Letters to the Kings of the World

A retelling for children, based on God Passes By by Shoghi Effendi, his account of Bahá'u'lláh's years in the city of Adrianople (1863-1868).

Imagine you have been sent far away from your home, into a strange city, and told you must stay there. You have no army. You have no throne. You have no riches. By the rules of the world, you have no power at all.

That is where Bahá'u'lláh was. He had been exiled — sent away from one land to another, again and again — until He came to live in a city the people of that time called Adrianople. Today it is the city of Edirne, in Turkey. He was kept there as a prisoner of the empire, far from His own country.

And yet it was from this very place that Bahá'u'lláh did one of the most astonishing things in all of history.

He began to write letters. But these were not ordinary letters, and they were not sent to ordinary people. They were sent to the kings, the queens, the emperors, and the great religious leaders of the whole world — the most powerful rulers alive. And He did not write to them timidly, the way a small person might write to a giant. He wrote to each of them as One who carried a message from God, calling every one of them by name to open their eyes to a new Day of God that had dawned upon the earth.

Think of how bold that was. A prisoner, with nothing the world counts as power, writing to the rulers of the greatest empires on earth — and speaking to them as their equal, even as one who had something they needed to hear.

Here are some of the letters He wrote.

He wrote to Napoleon III, the Emperor of France. At that time Napoleon was at the very height of his power, and France was strong and proud. Bahá'u'lláh's letter to him carried a warning as well as an invitation: if the Emperor turned away from the new Revelation, his kingdom would be taken from him. The Emperor did turn away — and only a few years later, in a great war, he lost his throne and his power, just as the letter had said.

He wrote to Queen Victoria of Great Britain, the ruler of what was then the largest empire in the world. He praised her for one good and brave thing she had done — helping to end the buying and selling of people as slaves — telling her this was a reflection of God's own will. And He counseled her on how to rule her lands with justice.

He wrote to Pope Pius IX, the leader of the Roman Catholic Church, who in those days held enormous authority over millions of people. Bahá'u'lláh called on him to recognize that the promise of the return of Christ had been fulfilled, and to use all his great influence to help. But the Pope gave no answer.

He wrote to the Czar of Russia, thanking him for a small kindness that Russia's officials had once shown Him during a time of imprisonment long before — and then calling the Czar, too, to recognize the new Day.

And He wrote to the Sháh of Persia, the very ruler whose own government had imprisoned Him and driven Him into exile. Even to the king who had treated Him so harshly, Bahá'u'lláh wrote with dignity, calling him to rule with justice and to see the truth of the Cause his country had been trying to stamp out.

He even wrote one great letter to all the kings of the world together, addressing not just one ruler but every throne and crown of that age at once.

Then the letters were sent out into the world. Some traveled through the official channels of governments. Some were carried by faithful believers who loved Bahá'u'lláh. Some were placed right into the hands of the very kings they were written for.

So what did all these mighty rulers do? Sadly, not one of them answered the call the way they had been asked to. They held their crowns and their power, and they let the moment pass them by.

But here is the strange and serious part. In the years that followed — across many, many years — the great thrones of Europe began to crumble. Empires that had seemed unshakable fell apart. The kings and emperors who had been written to, and their children after them, lost the power they had been so sure of. The rulers had each been given a chance to listen, and each had looked away. As Bahá'u'lláh had written, The Day is come, and ye are veiled — the great Day had arrived, and they had covered their own eyes to it.

The gentle lesson is this. True greatness does not come from a throne, an army, or a pile of gold. Bahá'u'lláh had none of those things, and yet, as a prisoner with empty hands, He spoke with more authority than all the kings of the earth. And the most important thing any of us can do — king or child — is to keep our eyes open, so that when something true and good arrives, we are brave enough to recognize it.

This is a retelling for children. For the fuller account, see "The Adrianople Revelation: Tablets to the Kings".

Effendi, S.. (1944). *God Passes By*. Bahá'í Publishing Trust. https://www.bahai.org/library/authoritative-texts/shoghi-effendi/god-passes-by/