Vauxhall Tea Party

Phase 1 · Foundations

Week 01

In the Name

The Words · The First Word

01

Story

  1. 01Whoever crosses this desert must travel in the name of its chief, or face it alone.

  2. 02Two men set out. One is humble, the other proud.

  3. 03The humble one takes the chief’s name. The proud one will cross on his own strength.

  4. 04In that name the first passes bandits unharmed and is welcomed in every tent.

  5. 05The second trembles at everything, begs for everything, and is brought low.

A parable retold from the First Word. The wording here is ours, the story is Nursi’s.

02

Meaning

To act “in the Name of God” is to cross the world under the protection of its Owner, instead of alone.

Nursi turns the story on his own soul. You are the traveller, and this world is the desert. Your weakness and your need have no limit, and neither do the things you fear. To say Bismillah is to take the Owner’s name: to stop begging from everything in the desert and rely on the One who holds all of it.

Six things the First Word shows

In the order Nursi makes them. Try each picture with your own hands.

  1. held by its Ownerwhat I feel I controlthe visa decisionthe job marketyour healthwho you happened to meetthe economytomorrowmy effort

    A wide ring: it feels as if I hold all of this.

    01 / 06

    You are the traveller, and this world is the desert

    Nursi turns the story on his own self straight away. Our weakness and our need have no limit, and neither do the things that can threaten us. No one is strong enough to cross this alone, however capable.

  2. Bismillahthe bossthe marketfollowersluckthe landlordthe newsapprovalthe visa office

    Begging before everything, trembling at every piece of news.

    02 / 06

    Take the Owner’s name, and stop begging from everything

    Bismillah is taking the name of the One who owns the desert for ever. It frees you from begging before the whole universe and trembling before every event. Without it we beg approval from bosses, markets, followers and luck, and every piece of news frightens us.

  3. His door · dergâhKadîrthe All-Powerfulaczmy weaknessRahîmthe Compassionatefakrmy need

    Each lack is matched to a Name. Bring one to the door.

    03 / 06

    Your weakness becomes your strongest asset

    The phrase ties our endless weakness and need to an endless power and mercy: weakness is matched to the All-Powerful (Kadîr), need to the Compassionate (Rahîm). The weakness itself becomes the most welcome intercessor at His door. Saying “I can’t do this alone” is not failure. It is what connects you to help.

  4. Oxford Street, 6 pmin the name of the law

    One man, and all of Oxford Street moving past him.

    04 / 06

    Acting in His name, like a soldier acting for the state

    Whoever acts with Bismillah is like a man who joins the army: he acts in the name of the state, fears no one, and gets every task done in the name of the law. The soldier still works hard. Bismillah is not about doing less. It is about not doing it alone, and not for your own name.

  5. A seed

    a speck that could not lift a leafcarries a whole tree on its head

    A plane-tree root

    softer than the stone above itlifts and cracks the paving stone

    A field of grass

    only grassbecomes milk, handed to you

    A thin leaf

    thinner than paper under the sunstays green through months of heat

    Look at what each of them could do by itself.

    05 / 06

    Everything around you already says Bismillah

    Nursi says all beings recite Bismillah through the tongue of their state: not in words, but by what they do. None of them has the power for it in itself. Each acts in Someone else’s name.

  6. the tea in your handpassed it onthe cafépassed it onthe shippassed it ona picker on a hillsidepassed it onrain, soil and sunpassed it onthe True GiverMün’im-i Hakikî
    1. Bismillahzikir · remember, at the start
    2. Noticefikir · see the gift, in the middle
    3. Alhamdulillahşükür · thank, at the end

    Start with the cup in your hand. Who gave it to you?

    06 / 06

    The price: remembrance, thanks and reflection

    If people hand us God’s gifts, we pay them. The real Owner asks three things: remembrance (zikir), saying Bismillah at the start; thanks (şükür), saying Alhamdulillah at the end; and reflection (fikir) in between, seeing that what you were given is a gift from Someone. It is foolish, Nursi says, to kiss the feet of the servant who brings a king’s gift and never think of the king.

03

Read

بِسْمِ اللّٰهِ الرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيمِ

In the Name of God, the Most Merciful, the Most Compassionate

“In the Name of God” is the beginning of every good thing. We too begin with it. Know, my soul, that this blessed phrase is a mark of Islam, and that every being repeats it constantly in the language of its own state.

It is so blessed a treasure that it ties your endless weakness and poverty to an endless power and mercy, and makes that weakness and poverty the most welcome intercessors at the court of the All-Powerful and Compassionate One.

Whoever acts with this phrase is like a man who enlists in the army. He acts in the name of the state and fears no one. Saying “in the name of the law, in the name of the state”, he gets every task done and holds firm against everything.

Bediüzzaman Said Nursi, The Words, the First WordWorking translation from the Turkish, made for this draft. Check against a published edition before release.

04

Explore

By its own strength, or in the Name

After the story, Nursi looks at ordinary things and finds that each of them is also a traveller carrying a name. Drag the line of light across the same seed and the same rock.

AloneBy its own strength a seed is a speck that could not lift a leaf, and a root is softer than the rock it meets.

In the NameIn the Name of its Owner the seed carries a tree on its head, and the root passes through the rock.

Everything says Bismillah in its own way, Nursi concludes, so we should say it too. Give in God’s name, take in God’s name, and begin in God’s name.

Course