The Passing of 'Abdu'l-Bahá: First Reports in the Star

In the early weeks of 1922 the *Star of the West* devoted its principal pages to the first detailed American accounts of the passing of 'Abdu'l-Bahá. The Master had ascended on the morning of 28 November 1921 in His house in Haifa, after a brief illness. The cabled news had reached America in the first week of December. The detailed accounts — sent by letter from those who had been present — took several further weeks to arrive.

1 / 8

The *Star's* lead editorial conveyed the spiritual gravity of the moment in language as steady as the editors could manage. The Master had been the Centre of the Bahá'í community for thirty years. Generations of believers in several continents had grown up under His direct guidance. The fact of His passing was, for the entire community, the end of a long and intimate spiritual companionship.

2 / 8

The accounts of the funeral itself — drawn from letters sent by Lady Blomfield, by the Holy Family, by the small circle of resident pilgrims — gave the American friends their first glimpse of the public extent of the mourning in the Holy Land.

3 / 8

The funeral procession wound from the Master's house in Haifa up the slope of Mount Carmel to the resting place that had been prepared beside the Shrine of the Báb. The *Star's* report estimated the number of mourners at *ten thousand* — drawn from every community of the Haifa-'Akká region. There were Christians of the Greek Orthodox, Roman Catholic, Maronite, Anglican, and Coptic communions. There were Muslims of both Sunní and Shi'a traditions.

4 / 8

There were Jews of the established Palestinian Jewish community and of the new Zionist settlements. There were Druzes from the Carmel villages. There were Bahá'ís from every quarter of the Holy Land and from the small community of resident pilgrims from abroad.

5 / 8

The British High Commissioner of the Mandate, Sir Herbert Samuel, attended in person. The mayors of Haifa and 'Akká attended. The senior religious dignitaries of every community were present. The streets of Haifa were lined, the *Star's* report records, by *uncounted thousands* who came simply to stand silently as the cortège passed.

6 / 8

At the gravesite a sequence of speakers from each community offered tribute. Christians spoke of the friend their churches had lost. Muslims spoke of the just man whose counsel they had sought. Jews spoke of the protector of the Jewish community whose intervention had served them in difficulty. Each tribute, the *Star's* report observes, was *free of the small partisan claim;* each speaker honoured the Master in the language proper to his own faith and left the larger fact of the Master's spiritual identity to the Bahá'í community to which He primarily belonged.

7 / 8

The procession dispersed at dusk. The Master rested in the chamber that had been prepared. The Holy Family returned to the house where He had lived. The Bahá'í world, in the days that followed, would learn of the existence of the *Will and Testament* and of the appointment of Shoghi Effendi as Guardian. But that news would belong to the following months. The closing of the November day at the gravesite on Mount Carmel was the closing of an age.

8 / 8