altitude of The Chief Judge, Ali Riza Balaban, who had the courtroom arranged like an amphitheatre. he took it back. And the Judge did prove to be fair, both in the final outcome of the case, and in allowing Bediuzzaman to sit while the Court was in session despite the objections of the Prosecutor." They walked from the prison to the Court, a line of seventy handcuffed in pairs. It was the only time the Students from the various parts of the prison could meet. They handcuffed Bediuzzaman to a different person each time. Accompanied by more than thirty gendarmes with fixed bayonets, the people of Denizli lined their route and expressed their sorrow and sympathy.

• Extracts from Bediuzzaman's Defence

"In His Name, be He be glorified!
"Sirs!
"I tell you with certainty that apart from those here who have no connection or little connection with us and the Risale-i Nur, I have as many true brothers and loyal friends on the way of truth as you could wish. Through the certain discoveries of the Risale-i Nur, we know with the unshakeable certainty of twice two equalling four that through the mystery of the Qur'an for us death has been transformed from eternal extinction into a discharge from duties, and that for those who oppose us and follow misguidance certain death is either eternal extinction (if they do not have certain belief in the hereafter), or everlasting, dark solitary confinement (if they believe in the hereafter and go the way of vice and misguidance). Is there a greater or more important question for man in this world than this that it can be a tool for it? I ask you! Since there is not and cannot be, why do you strive against us? In the face of your greatest penalty we receive our discharge papers to go to the world of light, so we await it in complete steadfastness. But we know as clearly as seeing it, like we see you in this Court, that those who reject us and condemn us on behalf of misguidance will in a very short time be condemned to eternal extinction and solitary confinement and will suffer that awesome punishment, and through the vein of humanity