The Ninth: This is very important, but since those who have convicted us have studied the Risale-i Nur, I have not written it so as not to upset them.

The Tenth: This is powerful and important, but again so as not to offend them, I have not written it for now.

S a i d N u r s i ,

who is being held in absolute solitary confinement.

***

[Part of a petition written during the Eskishehir trial fifteen years ago and sent to the Cabinet.]45

You who “bind and loose”!

I have suffered an injustice the like of which has rarely been seen in the world. To remain silent before such an injustice is disrespect for right. I am compelled therefore to divulge a most important fact. Demonstrate the fault I have committed so that the law demands either my execution or a hundred and one year’s imprisonment, or prove that I am completely mad, or else give complete freedom to myself, my treatises, and my friends, and collect our losses from those who caused them.

Yes, every government has a law and a principle according to which penalties are given. If there is nothing in the laws of the Government of the Republic to necessitate the heaviest penalty for myself and my friends, we should be given our complete freedom, as well as recompense and appreciation and an apology. For if my important service of the Qur’an, which is clear and open, is against the Government, I should receive not a year’s sentence in this way and a number of my friends, six months each, I should be given the death sentence or a hundred and one year’s imprisonment and those earnestly attached to me and my work should be given the heaviest penalties. But if our service is not against the Government, we should receive not penalties, charges and imprisonment, but appreciation and recompense. For it is service the nature of which may be understood through its one hundred and twenty treatises, and its