Tablet to Mrs. Jessie Cole of Chicago

Among the earliest Tablets of 'Abdu'l-Bahá to American believers, preserved in the 1909 *Tablets of 'Abdu'l-Bahá Abbas* compiled by the Bahai Publishing Society of Chicago, is a brief letter addressed to Mrs. Jessie Cole of Chicago. The Tablet bears no specific date but appears, by its contents, to have been composed in the early years of the twentieth century, shortly after Mrs. Cole's recognition of the Cause through the small Chicago community then gathering under the influence of the early American believers.

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The Tablet is short — perhaps five paragraphs in the English translation. It addresses Mrs. Cole with the characteristic warmth of the Master's correspondence with new believers. It opens with an expression of joy at her *recognition of the new dawn,* affirms the spiritual significance of her declaration, and proceeds to the practical exhortation that occupies most of its body.

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> O thou who hast turned thy face to the kingdom of God! > Be assured that the Holy Spirit is the helper of those > who arise in service. Lay aside the small concerns of > private comfort and undertake the labour of the teaching. > Be a fountain of mercy, that thou mayest be sheltered > beneath the wings of Providence.

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The exhortation is followed by specific direction. Mrs. Cole is asked to attend the small gatherings of the friends in Chicago regularly, to give attention to the spiritual education of any children placed in her care, to undertake the patient correspondence with friends in other cities who may be interested in the Cause, and to make her home a *hospitable centre of the friends.*

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The Tablet closes with a benediction and the Master's characteristic signature. The note of personal address — a new believer of perhaps a few months' standing being addressed by the Centre of the Cause as though she were already a substantial teacher — is the note that runs through nearly all the Master's correspondence with the American friends in those years. The Master extended to the new American believers the dignity of a confidence that their character was equal to their commission.

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Mrs. Cole, the brief biographical record indicates, took the Tablet seriously. She remained an active member of the Chicago community for the rest of her life, supporting the small Chicago institutional efforts and playing a steady if unspectacular role in the early development of the American Faith.

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The Tablet itself, brief and pastoral, is among the many similar Tablets published in the 1909 compilation. Each exemplifies a small particular instance of the Master's encouragement of an early American believer in the characteristic language of His correspondence — affirmation of the conversion, summons to active service, specific practical direction, closing benediction.

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