Stanwood Cobb's Most Important Interview
Bahá'í Chronicles editors, Bahá'í Chronicles · Read original
When in Bahá'í history
Paris (today: Paris, France)
A retelling based on Stanwood Cobb's own account in his memoir Memories of 'Abdu'l-Bahá, as quoted in Annamarie Honnold's Vignettes from the Life of 'Abdu'l-Bahá (p. 139), with biographical details from Bahá'í Chronicles. Words in quotation marks are Cobb's.
Stanwood Cobb was born on 6 November 1881. He was valedictorian of his class at Dartmouth College and earned an A.M. in philosophy and comparative religion at Harvard Divinity School. He became an educator, a writer and a lecturer.
He met 'Abdu'l-Bahá five times: twice in 'Akká, in 1909 and 1910; in Boston and in Washington in 1912; and in Paris in 1913. He recorded that "the most important interview" was the one in Paris.
At that time Cobb was on the staff of Porter Sargent's Travel School for Boys. "On my first visit He inquired about the school and asked me what I taught. I told Him that I taught English, Latin, Algebra and Geometry. He gazed intently at me with His luminous eyes and said, 'Do you teach the spiritual things?'"
"This question embarrassed me," Cobb wrote. He did not know how to explain to 'Abdu'l-Bahá that the need to prepare the boys for college-entrance examinations decided what the school taught. "So I simply answered: 'No, there is not time for that.'"
He went on: "'Abdu'l-Bahá made no comment on this answer. But He did not need to. Out of my own mouth I had condemned myself and modern education. No time for spiritual things! That, of course, is just what is wrong with our modern materialistic 'civilization'. It has no time to give for spiritual things.
"But 'Abdu'l-Bahá's question and His silent response indicated that from His viewpoint spiritual things should come first."
Cobb's recollections appeared in Bahá'í News in 1962 and were reprinted as Memories of 'Abdu'l-Bahá. He died in Chevy Chase, Maryland, on 28 December 1982, at the age of 101.
This is a retelling. For the full account, see Stanwood Cobb's Memories of 'Abdu'l-Bahá, quoted in Honnold's Vignettes from the Life of 'Abdu'l-Bahá.
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editors, B. C.. *Bahá'í Chronicles*. https://bahaichronicles.org/dr-stanwood-cobb/
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