. It is a necessary and
essential consequence of His Divine solicitousness and
His dominical compassion that He should also communicate
His presence and existence by speech, from behind the
veil of veracious inspiration -a mode of dominical
discourse- to individuals, in a manner peculiar to them
and their capacities, through the telephone of their
hearts. He then looked
to the testimony of inspiration and saw that if the sun,
for example, had consciousness and life, and if the seven
colours of sunlight were the seven attributes, in that
respect it would have a form of speech through the rays
and manifestations found in its light. And in this
situation both its similitudes and reflections would be
present in all transparent objects, and it would speak
with all mirrors and shining objects and fragments of
glass and bubbles and droplets of water, indeed with all
transparent particles, in accordance with the capacity of
each; it would respond to the needs of each, and all
these would testify to the sun’s existence; and no task
would form an obstacle to any other task, and no speaking
obstruct any other speaking. This is self-evident. ____________________ 18. Qur’an,18:109.
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.150 In the same
way, the Speech of the Glorious Monarch of Pre-Eternity
and Post-Eternity, the Beauteous and Exalted Creator of
All Beings, Who may be described as the Pre-Eternal Sun,
manifests itself to all things, in general and
comprehensive fashion, in a manner appropriate to their
capacity, as do also His Knowledge and Power. No request
interferes with another, no task prevents the fulfilment
of another, and no address becomes confused with another.
All of this our traveller understood as self-evident. He
knew that all of those manifestations, those discourses,
those inspirations, separately and together, evidenced
and bore witness unanimously to the presence, the
necessary existence, the unity and the oneness of that
Pre-Eternal Sun with a knowlege of certainty that
approached a vision of certainty. In brief
allusion to the lesson in knowledge of God from the World
of the Unseen gained by our inquisitive traveller, we
said in the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Degrees of the First
Station: There is no god
but God, the Necessary Existent, the One, the Single, to
Whose Necessary Existence in Unity points the consensus
of all true revelations, containing Divine descent,
glorious discourse, dominical self-revelation,
compassionate response to the invocations of men, and
eternal indications of His existence to his creatures.
There points also to His Necessary Existence in Unity the
agreement of all veracious inspirations, containing
expressions of God’s love, compassionate responses to
the prayers of God’s creatures, dominical responses to
the appeals of His servants for aid, and glorious
intimations of His existence to His creatures. Then that
traveller through the world addressed his own intellect
saying: “Since I am seeking my Master and Creator by
means of the creatures of the cosmos, I ought before all
else to visit the most celebrated of all these creatures,
the greatest and most accomplished commander among them,
according to the testimony even of his enemies, the most
renowned ruler, the most exalted in speech and the most
brilliant an intellect, who has illuminated fourteen
centuries with his excellence and with his Qur’an,
Muhammad the Arabian Prophet (May God’s peace and
blessings be upon him).” In order thus to visit him and
seek from him the answer to his quest, he entered the
blessed age of the Prophet in his mind, and saw that age
to be one of true felicity, thanks to that being. For
through the light he had brought, he had turned the most
primitive and illiterate of peoples into the masters and
teachers of the world. He said too to
his own intellect, “Before asking him concerning our
Creator, we should first learn that value of this
extraordinary being, the The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.151 veracity of his words
and the truthfulness of his warnings.” Thus he began
investigating, and of the numerous conclusive proofs that
he found we will briefly indicate here only nine of the
most general ones. THE FIRST:
All excellent qualities and characteristics were to be
found in that extraordinary being, according to the
testimony even of his enemies. Hundreds of miracles were
made manifest at his hands, according to explicit
Qur’anic verses or traditions enjoying the status of tawatur.19
Examples of these miracles are his splitting of the moon,
And the moon split,20 with a single
indication of his finger; his casting of a handful of
dust into the eyes of his enemies, causing them to flee, It
was not your act when you threw, but God’s,21
and his giving his thirsting army to drink from the water
that flowed forth from his five fingers like the Spring
of Kawthar. Since some of those miracles, numbering more
than three hundred, have been set forth with decisive
proofs in the remarkable and wondrous work known as The
Miracles of Muhammad (The Nineteenth Letter), we leave
discussion of the miracles to that work, and permit the
traveller to continue speaking: “A being who
in addition to noble characteristics and perfections has
all these luminous miracles to demonstrate, must
certainly be the most truthful in speech of all men. It
is inconceivable that he would stoop to trickery, lies
and error, the deeds of the vile.” THE SECOND:
He holds in his hand a decree from the lord of the
universe, a decree accepted and affirmed in each century
by more than three hundred million people. This decree,
the Qur’an of Mighty Stature, is wondrous in seven
different ways. The fact that the Qur’an has forty
different aspects of miraculousnes and that it is the
word of the Creator of all beings has been set forth in
detail with strong proofs in the Twenty-Fifth Word, The
Miraculousness of the Qur’an, a celebrated treatise
that is like the sun of the Risale-i Nur. We therefore
leave such matters to that work and listen to the
traveller as he says,“There can never be any
possibility of lying on the part of the being who is the
conveyor and proclaimer of this decree, for that would be
a violation of the decree and treachery toward the One
Who issued it.” THE THIRD:
Such a Sacred Law, an Islam, a code of worship, a cause,
a summons, and a faith did that being bring forth that
the like of them does not exist, nor could it exist. Nor
does a more perfect form of them ____________________ 19. Tawatur is
the kind of report transmitted by numerous authorities,
about which there is no room for doubt. [Tr.]
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.152 exist, nor could it
exist. For the Law appearing with that unlettered being
has no rival in its administration of one fifth of
humanity for fourteen centuries, in a just and precise
manner through its numerous injuctions. Moreover the
Islam that emerged from the deeds, sayings, and inward
states of that unlettered being has no peer, nor can it
have, for in each century it has been for three hundred
million men a guide and a refuge, the teacher and
educator of their intellects and the illuminator and
purifier of their hearts, the cause for the refinement
and training of their souls, and the source of progress
and advancement of their spirits. The Prophet is
similarly unparalleled in the way in which he was the
foremost in practising all the forms of worship found in
his religion, and the first in piety and the fear of God;
in his observing the duties of worship fully and with
attention to their profoundest dimensions, even while
engaged in constant struggle and activity; in his
practice of worship combining in perfect fashion the
beginning and end of worship and servitude to God without
imitation of anyone. With the Jawshan
al-Kabir, from among his thousands of supplicatory
prayers and invocations, he describes his Sustainer with
such a degree of gnosis that all the gnostics and saints
who have come after him have been unable, with their
joint efforts, to attain a similar degree of gnosis and
accurate description. This shows that in prayer too he is
without peer. Whoever looks at the section at the
beginning of the Treatise On Supplicatory Prayer which
sets forth some part of the meaning of one of the
ninety-nine sections of the Jawshan al-Kabir will
say that the Jawshan too has no peer. In his
conveying of the message and his summoning men to the
truth, he displayed such steadfastness, firmness and
courage that although great states and religions, and
even his own people, tribe and uncle opposed him in the
most hostile fashion, he exhibited not the slightest
trace of hesitation anxiety or fear. The fact that he
successfully challenged the whole world and made Islam
the master of the world likewise proves that there is not
and cannot be anyone like him in his conveying of the
message and summons. In his faith,
he had so extraordinary a strength, so marvellous a
certainty, so miraculous a breadth, and so exalted a
conviction, illumining the whole world, that none of the
ideas and beliefs then dominating the world, and none of
the philosophies of the sages and teachings of the
religious leaders, was able, despite extreme hostility
and denial, to induce in his certainty, conviction, trust
and assurance, the slightest doubt, hesitation, weakness
or anxiety. Moreover, the saintly of all ages, headed by
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.153 the Companions, the
foremost in the degrees of belief, have all drawn on his
fountain of belief and regarded him as representing the
highest degree of faith. This proves that his faith too
is matchless. Our traveller therefore concluded, and
affirmed with his intellect, that lying and duplicity
have no place in the one who has brought such a unique
sacred law, such an unparalleled Islam, such a wondrous
devotion to worship, such an extra-ordinary excellence in
supplicatory prayer, such a universally acclaimed summons
to the truth and such a miraculous faith. THE FOURTH:
In the same way that the consensus of the prophets is a
strong proof for the existence and unity of God, so too
it is a firm testimony to the truthfulness and
messengerhood of this being. For all the sacred
attributes, miracles and functions that indicate the
truthfulness and messengerhood of the prophets (Peace be
upon them) existed in full measure in that being
according to the testimony of history. The prophets have
verbally predicted the coming of that being and given
good tidings thereof in the Torah, the Gospels, the
Psalms, and the pages; more than twenty of the most
conclusive examples of these glad tidings, drawn from the
scriptures, have been set forth and proven in the
Nineteenth Letter. Similarly, through all the deeds and
miracles associated with their prophethood they have
affirmed and, as it were, put their signature to the
mission of that being which is the foremost and most
perfect in the tasks and functions of prophethood. Just
as through verbal consensus they indicate the Divine
unity, through the unanimity of their deeds they bear
witness to the truthfulness of that being. This too was
understood by our traveller. THE FIFTH:
Similarly, the thousands of saints who have attained
truth, reality, perfection, wondrous deeds, unveiling and
witnessing through the instruction of this being and
following him, bear unanimous witness not only to the
Divine unity but also to the truthfulness and
messengerhood of this being. Again, the fact that they
witness, through the light of sainthood, some of the
truths he proclaimed concerning the World of the Unseen,
and that they believe in and affirm all of those truths
through the light of belief, either with knowledge of
certainty, or with the vision of certainty, or with
absolute certainty. He saw that this too demonstates like
the sun the degree of truthfulness and rectitude of that
great being, their master. THE SIXTH:
The millions of purified, sincere, and punctilious
scholars and faithful sages, who have reached the highest
station of learning through the teaching and instruction
contained in the sacred truths brought by that being,
despite his unlettered nature, the exalted sciences he
invented and Divine knowledge he discovered - they not
only prove
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.154 and affirm,
unanimously and with the strongest proofs, the Divine
unity which is the foundation of his mission, but also
bear unanimous witness to the truthfulness of this
supreme teacher and great master, and to the veracity of
his words. This is a proof as clear as daylight. The
Risale-i Nur too with its one hundred parts is but a
single proof of his truthfulness. THE
SEVENTH: The Family and Companions of the Prophet
-who with their insight, knowledge, and spiritual
accomplishment are the most renowned, the most respected,
the most celebrated, the most pious and the most
keensighted of men after the prophets- examined and
scrutinized, with the utmost attention, seriousness and
exactitude, all the states, thoughts and conditions of
this being, whether hidden or open. They came to the
unanimous conclusion that he was the most truthful,
exalted, and honest being in the world, and this, their
unshakeable affirmation and firm belief, is a proof like
the daylight attesting the reality of the sun. THE EIGHTH:
The cosmos indicates its Maker, Inscriber, and Designer,
Who creates, administers, and arranges it, and through
determining its measure and form and regulating it, has
disposal over it as though it was a palace, a book, an
exhibition, a spectacle. And so too it indicates that it
requires and necessitates an elevated herald, a truthful
unveiler, a learned master, and a truthful teacher who
will know and make known the Divine purposes in the
universe’s creation, teach the dominical instances of
wisdom in its changes and transformations, give
instruction in the results of its dutiful motions,
proclaim its essential value and the perfections of the
beings within it, and express the meanings of that mighty
book; it indicates that he is certain to exist. Thus, the
traveller knew that it testified to the truthfulness of
this being, who performed these functions better than
anyone, and to his being a most elevated and loyal
official of the universe’s Creator. THE NINTH:
There is behind the veil One Who wishes to demonstrate
with these ingenious and wise artefacts the perfection of
His talent and art; to make Himself known and loved by
means of these countless adorned and decorated creations;
to evoke praise and thanks through the unnumbered
pleasurable and valuable bounties that he bestows; to
cause men to worship Him with gratitude and appreciation
in the face of His dominicality, through His solicitous
and protective sustenance of life, and His provision of
nurture and bounty in such manner as to satisfy the most
delicate of tastes and appetites; to manifest His
Divinity through the change of seasons, the alternation
of night and day, and through all His magnificent and
majestic deeds, all His awe-inspiring and wise acts and
creativity, and thereby to cause men to believe in his
Divinity, in submission, humility and obedience; and to
demonstrate His justice and truthful-
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.155 ness by at all times
protecting virtue and the virtuous and destroying evil
and the evil, by annihilating with blows from heaven the
oppressor and the liar. There will of a certainty be at
the side of this Unseen Being His most beloved creature
and most devoted bondsman, who, serving the purposes that
have just been mentioned, discovers and unravels the
talisman and riddle of the creation of the universe, who
acts always in the name of that Creator, who seeks aid
and success from Him, and who receives them from Him -
Muhammad of Quraysh (Peace and blessings be upon him!) The traveller
further said, addressing his own intellect: “Since
these nine truths bear witness to the truthfulness of
this being, he must be the source of glory of mankind and
the source of honour for the world. If we therefore call
him the Pride of the World and Glory of the Sons of Adam,
it will be fitting. The fact that the awesome sovereignty
of that decree of the Compassionate One, the Qur’an of
Miraculous Exposition that he holds in his hand, has
conquered half the world, together with his individual
perfections and exalted virtues, shows that he is the
most important personage in the world. The most important
word concerning our Creator is that which he utters.” Now see: the
foundation of the summons of this extraordinary being and
the aim of all his life, based on the strength furnished
by his hundreds of decisive and evident and manifest
miracles, and the thousands of exalted, fundamental
truths contained in his religion, was to prove and bear
witness to the existence of the Necessary Existent, His
Unity, attributes and Names, to affirm, proclaim and
announce Him. He is therefore like a sun in the cosmos,
the most brilliant proof of our Creator, this being whom
we call the Beloved of God. There are three forms of
great and infallible consensus each of which affirms,
confirms, and puts its signature to the witness he bears. The First:
the unanimous affirmation made by that luminous assembly
known and celebrated throughout the world as the Family
of Muhammad (Peace and blessings be upon him) including
thousands of poles and supreme saints of penetrating gaze
and ability to perceive the Unseen, such as Imam ‘Ali
(May God be pleased with him), who said, “Were the veil
to be lifted, my certainty would not increase,” and
‘Abd al-Qadir al-Gilani, the Ghawth al-A‘zam (May his
mystery be sanctified), who saw the Supreme Throne and
the awesome form of Israfil while yet on the earth. The Second:
the confirmation made with a strong faith that permitted
men to sacrifice their lives and their property, their
fathers and tribes, by the renowned assembly known as the
Companions, who found themselves among a primitive people
and in an unlettered environment, devoid
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.156 of all social life
and political thought, without any scripture and lost in
the darkness of a period between prophets; and who in a
very brief time came to be the masters, guides, and just
rulers of the most civilized and politically and socially
advanced peoples and states, and to rule the world from
east to west in universally approved fashion. The Third:
the confirmation provided with unanimous and certain
knowledge by that lofty group of punctilious and profound
scholars of whom in each age thousands spring forth, who
advance in wondrous fashion in every science and work in
different fields. Thus, the
testimony brought by this being to the Divine unity is
not particular and individual, but general and universal
and unshakeable. If all the demons that exist were to
unite, they could not challenge it. Such was the
conclusion reached by the traveller. In reference
to the lesson learned in the There is no god
but God, the Necessary Existent, the One, the Unique, the
Necessity of Whose Existence in Unity is indicated by the
Pride of the World and the Glory of the Sons of Adam,
through the majesty of the sovereignty of his Qur’an,
the splendour of the expanse of his religion, the
multiplicity of his perfections, and the exaltedness of
his characterisitics, as confirmed even by the testimony
of his enemies. He bears witness and brings proof through
the strength of his hundreds of manifest and evident
miracles, that both testify to truth and are themselves
the object of true testimony; and through the strength of
the thousands of luminous and conclusive truths contained
in his religion, according to the consensus of all the
possessors of light, the agreement of his illumined
Companions, and the unanimity of the scholars of his
community, the possessors of proofs and luminous insight. The tireless
and insatiable traveller, who knew the aim of life in
this world and the essence of life to be faith, addressed
his own heart and said: “Let us examine the book known
as the Qur’an of Miraculous Exposition, which is said
to be the word and utterance of the Being Whom we are
seeking, the most famous, the most brilliant and wisest
book in the world, that issues a challenge in every age
to whoever refuses to submit to it. Let us see what it
says. But first, we must establish that this book is from
our Creator,” and he began to search. Since the
traveller lived in the present age, he looked first at
the Risale-i Nur, flashes from the miraculousness of the
Qur’an; he saw its
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.157 one hundred and
thirty parts to consist of luminous points drawn from
that Book of Discernment, or well-founded explanations of
its contents. Even though the Risale-i Nur is valiantly
struggling to diffuse the truths of the Qur’an in all
directions, in this obstinate and atheistic age, no one
can defeat it, which proves that its master, its source,
its authority and its sun, is the Qur’an, heavenly not
human speech. Among the hundreds of proofs in the
different parts of the Risale-i Nur, the single proof
contained in the Twenty-Fifth Word and the end of the
Nineteenth Letter, establishes forty aspects of the
Qur’an’s miraculousness in such a way that whoever
sees it, far from uttering any criticism or objection,
admires its arguments, and utters appreciative praise.
The traveller left it to the Risale-i Nur to prove that
the Qur’an is miraculous and the true Word of God,
turning only to a brief indication of a few points
showing its greatness. F i r s
t P o i n t : Just as the Qur’an, with all its
miracles and truths indicating its veracity is a miracle
of Muhammad (Peace and blessings be upon him) so too,
Muhammad (Peace and blessings be upon him) with all his
miracles, proofs of prophethood and perfections of
knowledge, is a miracle of the Qur’an and a decisive
proof of the Qur’an’s being the Word of God. S e c o
n d P o i n t : The Qur’an, in this world,
brought about in so luminous, felicitous and truthful a
fashion, a revolution in the social life of man, as well
as in the souls, hearts, spirits, and intellects of men,
in their individual, social, and political lives, and
having caused this revolution perpetuated it in such a
fashion, that for fourteen centuries at every moment its
six thousand, six hundred and sixty-six verses have been
read by the tongues of more than a hundred million men,
training them, refining their souls and purifying their
hearts. To spirits, it has been a means of development
and advancement; to intellects, an orientation and light;
to life, it has been life itself and felicity. Such a
book is of a certainty unparalleled; it is a wonder, a
marvel, and a miracle. T h i r
d P o i n t : The Qur’an, from that age down to
the present, has demonstrated such eloquence that it
caused the value attached to the odes known as “Seven
Hanging Poems” that were written in gold on the walls
of the Ka‘ba to descend to such a point that the
daughter of Labid, when taking down her father’s poem
from the Ka‘ba, said, “Compared with the verses of
the Qur’an, this no longer has any value.” A bedouin poet
heard this verse being recited, Therefore expound
openly what you are commanded,22 ____________________ 22. Qur’an, 15:94.
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.158 and immediately
prostrated. They asked him: “Have you become a
Muslim?” “No,” he replied, “I was prostrating
before the eloquence of this verse.” Thousands of
scholars and litterateurs, like geniuses of the science
of rhetoric such as ‘Abd al-Qahir Jurjani, Sakkaki, and
Zamakhshari, have unanimously decided that the eloquence
of the Qur’an is beyond human capacity and is
unattainable. The Qur’an
has also from that time forward invited to the field of
combat all arrogant and egoistic litterateurs and
rhetoricians, and said to them in a manner calculated to
break their arrogance: “Come, produce a single sura
like it, or else accept perdition and humiliation in this
world and the hereafter.” Despite this challenge, the
obstinate rhetoricians of that age abandoned the short
path of producing a single sura like the Qur’an, and
instead chose the long path of casting their persons and
property into danger. This proves that the short path
cannot be taken. Millions of
Arabic books are in circulation, some written by friends
of the Qur’an in order to resemble and imitate it,
others written by its enemies in order to confront and
criticize it. Not one of them has been able to attain the
level of the Qur’an. Should a common man even listen to
them, he is sure to say: “The Qur’an does not
resemble these other books, nor is it in the same class
as they. It must be either below them or above them.”
No one -no unbeliever or fool- in the world can say that
it is below them. Hence its degree of eloquence is above
all of them. Once a man read the verse, All that is in the
heavens and the earth extols and glorifies God.23He
said: “I cannot see any miraculous eloquence in this
verse.” He was told: “Go back to that age like the
traveller, and listen to the verse as recited there.”
Imagining himself to be there before the revelation of
the Qur’an, he saw that all the beings in the world
were living in an unstable, transient world in empty,
infinite and unbounded space, in confusion and darkness,
lifeless and without consciousness and purpose. Suddenly
he heard this verse proclaimed by the tongue of the
Qur’an and the verse removed a veil from in front of
the universe and illumined the face of the globe; this
pre-eternal speech, this eternal decree, gave instruction
to all conscious beings, drawn up in the ranks of
succeeding centuries, in such fashion that the cosmos
became like a vast mosque. All of creation headed by the
heavens and the earth, was engaged in vital remembrance
of God and proclamation of His glory, was joyously and
contentedly fulfilling its function. ____________________ 23. Qur’an, 57:1.
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.159 All of this
our traveller observed. Thus tasting the degree of the
eloquence of the Qur’an, and comparing the other verses
to it by analogy, he understood one of the many thousands
of wise reasons for the conquest of half the globe and a
fifth of humanity by the eloquent murmuring of the
Qur’an, for the uninterrupted continuance of its
respected and magnificent monarchy for fourteen
centuries. F o u r
t h P o i n t : The Qur’an has demonstrated
such a veracious sweetness that whereas the repetition of
even the sweetest thing induces disgust, it has from
earliest times been accepted by everyone and even become
proverbial that repeated recitation of the Qur’an, far
from inducing disgust and weariness in men of sound heart
and pure taste, on the contrary increases its sweetness. The Qur’an
demonstrates, moreover, such a freshness, youth and
originality, that even though it has lived for fourteen
centuries and passed through many hands, it retains its
freshness as if it had only just been revealed. Every
century sees the Qur’an enjoying a new youth, as if it
were addressing that century in particular. Similarly,
scholars of every branch of learning, even though they
keep the Qur’an constantly at their side in order to
benefit from it, and perpetually follow its method of
exposition, see that the Qur’an maintains the
originality of its style and manner of explanation. F i f t
h P o i n t : One wing of the Qur’an is in the
past, and one is in the future, and like its root and one
wing are the agreed truths of the former prophets, and it
confirms and corroborates them, and they too confirm it
with the tongue of unanimity, so too all the true Sufi
paths and ways of sainthood whose fruits like the saints
and purified scholars, who receive life from the
Qur’an, show through their vital spiritual progress
that their blessed tree is living, effulgent, and the
means to truth, and who grow and live under the
protection of its second wing, testify that the Qur’an
is pure truth and the assembly of truths and in its
comprehensiveness, a matchless wonder. S i x t
h P o i n t : The Qur’an’s truthfulness and
veracity show that its six aspects are luminous. Indeed,
the pillars of argument and proof beneath it; the flashes
of the stamp of miraculousness above it; the gifts of
happiness in this world and the next before it, its goal;
the truths of heavenly revelation, the point of support
behind it; the assent and evidence of innumerable upright
minds to its right; and the true tranquillity, sincere
attraction, and submission of sound hearts and clean
consciences on its left all prove that the Qur’an is a
wondrous, firm, unassailable citadel of both the heavens
and the earth.
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.160 So too from
these six levels, the Disposer of the universe has set
His seal on its being sheer truth and right, and not
being man’s word, and its containing no error - the
Disposer, Who has made it His practice to always exhibit
beauty in the universe, protect good and right, and
eliminate imposters and liars, has confirmed and set His
seal on the Qur’an by giving it the most acceptable,
highest, and most dominant place of respect and degree of
success in the world. And so too the
one who is the source of Islam and interpreter of the
Qur’an - his believing in it and holding it in greater
respect than everyone else, and being in a sleep-like
state when it was revealed,24 and other words and
speeches not resembling or coming near it, and that
Interpreter’s describing without hesistation and with
complete confidence through the Qur’an true cosmic
events of generally the past and the future from behind
the veil of the Unseen, and no trickery or fault being
observed in him while being under the gazes of the
sharpest eyes, and his believing and affirming every
pronouncement of the Qur’an with all his strength and
nothing shaking him, is a stamp confirming that the
Qur’an is revealed and true and the blessed Word of his
own Compassionate Creator. Also a fifth
of mankind, indeed the greater part of it, being drawn to
the Qur’an and bound to it in religion and giving ear
to it eagerly desirous of the truth, and according to the
testimony of many indications and events and
illuminations, the jinn, angels, and spirit beings also
gathering around it in truth-worshipping fashion like
moths whenever it is recited25 is a stamp
confirming the Qur’an’s acceptance by all beings and
that it occupies a most high position. Also, all the
classes of mankind from the most stupid and lowly to the
cleverest and most learned taking their full share of the
Qur’an’s instruction and their understanding its most
profound truths, and all branches of scholars like the
great interpreters of the Greater Shari‘a in
particular, and hundreds of Islamic sciences and branches
of knowledge, and the brilliant and exacting scholars of
theology and the principles of religion extracting from
the Qur’an all the needs and answers for their own
sciences is a stamp confirming that the Qur’an is a
source of truth and mine of reality. Also, although
the Arab literary figures, who were the most advanced in
regard to literature, -those of them who were not
Muslims- had the greatest need to dispute the Qur’an,
their avoiding producing the like of ____________________ 24. Muslim,
iv, nos: 1816, 1817; al-Hakim, al-Mustadrak, ii,
392; Tabrizi, Mishkat al-Masabih, No: 4844.
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.161 only a single sura
and its eloquence, eloquence being only one aspect of the
seven major aspects of the Qur’an’s miraculousness,
as well as the famous orators and brilliant scholars up
to the present who have wanted to gain fame through
disputing it being unable to oppose a single aspect of
its miraculousness and their remaining silent in
impotence, is a stamp confirming that the Qur’an is a
miracle and beyond the powers of man. Yes, the
value, superiority, and eloquence of a speech or word is
apparent through knowing, “from whom it has come and to
whom, and for what purpose;” the Qur’an then can have
no like, and none can reach it. For the Qur’an is a
speech and address of the Sustainer of all the worlds and
Creator of the whole universe and a dialogue in no way
hinting of imitation and artificiality. It is addressed
to the one sent in the name of all men, indeed of all
beings, the most famous and renowned of mankind, the
strength and breadth of whose belief gave rise to mighty
Islam and raised its owner to the level of the
“Distance of Two Bow-strings” and returned him as the
addressee of the Eternally Besought One. It describes and
explains the matters concerning happiness in this world
and the next, the results of the creation of the
universe, and the dominical purposes within it. It
expounds also the belief of the one it addresses, which
was the highest and most extensive of belief and bore all
the truths of Islam. It turns and shows every side of the
huge universe like a map, a clock, or a house, and
teaches and describes it in the manner of the Craftsman
Who made them - to produce the like of this Qur’an of
Miraculous Exposition is not possible; the degree of its
miraculousness cannot be attained to. Also,
thousands of precise and learned scholars of high
intelligence have each written commentaries expounding
the Qur’an, some of which are of thirty, forty, or even
seventy volumes, showing and proving through evidence and
argument the innumerable qualities, fine points,
characteristics, mysteries, elevated meanings, and
numerous indications concerning every sort of hidden and
unseen matter in the Qur’an. And the one hundred and
thirty parts of the Risale-i Nur in particular, each of
which proves with decisive arguments one quality, one
fine point of the Qur’an. Each part of it - like The
Miraculousness of the Qur’an, and the Second Station of
the Twentieth Word, which deduces many things from the
Qur’an concerning the wonders of civilization like the
railway and the aeroplane, and the First Ray, called
Signs of the Qur’an, which makes known the indications
of verses alluding to the Risale-i Nur and electricity,
and the eight short treatises called The Eight Symbols,
which show how well-ordered, full of meaning, and
mysterious are the words of the Qur’an, and the small
treatise proving in five aspects the miraculousness of
the verses
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.162 at the end of Sura
al-Fath in regard to their giving news of the Unseen -
each part of the Risale-i Nur shows one truth, one light
of the Qur’an. All this forms a stamp confirming that
the Qur’an has no like, is a miracle and a marvel, and
that it is the tongue of the World of the Unseen in the
Manifest World and the Word of One All-Knowing of the
Unseen. Thus, due to
these qualities and characteristics of the Qur’an
indicated above in six points, six aspects, and six
levels, its sublime, luminous sovereignty and sacred,
mighty rule has continued with perfect splendour
illuminating the faces of the centuries and the face of
the earth for one thousand three hundred years. And also
on account of these qualities of the Qur’an, each of
its letters has gained the sacred distinction of yielding
at least ten rewards, ten merits, and ten eternal fruits,
and the letters of certain verses and suras yielding a
hundred or a thousand fruits, or even more, and at
blessed times the light, reward, and value of each letter
rising from ten to hundreds. The traveller through the
world understood this and said to his heart: “The
Qur’an, which is thus miraculous in every respect,
through the concensus of its suras, the agreement of its
verses, the accord of its lights and mysteries, and the
concurrence of its fruits and works, so testifies with
its evidences in the form of proofs to the existence,
unity, attributes, and Names of a Single Necessarily
Existent One that it is from its testimony that the
endless testimony of all the believers has issued
forth.” Thus, in brief
allusion to the instruction in belief and Divine unity
that the traveller received from the Qur’an, it was
said in the Seventeeth Degree of the First Station: There is no god
but God, the One and Unique Necessary Existent, to Whose
Necessary Existence in Unity points the Qur’an of
Miraculous Exposition, the book accepted and desired by
all species of angel, men and jinn, whose verses are read
each minute of the year, with the utmost reverence, by
hundreds of millions of men, whose sacred sovereignty
over the regions of the earth and the universe and the
face of time is permanent, whose spiritual and luminous
authority has run over half the earth and a fifth of
humanity, for more than fourteen centuries, with the
utmost splendour. Testimony and proof is also given by
the unanimity of its sacred and heavenly suras, the
agreement of its luminous, divine verses, the congruence
of its mysteries and lights, the correspondence of its
fruits and effects, by witnessing and clear vision. Our traveller,
our voyager through life, knew now that faith is the most
precious capital man can have, for it bestows on indigent
man not some transient and ephemeral field or dwelling,
but a palace, indeed an eternal
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.163 kingdom as vast as
the whole cosmos or the world itself. Faith also bestows
on ephemeral man all he will need for life eternal;
delivers from eternal annihilation wretched man who waits
on the gallows for the arrival of fate; and opens to man
an eternal treasury of everlasting felicity. The
traveller then said to himself: “Onward! In
order to gain a further degree from among the infinite
degrees of faith, let us refer to the totality of the
cosmos, and listen to what it says. We will then be able
to perfect and illumine the lessons we have received from
its components and parts.” Looking
through the broad and comprehensive telescope he had
taken from the Qur’an, he saw the cosmos to be so
meaningful and well-ordered that it took on the shape of
an embodied book of the Glorious One, an incarnate
dominical Qur’an, a finely adorned palace of the
Eternally Besought One, an orderly city of the Most
Merciful. All the suras, verses, and words of that book
of the universe, even its very letters, chapters,
divisions, pages, and lines, through their constant
meaningful effacement and reaffirmation, their wise
changes and alternations, gave unanimous expression to
the existence and presence of One Who has Knowledge of
all things and Power over all things as the author of the
book, of a Glorious Inscriber and a Perfect Scribe seeing
all things in all things and knowing the relationship of
all things with all things. So too all the
species and particles of the cosmos, all its inhabitants
and contents, all that enters it and leaves it, all the
providential changes and the wise processses of
rejuvenation that occur in it - these proclaim in unison
the existence and unity of an exalted craftsman, a
peerless Maker Who sets to work with limitless power and
infinite wisdom. The testimony of two great and vast
truths, of a piece with the immensity of the cosmos,
affirms this supreme witness of the cosmos. FIRST
TRUTH: These are the truths of ‘createdness’ and
‘contingency’ established with countless proofs by
the gifted scholars of the principles of religion and the
science of theology, as well as the sages of Islam. They
said that since change and mutation are to be observed in
the world and all things, the world must be ephemeral and
created; it cannot be uncreated. If it is created, then
there must be a Maker who created it. And if there is no
cause to be found in the essence of a thing either for
its being or for its non-being, so that these two are
equally possible, that thing cannot be necessary and
eternal. It has further
been proven with decisive arguments that it is not
possible for things to create each other, since that
would involve the absurd and false notion of causality
and never-ending causal sequences. Hence
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.164 the existence of a
Necessary Existence becomes necessary, whose like cannot
exist, whose similitude is impossible, all other than
whom is contingent and created by him. Yes, the truth
of createdness has permeated the whole of the cosmos, and
many instances of it are visible to the eye; the rest can
be seen only by the intellect. For in front of our eyes a
whole world dies every autumn, and together with it die
hundreds of thousands of different kinds of plants and
small animals, each member of each species being like a
small cosmos unto himself. It is, however, so orderly and
disciplined a death that all things leave behind in their
places seeds and eggs that in the spring shall be the
means of resurrection and rebirth, miracles of mercy and
wisdom, miracles of power and knowledge. They hand to the
seeds and eggs their book of deeds and plan of action,
entrusting them to the wisdom of the Glorious Preserver
and under His protection, and only then do they die. In spring, the
dead trees, roots and animals come to life again exactly
as they were, thus providing hundreds of thousands of
examples, specimens and proofs of the supreme
resurrection. In the place of others, plants and animals
resembling them exactly are brought into being and life,
thus publishing the pages of the beings of the preceding
spring, together with their deeds and functions, just
like an advertisement. Thus they demonstrate one meaning
of the verse, When the pages are
spread out.26 Then also, with
respect to the whole, each autumn a great world dies, and
each spring a fresh world comes into being. That death
and creation proceed in so orderly a manner, and so many
separate deaths and creations occur within them, in such
orderly and regular fashion, that it is as if the world
were a traveller’s lodge where animate beings reside
for a time, where travelling worlds and migrant realms
come, fulfil their duties, and then go on their way. So
there is apparent to all intellects, with the clarity of
the sun, the necessary existence, infinite power and
unending wisdom of a Glorious Being Who creates and
brings into being in this world vital realms and
purposive universes, with perfect wisdom, knowledge, and
equilibrium, with balance, order and regularity, and Who
then employs them for dominical purposes, Divine aims and
Merciful goals, with full power and compassion. We leave
to the Risale-i Nur and the books of the theologians the
further discussion of matters related to createdness. As for
contingence, it prevails over and surrounds all of the
cosmos. For we see that all things, universal or
particular, big or small, from ____________________ 26. Qur’an, 81:10..
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.165 God’s Throne down
to the ground, from the atom to the planet, all are sent
to the world with a particular essence, a specific form,
a distinct identity, particular attributes, wise
qualities, and beneficial organs. Now to bestow on that
particular essence and quiddity its peculiarities, from
amongst the infinite possibilities available; to clothe
it in its specific, distinctive and appropriate form,
from among the possibilities and probabilities that are
as numerous as the forms that may be conceived; to
distinguish that being with the identity suited to it,
from among the possibilities as numerous as the other
members of its species; to endow with special, suitable
and beneficial attributes the created object that is
formless and hesitant midst the possibilities and
probabilities that are as numerous as the varieties of
attribute and degree; to affix to that aimless creature,
perplexed and distraught amidst the innumerable
possibilities and probabilities that result from the
infinitude of conceivable paths and modalities -to affix
to it wise qualities and beneficial organs and equip it
with them- all of these are indications, proofs, and
affirmations to the number of the innumerable
possibilities of the necessary existence, infinite power
and unlimited wisdom of the Necessary Existent Who
creates, chooses, specifies, and distinguishes the
quiddity and identity, the form and shape, the attribute
and situation of all contingent beings, whether they be
universals or particulars. They indicate,
too, that no object and no matter is hidden from Him,
that nothing is difficult for Him, that the greatest task
is as easy for Him as the smallest, that He can create a
spring as easily as a tree, and a tree as easily as a
seed. All this, then, pertains to the truth of
contingence, and forms one wing of the great testimony
borne by the cosmos. Since the
testimony of the cosmos, with its two wings and two
truths, is fully established and explained in various
parts of the Risale-i Nur, and particularly the
Twenty-Second and Thirty-Second Words, as well as the
Twentieth and Thirty-Third Letters, we refer our readers
to those writings, and cut short an extremely long story. SECOND
TRUTH: As for the Second Truth that proceeds from the
total scheme of the cosmos, which is also the second wing
of its great and universal testimony, it is as follows: There is to be
seen a truth of co-operation among these beings that are
attempting to maintain their existence, and if they are
animate, their life, and fulfil their functions in the
midst of constantly stirring changes and revolutions, a
truth that lies far beyond their capacities. For example,
the elements hasten to aid animate beings; the clouds to
help the vegetable kingdom; the vegetable kingdom, to
help the animal
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.166 kingdom; the animal
kingdom, to help the human kingdom. Milk gushes forth
from the breast, like the spring of Paradise, to succour
the infant; the fact that animate beings are given their
needs and sustenance in a manner that transcends their
capacity, from unexpected places; the replenishing of the
cells of the body with particles of food, through their
being subjugated by their Sustainer and their employment
at His merciful hands - all of these and numerous other
examples of the truth of co-operation demonstrate the
universal and compassionate dominicality of the Sustainer
of All the Worlds, Who administers the cosmos like a
palace. Solid,
inanimate and unfeeling objects, that nonetheless
co-operate with each other in a sensitive and conscious
fashion, must of necessity be caused to rush to each
other’s aid by the power, mercy, and command of a
Compassionate, Wise, and Glorious Sustainer. The universal
co-operation visible throughout the cosmos; the
comprehensive equilibrium and all-embracing preservation
prevailing with the utmost regularity in all things, from
the planets to the members, limbs and bodily particles of
animate beings; the adorning whose pen ranges over the
gilded face of the heavens, the decorated face of the
earth, and the delicate faces of flowers; the ordering
that prevails over all things, from the Milky Way and
solar system down to fruits such as corn and
pomegranates; the assigning of duties to all things, from
the sun and the moon, the elements and the clouds, down
to honey-bees - all of these great truths offer a
testimony of proportionate greatness, and their testimony
forms the second wing of the testimony offered by the
cosmos. Since the
Risale-i Nur has established and clarified this great
testimony, we will content ourselves here with this brief
indication. In brief
allusion to the lesson of faith learned by our traveller
from the cosmos, we said in the Eighteenth Degree of the
First Station: There is no god
but God, the Necessary Existent, the like of Whom cannot
exist, other than Whom all things are contingent, the
One, the Unique, to the Necessity of Whose Existence in
Unity points the cosmos, the great book incarnate, the
supreme Qur’an personified, the ornate and orderly
palace, the splendid and well-arranged city, with all of
its suras, verses, letters, chapters, parts, pages, and
lines, with the agreement of its fundaments, species,
parts and particles, its inhabitants and contents, what
enters it and what leaves it; with the testimony of the
sublimity of the comprehensiveness of the truth of
createdness, change and contingency; with the consensus
of all scholars of the science of theology; with the
testimony of the truth of the changing of its form and
its contents, with wisdom and regularity, and
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.167 the renewal of its
letters and words with discipline and equilibrium; and
with the testimony of the sublimity of the
comprehensiveness of the truth of co-operation, mutual
response and solidarity, reciprocal care, balance and
preservation, among all its beings, as is to be clearly
observed. Then the
ardent and inquisitive traveller, who was seeking the
Creator of the world, had advanced by gaining knowledge
of God indirectly through eighteen degrees and
approached, at the end of an ascension in belief to the
throne of truth, a station where in the presence of God,
he addressed Him directly. He said to his own spirit: “In the
noble opening sura of the Qur’an, the verses that
extend from the beginning to the word iyyaka (You
alone) are like a form of praise and encomium uttered
indirectly; but the word iyyaka signifies a coming
into His presence and addresssing Him directly. So too we
should abandon this indirect seeking and ask for the
object of search from the object of our search. For one
must ask the sun, that shows all things, concerning the
sun, since that which shows all things will show itself
even more clearly. Just as we perceive and know the sun
by its rays, so too we can strive to know our Creator, in
accordance with our capacities, through His Most
Beautiful Names and Sacred Attributes.” We will set
forth here, with the utmost brevity and concision, two of
the countless paths that lead to this goal; two of the
infinite degrees of those two paths; and two of the
abundant truths and details of those two degrees. THE FIRST
TRUTH: There appears visible to our eye a
comprehensive, permanent, orderly and awesome truth, one
that changes, transforms, and renews all beings in heaven
and on earth, with imperious and incessant activity.
Within the truth of that in every way wise activity,
there is immediately perceived the truth of the
manifestation of dominicality, and in turn, within the
truth of that in every way merciful manifestation of
dominicality, is recognizable the truth of the epiphany
of Divinity. From this
continuous, wise and imperious activity, the deeds of an
All-Powerful and All-Knowing Doer can be discerned, as if
from behind a veil. And from behind the veil of these
nurturing and administering deeds of dominicality, the
Divine Names, manifest in all things, can be immediately
perceived. Then behind the veil of the Beautiful Names,
manifest with Glory and Beauty, can be deduced the
existence and reality of the seven sacred attributes,
according to the testimony of all creation, in a
life-giving, powerful, knowledgeable, all-hearing,
all-seeing, volitional and speech-endowed form, there
appears to the eye of faith in the heart,
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.168 self-evidently,
necessarily, and with full certainty, the existence of a
Necessary Existent that is described by these attributes,
a Single One of Unity known by these Names, a Peerless
and Eternal Doer, in a form more evidential and brilliant
than the sun. For a
beautiful and profound book necessarily presupposes the
act of writing and a well-built house presupposes the act
of building; and the acts of writing beautifully and
building well presuppose the names of writer and builder;
and the titles of writer and builder obviously imply the
arts and attributes of writing and building; and these
arts and attributes self-evidently necessitate one who
will be qualified by the names and attributes, and be the
artist and craftsman. For just as it is impossible for
there to be a deed without a doer, or a name without one
designated by the name, so too it is not possible for
there to be an attribute without one qualified by the
attribute, and for there to be a craft without a
craftsman. On the basis,
then, of this truth and principle, the universe with all
the beings it contains resembles a collection of profound
books and letters written by the pen of Divine
Determining, and countless buildings and palaces
constructed with the hammer of Divine Power. Each of
these singly in thousands of ways and together in
uncountable ways utters the following testimony: These
innumerable dominical and merciful deeds, and the endless
manifestations of the thousand and one Divine Names which
are the source of the deeds, and the infinite
manifestations of the seven transcendent attributes which
are the source of the Beautiful Names, in endless and
infinite ways point to and testify to the necessary
existence and unity of an All-Glorious Essence Which is
the source of those all-embracing, sacred seven
attributes and is qualified by them. And so too all the
instances of beauty, loveliness, perfection, and
exquisiteness found in those beings self-evidently
testify all together to the sacred beauties and
perfections of the dominical deeds, and the Divine Names,
and attributes, and qualities, which are fitting and
worthy of them, and to the sacred beauty of the Most Pure
and Holy Essence. So the truth
of dominicality that manifests itself within the truth of
activity reveals and makes itself known in qualities and
acts such as creating, originating, fashioning and
bringing into being, with knowledge and wisdom;
determining, forming, administering and changing with
regularity and balance; transforming, causing to descend
and perfecting, with purpose and will; and feeding,
nurturing, and bestowing generosity and bounty, with
tenderness and mercy. And within the truth of the
manifestation of dominicality, the truth of the
immediately perceived revelation of The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.169 Divinity makes itself
known and recognized through the compassionate and
munificent manifestations of the Beautiful Names and
through the Glorious and Beauteous manifestations of the
seven affirmative attributes: Life, Knowledge, Power,
Will, Hearing, Sight, and Speech. Just as the
attribute of Speech makes the Most Sacred Essence known
through revelation and inspiration, so too the attribute
of Power makes the Essence known through its skilled
works and effects, each of which is like a word assuming
external shape. Presenting the cosmos from end to end
under the aspect of an incarnate book of discernment, it
describes and makes known a Powerful Possessor of Glory. As for the
attribute of Knowledge, it makes known a single Most
Sacred Essence, through each of the wise, well-ordered
and balanced objects of creation, through each creature
administered, directed, adorned, and made distinct by
God’s Knowledge. As for the
attribute of Life, it is proven not only by its own
evidences, but also by all the works that proclaim
God’s Power, by all the well-ordered, wise, balanced
and adorned forms and states that indicate God’s
Knowledge, as well as by all proofs of all other
attributes. Thus Life, showing as witnesses all animate
beings, which act as mirrors reflecting those abundant
proofs, makes known an Eternally Living and
Self-Subsistent Essence. It is also
this attribute that constantly changes the cosmos, in
order to produce in it ever-fresh and various
manifestations and designs, and turns it into a supreme
mirror composed of countless smaller mirrors. Similarly,
the attributes of Seeing and Hearing, Willing and
Speaking, each reveal and make known the Most Sacred
Essence, just as the cosmos does. Then, too,
just as the attributes point to the existence of the
Possessor of Glory, they also indicate in most manifest
fashion the existence and reality of life, and the
livingness and permanence of that Essence. For Knowing is
a sign of Life; Hearing is an indication of Life; Seeing
belongs only to the living; Will takes place only with
Life. Purposive Power is found only in living beings, and
Speech is a task for those endowed with Knowledge and
Life. It follows
from the foregoing that the attribute of Life has proofs
seven times as numerous as the cosmos, and evidences that
proclaim its existence and the existence of the One Whom
it qualifies. Thus it comes to be the foundation and
source of the attributes, the origin and support of the
Supreme Name. Since the Risale-i Nur establishes this
first truth with powerful proofs and clarifies it, we
will content ourselves now with a drop from this ocean.
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.170 THE SECOND
TRUTH: Divine discourse, which proceeds from the
attribute of Speech. Were the sea to
become ink for the words of my Sustainer...27
According to the inner sense of this verse, Divine
discourse is infinite. The clearest sign demonstrating
the existence of a being is his speech. This truth,
therefore, constitutes an infinite testimony to the
existence and unity of the Pre-Eternal Speaker. Since two
powerful evidences of this truth are revelation and
inspiration, set forth in the Fourteenth and Fifteenth
Degrees of this treatise; another broad proof is provided
by sacred and heavenly Books, as indicated in the Tenth
Degree; and a further most brilliant and comprehensive
proof is furnished by the Qur’an of Miraculous
Exposition, as discussed in the Seventeenth Degree - for
all these reasons we refer our readers to those Degrees
for the exposition and affirmation of this truth. Enough
for us and for our traveller, who was unable to proceed
beyond this point, are the lights and mysteries contained
in the sublime verse that proclaims this truth in
miraculous fashion and adds it own testimony to all of
the preceding ones: God bears witness
that there is no god but He, as do the angels and the
possessors of knowledge; steadfast in equity; there is no
god but He, the Mighty, the Wise!28
In allusion to the core of the lesson learned by our
traveller at this sacred Station, we said, in the
Nineteenth Degree of the First Station: There is no god
but God, the Necessary Existent, the One, the Unique; His
are the Beautiful Names, His are the Supreme Attributes,
and His is the Most Sublime Similitude. To His Necessary
Existence in Unity points the necessarily existent
Essence, with the consensus of all its sacred and
comprehensive attributes and all of its Beautiful Names,
manifested according to the consensus of His dominant
qualities and deeds. By the testimony of the sublimity of
the truth of the self-revelation of Divinity in the
manifestation of dominicality, in the permanence of
imperious activity through the act of bringing into
being, creating, making and originating, in will and in
power; and through the act of determining, forming and
regulating, in choice and in wisdom; through the act of
expending, preserving, ordering, administering, and
nurturing in purposiveness and mercy, in complete order
and equilibrium; as too by the testimony of the sublimity
of the comprehensiveness of the truth of the mysteries of
the verse: God bears witness ____________________ 27. Qur’an, 18:109.
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.171 that there is no
god but He, as do the angels and the possessors of
knowledge; steadfast in equity; there is no god but He,
the Mighty, the Wise! ba
Each of the
truths that offer their testimony in the Nineteen Degrees
of the First Chapter of the Second Station above not only
indicate Necessary Existence through existence and
presence, but also through their comprehensiveness,
attest God’s unity and oneness. But since they prove
existence most clearly and explicitly, we regarded them
first as proofs of Necessary Existence. As for the
Second Chapter of the Second Station, the truths in
question will be designated instead as proofs of Divine
unity, insofar as they explicitly prove unity, and
implicitly necessity. In reality, each proves the other;
unity proves necessity, and necessity proves unity. In
order to indicate the difference, we said repeatedly in
the First Chapter, “By the testimony of the sublimity
of the comprehensiveness of the truth of....,” while in
the Second Chapter we shall recurrently say, “By the
witnessing of the sublimity of the comprehensiveness of
the truth of...,” thus indicating the evident
visibility of Divine unity. I had the intention of
explaining the degrees of the Second Chapter, just as I
did in the First Chapter, but on account of various
obstacles I am compelled to be summary and concise. I
leave it to other parts of the Risale-i Nur to expound
these matters as they deserve to be expounded.
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - Second Chapter - p.172 Second Chapter Concerning Proofs
of the Divine Unity [The traveller who
had been sent to the world in order to attain faith, who
journeyed through the whole cosmos in his mind in order
to ask all things concerning his Creator, to seek his
Sustainer in every place and find his God, with the
utmost certainty, at the point of Necessary Existence -
this traveller said to his intellect: “Come, let us
depart on a new journey in order to behold the proofs of
the unity of our Necessarily Existent Creator.” They set out
together. At the First Stopping-Place, they saw four
sacred truths prevailing over the whole cosmos, truths
that self-evidently necessitated the unity of God.] THE FIRST TRUTH:
Absolute Divinity The absorption
of each class of men in a mode of worship dictated by
their innate dispositions; the species of worship engaged
in by other animate beings, as well as inanimate beings,
through the performance of their essential functions; the
way in which all material and immaterial bounties and
gifts in the cosmos become means inciting men to worship
and thanks, to praise and gratitude; the fashion in which
all the manifestations of the Unseen and epiphanies of
the spirit, revelation and inspiration, unanimously
proclaim the exclusive fitness of one God to receive
worship - all of this, in most evidential fashion, proves
the reality and dominance of a single and absolute
Divinity. If the truth of such a Divinty exists, it can
in no way accept partnership. For those who respond to
Divinity -that is, the fitness to be worshipped- with
thanks and worship, are the conscious and animate fruits
on the highest branches of the tree of the cosmos. If
others were able to gratify and place under their
obligation those conscious beings in such fashion as to
make them turn away from and forget their true object of
worship -Who may, indeed, be swiftly forgotten, because
of his invisibility- this would be in such utter
contradiction to the essence of Divinty and its sacred
purposes that it could in no way be allowed. It is for
this reason that the Qur’an so repeat
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.173 edly and with such
vehemence refutes polytheism and threatens the
polytheists with Hell-fire. THE SECOND TRUTH:
Absolute Dominicality The ubiquitous
workings of a wise and compassionate hidden hand
throughout the cosmos, especially in animate beings and
their nurturing and development, everywhere in the same
fashion and yet in a totally unexpected form, must be,
without doubt, the emanation and light of an absolute
dominicality and a decisive proof of its reality. An absolute
dominicality cannot accept any partnership for since the
important aims and purposes of dominicality, such as the
manifestation of its beauty, the proclamation of its
perfection, the revelation of its precious arts and the
display of its hidden accomplishments, are combined and
concentrated in particulars and animate beings, the
slightest attribution to God of a partner, when entering
even the most particular of things and the smallest of
animate beings, will frustrate the attainment of those
purposes and destroy those aims. Averting the faces of
conscious beings from those purposes and the One Who
conceived them toward causes will be totally opposed and
hostile to the essence of dominicality, and absolute
dominicality cannot in any way countenance it. The abundant
proclamations in the Qur’an of God’s sanctity and
transcendence, its verses and words, even its letters and
their shapes, are constant guides to God’s unity, made
necessary by the mystery we have just expounded. THE THIRD TRUTH:
Perfections The
self-evident testimony to the existence of the truth of
perfections given by all the exalted instances of wisdom
in the universe, all its wondrous beauties, its just
laws, its wise purposes, and in particular its testimony
to the perfections of the Creator, Who brought forth the
cosmos out of the void and then administered it in every
way miraculously and beauteously, as well as the
perfections of man, who is the conscious mirror of the
Creator - such testimony is extremely clear. There exists
then the truth of perfections, and the certainty that the
Creator Who fashioned the cosmos in perfection must
Himself possess perfection. Further, the perfections of
man, the most important fruit of the universe, God’s
vicegerent on earth, the beloved and most valued object
of His creation - these are also established as true.
Therefore, to assign partners to God would be
unacceptable and false, for it would condemn to
destruction and perdition all of the perfect and wise
beings we behold with our eyes; it would turn the cosmos
into a vain plaything of accident, a
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.174 place of amusement
for nature, a cruel slaughterhouse for the animate, an
awesome house of sorrows for the conscious; it would
reduce man, whose perfections are visible in his works,
to the level of the most wretched, distraught and vile
animal; and it would draw a veil across the infinite
perfections of the Creator that are reflected in the
mirror of all beings, thus nullifying the result of His
activity and denying His creativity. Since
assigning partners to God contradicts Divine, human and
cosmic perfections and its denial of them has been
established and explained in the First Station of the
Second Ray (devoted to three ‘Fruits’ of Divine
unity) with strong and decisive proofs, we refer our
readers that work and cut short the discussion here. THE FOURTH TRUTH:
Sovereignty Whoever looks
at the cosmos with comprehensive attention, will see it
to resemble a most prosperous and active kingdom, a city
administered most wisely and ruled most firmly; he sees
all things and all species obediently engaged in a
particular function. According to
the military metaphor contained in the verse, God’s are the
armies of the heavens and earth,29the
prevailing creative commands, imperious orders, and
kingly laws enunciated in those numerous armies, that
extend from the hosts of the atom, the battalions of the
vegetable kingdom, the brigades of the animal kingdom, to
the armies of the stars, and embrace both the lowliest
soldier and the loftiest commander - they all indicate
self-evidently the existence of an absolute sovereignty
and a universal authority. There is then
a truth of absolute sovereignty, and there can be no
truth of assigning partners to God. For according to the
decisive truth of the verse, Were there to be
in the heavens and earth gods other than God, verily they
would be corrupted,30if numerous hands all
engage assertively in the same task, the result will be
confusion. If there are two kings in one country, or even
two headmen in one district, order will disappear, and
administration be replaced by anarchy. But on the
contrary we see everywhere such order, from the wing of
the fly to the lamps of the heavens, from the cells of
the body to the signs of the planets, that there is no
possibility for the intervention of any partner in
God’s affairs. ____________________ 29. Qur’an, 48:4.
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.175 Sovereignty
is, moreover, a station of dignity; to accept a rival
would flout the dignity of sovereignty. The fact that
man, who needs the assistance of many people on account
of his impotence, will kill his brothers and offspring in
the cruellest fashion for the sake of some petty,
apparent and temporary sovereignty, shows that
sovereignty rejects all notion of partnership. If so
feeble a one acts thus for the sake of so petty a
sovereignty, it follows that the Possessor of Absolute
Power, the Master of All Creation, will never permit one
other than Himself to participate in His sacred
sovereignty, the means to His real and universal
dominicality and Divinity. Since this
truth has been established with firm proofs in numerous
places throughout the Risale-i Nur and especially the
Second Station of the Second Ray, we refer the reader to
those pages for further discussion of it. Through
witnessing these four truths, our traveller came to know
Divine unity with the degree of certain and clear
witnessing. His faith shone, and with all his power he
said, “There is no god but God, He is One, He has no
partner.” In brief allusion to the lesson he derived
from this station, we said in the Second Chapter of the
First Station: There is no god
but God, the One, the Unique, to Whose Unity and the
Necessity of Whose Existence point the witnessing of the
sublimity of the truth of the manifestation of absolute
Divinity, as well as the witnessing of the sublimity of
the comprehensiveness of the truth of the manifestation
of absolute dominicality that requires Unity, the
witnessing of the sublimity of the comprehensiveness of
the truth of the perfections that arise from unity, and
the witnessing of the sublimity of the comprehensiveness
of the truth of absolute sovereignty, that prevents and
contradicts the existence of any partnership. Then that
restless traveller addressed his heart and said: “The
fact that the people of faith, and particularly those
affiliated with a sufi order, are constantly repeating
the words, ‘no god but He,’ and recalling and
proclaiming God’s unity, is an indication that the
affirmation of God’s unity comprises many degrees. Such
affirmation is moreover a most enjoyable, most valuable,
and most exalted sacred duty, instinctive function, and
act of worship. Let us then in order to attain a further
degree, open the door of another stopping-place in this
abode of instruction. For the true affirmation of God’s
unity we seek is not some imaginary species of knowledge.
It is rather an affirmation that in terms of logic is
deemed the opposite of imagination, that is far more
valuable than cognition based on imagination, that is the
result of proof, that is designated a knowledge.”
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.176 The true
affirmation of God’s unity is a judgement, a
confirmation, an assent and acceptance that can find its
Sustainer present with all things, that sees in all
things a path leading to its Creator, and does not regard
anything as an obstacle to His presence. For otherwise it
would always be necessary to tear and cast aside the veil
of the cosmos in order to find its Sustainer. “Onward,
then,” said the traveller to himself, as he knocked at
the door of God’s Sublimity and Grandeur. He entered
the Stopping-Place of God’s deeds and workings, the
world of creation and origination, and there he saw that
five comprehensive truths were prevailing over the entire
cosmos, and offering self-evident proof of the Divine
unity. THE FIRST TRUTH:
that of Grandeur and Sublimity. Since this
truth is explained with different proofs in the Second
Station of the Second Ray and various other places in the
Risale-i Nur, we restrict ourselves here to the
following: The Being that
creates and then administers at a single time and in a
single fashion the stars that are thousands of years
distant from each other; that creates at a single time
and in a single form the countless members of the same
species of flower, distributed over the east and the
west, the north and south of the globe; that administers,
nurtures, quickens, distinguishes and adorns more than
two hundred thousand different types of plant and species
of animal in five or six weeks, with the utmost
regularity and equilibrium, without any confusion, defect
or error, in order to provide every spring on the face of
the earth more than a hundred thousand specimens of the
supreme resurrection, and thus prove before man’s eyes
a remarkable event, now belonging to the past and the
realm of the Unseen, namely the creation of the heavens
and the earth in six days, as indicated in the verse, He it is Who
created the heavens and the earth in six days;31the
Being that causes the earth to revolve, as evidenced in
the verse, He merges night
with day, and day with night,32and turns
the night into the page on which the events of the day
are written - this same Being knows and administers
according to His own will, all at the same time, the most
secret and obscure thoughts that occur to men’s hearts.
Since each of the aforementioned acts is in reality one
act, it follows that their Glorious Doer is a Unique and
Powerful Being, enjoying such grandeur and sublimity that
nowhere, in nothing, in no ____________________ 31. Qur’an, 57:4.
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.177 way, does it leave
the slightest possibility for the acceptance of
partnership; on the contrary, it uproots all such
possibility. Since such
sublime power and grandeur exist and since that grandeur
is at the very apex of perfection and comprehends
everything, it is certainly in no way possible to permit
or allow any attribution of partners to that Unique and
Powerful Being, for so doing would ascribe impotence or
need to that power, fault to that grandeur, defect to
that perfection, and impose restriction on that
comprehensiveness. No sound intellect could deem this
possible. The assignment
of partners to God, is then by virtue of the offence it
causes to God’s Grandeur, the dignity of his Glory and
His Sublimity, so grave a crime that the Qur’an of
Miraculous Exposition decrees with an earnest threat, God does not
pardon the assignment to Him of a partner; He pardons
whatever is lesser than that.33
THE SECOND TRUTH:
The absoluteness, the comprehensiveness, and appearance
in infinite form of the dominical deeds seen at work in
the cosmos. It is only
God’s wisdom and will that limits and restricts those
deeds, as well as the inherent capacities of the objects
and places in which they manifest themselves. Stray
chance, dumb nature, blind force, unconscious causality
and the elements that without restriction are scattered
in every direction - none of these can have any part in
the most balanced, wise perspicacious, life-giving,
orderly and firm deeds of the Creator. They are used,
rather, by the command, will, and power of the Glorious
Doer as an apparent veil to conceal His power. Three out of
innumerable examples: We will set
forth three from among the numerous subtle points that
relate to the three deeds indicated in three continuous
verses in Sura al-Nahl. The
First: Your Sustainer
inspired in the bee that it should seek a dwelling-place
in the mountains.34 The bee
is, with respect to its disposition and function, such a
miracle of God’s power that a whole sura, Sura al-Nahl,
has been named after it. For to inscribe in the minute
head of that little honey-machine a complete ____________________ 33. Qur’an,
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.178 programme for the
fulfilment of its important task; to place in its
diminutive stomach the most delicious of foods and to
ripen it there; to place in its sting poison capable of
destroying and killing animate beings, without causing
any harm to its own body or the member in question - to
do all this without the utmost care and knowledge, with
exceeding wisdom and purposiveness, partakes of a perfect
orderliness and equilibriium, and hence unconscious,
disorderly, disequilibriated nature and accident could
never interfere or participate in any of this. The appearance
and comprehensiveness of this Divine craft, this
dominical deed, which is miraculous in three separate
respects, in the countless bees that are found scattered
over the earth, with the same wisdom, the same care, the
same symmetry, at the same time and in the same fashion -
this is a self-evident proof of God’s unity. The Second
Verse: There is for you a
lesson in cattle. From what is within their bodies,
between excretions and blood, we produce for your drink,
milk, pure and agreeable to those who drink it.35
This verse is a decree overflowing with useful
instruction. To place in the nipples of cows, camels,
goats and sheep, as well as human mothers, in the midst
of blood and excrement but without being polluted by
them, a substance the exact opposite, pure, clean,
pleasant, nutritive and white milk, and to inspire in
their hearts tenderness toward their young that is still
more pleasant, sweeter and more valuable than milk - this
requires such a degree of mercy, wisdom, knowledge,
power, will and care that it cannot in any way be the
work of turbulent chance, of the tangled elements, or of
blind forces. The
manifestation, workings and comprehensiveness of so
miraculous a dominical art and so wise a Divine deed, all
over the face of the globe and in the countless hearts
and breasts of innumerable mothers of hundreds of
thousands of species, in the same instant, the same
fashion, with the same wisdom and the same care - this
too constitutes a self-evident proof of God’s unity. The Third
Verse: From the fruits of
the date-palm and the vine you take sugar and fine
nourishment; verily therein is a sign for a people
possessing intelligence.36 This
verse invites our attention to the date and to grapes,
saying, “For ____________________ 35. Qur’an, 16:66. 36. Qur’an, 16:67.
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.179 those of
intelligence, there is great proof, argument and evidence
of the Divine unity in these two fruits. These two fruits
yield nurture and sustenance, fresh and dry fruit, and
give rise to most delicious forms of food; yet the trees
that bear them stand in waterless sand and dry soil, and
are thus miracles of power and wonders of wisdom. They
are each of them like a factory producing sweet sugar, a
machine manufacturing honeylike syrup, a work of art
created with perfect order and sensitive balance, wisdom
and care; hence anyone with a grain of intelligence will
say on contemplating them, ‘The one who made them in
this fashion may very well be the Creator of the whole
cosmos.’” For in front
of our eyes each vine branch the thickness of a finger
will hold twenty bunches of grapes, and each bunch will
in turn contain hundreds of sugary grapes, each like a
litle pump emitting syrup. To clothe the surface of each
grape with a fine, delicate, thin, and colourful
protection; to place in its delicate and soft heart seeds
with their hard shells, which are like its retentive
faculty, programme, and the story of its life; to
manufacture in its stomach a sweetmeat like the helva of
Paradise, a honey like the water of Kawthar; to create an
infinite number of such grapes over the face of the
entire earth, with the same care and wisdom and wonderful
art, and at the same time and in the same fashion - this
proves in self-evident fashion that the one who fulfils
these tasks is the Creator of the whole cosmos, and this
deed, requiring as it does infinite power and limitless
wisdom, can be only His deed. Yes, blind and
stray, disorderly and unconscious, aimless, aggressive,
and anarchic forces, nature and causality, cannot have
anything to do with this most sensitive balance, this
most skilful art, this most wise scheme. They cannot even
stretch out their hands toward it. It falls to them only
to be employed through the dominical command as passive
objects, as curtainholders. Just like the
three points proving Divine unity contained in the three
truths indicated in the three verses, the countless
manifestations and workings of infinite dominical deeds
attest unanimously the unity of a Single One of Unity,
the All-Glorious One. THE THIRD
TRUTH: The creation of beings, particularly plants
and animals, with absolute speed and absolute
orderliness; with absolute ease and extreme skill,
talent, ability, and order; with great value and
distinction, despite extreme abundance and intermingling. Yes, to
produce with extreme swiftness and in extreme abundance,
most skilfully and artistically, with great ease and
facility combined with the utmost care and orderliness,
with great value and distinction despite
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.180 abundance and
intermingling, without any form of confusion or
deficiency - this can be achieved only by a Unique Being
Whose power is such that nothing appears difficult to it. For that power
it is as easy to create stars as atoms, the greatest as
the smallest, a whole species as a single member of a
species, a sublime and comprehensive universal as a
restricted and petty particular; it is as easy for Him to
revivify and quicken the whole earth as to do the same
with a tree or to erect a tree as tall as a mountain as
it is to produce a seed no bigger than a fingernail. All
of these deeds He performs in front of our eyes. So the
exposition, the solution, the uncovering and proof of the
mystery of this degree of the assertion of the Divine
unity, this Third Truth, this word of unity - the mystery
that the greatest universal is like the smallest
particular without the slightest difference between them
-this beneficial wisdom, this supreme talisman, this
riddle beyond the reach of the intellect, this most
significant foundation of Islam, this most profound
source of faith, this greatest basis of the Divine unity-
the setting forth of all this opens the talisman of the
Qur’an, and makes it possible to know the most secret
and unknowable riddle of the creation of all beings, a
riddle that reduces philosophy to impotence. Thanks and
praise one hundred thousand times the letters of the
Risale-i Nur be to the Compassionate Creator that the
Risale-i Nur has solved, uncovered and established this
wondrous talisman, this wondrous riddle. It has been
proven with decisive arguments, to the same degree of
certainty that twice two is four, particularly in the
discussion of “He is powerful over all things” toward
the end of the Twentieth Letter; in the section
concerning God’s being an all-powerful agent in the
Twenty-Ninth Word, one devoted to the resurrection; and
in the section proving the Divine power in the degrees of
“God is Most Great” in the Twenty-Ninth Flash,
written in Arabic. For that reason we assign to those
parts of the Risale-i Nur the exposition of this matter,
wishing, however, to set out briefly the foundations and
proofs that solve this mystery and to allude to thirteen
mysteries that resemble thirteen steps, or a list of
contents. I have indeed written the first and second
mysteries, but unfortunately two powerful obstacles,
material and immaterial, have caused me to abandon the
remainder. T h e F
i r s t M y s t e r y : If something be
essential, its opposite cannot have access to the essence
defined by that thing. For that would be equivalent to
the union of opposites, which is an absurdity. Now with
regard to this principle, since God’s power is related
to His Essence and
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.181 is an essential
concomitant of His Most Sacred Essence, impotence -the
opposite of power- cannot in any way gain access to that
All-Powerful Essence. Moreover, the
existence of degrees within a thing comes about through
the intervention in it of its opposite. For example,
strong and weak degrees of light result from the
intervention of darkness; high and low degrees of heat
proceed from the admixture of coldness; and greater and
lesser amounts of strength are determined by the
intervention and opposition of resistance. It is
therefore impossible that degrees should exist in that
power of the Divine Essence. He creates all things as if
they were but a single thing. And since degrees do not
exist in the power of the Divine Essence and it does not
admit of weakness or deficiency, no obstacle can in any
way obstruct it nor can the creation of anything cause it
difficulty. Since, then,
nothing is difficult for God’s power, He creates the
supreme resurrection with the same ease as spring; spring
with the same facility as a tree; and a tree with as
little trouble as a flower. Further, He creates a flower
as artistically as a tree; a tree as miraculously as a
spring; and a spring as comprehensively and wondrously as
a resurrection. All of this He accomplishes in front of
our eyes. It has been
proved in the Risale-i Nur with decisive and strong
proofs that if there were no Divine unity, the making of
a flower would be as difficult as a tree or even more
difficult; the making of a tree would be as hard a spring
or even more difficult; and creation would even lose its
value and artistic quality. An animate being that now
takes a minute to produce would be produced with
difficulty in one year, or maybe never at all. It is then on
account of this mystery that these fruits, flowers, trees
and animals, that are extremely valuable despite their
ubiquitousness and abundance, and extremely artistic
despite the swiftness and ease of their fashioning,
emerge in regular fashion onto the plain of being and
assume their functions. Proclaiming God’s glory, they
accomplish their duties and depart, leaving behind their
seed in their stead. S e c o
n d M y s t e r y : Through the mystery of
luminosity, transparency, and obedience, just as through
the manifestation of its essential power, a single sun
reflects it light in a single mirror, so too, through the
Divine command and due to the extensive activity of that
unrestricted power, it can easily bestow the same
reflection -together with its light and heat- on
innumerable mirrors, shining objects, and droplets. Great
and small are the same, there is no difference between
them. Similarly,
like a single word can enter the ear of one man without
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.182 trouble, so too due
to the infinite breadth of boundless creativity, it may
enter a million ears, with dominical permission. And a
single light like an eye, or a single luminous spirit
being like Gabriel, through the infinite breadth of
dominical activity within the manifestation of mercy, may
be present in, or look at, or enter thousands of places
through Divine power, as easily as they look at or enter
a single place. There is no difference between many and
few. The
pre-eternal power of God’s essence is the most subtle
and choicest of lights, the light of all lights; the
quiddities, essences and inner dimensions of all things
are luminous and lustrous as mirrors; all things, from
the atom, the plant, and the animate creature to the
stars, the suns and the moons, are extremely obedient and
submissive to the command of that power of the Divine
Essence and subordinate to the orders of that pre-eternal
power. It is for all of these reasons entirely natural
that innumerable things should be created with the same
ease as a single thing and placed side by side with each
other. No concern or task interferes with another. Great
and small, many and few, particular and universal - all
are the same for that power, for which nothing is
difficult. As was said in
the Tenth and Twenty-Ninth Words, through the mysteries
of order, equilibrium, obedience to command and
submission to order, that power causes a great ship as
big as a hundred houses, to move and advance as a
child’s finger pushes his toy. As a commander
will send a single infantryman into battle with an order
from his throne, so too he may throw a whole obedient
army into the fray with the same single order. Let us suppose
that two mountains are in a state of equilibrium in a
large and sensitive balance. In the same way that a
single walnut would cause one pan to rise and the other
to fall if placed on one side of a balance containing two
eggs, it would produce the same result with the scale
containing the mountains; through a wise law it would
cause one pan with its mountain to rise to the
mountain-top, and the other to descend with its mountain
to the bottom of the valley. Since there is
to be found in God’s absolute, infinite, luminous,
esssential and eternal power a Divine justice and
unending wisdom that is the origin, source, fundament and
beginning of all order, regularity and equilibrium in
creation; and since all things, particular and universal,
small and great, are obedient to the command of that
power and submissive to its workings - it follows that
God causes the stars to revolve and to move, through the
wisdom of His order, as easily as He rotates and moves
the atoms.
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.183 In spring,
just as He brings to life a single fly with a single
order, so too He bestows life with the same ease and the
same command on the whole species of fly, as well as all
the hosts of plants and animals, through the mystery of
the wisdom and equilibrium inherent in His power, and
then sends them forth onto the plain of life. In the same
way that he swiftly gives life to a tree in spring and
infuses vitality in its bones, with His wise and just
absolute power, He also resurrects in the spring the
corpse of the vast earth and brings into being hundreds
of thousands of different specimens of resurrection
similar to the tree, all this with the greatest of ease. With His
creative command, He brings the earth back to life. By
the decree of, There will be but
a single cry, then they shall all be brought nigh unto Us;37that
is, “all men and jinn, with a single cry and command
shall be brought to Us and made present at the plain of
resurrection.” Again, by His command, The hour shall be
but a blinking of the eye, or even closer;38that
is, the bringing about of resurrection and the gathering
that follows upon it shall take no longer than the
opening and closing of an eye, or even less. Then there
is the verse, Your creation and
resurrection is as a single soul,39meaning
the following: “O men! To create you and to bring you
to life, to resurrect and gather you, is as easy for me
as bringing one soul to life; it presents no problem to
My power.” Acccording to the inner sense of these three
verses, God will bring all men and jinn, all animals,
spirit beings and angels to the field of the Supreme
Gathering and the great balance with a single command and
with great ease. One concern does not interfere with
another. The remaining
Mysteries, from the third and fourth as far as the
thirteenth, have been postponed to another time in a
fashion disagreeable to me. THE FOURTH
TRUTH: The existence and appearance of all beings
proclaim the Divine unity in a self-evident fashion
through their numerous points of unity and convergence,
such as being simultaneously ____________________ 37. Qur’an, 36:53.
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.184 together and yet
separate and unique; resembling one another; being the
miniature or magnified versions of each other; being
some, universals and species, and some, particulars and
individuals; resembling each other in the stamp of innate
disposition; having affinity in the impress of artistry;
and aiding and complementing each other with respect to
their innate functions. They establish the unity of their
Maker. And with respect to dominicality, make it clear
that the cosmos is a universal and a whole that may not
be divided or fragmented. For example,
in each spring, to create, order and sustain the
innumerable members of the four hundred thousand
different species of plants and animals, together and
intermingled, in a single moment and in the same fashion,
without any error or mistake, with the utmost wisdom and
perfection of artistry; to create all the different
species of bird, from flies, which are like birds in
miniature, to eagles which are the supreme specimens of
the species, then to equip them with the means of flight
and subsistence and to cause them to journey through the
realm of the air; to imprint on the countenances of each
of the birds in miraculous fashion a stamp of artistry,
on the body of each of them a seal of wisdom, and in the
quiddity of each of them, in sustaining fashion, a sign
of God’s unity; to cause wisely and mercifully
particles of food to hasten to the aid of the cells of
the body, plants to rush to the assistance of animals,
and all mothers to go swiftly to the help of their
powerless infants; to work on all things, particular and
universal, from the Milky Way, the solar system and the
elements of the earth, down to the veils of the pupil of
the eye, the petals of the rose, the husk of the corn,
the seeds of the melon, like a series of intersecting
circles, with the same regularity, perfection of
artistry, the same deed, and plenitude of wisdom - to do
all this establishes the following with self-evident
certainty: He who
performs these deeds is One and unique; His imprint is on
all things. In the same way that He is not in any place,
he is present in every place. Like the sun, all things
are distant from Him, but He is close to all things. Just
as the greatest objects, such as the Milky Way and the
solar system, are not difficult for Him, so too the cells
in man’s blood and the thoughts that pass across his
heart are not secret from Him nor beyond the reach of His
power. However great
and multitudinous a thing may be, it is as easy for Him
as the smallest and scarcest thing, for He creates with
ease a fly on the model of an eagle, a seed in the form
of a tree, a tree in the shape of a garden, a garden with
the artistry of a spring, and a spring on the scale of a
resurrection. Things most valuable in their artistry He
gives to us and bestows upon us most cheaply. The price
that He asks of us is merely to
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.185 say “In the name of
God” and “Praise be to God.” In other words, the
accepted price for all those numerous precious bounties
is to say at the beginning of all things, “In the Name
of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate,” and at their
end, “Praise be to God.” Since this
Fourth Truth is explained and proved elsewhere in the
Risale-i Nur, we content ourselves here with this brief
allusion. THE FIFTH
TRUTH perceived by our traveller at the second stage:
the existence in the entirety of the cosmos, its pillars
and parts and all the beings contained in it, of the most
perfect order and regularity; the sameness of the
substances and purposive beings that are the means of the
rotation and administration of that vast kingdom and are
connected to its general scheme; the fact that the Divine
Names and deeds that are at work in that magnificent
city, that vast exhibition, encompass and comprehend all
things or most things, despite their being one within the
other, and of the same nature, and the same, and their
being the same Name and deed in every place; the fact
that the elements and species that are the means for the
administration, inhabiting, and construction of that
well-adorned palace, cover the whole face of the earth in
their diffusion, despite their being one within the
other, of the same nature, and the same element and the
same species being found everywhere - all of this
demands, proves, and affirms, necessarily and
self-evidently, the following: The Maker and
Disposer of this cosmos, the Monarch and Nurturer of this
realm, the Master and Builder of this palace, is one,
unique, sole. He has neither like nor peer, neither
minister nor aide. He has neither partner nor opposite,
he has neither inability nor deficiency. Yes, order is in
itself a perfect expression of unity; it demands a single
orderer. It leaves no place for the assignment of
partners to God, the source of dispute and dissension. There is a
wise and precise order inherent in all things, whether
universal or particular, from the total scheme of the
cosmos and the daily and annual rotation of the earth
down to the physiognomy of man, the complex of senses in
man’s head and the circulation of white and red cells
in man’s blood. Nothing other than One Absolutely
Powerful and Absolutely Wise can stretch out its hand
intentionally and creatively toward any thing, nor
interfere with it. On the contrary, all things are
recipients, means of manifestation, and passive. Now, ordering,
the pursuit of certain purposes and the bestowal of
regularity with a view to certain benefits, can be done
only by means of knowledge and wisdom and performed only
with will and choice.
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.186 Certainly and
in all events, this wisdom-nurturing regularity, this
infinitely varied ordering of the cosmos that before our
very eyes assures various benefits, proves and affirms to
a self-evident degree that the Creator and Disposer of
all beings is one, an agent possessing will and choice.
Everything comes into being through His power, assumes a
particular state through His will, and takes on a
particular form through His choice. The
heat-giving lamp of this hospice that is the world is
one; its candle that is the basis for the reckoning of
time is one; its merciful sponge is one; its fiery cook
is one; its life-giving beverage is one; its well-guarded
field is one, as well as a thousand and one other
instances of oneness. It follows from all of these
instances of oneness that the Maker and Master of this
hospice is also one, that He is extremely generous and
hospitable, for He employs numerous high-ranking and
great officials to serve the animate guests of His
hospice. Names such as
All-Wise, Compassionate, Giver of Forms, Disposer,
Quickener, and Nurturer, the impresses and manifestations
of which are to be seen at work in every corner of the
world, attributes such as wisdom, mercy, and grace, and
acts such as formation, disposition and nurturing, are
all one. They embrace every place in the utmost degree,
each Name and act being present there. They also
complement the imprint of each other in such a way that
it is as if those Names and deeds were uniting in such
fashion that power becomes identical with wisdom and
mercy, and wisdom becomes identical with grace and life.
For example, as soon as the activity of the Name of
Quickener appears in a thing, the activity of numerous
other Names such as Creator, Giver of Form, and Provider,
also appears at the same instant, everywhere, and in the
same system. This of a certainty and self-evidently
establishes and proves that that which is designated by
the Names and the Doer of the comprehensive deeds that
appear everywhere in the same fashion must also be one,
single and unique. In this we believe and to this we give
our assent! The elements
that are the substance and material of creation encompass
the whole earth. Each of the species of creation that
bears an imprint attesting unity is diffused throughout
the earth in unity and, so to speak, conquers it. This
also proves to the degree of being self-evident that
those elements together with what they embrace, and those
species, together with their separate members, are the
product and property of a single being. They are the
products and servants of so Unique and Powerful a One
that He employs those vast and and imperious elements as
obedient servants and those species diffused throughout
the earth as well-
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.187 disciplined soldiers.
Since this truth also has been established and explained
in other places in the Risale-i Nur, we content ourselves
here with this brief indication. In summary of
the witnessings that he derived from these Five Truths,
through the superabundance of faith and the joy of Divine
unity, and in expression of his feelings, our traveller
said to his heart: Look upon the
coloured page of the cosmic book; See what forms the
golden pen of power has traced. No dark point
remains for the gaze of the heart’s eye; It is as if God
has inscribed His signs with light. Know too that: The leaves in the
world’s book are dimensions infinite; The lines of
time’s events are works innumerable. Written on the
workbench of the Preserved Tablet of reality, A meaningful
embodied word, is every being in this world. Listen also to this: When all things
proclaim, “No god but God,” they will in unison say,
“O Truth and Reality!” and beseech in harmony, “O
Living One!” Yes, in all things there is a sign
pointing to the fact that He is One. Hearkening to this
his heart and soul affirmed the truth of what they heard
and said, “Yes, indeed!” In brief
allusion to the Five Truths of Unity observed by our
traveller through the world, our voyager through the
cosmos, at this Second Stopping-Place, it was said in the
Second Chapter of the First Station: There is no god
but God, the One, the Unique, to Whose Unity in Necessary
Existence points the witnessing of the truth of Grandeur
and Sublimity, its perfection and comprehensiveness; the
witnessing of the truth of the appearance of deeds in
absolute fashion, in infinitude, without any limitation
except that of God’s will and wisdom; the witnessing of
the truth of the creation of beings in absolute
multiplicity with absolute swiftness, the creation of
creatures in absolute ease with absolute perfection, the
origination of things made in absolute plenitude with
utter perfection of artistry and value; the witnessing of
the truth of the existence of beings in universal and
comprehensive fashion, joined, interconnected and
interrelated; the witnessing of the truth of universal
order, an order incompatible with the assignation of
partners to God; the witnessing of the unity of the
sources of cosmic order, a unity that clearly attests the
unity of their Maker; the unity of the Names and deeds
that comprehend and permeate the universe; and the
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.188 unity of the
elements and species dispersed over the face of the earth
in imperious fashion. That world
traveller voyaging through different ages chanced upon
the school of the Renewer of the Second Millenium, Imam-i
Rabbani, Ahmad Faruqi. He entered and listened to the
lesson being taught by the Imam: “The most
important result yielded by all the Sufi paths is the
unfolding of the truths of belief. The unfolding in
clarity of a single truth of belief is preferable to a
thousand miraculous deeds and mystical visions.” The Imam said
too: “In former
times, great persons said that someone will arise from
among the theologians and the scholars of the science of
theology. He will prove all the truths of belief and
Islam with rational proofs and the utmost clarity. I wish
to be that man and maybe I am.”40 He
continued his instruction by saying that belief and the
assertion of Divine unity were the foundation, substance,
light and life of all human perfection; that the Hadith
“An hour’s reflective thought is better than a
year’s worship”41 refers to reflection on
belief; and that the silent mode of invocation practised
in the Naqshbandi Order is a form of this most excellent
reflection. The traveller
listened with utmost care. He turned and addressed
himself as follows: “It is thus that this heroic Imam
speaks. To increase the strength of one’s belief by as
much as an atom is worth more than a ton of gnosis or
other form of perfection and sweeter than the honey of a
hundred visionary experiences. “On the
other hand, the philosophers of ____________________ 40. Time has proven
that the man referred to here is not in fact an
individual, but the Risale-i Nur itself. It maybe that
the people of unveiling happened to notice the
insignificant interpreter and proclaimer of the Risale-i
Nur and hence came to speak of “a man.” 41. al-‘Ajluni, Kashf
al-Khafa, i, 310.
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.189 prayer, and in order
to see a third stopping-place in this realm of
instruction, let us knock at the door of the dominical
sustenance of the animate world and open it with the key
of ‘In the Name of God, the Merciful, the
Compassionate.’” Speaking thus he beseechingly
knocked at the gate of this Third Stopping-Place, a
compendium of wonders, and a spectacle of marvels. Saying, “In
the Name of God, the Opener,” he opened the gate. The
Third Stopping-Place became visible to him. He entered
and saw that it was illumined by four great and
encompassing truths that demonstrated the Divine unity as
brightly as the sun. THE FIRST
TRUTH: the Truth of Opening That is, the
opening up from a single simple substance of innumerable
varied and separate forms, together, everywhere, in a
single instant and by a single deed, through the
manifestation of the Name of Opener.Yes, in the same way
that God’s creative power has opened up innumerable
beings like flowers in the garden of the cosmos, and
endowed each with an orderly form and distinct identity,
through the manifestation of the Name of Opener, so too,
although in more miraculous fashion, he has given to the
four hundred thousand species of animate beings in the
garden of the earth each its symmetrical, adorned and
distinct form. He creates you in
the wombs of your mothers, creation after creation in
three darknesses. That is God, your Sustainer. His is the
sovereignty; there is no god other than He. Where, then,
will you turn?42Nought is
hidden from God, neither on earth nor in the heavens. He
it is Who forms you in the wombs as He wills; there is no
god but He, the Mighty, the Wise.43As
these two verses indicate, the strongest proof of Divine
unity and the most remarkable miracle of Divine Power is
God’s opening up of forms. Because the opening of forms
is repeatedly established and expounded in different ways
elsewhere in the Risale-i Nur, and particularly in the
Sixth and Seventh Degrees of the First Chapter of the
Second Station of this treatise, we refer the discussion
of this matter to those places and restrict ourselves
here to the following: According to
the testimony of botany and biology, based on profound
research, there is in the opening and unfolding of forms,
such comprehen ____________________ 42. Qur’an, 39:6. The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.190 siveness and artistry
that other than a Single and Unique One, One Absolutely
Powerful, able to see and do all things in all things, no
one could undertake this comprehensive and all-embracing
deed. For this deed of the unfolding of forms demands a
wisdom, an attention and a comprehensiveness that are
present at all times and are contained within an infinite
power. This power, in turn, can be found only in that
Unique Being Who administers the whole cosmos. As is decreed
in the above-quoted verses, God’s attribute of
‘opening’ expressed in the opening and creation of
the forms of men from their mother’s wombs, within
three darknesses, separately, with equilibrium,
distinctness, and order, without any error, confusion, or
mistake; this truth of the unfolding of the forms of all
men and animals, all over the earth, with the same power,
the same wisdom and the same artistry, is a most powerful
proof of God’s unity. For to comprehend and embrace all
things is itself a form of unity that leaves no room for
the assignation of partners to God. Just as the nineteen
Truths of the First Chapter bearing witness to the
necessary existence of God also attest the existence of
the Creator through their own existence, so too they bear
witness to His unity through their comprehensiveness. Our
traveller then saw the following Second Truth in the
Third Stopping-Place: THE SECOND
TRUTH: the Truth of Mercifulness We see with
our own eyes that there is one who has covered the face
of the earth with thousands of gifts of mercy, and made
it into a feasting-place. He has laid out a spread of
hundreds of thousands of the different delicious foods of
Mercifulness, and made the inside of the earth a
storehouse containing thousands of precious bounties of
compassionateness and wisdom. That Being sends to us also
the earth, in its yearly rotation, like a ship or a
train, laden with the finest of the hundreds of thousands
of vital human necessities, proceeding from the World of
the Unseen; and He sends to us too the spring, like a
waggon carrying food and clothing for us. Thus does he
nurture us, with utmost compassion. In order for us to
profit from those gifts and bounties, He has moreover
given us hundreds and thousands of appetities, needs,
feelings, sensations and senses. As was set
forth in the Fourth Ray concerning the verse on the
sufficiency of God, He has given us a stomach that can
take pleasure in infinite varieties of food. He has given
us such a life that through the senses associated with it
we can derive benefit from the innumerable bounties of
the vast corporeal world, just as if it were some
bounteous spread.
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.191 He has
favoured us with the human state so that we delight in
the boundless gifts of both the spiritual and material
worlds, through instruments such as the intellect and the
heart. He has
conveyed Islam to us so that we derive light from the
boundless treasuries of the Unseen and Manifest Realms. He has guided
us to faith so that we are illumined by the innumerable
lights and gifts of this world and the hereafter. This
cosmos is like a palace fitted out and adorned by the
Divine quality of mercy with innumerable antiques and
valuable items, which then gives to man’s hands the
keys to open all the chests and chambers in that palace,
as well as bestowing on man’s nature all the needs and
senses that will enable him to make use of them. This mercy
that embraces this world and the hereafter, and indeed
all things, is without doubt a manifestation of oneness
within unity. Just as the
light of the sun is a parable of unity, through its
comprehending all things that face it, every bright and
transparent object that receives the reflection of the
light, heat, and seven colours of the sun, is also a
parable and a symbol of oneness. Hence, whoever sees its
all-embracing light will conclude that the sun of this
earth is one and unique. Witnessing the warm and luminous
reflection of the sun in all bright objects, and even in
drops of water, he will say that the oneness of the sun,
or the sun itself, is present with its attributes close
to all things; it is at the mirrorlike heart of all
things. So too the
encompassing of all things by the extensive mercy of the
Merciful One of Beauty, like a light, demonstrates the
unity of that Merciful One and that He in no way has any
partner. Similarly, the fact that under the veil of that
all-embracing mercy the lights of most of the Merciful
One’s Names and a sort of manifestation of His essence
are found in everything, and especially in all living
beings, and in man in particular, and the fact that this
gives each individual a comprehensiveness arising from
life which causes him to look to and be related to the
whole universe, proves the oneness of the Merciful One
and that He is present with all things and does all
things in all things. Yes, the
Merciful One shows the splendour of His glory in the
whole of the cosmos and all over the earth through the
unity and comprehensiveness of His mercy. With the
manifestation of His oneness, He gathers together in
every member of all animate species, and particularly
man, specimens of all His bounties, orders the tools and
instruments of animate beings, and proclaims the special
solicitude of His beauty to each individual, this without
shattering the wholeness of the universe. As for man, it
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.192 is in him that God
makes known in concentrated form the various forms of His
bounty. Similarly, a
melon can be said to be concentrated in its seed; the
being that makes the seed must necessarily be he who
makes the melon. Then, with the special balance of his
knowledge and the particular law of his wisdom, he draws
the seed out from it, gathers it together and clothes it
in a body. Nothing other than the one and unique master
craftsman who makes the melon is able to make its seed.
That would be impossible. Since through
the manifestation of Mercifulness the cosmos becomes like
a tree or a garden, the earth becomes like a fruit or a
melon, and man becomes like a seed, of a certainty the
Creator and Sustainer of the smallest animate being must
be the Creator of all the earth and all the cosmos. In
Short: just as the making and unfolding of
the regular and orderly forms of all beings through the
truth of Opening, which is comprehensive, proves unity to
the point of being self-evident, so too the truth of
Mercifulness, which encompasses all things, through its
nurturing of all animate beings that come into existence
and enter the life of this world, particularly the newly
arrived, with the utmost order and regularity, causing
all necessities to reach them, forgetting none of them,
this same mercy reaching all individuals everywhere at
the same instant demonstrates both unity, and oneness
within unity. Our traveller then witnessed the following
Third Truth in the Third Stopping-Place THE THIRD
TRUTH: the Truth of Disposing and Administering That is, to
administer with complete order and equilibrium both the
awesome and swift-moving heavenly bodies and imperious,
interfering elements, and the needy, weak denizens of
earth; to cause them to aid each other; to administer
them jointly with each other; to take all necessary
measures concerning them; and to make this vast world
like a perfect kingdom, a magnificent city, a
well-adorned palace.Leaving side the vast spheres of this
imperious and merciful administration, since it is
explained and proved in important sections of the
Risale-i Nur such as the Tenth Word, we will show, by
means of a comparison, a single page and stage of that
administration as it manifests itself in the spring on
the face of the earth. Let us
suppose, for example, that some wondrous world conqueror
assembled an army from four hundred thousand different
groups and nationalities, and supplied the clothes and
weapons, the instructions and dismissals and salaries of
every group and nationality, separately and variously,
without any defect or shortcoming, without error or
mistake, at the
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.193 proper time, without
any delay or confusion, with the utmost regularity and in
most perfect form, no cause other than the extraordinary
power of that wondrous commander could stretch out is
hand to attempt that vast, complex, subtle, balanced,
multitudinous and just administration. Were it to stretch
out its hand, it would destroy the equilibrium and cause
confusion. So too we see
with our own eyes that an unseen hand creates and
administers every spring a magnificent army composed of
four hundred thousand different species. In the autumn
-an example of the day of resurrection- it dismisses
three hundred thousand out of those four hundred thousand
species of plants and animals from their duties, and they
go on leave through the activity of death and in the name
of decease.. In spring -a
sample of the gathering that follows resurrection- it
constructs three hundred thousand examples of raising
from the dead in the space of a few weeks, with the
utmost order and discipline. In the case of the tree,
four such resurrections take place with respect to the
tree itself, its leaves, its flowers, and its fruits.
After showing spring to our eyes exactly like the
preceding one, it gives each species and group in that
army of glory that contains four hundred thousand
different species its appropriate sustenance and
provision, its defensive weapons and distinctive
garments, its orders and dismissals, and all the tools
and instruments it needs, with the utmost order and
regularity, without error or slip, without confusion or
omission, in unexpected fashion and at the proper time.
It thus proves its unity, oneness, uniqueness, and
infinite power and boundless mercy within perfection of
dominicality, sovereignty and wisdom, and writes with the
pen of Divine Determining this proclamation of Divine
unity on the face of the earth, on the page of every
spring. After reading
only a single page of this proclamation of one spring,
our traveller said to himself: “The torment
of Hell-fire is pure justice for those who commit the
error of denying resurrection. For such denial would be
to refute the numerous promises and to deny the power of
One Powerful and Compelling, a Wrathful One of Glory, Who
has promised and assured all of His prophets thousands of
times and set forth in thousands of verses of the
Qur’an, explicity and by way of allusion, that He will
bring about a resurrection and gathering far easier for
Him than the thousands of miraculous gatherings that
occur every spring, each more wondrous than the Supreme
Gathering.” His soul responded: “We believe in what
you say.”
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.194 THE FOURTH
TRUTH, which forms the Thirty-Third Degree: the Truth
of Compassionateness and Bestowal of Provision That is, the
giving, over the whole face of the globe, within the
earth, in the air above it and the ocean around it, to
all animate beings, especially those endowed with spirit,
and among them especially the impotent, the weak and the
young, all of their necessary sustenance, material and
immaterial, in the most solicitous manner, deriving it
from dry and rude soil, from solid, bonelike dry pieces
of wood, and in the case of the most delicate of all
forms of sustenance, from between blood and urine, at the
proper time, in orderly fashion, without any omission or
confusion, in front of our eyes, by an unseen hand. Yes, the
verse, God is the
Provider, the firm possessor of strength,44 restricts to God the
task of sustaining and providing, and the verse, There is no moving
thing on earth but depends on God for its sustenance; He
knows its resting-place and storage-place; all is in a
book perspicuous45 provides a dominical
guarantee and pledge to furnish provision for all men and
animals. Similarly, the verse, The beasts do not
carry their sustenance; God sustains them and you, and He
is All-Hearing, All-Knowing,46 establishes and
proclaims that it is God Who guarantees and provides for
all impotent, powerless, weak and wretched creatures that
are unable to secure their own sustenance, in an
unexpected fashion, indeed from the Unseen or even out of
nothing; it is He for example Who provides for insects on
the ocean bed and their young. This proclamation is
directed in particular to those men who worship causes
and are unaware that it is He Who bestows provision from
behind the veil of causality. Numerous other verses of
the Qur’an and innumerable pieces of cosmic evidence
unanimously demonstrate that it is the compassionateness
of a single Glorious Provider that nurtures all animate
beings. Now the trees
require a certain form of sustenance but have neither
power nor will. They remain therefore in their places,
trusting in God, and their provision comes hastening to
them. So too the sustenance of infants flows to their
mouths from wondrous small pumps, aided by the solici ____________________ 44. Qur’an, 51:58.
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.195 tude and tenderness
of their mothers. Then when the infants acquire a little
power and will, the milk ceases. These various instances
clearly prove that licit sustenance is not proportionate
to will and power, but comes in relation to weakness and
impotence, which induce trust in God. Will, power
and cleverness frequently incite greed, which is a source
of loss, and often push certain learned men toward a form
of beggary, whereas by contrast the trusting weakness of
the boorish, crude and common man may cause him to attain
riches. The proverb,
“How many a learned man has striven in vain, and how
many an ignoramus gained rich provision,” establishes
that licit provision is not won by power and will, but by
a mercy that finds working and striving acceptable; it is
bestowed by a tenderness that takes pity on need. Now provision
and sustenance is of two kinds: The First
is true and natural provision, that required for life;
this is guaranteed by the Sustainer. It is indeed so
regular and well-ordered that this natural provision,
stored in the body in the form of fat and other things,
is enough to ensure survival for at least twenty days,
even if nothing is eaten. Those who apparently die of
hunger before the twenty or thirty days are up and before
the provision stored up in their body is exhausted, die
in reality not from a lack of provision, but from a
disease arising from lack of caution and the disturbance
of fixed habit. The Second
Form of Provision: metaphorical and artifical
provision, arising due to addiction from habit,
wastefulness and misuse, but acquiring the appearance of
necessity. This form is not guaranteed by the Sustainer,
but depends on His generosity: sometimes He may give it,
sometimes He may not give it. With respect
to this second form of provision and sustenance, happy is
he who regards his frugality -a source of happiness and
pleasure- contentment and licit striving, as a form of
worship and active prayer for sustenance. He accepts
God’s bounty gratefully and appreciatively, and passes
his life in happpy fashion. Wretched is he
who on account of prodigality -the source of wretchedness
and loss- and greed, abandons licit striving, knocks at
every door, passes his life in sloth, oppression and
wretchedness, and indeed puts his own life to death. In the same
way that a stomach requires sustenance, so too the subtle
capacities and senses of man, his heart, spirit,
intelligence, eye, ear and mouth, also request their
sustenance from the Compassionate Provider and gratefully
receive it. To each of them separately and in appropriate The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.196 form is presented
such provision from the treasury of mercy as will rejoice
them and give them pleasure. Indeed, the Compassionate
Provider, in order to give to them provision in more
generous measure has created each of man’s subtle
capacities -eye and ear, heart, imagination, and
intellect- in the form of a key to His treasury of mercy.
For example, the eye is a key to the treasury containing
such precious jewels as the fairness and beauty to be
seen on the face of the universe, and the same holds true
of all the others mentioned; they all benefit through
faith. To resume after our digression: The
All-Powerful and Wise One Who created this cosmos created
also life as a comprehensive summary of the cosmos, and
concentrated all of His purposes and the manifestations
of His Names therein. So too, within the realm of life,
he made of provision a comprehensive centre of activity
and created within animate beings the taste for
provision, thus causing animate beings to respond to His
dominicality and love with a permanent and universal
gratitude, thankfulness, and worship that is one of the
significant purposes and instances of wisdom inherent in
the creation of the universe. For example,
it is one of the activities of dominicality to cause
every area of the broad realm of dominicality to rejoice
- the heavens are caused to rejoice with the angels and
spirit beings, the World of the Unseen with spirits, and
the material world, particularly the air and the earth,
with the existence of all animate beings, particularly
birds, great and small, at all times and places. Through
the wisdom of this causing to rejoice and the infusion of
life and spirit, animals and men are, as it were, whipped
by the need for provision and the pleasure they take
therein to pursue their provision and sustenance, thus
being delivered from sloth. This too is one of the wise
activities of dominicality. Were it not for such
significant instances of wisdom, the provision destined
for animals would be caused instinctively to hasten
toward them to satisfy their needs, without any effort on
their part, just as provision and sustenance is caused to
hasten toward the tree. Were there to
be an eye capable of witnessing and comprehending the
whole surface of the earth at one time, in order to
perceive the beauties of the Names of Compassionate and
Provider and the witness they bear to Divine unity, it
would see what sweet beauty is contained in the tender
and solicitous manifestation of the Compassionate
Provider Who sends to the caravans of animals at the end
of winter, when their provision is about to be exhausted,
extremely delicious, abundant and varied foods and
bounties, drawn exclusively from His unseen treasury of
mercy, as
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.197 succour from the
unseen and Divine generosity, placed in the hands of
plants, the crowns of trees, and the breasts of mothers.
The possessor of that all-seeing eye would realize the
following: The making of
a single apple, and the generous giving of it to a man as
true sustenance and provision, can be accomplished only
by a Being Who causes the seasons, the nights and the
days to rotate, Who causes the globe to revolve like a
cargo ship, and thus brings the fruits of the seasons
within reach of those needy guests of the earth who stand
waiting for them. For the stamp of its nature, the seal
of wisdom, the imprint of eternal besoughtedness, the
signet of mercy that is to be found on the surface of the
apple, is to be found also on all apples and other
fruits, plants and animals. Hence the true Master and
Maker of the apple is bound to be the Glorious Sovereign,
the Beauteous Creator of all the inhabitants of the
world, who are the peers, the congeners and the brothers
of the apple; of the vast earth that is the garden of the
apple; of the tree of the cosmos that is its factory; of
the seasons that are its workshop; and of the spring and
summer that are its place of maturing. In other
words, every fruit is a seal of unity that makes known
the Writer and Maker of the earth, its tree, and of the
book of the universe, its garden; it demonstrates His
unity, and shows to the number of fruits, the seal
affixed to the decree of unity. Since the
Risale-i Nur is a manifestation of the Names of
All-Compassionate and All-Wise, and numerous flashes and
mysteries of the truth of Compassionateness have been
expounded and proved in many parts of the Risale-i Nur,
we leave further discussion of the matter to those parts
and content ourselves with this brief indication, out of
a vast treasury, on account of the unfavourable
circumstances from which we are now suffering. Our traveller
now says: “Praise be to God! I have seen and heard
Thirty-Three Truths bearing witness to the necessary
existence and unity of the Creator and Sovereign I was
everywhere seeking and enquiring after. Each of the
truths is bright as the sun and leaves no darkness
behind. It is as strong and unshakeable as a mountain.
Each of them, with its verifications, bears decisive
witness to His existence, and with its comprehensiveness
proves His unity in manifest fashion. While proving
implicitly all the pillars of faith, the totality and
consensus of these truths causes our belief to advance
from imitation to realization, from realization to
knowledge of certainty, from knowledge of certainty to
vision of certainty, and from vision of certainty to
absolute certainty. Praise be to God; this is from the
bounty of my Sustainer.”
The Rays / The
Supreme Sign - First Chapter - p.198 Praise be to God
Who guided us to this; verily we would not have been
guided unless God had guided us. The messengers of God
have come to us with the truth.47 In
extremely brief allusion to the lights of belief derived
by our inquisitive traveller from the four sublime truths
he witnessed at the Third Stopping-Place, it was said in
the Second Chapter of the First Station, concerning the
truths of the Third Stopping-Place: There is no god
other than God, the One, the Unique, to Whose Unity in
Necessary Existence points the witnessing of the
sublimity of the comprehensiveness of the truth of
opening, through the unfolding of different forms of four
hundred thousand species of living beings, perfect and
without defect, according to the testimony of biology and
botany; the witnessing of the sublimity of the
comprehensiveness of the truth of mercifulness,
all-embracing and regular, without any deficiency, as the
eye can see; the witnessing of the sublimity of the truth
of administering, that encompasses in orderly fashion all
living beings, without error or defect; the witnessing of
the sublimity of the comprehensivness of the truth of
compassionateness and sustaining, embracing all consumers
of sustenance, at every time of need, without any mistake
or forgetfulness; Glory be unto Him, the Provider, the
Merciful, the Compassionate, the Solicitous, the
Generous; His gifts are universal, and His Generosity is
all-embracing; there is no god but He! Glory be unto You;
we have no knowledge save that which You have taught us;
indeed, You are All-Knowing, All-Wise.48O
our Sustainer! For the sake of ‘In the name of God, the
Merciful, the Compassionate,’ O God, O Merciful One, O
Compassionate One! Bestow peace and blessings upon our
master Muhammad, his Family and all his Companions, to
the number of all the letters in the Risale-i Nur,
multiplied by ten times the number of minutes in all of
our lives in this world and the hereafter, and then by
the number of particles in my body throughout the course
of my life. Forgive me, and those who aid me in sincerity
in the copying and distribution of the Risale-i Nur, and
our fathers, our masters, our shaykhs, our sisters, our
brothers, and the sincere students of the Risale-i Nur,
particularly those who write and copy this treatise; by
Your Mercy, O Most Merciful of the Merciful, Amen. The
conclusion of our prayer is, ‘Praise be to God, the
Sustainer of All The Worlds!’ ba ____________________ 47. Qur’an,
The Rays / p.199 NOTE Since the other parts
of the Risale-i Nur were not available in the place that
saw the composition of the foregoing treatise, which was
of necessity written down here, certain important matters
of The Words and The Flashes have been mentioned also in
The Supreme Sign, in what is an apparent repetition. In
order to have the students of the Risale-i Nur in this
area write a complete Risale-i Nur in miniature, we
nonetheless had them write down all the present treatise. The revised copy of
this rough draft was written by a certain blessed person.
Even though he was ignorant of such matters, we saw in
the copy prepared by him a subtle and profound
correspondence of the letters: there were six hundred and
sixty-six alifs49 written at the beginning of the lines
in his copy. This number corresponds fully with the value
according to the abjad of the title given to this
treatise by Imam ‘Ali (May God be pleased with him),
Ayat al-Kubra (The Supreme Sign), and thus demonstrates
the suitability of this title for the treatise. We also
understood this numerical correspondence to be an
indication that this treatise is a flash derived from the
light of the verses of the Qur’an for they are six
thousand six hundred and sixty-six in number. S a i d N u r s i ba ____________________ 49. Alif: the
first letter of the Arabic alphabet, written as a
vertical stroke, and the numerical value of which is one.
[Tr.]
The Rays / p.200 ON THE PURPOSE OF THE RISALE-I
NUR Today, I
listened to an imaginary exchange of question and answer.
Let me set forth for you a summary of it. Someone said:
“The great mobilization and complete preparedness of
the Risale-i Nur for the sake of belief and the proving
of the Divine unity is constantly increasing. One
hundredth part of its contents is enough to silence the
most obstinate atheist; why then this further feverish
mobilization and preparation?” They answered
him: “The Risale-i Nur is not only repairing some minor
damage or some small house; it is repairing vast damage
and the all-embracing citadel which contains Islam, the
stones of which are the size of mountains. And it is not
striving to reform only a private heart and an individual
conscience; it is striving to cure with the medicines of
the Qur’an and belief and the Qur’an’s
miraculousness the collective heart and generally-held
ideas, which have been breached in awesome fashion by the
tools of corruption prepared and stored up over a
thousand years, and the general conscience, which is
facing corruption through the destruction of the
foundations, currents, and marks of Islam which are the
refuge of all and particularly the mass of believers. |