The Purest Branch in the First Bahai News

When the magazine later known as the *Star of the West* issued its first number in Chicago on the 21st of March 1910, under the name *Bahai News*, its first page carried a photograph of Mírzá Mihdí, the *Purest Branch.* He was the younger brother of 'Abdu'l-Bahá, a son of Bahá'u'lláh and Ásíyih Khánum, and he died in the barracks of 'Akká in 1870, twenty-two years old.

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The photograph had been sent to the friends in the West by a believer in Tehran, Fareeza Khánum, at the instruction of 'Abdu'l-Bahá. With it the editors printed an account of his death taken from Myron Phelps' *Life and Teachings of Abbas Effendi,* told in the words of his sister.

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Towards the end of the second year in the barracks, the account says, Mírzá Mihdí came one evening, as was his habit, to write for his Father. He was not well, and Bahá'u'lláh told him to go and come back later. He went up to the flat roof, the family's only place for fresh air and exercise, and walked up and down repeating Tablets and gazing at the sky.

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He stumbled, lost his balance and fell through the opening where the ladder came up from below, into the family's living-room, which had a lofty ceiling. The physician who was sent for said there was no hope.

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He lived for thirty hours. When he was about to pass away, Bahá'u'lláh asked him what he most wished for, whether he wished to live or preferred to die. He answered that he did not care to live; he had but one wish:

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> I want the believers to be admitted to see their Lord.

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Bahá'u'lláh told him that it would be as he desired.

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His death nearly broke his mother's heart. Bahá'u'lláh went to her and told her that her son had been taken by God that His people might be free; his life was the ransom, and she should rejoice that she had a son so dear to give to the Cause of God. After that, the account says, she did not shed a tear.

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The same issue printed a letter from Fareeza Khánum. She wrote that 'Abdu'l-Bahá had asked her to find photographs of the Purest Branch for the American believers, that they had been hard to find, and that she was sending nineteen. After Bahá'u'lláh's arrival in 'Akká, she explained, the door of meeting had been closed to the believers; the Purest Branch had begged for martyrdom so that it might be opened, his supplication was accepted, and the result was the opening of the gates of 'Akká to the believers.

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*A retelling based on **Star of the West** (Bahai News), Volume 1, No. 1 (March 21, 1910). For the fuller account, see the original.*

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