'Abdu'l-Baha's great work was now ended. The historic Mission with which
His Father had, twenty-nine years previously, invested Him had been
gloriously consummated. A memorable chapter in the history of the first
Baha'i century had been written. The Heroic Age of the Baha'i
Dispensation, in which He had participated since its inception, and played
so unique a role, had drawn to a close. He had suffered as no disciple of
the Faith, who had drained the cup of martyrdom, had suffered, He had
labored as none of its greatest heroes had labored. He had witnessed
triumphs such as neither the Herald of the Faith nor its Author had ever
witnessed.
At the close of His strenuous Western tours, which had called forth the
last ounce of His ebbing strength, He had written: "Friends, the time is
coming when I shall be no longer with you. I have done all that could be
done. I have served the Cause of Baha'u'llah to the utmost of My ability.
I have labored night and day all the years of My life. O how I long to see
the believers shouldering the responsibilities of the Cause!... My days
are numbered, and save this there remains none other joy for me." Several
years before He had thus alluded to His passing: "O ye My faithful loved
ones! Should at any time afflicting events come to pass in the Holy Land,
never feel disturbed or agitated. Fear not, neither grieve. For whatsoever
thing happeneth will cause the Word of God to be exalted, and His Divine
fragrances to be diffused." And again: "Remember, whether or not I be on
earth, My presence will be with you always." "Regard not the person of
'Abdu'l-Baha," He thus counselled His friends in one of His last Tablets,
"for He will eventually take His leave of you all; nay, fix your gaze upon
the Word of God... The loved ones of God must arise with such
steadfastness that should, in one moment, hundreds of souls even as
'Abdu'l-Baha Himself be made a target for the darts of woe, nothing
whatsoever shall affect or lessen their ... service to the Cause of God."
In a Tablet addressed to the American believers, a few days before He
passed away, He thus vented His pent-up longing to depart from this world:
"I have renounced the world and the people thereof... In the cage of this
world I flutter even as a frightened bird, and yearn every day to take My
flight unto Thy Kingdom. Ya Baha'u'l-Abha! Make Me drink of the cup of
sacrifice, and set Me free." He revealed a prayer less than six months
before His ascension in honor of a kinsman of the Bab, and in it wrote:
"'O Lord! My bones are weakened, and the hoar hairs glisten on My head ...
and I have now reached old age, failing in My powers.'... No strength is
there left in Me wherewith to arise and serve Thy loved ones... O Lord, My
Lord! Hasten My ascension unto Thy sublime Threshold ... and My arrival at
the Door of Thy grace beneath the shadow of Thy most great mercy..."
Through the dreams He dreamed, through the conversations He held, through
the Tablets He revealed, it became increasingly evident that His end was
fast approaching. Two months before His passing He told His family of a
dream He had had. "I seemed," He said, "to be standing within a great
mosque, in the inmost shrine, facing the Qiblih, in the place of the Imam
himself. I became aware that a large number of people were flocking into
the mosque. More and yet more crowded in, taking their places in rows
behind Me, until there was a vast multitude. As I stood I raised loudly
the call to prayer. Suddenly the thought came to Me to go forth from the
mosque. When I found Myself outside I said within Myself: 'For what reason
came I forth, not having led the prayer? But it matters not; now that I
have uttered the Call to prayer, the vast multitude will of themselves
chant the prayer.'" A few weeks later, whilst occupying a solitary room in
the garden of His house, He recounted another dream to those around Him.
"I dreamed a dream," He said, "and behold, the Blessed Beauty
(Baha'u'llah) came and said to Me: 'Destroy this room.'" None of those
present comprehended the significance of this dream until He Himself had
soon after passed away, when it became clear to them all that by the
"room" was meant the temple of His body.
A month before His death (which occurred in the 78th year of His age, in
the early hours of the 28th of November, 1921) He had referred expressly
to it in some words of cheer and comfort that He addressed to a believer
who was mourning the loss of his brother. And about two weeks before His
passing He had spoken to His faithful gardener in a manner that clearly
indicated He knew His end to be nigh. "I am so fatigued," He observed to
him, "the hour is come when I must leave everything and take My flight. I
am too weary to walk." He added: "It was during the closing days of the
Blessed Beauty, when I was engaged in gathering together His papers which
were strewn over the sofa in His writing chamber in Bahji, that He turned
to Me and said: 'It is of no use to gather them, I must leave them and
flee away.' I also have finished My work. I can do nothing more. Therefore
must I leave it, and take My departure."
Till the very last day of His earthly life 'Abdu'l-Baha continued to
shower that same love upon high and low alike, to extend that same
assistance to the poor and the down-trodden, and to carry out those same
duties in the service of His Father's Faith, as had been His wont from the
days of His boyhood. On the Friday before His passing, despite great
fatigue, He attended the noonday prayer at the mosque, and distributed
afterwards alms, as was His custom, among the poor; dictated some
Tablets--the last ones He revealed--; blessed the marriage of a trusted
servant, which He had insisted should take place that day; attended the
usual meeting of the friends in His home; felt feverish the next day, and
being unable to leave the house on the following Sunday, sent all the
believers to the Tomb of the Bab to attend a feast which a Parsi pilgrim
was offering on the occasion of the anniversary of the Declaration of the
Covenant; received with His unfailing courtesy and kindness that same
afternoon, and despite growing weariness, the Mufti of Haifa, the Mayor
and the Head of the Police; and inquired that night--the last of His
life--before He retired after the health of every member of His household,
of the pilgrims and of the friends in Haifa.
At 1:15 A.M. He arose, and, walking to a table in His room, drank some
water, and returned to bed. Later on, He asked one of His two daughters
who had remained awake to care for Him, to lift up the net curtains,
complaining that He had difficulty in breathing. Some rose-water was
brought to Him, of which He drank, after which He again lay down, and when
offered food, distinctly remarked: "You wish Me to take some food, and I
am going?" A minute later His spirit had winged its flight to its eternal
abode, to be gathered, at long last, to the glory of His beloved Father,
and taste the joy of everlasting reunion with Him.
The news of His passing, so sudden, so unexpected, spread like wildfire
throughout the town, and was flashed instantly over the wires to distant
parts of the globe, stunning with grief the community of the followers of
Baha'u'llah in East and West. Messages from far and near, from high and
low alike, through cablegrams and letters, poured in conveying to the
members of a sorrow-stricken and disconsolate family expressions of
praise, of devotion, of anguish and of sympathy.
The British Secretary of State for the Colonies, Mr. Winston Churchill,
telegraphed immediately to the High Commissioner for Palestine, Sir
Herbert Samuel, instructing him to "convey to the Baha'i Community, on
behalf of His Majesty's Government, their sympathy and condolence."
Viscount Allenby, the High Commissioner for Egypt, wired the High
Commissioner for Palestine asking him to "convey to the relatives of the
late Sir 'Abdu'l-Baha Abbas Effendi and to the Baha'i Community" his
"sincere sympathy in the loss of their revered leader." The Council of
Ministers in Ba_gh_dad instructed the Prime Minister Siyyid 'Abdu'r-Rahman
to extend their "sympathy to the family of His Holiness 'Abdu'l-Baha in
their bereavement." The Commander-in-Chief of the Egyptian Expeditionary
Force, General Congreve, addressed to the High Commissioner for Palestine
a message requesting him to "convey his deepest sympathy to the family of
the late Sir Abbas Baha'i." General Sir Arthur Money, former Chief
Administrator of Palestine, wrote expressing his sadness, his profound
respect and his admiration for Him as well as his sympathy in the loss
which His family had sustained. One of the distinguished figures in the
academic life of the University of Oxford, a famous professor and scholar,
wrote on behalf of himself and his wife: "The passing beyond the veil into
fuller life must be specially wonderful and blessed for One Who has always
fixed His thoughts on high, and striven to lead an exalted life here
below."
Many and divers newspapers, such as the London "Times," the "Morning
Post," the "Daily Mail," the "New York World," "Le Temps," the "Times of
India" and others, in different languages and countries, paid their
tribute to One Who had rendered the Cause of human brotherhood and peace
such signal and imperishable services.
The High Commissioner, Sir Herbert Samuel, sent immediately a message
conveying his desire to attend the funeral in person, in order as he
himself later wrote, to "express my respect for His creed and my regard
for His person." As to the funeral itself, which took place on Tuesday
morning--a funeral the like of which Palestine had never seen--no less than
ten thousand people participated representing every class, religion and
race in that country. "A great throng," bore witness at a later date, the
High Commissioner himself, "had gathered together, sorrowing for His
death, but rejoicing also for His life." Sir Ronald Storrs, Governor of
Jerusalem at the time, also wrote in describing the funeral: "I have never
known a more united expression of regret and respect than was called forth
by the utter simplicity of the ceremony."
The coffin containing the remains of 'Abdu'l-Baha was borne to its last
resting-place on the shoulders of His loved ones. The cortege which
preceded it was led by the City Constabulary Force, acting as a Guard of
Honor, behind which followed in order the Boy Scouts of the Muslim and
Christian communities holding aloft their banners, a company of Muslim
choristers chanting their verses from the Qur'an, the chiefs of the Muslim
community headed by the Mufti, and a number of Christian priests, Latin,
Greek and Anglican. Behind the coffin walked the members of His family,
the British High Commissioner, Sir Herbert Samuel, the Governor of
Jerusalem, Sir Ronald Storrs, the Governor of Phoenicia, Sir Stewart
Symes, officials of the government, consuls of various countries resident
in Haifa, notables of Palestine, Muslim, Jewish, Christian and Druze,
Egyptians, Greeks, Turks, Arabs, Kurds, Europeans and Americans, men,
women and children. The long train of mourners, amid the sobs and moans of
many a grief-stricken heart, wended its slow way up the slopes of Mt.
Carmel to the Mausoleum of the Bab.
Close to the eastern entrance of the Shrine, the sacred casket was placed
upon a plain table, and, in the presence of that vast concourse, nine
speakers, who represented the Muslim, the Jewish and Christian Faiths, and
who included the Mufti of Haifa, delivered their several funeral orations.
These concluded, the High Commissioner drew close to the casket, and, with
bowed head fronting the Shrine, paid his last homage of farewell to
'Abdu'l-Baha: the other officials of the Government followed his example.
The coffin was then removed to one of the chambers of the Shrine, and
there lowered, sadly and reverently, to its last resting-place in a vault
adjoining that in which were laid the remains of the Bab.
During the week following His passing, from fifty to a hundred of the poor
of Haifa were daily fed at His house, whilst on the seventh day corn was
distributed in His memory to about a thousand of them irrespective of
creed or race. On the fortieth day an impressive memorial feast was held
in His memory, to which over six hundred of the people of Haifa, Akka and
the surrounding parts of Palestine and Syria, including officials and
notables of various religions and races, were invited. More than one
hundred of the poor were also fed on that day.
One of the assembled guests, the Governor of Phoenicia, paid a last
tribute to the memory of 'Abdu'l-Baha in the following words: "Most of us
here have, I think, a clear picture of Sir 'Abdu'l-Baha Abbas, of His
dignified figure walking thoughtfully in our streets, of His courteous and
gracious manner, of His kindness, of His love for little children and
flowers, of His generosity and care for the poor and suffering. So gentle
was He, and so simple, that in His presence one almost forgot that He was
also a great teacher, and that His writings and His conversations have
been a solace and an inspiration to hundreds and thousands of people in
the East and in the West."
Thus was brought to a close the ministry of One Who was the incarnation,
by virtue of the rank bestowed upon Him by His Father, of an institution
that has no parallel in the entire field of religious history, a ministry
that marks the final stage in the Apostolic, the Heroic and most glorious
Age of the Dispensation of Baha'u'llah.
Through Him the Covenant, that "excellent and priceless Heritage"
bequeathed by the Author of the Baha'i Revelation, had been proclaimed,
championed and vindicated. Through the power which that Divine Instrument
had conferred upon Him the light of God's infant Faith had penetrated the
West, had diffused itself as far as the Islands of the Pacific, and
illumined the fringes of the Australian continent. Through His personal
intervention the Message, Whose Bearer had tasted the bitterness of a
life-long captivity, had been noised abroad, and its character and purpose
disclosed, for the first time in its history, before enthusiastic and
representative audiences in the chief cities of Europe and of the North
American continent. Through His unrelaxing vigilance the holy remains of
the Bab, brought forth at long last from their fifty-year concealment, had
been safely transported to the Holy Land and permanently and befittingly
enshrined in the very spot which Baha'u'llah Himself had designated for
them and had blessed with His presence. Through His bold initiative the
first Ma_sh_riqu'l-A_dh_kar of the Baha'i world had been reared in Central
Asia, in Russian Turkistan, whilst through His unfailing encouragement a
similar enterprise, of still vaster proportions, had been undertaken, and
its land dedicated by Himself in the heart of the North American
continent. Through the sustaining grace overshadowing Him since the
inception of His ministry His royal adversary had been humbled to the
dust, the arch-breaker of His Father's Covenant had been utterly routed,
and the danger which, ever since Baha'u'llah had been banished to Turkish
soil, had been threatening the heart of the Faith, definitely removed. In
pursuance of His instructions, and in conformity with the principles
enunciated and the laws ordained by His Father, the rudimentary
institutions, heralding the formal inauguration of the Administrative
Order to be founded after His passing, had taken shape and been
established. Through His unremitting labors, as reflected in the treatises
He composed, the thousands of Tablets He revealed, the discourses He
delivered, the prayers, poems and commentaries He left to posterity,
mostly in Persian, some in Arabic and a few in Turkish, the laws and
principles, constituting the warp and woof of His Father's Revelation, had
been elucidated, its fundamentals restated and interpreted, its tenets
given detailed application and the validity and indispensability of its
verities fully and publicly demonstrated. Through the warnings He sounded,
an unheeding humanity, steeped in materialism and forgetful of its God,
had been apprized of the perils threatening to disrupt its ordered life,
and made, in consequence of its persistent perversity, to sustain the
initial shocks of that world upheaval which continues, until the present
day, to rock the foundations of human society. And lastly, through the
mandate He had issued to a valiant community, the concerted achievements
of whose members had shed so great a lustre on the annals of His own
ministry, He had set in motion a Plan which, soon after its formal
inauguration, achieved the opening of the Australian continent, which, in
a later period, was to be instrumental in winning over the heart of a
royal convert to His Father's Cause, and which, today, through the
irresistible unfoldment of its potentialities, is so marvellously
quickening the spiritual life of all the Republics of Latin America as to
constitute a befitting conclusion to the records of an entire century.
Nor should a survey of the outstanding features of so blessed and fruitful
a ministry omit mention of the prophecies which the unerring pen of the
appointed Center of Baha'u'llah's Covenant has recorded. These foreshadow
the fierceness of the onslaught that the resistless march of the Faith
must provoke in the West, in India and in the Far East when it meets the
time-honored sacerdotal orders of the Christian, the Buddhist and Hindu
religions. They foreshadow the turmoil which its emancipation from the
fetters of religious orthodoxy will cast in the American, the European,
the Asiatic and African continents. They foreshadow the gathering of the
children of Israel in their ancient homeland; the erection of the banner
of Baha'u'llah in the Egyptian citadel of Sunni Islam; the extinction of
the powerful influence wielded by the _Sh_i'ah ecclesiastics in Persia;
the load of misery which must needs oppress the pitiful remnants of the
breakers of Baha'u'llah's Covenant at the world center of His Faith; the
splendor of the institutions which that triumphant Faith must erect on the
slopes of a mountain, destined to be so linked with the city of Akka that
a single grand metropolis will be formed to enshrine the spiritual as well
as the administrative seats of the future Baha'i Commonwealth; the
conspicuous honor which the inhabitants of Baha'u'llah's native land in
general, and its government in particular, must enjoy in a distant future;
the unique and enviable position which the community of the Most Great
Name in the North American continent must occupy, as a direct consequence
of the execution of the world mission which He entrusted to them: finally
they foreshadow, as the sum and summit of all, the "hoisting of the
standard of God among all nations" and the unification of the entire human
race, when "all men will adhere to one religion ... will be blended into
one race, and become a single people."
Nor can the revolutionary changes in the great world which that ministry
has witnessed be allowed to pass unnoticed--most of them flowing directly
from the warnings which were uttered by the Bab, in the first chapter of
His Qayyumu'l-Asma, on the very night of the Declaration of His Mission in
_Sh_iraz, and which were later reinforced by the pregnant passages
addressed by Baha'u'llah to the kings of the earth and the world's
religious leaders, in both the Suriy-i-Muluk and the Kitab-i-Aqdas. The
conversion of the Portuguese monarchy and the Chinese empire into
republics; the collapse of the Russian, the German and Austrian empires,
and the ignominious fate which befell their rulers; the assassination of
Nasiri'd-Din _Sh_ah, the fall of Sultan 'Abdu'l-Hamid--these may be said to
have marked further stages in the operation of that catastrophic process
the inception of which was signalized in the lifetime of Baha'u'llah by
the murder of Sultan 'Abdu'l-'Aziz, by the dramatic downfall of Napoleon
III, and the extinction of the Third Empire, and by the self-imposed
imprisonment and virtual termination of the temporal sovereignty of the
Pope himself. Later, after 'Abdu'l-Baha's passing, the same process was to
be accelerated by the demise of the Qajar dynasty in Persia, by the
overthrow of the Spanish monarchy, by the collapse of both the Sultanate
and the Caliphate in Turkey, by a swift decline in the fortunes of
_Sh_i'ah Islam and of the Christian Missions in the East, and by the cruel
fate that is now overtaking so many of the crowned heads of Europe.
Nor can this subject be dismissed without special reference to the names
of those men of eminence and learning who were moved, at various stages of
'Abdu'l-Baha's ministry, to pay tribute not only to 'Abdu'l-Baha Himself
but also to the Faith of Baha'u'llah. Such names as Count Leo Tolstoy,
Prof. Arminius Vambery, Prof. Auguste Forel, Dr. David Starr Jordan, the
Venerable Archdeacon Wilberforce, Prof. Jowett of Balliol, Dr. T. K.
Cheyne, Dr. Estlin Carpenter of Oxford University, Viscount Samuel of
Carmel, Lord Lamington, Sir Valentine Chirol, Rabbi Stephen Wise, Prince
Muhammad-'Ali of Egypt, _Sh_ay_kh_ Muhammad 'Abdu, Mi_dh_at Pa_sh_a, and
_Kh_ur_sh_id Pa_sh_a attest, by virtue of the tributes associated with
them, the great progress made by the Faith of Baha'u'llah under the
brilliant leadership of His exalted Son--tributes whose impressiveness was,
in later years, to be heightened by the historic, the repeated and written
testimonies which a famous Queen, a grand-daughter of Queen Victoria, was
impelled to bequeath to posterity as a witness of her recognition of the
prophetic mission of Baha'u'llah.
As for those enemies who have sedulously sought to extinguish the light of
Baha'u'llah's Covenant, the condign punishment they have been made to
suffer is no less conspicuous than the doom which overtook those who, in
an earlier period, had so basely endeavored to crush the hopes of a rising
Faith and destroy its foundations.
To the assassination of the tyrannical Nasiri'd-Din _Sh_ah and the
subsequent extinction of the Qajar dynasty reference has already been
made. Sultan 'Abdu'l-Hamid, after his deposition, was made a prisoner of
state and condemned to a life of complete obscurity and humiliation,
scorned by his fellow-rulers and vilified by his subjects. The
bloodthirsty Jamal Pa_sh_a, who had resolved to crucify 'Abdu'l-Baha and
raze to the ground Baha'u'llah's holy Tomb, had to flee for his life and
was slain, while a refugee in the Caucasus, by the hand of an Armenian
whose fellow-compatriots he had so pitilessly persecuted. The scheming
Jamalu'd-Din Af_gh_ani, whose relentless hostility and powerful influence
had been so gravely detrimental to the progress of the Faith in Near
Eastern countries, was, after a checkered career filled with vicissitudes,
stricken with cancer, and having had a major part of his tongue cut away
in an unsuccessful operation perished in misery. The four members of the
ill-fated Commission of Inquiry, despatched from Constantinople to seal
the fate of 'Abdu'l-Baha, suffered, each in his turn, a humiliation hardly
less drastic than that which they had planned for Him. Arif Bey, the head
of the Commission, seeking stealthily at midnight to flee from the wrath
of the Young Turks, was shot dead by a sentry. Adham Bey succeeded in
escaping to Egypt, but was robbed of his possessions by his servant on the
way, and was in the end compelled to seek financial assistance from the
Baha'is of Cairo, a request which was not refused. Later he sought help
from 'Abdu'l-Baha, Who immediately directed the believers to present him
with a sum on His behalf, an instruction which they were unable to carry
out owing to his sudden disappearance. Of the other two members, one was
exiled to a remote place, and the other died soon after in abject poverty.
The notorious Yahya Bey, the Chief of the Police in Akka, a willing and
powerful tool in the hand of Mirza Muhammad-'Ali, the arch-breaker of
Baha'u'llah's Covenant, witnessed the frustration of all the hopes he had
cherished, lost his position, and had eventually to beg for pecuniary
assistance from 'Abdu'l-Baha. In Constantinople, in the year which
witnessed the downfall of 'Abdu'l-Hamid, no less than thirty-one
dignitaries of the state, including ministers and other high officers of
the government, among whom numbered redoubtable enemies of the Faith,
were, in a single day, arrested and condemned to the gallows, a
spectacular retribution for the part they had played in upholding a
tyrannical regime and in endeavoring to extirpate the Faith and its
institutions.
In Persia, apart from the sovereign who had, in the full tide of his hopes
and the plenitude of his power, been removed from the scene in so
startling a manner, a number of princes, ministers and mujtahids, who had
actively participated in the suppression of a persecuted community,
including Kamran Mirza, the Na'ibu's-Saltanih, the Jalalu'd-Dawlih and
Mirza 'Ali-As_gh_ar _Kh_an, the Atabik-i-A'zam, and _Sh_ay_kh_
Muhammad-Taqiy-i-Najafi, the "Son of the Wolf," lost, one by one, their
prestige and authority, sank into obscurity, abandoned all hope of
achieving their malevolent purpose, and lived, some of them, long enough
to behold the initial evidences of the ascendancy of a Cause they had so
greatly feared and so vehemently hated.
When we note that in the Holy Land, in Persia, and in the United States of
America certain exponents of Christian ecclesiasticism such as Vatralsky,
Wilson, Richardson or Easton, observing, and in some cases fearing, the
vigorous advances made by the Faith of Baha'u'llah in Christian lands,
arose to stem its progress; and when we watch the recent and steady
deterioration of their influence, the decline of their power, the
confusion in their ranks and the dissolution of some of their old standing
missions and institutions, in Europe, in the Middle East and in Eastern
Asia--may we not attribute this weakening to the opposition which members
of various Christian sacerdotal orders began, in the course of
'Abdu'l-Baha's ministry, to evince towards the followers and institutions
of a Faith which claims to be no less than the fulfilment of the Promise
given by Jesus Christ, and the establisher of the Kingdom He Himself had
prayed for and foretold?
And finally, he who, from the moment the Divine Covenant was born until
the end of his life, showed a hatred more unrelenting than that which
animated the afore-mentioned adversaries of 'Abdu'l-Baha, who plotted more
energetically than any one of them against Him, and afflicted his Father's
Faith with a shame more grievous than any which its external enemies had
inflicted upon it--such a man, together with the infamous crew of
Covenant-breakers whom he had misled and instigated, was condemned to
witness, in a growing measure, as had been the case with Mirza Yahya and
his henchmen, the frustration of his evil designs, the evaporation of all
his hopes, the exposition of his true motives and the complete extinction
of his erstwhile honor and glory. His brother, Mirza Diya'u'llah, died
prematurely; Mirza Aqa Jan, his dupe, followed that same brother, three
years later, to the grave; and Mirza Badi'u'llah, his chief accomplice,
betrayed his cause, published a signed denunciation of his evil acts, but
rejoined him again, only to be alienated from him in consequence of the
scandalous behavior of his own daughter. Mirza Muhammad-'Ali's
half-sister, Furu_gh_iyyih, died of cancer, whilst her husband, Siyyid
'Ali, passed away from a heart attack before his sons could reach him, the
eldest being subsequently stricken in the prime of life, by the same
malady. Muhammad-Javad-i-Qazvini, a notorious Covenant-breaker, perished
miserably. _Sh_u'a'u'llah who, as witnessed by 'Abdu'l-Baha in His Will,
had counted on the murder of the Center of the Covenant, and who had been
despatched to the United States by his father to join forces with Ibrahim
_Kh_ayru'llah, returned crestfallen and empty-handed from his inglorious
mission. Jamal-i-Burujirdi, Mirza Muhammad-'Ali's ablest lieutenant in
Persia, fell a prey to a fatal and loathsome disease; Siyyid
Mihdiy-i-Dahaji, who, betraying 'Abdu'l-Baha, joined the
Covenant-breakers, died in obscurity and poverty, followed by his wife and
his two sons; Mirza Husayn-'Aliy-i-Jahrumi, Mirza
Husayn-i-_Sh_iraziy-i-_Kh_urtumi and Haji Muhammad-Husayn-i-Ka_sh_ani, who
represented the arch-breaker of the Covenant in Persia, India and Egypt,
failed utterly in their missions; whilst the greedy and conceited
Ibrahim-i-_Kh_ayru'llah, who had chosen to uphold the banner of his
rebellion in America for no less than twenty years, and who had the
temerity to denounce, in writing, 'Abdu'l-Baha, His "false teachings, His
misrepresentations of Bahaism, His dissimulation," and to stigmatize His
visit to America as "a death-blow" to the "Cause of God," met his death
soon after he had uttered these denunciations, utterly abandoned and
despised by the entire body of the members of a community, whose founders
he himself had converted to the Faith, and in the very land that bore
witness to the multiplying evidences of the established ascendancy of
'Abdu'l-Baha, Whose authority he had, in his later years, vowed to uproot.
As to those who had openly espoused the cause of this arch-breaker of
Baha'u'llah's Covenant, or who had secretly sympathized with him, whilst
outwardly supporting 'Abdu'l-Baha, some eventually repented and were
forgiven; others became disillusioned and lost their faith entirely; a few
apostatized, whilst the rest dwindled away, leaving him in the end, except
for a handful of his relatives, alone and unsupported. Surviving
'Abdu'l-Baha by almost twenty years, he who had so audaciously affirmed to
His face that he had no assurance he might outlive Him, lived long enough
to witness the utter bankruptcy of his cause, leading meanwhile a wretched
existence within the walls of a Mansion that had once housed a crowd of
his supporters; was denied by the civil authorities, as a result of the
crisis he had after 'Abdu'l-Baha's passing foolishly precipitated, the
official custody of his Father's Tomb; was compelled, a few years later,
to vacate that same Mansion, which, through his flagrant neglect, had
fallen into a dilapidated condition; was stricken with paralysis which
crippled half his body; lay bedridden in pain for months before he died;
and was buried according to Muslim rites, in the immediate vicinity of a
local Muslim shrine, his grave remaining until the present day devoid of
even a tombstone--a pitiful reminder of the hollowness of the claims he had
advanced, of the depths of infamy to which he had sunk, and of the
severity of the retribution his acts had so richly merited.
FOURTH PERIOD: THE INCEPTION OF THE FORMATIVE AGE OF THE BAHA'I FAITH
1921-1944