First Reports of the Master's Passing

'Abdu'l-Bahá passed away at half past one in the morning of the 28th of November 1921, in His house in Haifa. He had felt unwell for only three days. A cable signed by the Greatest Holy Leaf carried the news to America at once, and the *Star of the West* printed it in facsimile in its December issue. The detailed accounts, newspaper reports from Haifa and letters from those who had been there, took several more weeks to arrive.

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The issue of the 19th of January 1922 printed a translation, made by Dr. Zia Bagdadi, of an article from the Haifa newspaper *Annafir* describing the funeral. At nine o'clock on the morning of Tuesday, the 29th of November, Allenby Road was crowded with people from its starting place to the summit of Mount Carmel. In the front ranks were Sir Herbert Samuel, the High Commissioner, and his staff, who had come from Jerusalem; Mr.

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Sims, the Governor of Phoenicia; the consuls of the various governments; and the Muslim, Christian and Jewish religious leaders. The casket, of plain white wood covered with Persian shawls, was carried up the mountain on the hands of the mourners. Police, Muslim and Christian Boy Scouts and the consuls' guards went ahead, with the leaders of the various Muslim communities chanting in front of the casket, and the High Commissioner and his staff walked behind it.

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At twenty minutes past ten the procession reached the Shrine of the Báb, and the casket was set on a dais beside it.

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There speakers from the Muslim, Christian and Jewish communities of the Holy Land gave their eulogies, and the *Star* printed them in translation. The first was Yessif Effendi El-Khatib, a Muslim orator. He told the crowd that there should be no weeping for the one who had departed to the eternal world; they should weep instead for their own loss of His bounty and knowledge:

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> Weep for one hour for the one who has wept for you for eighty years.

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Letters followed in the February and March issues: from Munavvar Khánum, a daughter of the Master, and from believers in the East and the West. When the national convention met in Chicago that April, Mrs. Florian Krug of New York, who had been a guest in the Master's house when He passed away, described the funeral, the officials who took part, the eulogies, and the crowd of some ten thousand who followed His body up the mountain. The *Star* included her account in its report of the convention.

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The same January issue that described the funeral also printed a cablegram from the Greatest Holy Leaf, dated the 16th of January: in the Master's Will, Shoghi Effendi had been appointed Guardian of the Cause.

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*A retelling based on the **Star of the West**, Volume 12, Nos. 15–19, and Volume 13, No. 4 (December 1921 – May 1922). For the fuller account, see the original.*

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