Suddenly through the light of the Qur’an and through the guidance of Ghawth al- A‘zam, Shaykh Geylani, my grievous state was transformed into a joyful one. It was like this:

The light proceeding from the Qur’an gave me the following thought: you had one or two officer friends while a prisoner-of-war in exile in Kosturma in the north- east. You knew that they would in any event go to Istanbul. If one of them had asked you: “Do you want to go to Istanbul, or to stay here?” For sure if you had had a jot of intelligence, you would joyfully have chosen to go to Istanbul. For out of a thousand and one friends, nine hundred and ninet y-nine were already in Istanbul. Only one or two remained there, and they too would leave. Going to Istanbul for you would not be a sad departure and sorrowful separation. Moreover  you  have come here and were you not happy to do so? You were delivered from the long,  dark nights and cold, stormy winters in that enemy country. You came to Istanbul, a worldly paradise.

In just the same way, from your childhood to your present age, ninety-nine out of

a hundred of those you love have migrated to the graveyard, which terrifies you. You have one or two friends still in this world, and they too will depart. Your death in this world is not separation; it is union; it is to be reunited with all those friends. I was reminded that they,  that is those immortal spirits, have left behind under the earth their worn-out dwellings, and some of them are travelling about the stars and some in the levels of the Intermediate Realm.

Yes, the Qur’an and belief proved this truth so certainly that you should believe it as though  seeing it if you are not entirely lacking heart and spirit, and misguidance has not suffocated your heart. For most certainly and self-evidently the All-Generous Maker  who  adorns  this  world  with  innumerable  sorts  of gifts  and  bounties,  and demonstrates His dominicality munificently and compassionately, and preserves even the least significant things like seeds, would not annihilate or send to nothingness or waste man as unkindly and purposelessly as it superficially appears, for he is the most perfect, comprehensive, important, and beloved among His creatures. Rather, like the seeds a farmer scatters on the earth, the Compassionate Creator temporarily casts that beloved creature of His under the ground,  which  is a door of mercy, in order to

produce shoots in another life.8

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8   This truth has been proved as clearly as twice two equals four in other parts of the Risale-i Nur, and especially in the Tenth and Twenty-Ninth Words.