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"The earth is but one country, and mankind its citizens."
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"The earth is but one country, and mankind its citizens."
246 stories in the library.
Another one of the qualities that you found in Shoghi Effendi, and which rather astonished me, was humility. I had studied a lot in the writings about humility. I had read a lot in the religious teachings about being humble, and I thought…
Aqa Husayn related that Shaykh Mahmud (whose wondrous story we shall shortly come by) told the Most Great Branch that he desired the honour of washing and shrouding the body of the Purest Branch, so that the guards should not lay their…
Munirih Khánum, wife of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, who was the Greatest Branch of the Tree of Life had this to say: Five of my children died in the poisonous climate of `Akká. The bad air was, in truth, only the outside material reason. The inner…
On March 25, 1911, at the behest of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, Louis Gregory sailed from New York through Europe to Egypt and Palestine to go on pilgrimage. In Palestine, Gregory met with ‘Abdu’l-Bahá and Shoghi Effendi and visited the Shrine of…
On the [day] of the first Naw-Rúz (1909), which He celebrated after His release from His confinement, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá had the marble sarcophagus transported with great labor to the vault prepared for it, and in the evening, by the light of a…
On the eve of the Báb's arrival at Kashan, Haji Mirza Jani, surnamed Parpa, a noted resident of that city, dreamed that he was standing at a late hour in the afternoon at the gate of Attar, one of the gates of the city, when his eyes…
One of the most striking examples of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s imperturbability was His reaction to possible personal tragedy, further exile or execution. His troubles stemmed from the Covenant-breakers, those Bahá’ís who did not accept…
Glory be unto Him Who knoweth all that is in the heavens and in the earth. Verily there is no God but Him, the sovereign Ruler, the Almighty, the…
Is there any Remover of difficulties save God? Say: Praised be God! He is God! All are His servants and all abide by His bidding! Footnotes 1.This is the first letter of ‘Thamárih’ which means ‘fruit’. Shoghi Effendi, in…
Siyyid ‘Abdu’l-Baqi sat and listened to the Báb. He heard His voice, watched His movements, looked upon the expression of His face, and noted the words which streamed unceasingly from His lips, and yet failed to be moved by their majesty…
Sometime later, I usually had the privilege of walking home with the Guardian after he left the pilgrims, and very often he talked further about the subject which we had been discussing at dinner, and gave further amplification, which, of…
The Báb answered and said: 'What you have witnessed is true and undeniable. You belittled this Revelation and have contemptuously disdained its Author. God, the All-Merciful, desiring not to afflict you with His punishment, has willed to…
swords be blunted, and their footsteps slip. I know not how long they shall ride the steed of desire and wander erringly in the desert of heedlessness and error. Of glory shall any glory endure, or of abasement any abasement? Or shall…
To the galling weight of these tribulations was now added the bitter grief of a sudden tragedy -- the premature loss of the noble, the pious Mirza Mihdi, the Purest Branch, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá's twenty-two year old brother, an amanuensis of…
Upon His arrival in Jaddih, the Báb donned the pilgrim's garb, mounted a camel, and set out on His journey to Mecca [to perform His pilgrimage]. Quddus, however, notwithstanding the repeatedly expressed desire of his Master, preferred to…
We were all huddled together in one cell, our feet in stocks, and around our necks fastened the most galling of chains. The air we breathed was laden with the foulest impurities, while the floor on which we sat was covered with filth and…
When I first arrived in the Holy Land, there were two or three things about the Guardian that impressed me very much. And one was, particularly, the size of the Guardian. Now in the West, for you people who haven’t been in the West, we’ve…
When my father fell desperately ill in the winter of 1949-50 his condition was despaired of by his doctors. He reached a point where he seemed to have no conscious mind left, could not recognize me, his only and idolized child, at all, and…
When Shoghi Effendi completed the construction of the Shrine of the Báb on Mount Carmel, he decided to place a piece of plaster from the cell in which the Báb had been imprisoned in the Castle of Mah-Ku, where he had been denied even a…
While in Sari, Quddus frequently attempted to convince Mirza Muhammad-Taqi of the truth of the Divine Message. He freely conversed with him on the most weighty and outstanding issues related to the Revelation of the Báb. His bold and…
‘Abdu’l-Bahá spent His early years in an environment of privilege, wealth, and love. ** ‘Abdu’l-Bahá…
Over his mother's signature, but drafted by the Guardian, the following cable was sent to America: “Announce Assemblies celebration marriage beloved Guardian. Inestimable honour conferred upon handmaid of Baha'u'llah Ruhiyyih Khanum Miss…
Aqa Husayn-i-Ashchi (Ashchi in Farsi means cook or maker of broth) was Baha'u'llah's cook. His father died on his way to ask for the hand of his brother's daughter to wed 'Abdu'l-Baha. Aqa Husayn-i-Ashchi's uncle Ustad Ismail raised him…
Not long after Shoghi Effendi assumed his stewardship as Guardian, it was possible for him, through the munificent assistance of a dedicated 'Iraqi Baha'i, Haji Mahmud Qassabchi, to carry out the arduous task, already referred to, of…
Haji Abu'l-Hasan Ardikani known as Haji Amin or Amin-i-Ilahi (the trustee of God). He was one of the prominent Bahá'ís of Iran and was appointed the trustee (amin) of the Huququ'llah as well as acting as a courier for conveying the letters…
The Bab's three uncles: Haji Mirza Siyyid Ali aka the Greatest Uncle - he was the middle brother, Haji Mirza Siyyid Muhammad aka the Greater Uncle - he was the eldest of the three brothers, and Haji Mirza Hassan Ali, the younger Uncle.…
Gregory was instrumental in arranging for two major speaking engagements for ‘Abdu’l-Bahá in Washington DC to an audience of more than a thousand in Rankin Chapel at Howard University, and that evening to a large gathering of the Bethel…
"he that was created by the light of Bahá" L: Mirza Mihdi with his brother ‘Abdu’l-Baha **Mírzá…
During the nineteen days that he remained there he drank his fill from the life-giving draught of the presence of the Master and on daily basis paid homage to the Sacred Shrine of Baha’u’llah. **Mirza Yusuf Vahid Kashfi Born:**…
Muḥammad showed a keen interest to learn and master this language. He moved to Qazvín, the birth place of Táhiríh, to teach at Tavakkul Bahá’í School in 1914. In 1916, he was nominated as the official representative of the World Esperanto…
In May 1878, his travel teaching took Siyyid Mustafa Rumi to Myanmar (Burma). There he would, not yet knowing the local language, together with Jamal Effendi and Haji Siyyid Mihdi, lay the foundation for the Burmese Bahá’í community.…
Although the young merchant's given name was Siyyid 'Ali-Muhammad, He took the name "Báb"…
"‘Abdu’l-Bahá recognized Chase as "the first American believer," and Shoghi Effendi later described him as "indeed the first to embrace the Cause of Bahá’u’lláh in the Western world." ** Thornton Chase, Disciple of…
From his years Billy Sears possessed an inordinate interest in God. He asked his parents, his grandfather, the preacher, the mayor, even the local people he met a myriad of questions: 'Did God have a wife? Where was His house? Could He…
He was made a Fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects. ** William Sutherland…
73 Your touching words in connection with the sudden removal of the Greatest Holy Leaf from their74 midst have greatly alleviated the burden of sorrow that weighs so heavily upon their hearts and have demonstrated that in their great…
84 The letter dated 5 August 1932, from that spiritual friend has been received by the Guardian of the Cause of God, may our lives be sacrificed for him, and he has been informed of your receiving his telegram regarding the ascension…
85 What you had written concerning the memorial gatherings of men and women believers to mourn the Most Exalted Leaf, who was the peerless fruit of the Holy Tree, and to commemorate the ascension of her who was the most glorious trust…
19 O my spiritual…
88 The profound sorrow occasioned by the sudden passing of the Greatest Holy Leaf, as well as the unnumbered messages of sympathy received from friends and believers in East and West, all of which the Guardian acknowledged in person,…
89 The Guardian of the Cause of God has received your letter of 21 July 1932, telling of your and the other friends’ profound distress on receiving word of this calamity, this dire ordeal, that is, the ascension of the Most Exalted…
90 The Guardian’s anguish, because of this tragic occurrence, is such that it can neither be plumbed nor described in words. That sublime and gloried Leaf, that precious jewel of the Kingdom, was the one great solace of his life; she…
92 The Guardian trusts that the explanation he has given by wire regarding the suspension for a period of nine months of Bahá’í religious festivity has been made clear. The Nineteen Day Feast being of a quasi-administrative character…
26 O my sister in the spirit, and the companion of my…
93 The loss of the Greatest Holy Leaf will be bitterly felt by all those friends who had the pleasure and privilege to meet her. She always kept such a wonderful atmosphere of joy and hope around her that was bound to influence those…
94 Even though during these last years she was weak and most of the time confined to her room, yet she was a source of constant joy and inspiration to those that met her. The Guardian feels her loss tremendously because the greatest…
27 O thou Greatest and Most Merciful Holy…
95 The passing away of the Greatest Holy Leaf was a loss every Bahá’í will feel deeply if only he stops to think about it. She was such a precious soul and so radiantly happy and hopeful even under most adverse circumstances. Every…
96 Even though the Greatest Holy Leaf has left us in body she is with us in spirit, inspiring us in our work and beseeching for us God’s loving mercy and fatherly care. She will never forget her loving friends nor leave them in their…
97 Shoghi Effendi wishes me to acknowledge the receipt of your letter dated August 25th 1932 and to extend his deep appreciation for your kind words of sympathy. This loss is a thing that will be bitterly felt by every Bahá’í…
99 Surely there is nothing that will console the Guardian more than the happy news that the Cause for which the Greatest Holy Leaf lived and suffered is gradually spreading and embracing the whole of the people of the…
100 These nine months during which the Guardian has asked the friends to discard feast days, are meant to be months of mourning for the passing away of the Greatest Holy Leaf. The friends should also use it as a period of redoubled…
138 We thank you most sincerely for your kind letters of sympathy, and we appreciate your loving Messages, which are as comforting balm to our wounded…
102 Indeed it would have been for you such a joy to meet the Greatest Holy Leaf during her earthly life, but the Guardian does not wish you to feel depressed about it; this beloved soul will from the Heaven of her Almighty Father guide…
141 It is not unknown to those who stand firm in the Covenant and Testament of God that the centre of violation and his associates, from the day of the ascension of the Ancient Beauty, may His Great Name be ever exalted, have been…
142 This dire calamity, this great affliction, the passing of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, may our lives be sacrificed for His meekness, has shaken us to the very depths. Our lives lie in ruins. In our hearts, the stars of happiness have set, the…
143 Although that supreme calamity, that great ordeal, the ascension of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, put the torch to the harvest of our hearts, and brought down both our outer and inner beings, wedding us to grief and ceaseless pain, yet praised be…
144 O faithful servant of the Best-Beloved, the Most Glorious! O steadfast friend, flourishing in the garden of His luminous Beauty! The brief but informative letter you had written to Shoghi Effendi, the Chosen Branch, the Guardian of…
71 The raising of this Edifice72 will in turn herald the construction, in the course of successive epochs of the Formative Age of the Faith, of several other…
160 That supreme affliction, the passing of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, was the direst of ordeals; it was an anguish of mourning. The parting with mankind’s Beloved set fire to the hearts of all His lovers, and the souls of the believers dissolved…
162 The good news that the Word of God is being raised up, and His Cause glorified, and that His friends, on fire with love for Him, are arising to spread His sweet savours abroad—is coming in steadily from every quarter of the…
164 It is clear how that most dire of calamities, that most great disaster which was the ascension of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, may our souls be sacrificed for His meekness, has set our hearts on fire and dissolved our very limbs and members in…
168 The good news has come that the Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, may our lives be sacrificed for His meekness, has been read at the meetings of the friends, and we here are rejoiced to learn of their unity and their…
169 In this noblest of all ages the Sun of grace and loving-kindness has shone out from the divine day-spring with such resplendent glory and is casting His beams so bright and far, that He has lit up all the earth and made the hearts…
170 The purport of your letter is highly indicative of your steadfastness in His Cause, of your unswerving constancy in the Covenant, of having set your face toward Shoghi Effendi, the authorized Point to whom all must turn, the Centre…
172 At this hour while yet the heart burns with the anguish of sorrow, and the gloom of bereavement still hangs low, my thoughts turn in loving remembrance to my sincere beloved sisters and brothers in the…
174 A physician treats every illness with a certain remedy and to every painful sore he applies a specially prepared compound. The more severe the illness, the more potent must be the remedy, so that the treatment may prove effective…
177 We were delighted to receive your excellent letter ... and read it with joy. It gladdens our hearts to witness from its contents the evidences of loyalty and sincerity and perfect steadfastness in the Cause of God, and unshakeable…
180 The letter that you wrote in your burning grief, on the passing of the world’s Beloved, the Orb of the Covenant—wrote with weeping eyes and a heart afire, has come. Once again, it brings back the full force of this calamity, and…
181 Although the ascension of the beloved Centre of the Covenant was the ultimate calamity, the severest of ordeals, and the fire of that bereavement consumed our hearts and souls, and there were no eyes but wept their tears of blood…
182 You have offered up thanks to the Lord for appointing the Centre of His Cause and the Guardian of His Covenant, and have voiced your gratitude and expressed your spiritual sentiments, for this favour and…
80 In these days, when we are all mourning the loss of our beloved Greatest Holy Leaf, Shoghi Effendi’s sole comfort is to see the friends as ever devoted and active and striving day and night to promote the teachings of the…
194 It has been demonstrated time and time again that whatever comes to pass only enhances the glory of God’s Faith, and further proclaims His Word. This time it will be the…
81 Your message of condolence and sympathy, dated July 22nd, 1932 which so fully conveyed your profound grief at the loss occasioned by the unexpected passing of the Greatest Holy Leaf was received and read with great interest. The…
198 Your letter of 12th October 1922 is just received and refreshed in our memory the many beautiful days that you spent here when the Beloved Lord, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, was still on this earth. Those are days that many events of history…
199 All praise to the beloved Abhá Beauty, that those nightingales of the gardens of knowledge, those doves of the fragrant bowers of certitude, are singing the holy verses on the boughs of grace and bounty, celebrating the praise and…
203 It was sometime ago that I received your kind and encouraging letter through your honourable secretary. And although in a joyless world, the love and unity of the friends in Yonkers imparted the utmost joy to this bereaved family.…
204 You quite well realize, I presume, that Shoghi Effendi has always cherished the fondest hopes for your services to the Cause of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, and I am sure that your achievements will be great, shining brilliantly as a star. The…
205 The Pen of the divine Ordainer has so decreed that this house of sorrows should be encompassed by unending calamity and pain. Even before the dark clouds of one disaster are scattered, the lowering storm of yet a new grief takes…
206 ‘O God, My God! Thou hast lighted the lamp of Thy Cause with the oil of wisdom; protect it from contrary winds. The lamp is Thine and the glass is Thine, and all things in the heavens and on earth are in the grasp of Thy power.’207…
209 The tongue of this lowly and grief-stricken maidservant is powerless to praise those loved ones of God, and the words uttered by her are wholly inadequate to pay a worthy tribute to the staunch firmness and constancy, to the spirit…
211 The question of Avárih has surely come to your attention. In spite of the fact that last year, the first time that he visited this sacred Spot, he was shown the greatest kindness and love, and he was the object of every…
214 Your short and loving note of June 25th has been received. Its contents, though short, gave me and the ladies of the Household great joy, because they indicate that the dear friends have, with willing efforts, arisen to strengthen…
215 Your charming letter of June 20th has arrived and with it the spiritual waves of your love and devotion to the welfare of the Cause of God and to the prosperity of the dear friends throughout…
218 In this Day nothing is so important as service. Did not ‘Abdu’l-Bahá voluntarily call Himself the ‘Servant’ of Bahá, manifesting also in His life the perfections of servitude to God and…
219 It always cheers my heart to hear from the dear friends whose hearts are so full of love and devotion, and desire to serve this Blessed Cause which has been proclaimed by Bahá’u’lláh to all the world, so that all national, racial,…
83 The letter from that spiritual friend has reached the beloved Guardian, and he is aware of your bitter grieving over the calamitous news that a most glorious fruit of the Holy Tree, the Most Exalted Leaf, the Remnant of Bahá, has…
Under the inspired guidance of Shoghi Effendi the Bahá’í Cause grew steadily in size and in the establishment of its Administrative Order, so that by 1951 there were eleven functioning National Spiritual Assemblies. At that point the…
During His own lifetime Bahá’u’lláh appointed a few tried and trusted friends to assist in directing and promoting the work of the Movement, and gave them the title of Ayadiyi-Amru’lláh (lit. “Hands of the Cause of God”). ‘Abdu’l-Bahá…
Even when the imprisonment was at its worst, the Bahá’ís were not dismayed, and their serene confidence was never shaken. While in the barracks at Akká, Bahá’u’lláh wrote to some friends, “Fear not. These doors shall be opened. My tent…
He was then in His seventieth year, and His long and arduous labors, culminating in these strenuous Western tours, had worn out His physical frame. After His return He wrote the following pathetic Tablet to the believers in East and…
Before ‘Abdu’l-Bahá completed His earthly mission, He had laid a basis for the development of the administrative order established in Bahá’u’lláh’s Writings. To show the high importance to be attributed to the institution of the…
It has been the general characteristic of religion that organization marks the interruption of the true spiritual influence and serves to prevent the original impulse from being carried into the world. The organization has invariably…
‘Abdu’l-Bahá appointed His eldest grandson, Shoghi Effendi, to the responsible position of “Guardian of the Cause” (Valiyy-i-Amru’lláh). Shoghi Effendi is the eldest son of Diya’íyyih Khánum, the eldest daughter of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. His…
1.For the author of The Dawn-Breakers, see Nabíl-i-Zarandí.2.Cf. Nabíl, The Dawn-Breakers, p. 395, note 1.3.Cf. Qur’án 19:98.4.Qur’án 3:91.5.Qur’án 54:55.6.1849–1850.7.1853; 1892.8.Áqá Ján. Cf. Shoghi Effendi, God Passes By, p.…
Bahá'í Chronicles preserves the biographical record of John Ebenezer Esslemont — the Aberdeen physician who, after encountering the Cause in 1914, wrote the introductory work *Bahá'u'lláh and the New Era,* moved to Haifa to serve at the Master's side, and was named by Shoghi Effendi a Hand of the Cause after his early death in 1925.
Bahá'í Chronicles preserves the biographical record of May Bolles Maxwell — one of the first pilgrims to 'Akká, the woman who established the Bahá'í community of Paris and of Montreal, the mother of Rúḥíyyih Khánum, and the travel-teacher whom Shoghi Effendi would name a martyr of the Faith after her death in Buenos Aires in 1940.
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<div class="MsoNormal"> <i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Hand of the Cause John Robarts recalled the following during his pilgrimage in 1955:</span></i></div> <div class="MsoNormal"> <span style="font-family: Verdana,…
<p><span style="font-family: verdana;">The news of the approaching arrival of the Báb at Tabríz bestirred the believers in that city. They all set out to meet Him, eager to extend to so beloved a Leader their welcome. The officials of the…
<p><span style="font-family: verdana;">The night before his [</span><span style="font-family: verdana;">Mullá Husayn's]</span><span style="font-family: verdana;"> arrival at Máh-Kú, which was the eve of the fourth Naw-Rúz after the…
<p><span style="font-family: verdana;">The other story surprised me - and enlightened me - very much; I heard it more than once:</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: verdana;">Shoghi Effendi said that one day he was…
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<p><span style="font-family: verdana;">“‘Abdu’l-Bahá,” writes Dr. J.E. Esslemont, “tells how one day He was allowed to enter the prison-yard to see His beloved Father when He came out for His daily exercise. Bahá’u’lláh was terribly…
<p><span style="font-family: verdana;">“For three days and three nights,” Nabíl has recorded in his chronicle, “no manner of food or drink was given to Bahá’u’lláh. Rest and sleep were both impossible to Him. The place was infested with…
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<div class="MsoNormal"> <span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Louis G. Gregory was one of the first African-Americans in the United States to embrace the Baha'i Faith. He was later named a Hand of the Cause of God posthumously by…
<div class="MsoNormal"> <span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In the ‘Priceless Pearl’ Ruhiyyih Khanum tells us how in 1920 ‘Abdu’l-Bahá sent Shoghi Effendi abroad for his studies, in the company of Lotfullah Hakim who was…
<p><span style="font-family: verdana;">In the “Taríkh-i-Jadíd,” Muhammad Big is reported to have related the following account to Hájí Mírzá Jání: </span></p><p><span style="font-family: verdana;">“So we mounted and rode on till we came to…
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<div class="MsoNormal"> <span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When Siyyid Kazim died in Karbila, Iraq, on December 31, 1843, his enemies became emboldened and renewed their hurtful activities to further discredit his teachings…
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Here is a brief story of the early life of Mulla Husayn whose amazing station is summarized below by the beloved Guardian:</span><br /> <br /> <span style="font-family: "verdana" ,…
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<div class="MsoNormal"> <span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When ‘Abdu'l-Bahá was saying farewell amid the tears, lamentations and sadness of the friends and members of the Holy Family who watched their beloved's departure, one…
<div class="MsoNormal"> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Ruhiyyih Khanum often described </span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">her first encounter with the youthful Guardian</span><span…
<div class="MsoNormal"> <span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Shoghi Effendi was sometimes subject to vivid and significant dreams, both pleasant and unpleasant. It is reported that in his babyhood he woke one night crying and…
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In his recollections of those early years one of the Bahá'ís has written that one day Shoghi Effendi entered the Master's room, took up His pen and tried to write. 'Abdu'l-Bahá drew him to…
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<p><span style="font-family: verdana;">On the day after the Báb’s arrival, Hájí Muhammad-Taqíy-i-Milání, a noted merchant of the city, ventured, together with Hájí ‘Alí-‘Askar, to interview the Báb. They were warned by their friends and…
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<p><span style="font-family: verdana;">We were awakened one night, ere break of day, by Mírzá ‘Abdu’l-Vahháb-i-Shírází, who was bound with Us to the same chains. He had left Kazímayn and followed Us to </span><span style="font-family:…
<p><span style="font-family: verdana;">In the concluding passages of the Tablet which He [the Báb] was addressing to Hájí Mírzá Jání, He prayed in his behalf, supplicated the Almighty to illumine his heart with the light of Divine…
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<p><span style="font-family: verdana;">On that same night, [the night when the Báb arrived in Káshán] Siyyid Husayn-i-Yazdí, who had previously, in accordance with the directions of the Báb, come to Káshán, was invited to the house of Hájí…
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<p><span style="font-family: verdana;">My grandfather had many colored maids and servants. When the Blessed Perfection became the head of the family He liberated all of them, and gave them permission to leave or stay, but if they desired…
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<p><span style="font-family: verdana;">In the whole range of Bahá'u'lláh's Writings, the Kitáb-i-Íqán (The Book of Certitude) has most importance, with the exception of the Kitáb-i-Aqdas (The Most Holy Book). It was revealed in Baghdad…
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Dr. Baghdadi <span style="font-size: x-small;">[an intimate of the Holy family who years later wrote a book about the time he spent with the family of Abdu’l-Baha]</span> recounts how, on one…
<div class="MsoNormal"> <span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Mirza Aqa Jan embraced the religion of the Báb when he was about sixteen years old and became instantly “aflame with devotion.” </span><span style="font-family:…
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<p><span style="font-family: verdana;">One night, aware that the hour of her death was at hand, she put on the attire of a bride, and anointed herself with perfume, and, sending for the wife of the Kalantar, she communicated to her the…
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"> </div> <b style="font-family: verdana, sans-serif;">Background:</b><br /> <div class="MsoNormal"> <a…
On November 28, 1921, 'Abdu'l-Bahá ascended at His home in Haifa. The next day, before a procession of ten thousand mourners — Muslims, Christians, Jews, Druze — He was carried up the slopes of Mount Carmel to the Shrine of the Báb, where nine speakers from three faiths delivered His funeral orations.
In *The Priceless Pearl* Rúḥíyyih Khánum describes a small ritual at the family table in 'Akká: Bahíyyih Khánum, the Greatest Holy Leaf, would spoon a small bite from her own plate — *the mouthful of Khánum* — to one of the grandchildren, and the grandchildren would watch for whose turn it was.
In *The Priceless Pearl* Rúḥíyyih Khánum recounts the months Shoghi Effendi spent at Balliol College, Oxford, in 1920–1921, perfecting his English so that he might one day serve 'Abdu'l-Bahá as His translator — a small private programme of self-discipline that would, only months later, bear an unimaginable wider fruit.
In *The Priceless Pearl* Rúḥíyyih Khánum recounts the years the young Shoghi Effendi spent at the Syrian Protestant College in Beirut — later the American University of Beirut — where the grandson of 'Abdu'l-Bahá met the West for the first time inside a Western classroom, and was prepared, without knowing it, for the office that lay ahead.
Rúḥíyyih Khánum's *The Priceless Pearl* preserves a moment from Shoghi Effendi's boyhood in 'Akká: a small barefoot figure in a doorway, eyes on his grandfather, and 'Abdu'l-Bahá's slow nod of recognition that the bond between them was not only physical, but something else.
Glory be unto Thee, O my…
O my Lord!279…
‘Abdu'l-Bahá sent for me. I went to Him in the little room where He writes. He said, “Be strong! Be firm! You are not leaving Me; it is only your body that is going away. Your spirit will always be here. I shall always see you. There is…
Before there were Bahá'í books, pamphlets, periodicals—before there were, properly speaking, Bahá'í administrative institutions; before ‘Abdu'l-Bahá made His historic voyage to America; before Shoghi Effendi transmitted to the English…
A number of times during his life, particularly in the years immediately following the Ascension of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, Shoghi Effendi retired to Switzerland to regain health, energy and self-confidence. He lived a very physically rigorous life…
A young Bahá 'i lady pioneered to Bolivia in the 1930 s to open it to the Faith. Having no success in teaching anyone, she began to write to the Guardian expressing feelings of failure. With each passing month she wrote and he replied…
In *The Advent of Divine Justice* (1939), Shoghi Effendi laid before the American Bahá'ís the work that would prove central to their century: the task of overcoming racial prejudice. White believers were called to abandon their inherited sense of superiority; minority members were to be unhesitatingly given priority — not for sentiment, but for the health of the Faith.
Although Shoghi Effendi was extremely busy during this vacation and barely spent time in Oxford, yet spring was the season he would begin to play tennis, a game he loved and in which he excelled. He played tennis with many students during…
And yet, as you know, when he passed away in England, I had many cables from him, many letters from him letting me know the things he wanted to be done, the things he wanted finished by the time he got back because of the things he wanted…
Another time he came over for dinner and he was rather disturbed. He had some cables from America about certain matters, and some actions had been taken, and he was a little disturbed at the actions which were taken, actually, and he…
As he would go about, he would always be complimenting someone. The gardeners, even the gardeners taking care of the garden, he would say, “You planted that very beautifully. Your flowers are very beautiful. I am very pleased with the way…
At first, on going to her aunt's, my mother would take me with her; but one day, returning unusually late, we found Abbas Effendi surrounded by a band of boys who had undertaken to personally molest him. He was standing in their midst as…
At the time my father was invited by the Guardian to come and live with us in the Holy Land, after my mother's unexpected death in Argentina in March 1940, Shoghi Effendi decided, for reasons of his own, to go to England. For those who…
Bahá'í Chronicles records the establishment of the South African Bahá'í community in the early 1950s — when Shoghi Effendi's Ten Year Crusade brought pioneers to the apartheid-era cities, and the first declarations were made by a handful of Black, white, and Indian South Africans who had found in the Faith the answer to the racial question their country had not yet faced.
Bahá'í Chronicles preserves the biographical record of Martha Root — the small, quiet Pennsylvania newspaperwoman who, in the years between 1919 and her death in 1939, travelled four times around the world as a Bahá'í teacher, met queens and presidents, and was named by Shoghi Effendi *the foremost Hand of the Cause* of the Western world in his time.
A short paraphrase from the Baha'i Stories Blog about a letter the young Guardian sent in early 1922 to the small Bahá'í community of Australia, then concentrated in Sydney and Melbourne — one of the first messages sent in the new ministry, encouraging the friends to hold steadily through the change.
A short paraphrase from the Baha'i Stories Blog about a letter Shoghi Effendi sent in the late 1930s to the small Bahá'í community of Germany, then under increasing harassment from the National Socialist regime — a brief message of love, encouragement to steadfastness, and assurance that the prayers of the world's believers were with them.
Cobb wrote that Shoghi Effendi said that ‘Abdu’l-Bahá had the power of intuition, the power of the soul, available in its totality. ‘Abdu’l-Bahá would commonly end the conversation by saying that there wasn't time for a fuller answer, but…
Corinne True had desperately wish to meet ‘Abdu’l- Bahá when He landed in New York, but her son Davis was critically ill. When ‘Abdu’l-Bahá finally arrived in Chicago, one of the first things He did on the morning of 30, April was to go…
Dr. Bagdadi states that when Shoghi Effendi was only five years old he was pestering the Master to write something for him, whereupon ‘Abdu’l-Bahá wrote this touching and revealing letter in His own hand: He is God! O My Shoghi, I have no…
During one or two of those summers early in Shoghi Effendi's ministry he told me he had bought a bicycle and cycled over many passes. His bicycle--the poor man's car--became a favourite of Shoghi Effendi. He sometimes climbed the highest…
Economic justice, even in small matters, was important to the Master. Once in Egypt ‘Abdu’l-Bahá obtained a carriage in order that He might offer a ride to an important Pasha, who was to be His luncheon guest. When they reached their…
Every time one goes into the details of any particular period in the Guardian's life one is tempted to say "this was the worst period", so fraught with strain, problems, unbearable pressures was his entire ministry. But there is a pattern,…
Five years after Grace told me these stories she went on an extensive teaching trip through the nearsouthern states. For three of these five years she had been very ill - most of the time very close to the Open Door. Finally, when she was…
From early morning until dark, often more than eight hours on his feet, day after day and month after month he directed the work. It was certainly not his work to do this, but he was determined to ensure it was done not only quickly, but…
Shoghi Effendi's own narration, in *God Passes By*, of the events of late 1921 and early 1922 — the Master's passing, the discovery of the Will and Testament naming the young Shoghi as Guardian, and the formal beginning of the Formative Age of the Faith.
He wasn’t interested in the man. He wasn’t interested in his clothes. All he was interested in was interested in was his character and his devotion to the Cause. Someone knocked on the door of the Western pilgrim house, and I opened the…
Here’s a story of Ugo Giachery (a Hand of the Cause) who went through the process while on pilgrimage: The first time I beheld the Shrine of Bahá’u’lláh, I was overcome by deep emotion and, as I walked close to it, trepidation and…
How many stories are there of the Hands of the Cause who were shocked by their appointment because knew how unworthy they were? John Robarts thought the telegraph was for his wife. When William Sears was appointed, he wrote back to the…
I had in mind that ‘Abdu’l-Bahá would give me the honor of . . . calling together the great conclave which would elect the Universal House of Justice. And I thought in His Will and Testament that that was probably what He was instructing…
I remember the Guardian telling me of how (I believe it must have been in early 1920) one of the old American Baháis had sent a gift to the Master of a Cunningham automobile; notice of its arrival at the quayside in port came just as the…
I remember we were speaking one night, and I said, “Shoghi Effendi, you know the way that the way that the administrative order in America grew and developed, and I know the matchless way in which you did this thing, it was almost the work…
I want to give you just one day in the Guardian’s life so you can appreciate a little bit more what it is to be the head of a faith like the Bahá’í Faith. Shoghi Effendi usually arose in the morning about 5:30. And then he had his period…
In reading over my diaries - so very little of which I have quoted out of hundred of pages written off and on throughout the years - it seems strange to me there is practically no reference to the World War raging everywhere during almost…
In the 1970’s I met Inez Greeven. She went on Pilgrimage during the days of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, in 1920 and again in 1921. She told me that during her Pilgrimage the Master asked her, “Where is your husband?” She said, “This was the one thing…
In the days of Shoghi Effendi's childhood it was the custom to rise about dawn and spend the first hour of the day in the Master's room, where prayers were said and the family all had breakfast with Him. The children sat on the floor,…
In the early summer of 1923 Shoghi Effendi again left Haifa and sought some restoration of health and solace in the solitude of the high mountains of Switzerland. But, unlike later years, when he continued to keep in constant touch with…
Interlaken is in the heart of the Bernese Oberland and the starting point for innumerable excursions into the surrounding mountains and valleys. Often long before sunrise Shoghi Effendi would start out, dressed in knee breeches, a Norfolk…
It may sound disrespectful to say the Guardian was a mischievous child, but he himself told me he was the acknowledged ringleader of all the other children. Bubbling with high spirits, enthusiasm and daring, full of laughter and wit, the…
It seems almost inconceivable that Mr. Ioas could render any more extraordinary services, but he did. There was one service that meant more than any other, to Shoghi Effendi. An apartment building in which the Covenant-breakers lived,…
It was the custom of Shoghi Effendi to walk on Mount Carmel, and at times he invited the Persian men believers to walk with him. They would walk a few paces behind him, out of respect. Ali-Kuli Khan was a member of one of these groups of…
May Maxwell, the mother of Rúhíyyih Khánum, died only a few weeks after pioneering to South America, and was declared a martyr by Shoghi Effendi. (Her story can be read in the Bahá’í World, Vol. VIII, pp. 631-642.) There is no question…
My mother was the one who had first known Shoghi Effendi as a child, when she came to the Holy Land at the end of the last century; she had come again, in 1909, with my father but I do not know how much contact, if any, they had at that…
Now, people have asked, “Did the Guardian have any conception that he was going to pass away? Did he have fore-knowledge, being divinely guided, that he was going to pass away? Again, friends, the answer to the question is that we don’t…
On one occasion two young boys, Shoghi Effendi and his first cousin, Ruhi Effendi, entered the presence of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. The Master looked at them thoughtfully and then remarked to Ruhi Effendi, 'If you can't wear a happy, pleasant…
On the night of 20 August, a horrifying young man came to a meeting at the Kinney's house. From head to foot he was covered with soot. His blue eyes stared out from a dark gray face. This was Fred Mortensen, a reformed criminal. When…
“One evening the western pilgrims were gathered together as usual with the Guardian. All was quiet when Shoghi Effendi suddenly said: “Prayer is useless.” An embarrassed silence followed. Shoghi Effendi said nothing. He paused and a moment…
In *The Promised Day Is Come*, Shoghi Effendi surveys the decline of the established religious authorities — Catholic, Protestant, Orthodox, Sunní, Shi'í — across the early twentieth century, reading the decline as the parallel of the political collapses that had been visible since 1914.
In *The Promised Day Is Come*, Shoghi Effendi surveys the fall of the great monarchies of Europe and the Middle East during the cataclysm of the First World War — reading the collapses as the historical fulfilment of the warnings Bahá'u'lláh had sent to those same monarchs in the Adrianople period.
In *The Promised Day Is Come* (1941), with Europe in flames and the world at war for the second time in a generation, Shoghi Effendi diagnosed the upheavals of the twentieth century as a single judgment-and-redemption: a tempest unprecedented in its violence, unimaginably glorious in its ultimate consequence.
In *The Priceless Pearl* Rúḥíyyih Khánum recounts how Shoghi Effendi, walking the slope of Mount Carmel year after year, conceived and laid out the great Arc of buildings — the International Archives, the Universal House of Justice site, the Centre for the Study of the Texts, the Teaching Centre — on which the world administrative institutions of the Faith would in time stand.
In *The Priceless Pearl* Rúḥíyyih Khánum tells the story of her own marriage to Shoghi Effendi in the spring of 1937 — a private ceremony in the room of the Greatest Holy Leaf, witnessed by a handful of family members, that joined two streams of the Cause and was deliberately kept free of fanfare.
Rúḥíyyih Khánum's *The Priceless Pearl* recounts how, in 1942, Shoghi Effendi asked his own father-in-law — the celebrated Canadian architect William Sutherland Maxwell, then resident in Haifa — to design the arcade and superstructure of the Shrine of the Báb on Mount Carmel. The colonnade of Baveno granite and the Chiampo arches were the answer.
In *The Priceless Pearl* Rúḥíyyih Khánum gives the most reliable account of her husband's last days — a brief illness in a London hotel, the flu that turned to a heart attack, and the night of the fourth of November 1957 when the Guardian of the Cause of God passed from the world at the age of sixty.
In *The Priceless Pearl* Rúḥíyyih Khánum describes the small household office from which Shoghi Effendi guided the Bahá'í world for thirty-six years — a room with a typewriter, a stack of cables, a Hebrew-Arabic-Persian shelf of dictionaries, and a Guardian who answered each letter himself in the long hours after Haifa had gone to sleep.
In Rúḥíyyih Khánum's biography *The Priceless Pearl* she describes the moment in November 1921 when a young Shoghi Effendi, reading the cable in Major Tudor Pole's London office, learned that 'Abdu'l-Bahá had passed — and how, only on his return to Haifa, the opening of the Master's Will revealed an office he had never imagined for himself.
In *The Priceless Pearl* Rúḥíyyih Khánum describes the months in 1922 and after when the young Shoghi Effendi, crushed by the weight of his appointment, withdrew to the Alps — walking long mountain paths, praying, gathering the strength he would need to take up the task the Master's Will had laid on him.
In *The Priceless Pearl* Rúḥíyyih Khánum describes the moment in the spring of 1953 when Shoghi Effendi, looking out from the newly completed Shrine of the Báb on the centenary of its Founder's enthronement, summoned the Bahá'í world to the most ambitious teaching plan in its history — to settle believers in every remaining unopened country and territory of the planet.
In *The Priceless Pearl* Rúḥíyyih Khánum describes the years of patient nightly labour by which Shoghi Effendi rendered Nabíl's Persian chronicle of the Bábí period into the cadenced English that became *The Dawn-Breakers* — the volume that, more than any other, made the heroic story of the Báb's followers available to the Western world.
In *The Priceless Pearl* Rúḥíyyih Khánum describes the slow, exacting labour by which Shoghi Effendi rendered Bahá'u'lláh's *Hidden Words* into the English in which generations of Western believers have come to know them — a translation built one aphorism at a time, in the silent hours of his Haifa office.
Shoghi Effendi completely dedicated his whole life to the Cause of God. He had no other thought. He ate, he slept, he was awake, he worked, every minute, day and night, was for the Cause of God. He thought of nothing else. Nothing else was…
Shoghi Effendi was a small, sensitive, intensely active and mischievous child. He was not very strong in his early years and his mother often had cause to worry over his health. However, he grew up to have an iron constitution, which,…
Shoghi Effendi was a very remarkable young man, and of course, he just worshipped ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. And when ‘Abdu’l-Bahá passed away, the whole world became dark for him. All light had gone out. When he returned to the Holy Land, he had in…
Shoghi Effendi was of an infinitely kind and loving nature. Before meeting him, many Bahá’ís, sensitive to his station in the Cause, were fearful. But they were immediately put at ease by his warmth and affection, and shortly, as Leroy…
In 1925 the *Star of the West* carried the announcement of the formation of the first National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá'ís of the United States and Canada — the inaugural national institution of the American Faith, elected in convention at the Wilmette Temple grounds.
In 1922 the Star of the West printed Mountfort Mills' account of his visit to Haifa in the months following 'Abdu'l-Bahá's passing — the first encounter of a Western pilgrim with the new Guardian of the Cause, Shoghi Effendi, then only twenty-five years old and already, in Mills' words, *the center of the world today.*
Surely the simplicity of the marriage of Shoghi Effendi - reminiscent of the simplicity of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá's own marriage in the prison-city of 'Akká - should provide a thought-provoking example to the Bahá’ís everywhere. No one, with the…
The great kindness that was such a prominent feature of Shoghi Effendi's character is shown in the manner in which he conveyed to Khánum the news of the death of her beloved mother, May Maxwell: The devastating news of May Maxwell's…
The Guardian came over one evening. He was very happy and very enthused. He said, “We have some wonderful cables today.” So he read this cable, and it was from one of the islands in the Pacific. The pioneer who had been there had had been…
The word sport is a contracted form of “disport” which means to amuse, to divert one’s self. It includes play, amusement, entertainments or recreation. It is a word which signifies the outdoor recreations, the athletic work as contrasted…
There was a pilgrim from the United States, a Mrs.True, the American Bahá’ís who are here, of course, remember her very well. One of the early of the Cause and one of the great workers for the Bahá’í temple, and one of the great pillars of…
There was one of the pilgrims from Canada who was a member of the National Assembly, and it was the night of her departure before returning home to Canada. And she was talking to him about translating the Bahá’í literature into the Eskimo…
Today the car was stolen! [A gift to Shoghi Effendi from Roy Wilhelm. The Guardian had had no car for years as the old one was sold during the war owing to no spare parts.] My God what a day! At 2:30, as Gladys and I sat over our coffee at…
When my father fell desperately ill in the winter of 1949-50 his condition was despaired of by his doctors. He reached a point where he seemed to have no conscious mind left, could not recognize me, his only and idolized child, at all, and…
When Shoghi Effendi was beginning to write The Advent of Divine Justice he was one day expatiating on this theme and suddenly stated that the United States was the most corrupt country politically in the world. I was simply stupefied by…
*World Order* magazine carried, in a historical profile, the story of Keith Ransom-Kehler — the American Bahá'í pioneer who died in Iṣfáhán in 1933 of smallpox contracted during her teaching tour of Persia, and who was named by Shoghi Effendi the first American Bahá'í martyr.
In *The World Order of Bahá'u'lláh*, Shoghi Effendi insisted on a single, load-bearing distinction: the administration of the Cause is *an instrument and not a substitute* for the Faith. To separate the spiritual teachings from the institutions, he warned, would be to mutilate the body of the Cause itself.
You can’t feel the precision of mind. I’ve dealt in America with high executives all of my business life. Men who have a problem, and they size it up, and they see the meat and heart of it and seize the situation immediately, but they pale…