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Chronology of the Bahá'í Faith

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Date 1921-1, descending — sort earliest first

date event tags firsts
1921 (Late in the year) Mírzá Husayn Tútí arrived in the Philippines, the earliest known visit by a Bahá'í to this country. He stayed for four months. Mírzá Husayn Tuti; Philippines
1921 29 Dec Shoghi Effendi arrived in the Holy Land from England by train from Egypt. [GBF14; PP42]
  • An envelope addressed to him from 'Abdu'l-Bahá was waiting for him. It contained the Will and Testament. [Ruhi8.2p2; PP42]
  • He was so worn and grief-stricken that he had to be assisted up the stairs and was confined to bed for a number of days. [CB285]
    		•  `Abdu'l-Bahá, Ascension of; Shoghi Effendi, Life of; Shoghi Effendi, Basic timeline; `Abdu'l-Bahá, Will and Testament of; * `Abdu'l-Bahá, Writings and talks of; United Kingdom; Egypt; Haifa, Israel
    1921 16 Dec Shoghi Effendi left England for Haifa in the company of Lady Blomfield and his sister Rouhangeze [Rúhangíz]. Lady Blomfield stayed on in the Holy Land for several months to assist Shoghi Effendi in his new role as the Guardian. [GBF13-14; PP42; SBR66]
  • Due to passport difficulties Shoghi Effendi could not leave sooner. [GBF13; PP42; SBR66; PG202]
    		• Shoghi Effendi, Life of; Shoghi Effendi, Basic timeline; Lady Blomfield (Sara Lousia Ryan, Sara Blomfield, Sitarih Khanum); Rouhangeze (Ruhangiz); London, England; United Kingdom; Haifa, Israel
    1921 5-6 Dec The second Convention for Amity between the White and Coloured Races was held in Springfield, Massachusetts. [BW2:282; SBR92; SYH113-114, 126]
  • Over a thousand people attended. [SW13, 3:51]
  • For a report of the convention see SW13, 3:51-5, 601.
  • For a photograph see SW13, 3:50.
    		•  Race; Race amity; Race unity; Conferences, Race Amity; Springfield, MA; Massachusetts, USA; USA
    1921 4 Dec On the seventh day after the passing of `Abdu'l-Bahá, corn was distributed in His name to about a thousand of the poor.
  • Up to this day 50 to 100 poor were fed daily at the Master's House. [BW15:122]
    		•  `Abdu'l-Bahá, Ascension of; `Abdu'l-Bahá, Life of (chronology); `Abdu'l-Bahá, House of; Haifa, Israel
    1921 2 Dec Ethel Rosenberg arrived in the Holy Land, having learned on the train from Port Said of the passing of `Abdu'l-Bahá. [EJR181-2] Ethel Rosenberg; Haifa, Israel
    1921 1 Dec - 7 Dec Dr Esslemont made a trip from Bournemouth to London to visit Shoghi Effendi and offer support. He invited him back to Bournemouth where he stayed from the evening of the 2nd of December until the morning of the seventh. [PG199]
  • Shoghi Effendi wrote to a Bahá'í student in London describing his reaction to the news of the Master's passing. It would appear he had reconciled himself to the situation. [PG100; PP40-41]
  • See PG201 for the observations of others.
  • On the 7th of December he received a cable from the Greatest Holy Leaf urging him to return to the Holy Land. He left for London immediately. [PG100]
    		•  Esslemont; Shoghi Effendi, Life of; London, England; Bournemouth, England; United Kingdom
    1921 (Following `Abdu'l-Bahá's passing) Mírzá Muhammad-`Alí published far and wide that he was the successor to `Abdu'l-Bahá. [CB277]
  • The Egyptian Bahá'ís responded to this by publishing a refutation of his claims. [CB276; SW12, 19:294-5]
    		• Mírzá Muhammad Ali; Covenant-breakers; Succession; `Abdu'l-Bahá, Will and Testament of; Egypt
    1921 29 Nov A cable was sent to London with news of `Abdu'l-Bahá's passing. Shoghi Effendi was summonsed to the office of Wellesley Tudor Pole, probably at at 61, St. James St. in London, and learned of his grandfather's passing about noon after seeing the cable on Tudor Pole's desk. [GBF13]
  • See GBF13, PG199 and PP39-40 for Shoghi Effendi's reaction.
    		•  `Abdu'l-Bahá, Ascension of; `Abdu'l-Bahá, Life of (chronology); Shoghi Effendi at Oxford; Shoghi Effendi, Life of; Shoghi Effendi, Basic timeline; Wellesley Tudor Pole; Oxford, England; London, England; United Kingdom
    1921 29 Nov The Faith had spread to 35 countries, an increase of 20 since the passing of Bahá'u'lláh. [Patheos website]
  • The additional countries were: Saudi Arabia, Australia, Austria, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, Treat Britain, Hawaiian Islands, Holland, Hungary, Italy, Japan, Jordon, Russia, South Africa, Switzerland, Tunisia, and the United States.
    		•  Statistics
    1921 29 Nov The funeral of `Abdu'l-Bahá. [BW15:115]
  • For details of the funeral see AB464-74; BW1:23-6; BW15:115-19; GPB312-14; and SW12, 17:259-67.
  • For Western and newspaper accounts see AB474-80; BBR347-9; BW1:26-8; and BW15:119-20.
  • For eulogies to `Abdu'l-Bahá see AB481-2, BW1:28-9 and BW15 120-1.
  • Ten thousand people attend `Abdu'l-Bahá's funeral. [v7]
  • For a number of pictures of the funeral procession see SW12, 91:290, 292-8.
  • Bahíyyih Khánum looked for instructions on where to bury `Abdu'l-Bahá and, finding none, entombed Him in a vault next to the one where the remains of the Báb lay. [AB464; GBF14]
  • Also see Balyuzi, `Abdu'l-Bahá; Blomfield, The Chosen Highway; Honnold, Vignettes from the Life of `Abdu'l-Bahá; SW12, 15:245 and several following issues.
  • Photo.
  • The Greatest Holy Leaf engaged a locksmith to change all the locks in the Master's house. During the funeral procession she remained there and asked that a policeman be assigned to stand outside the door. During the procession Mirza Muhammad-Ali and his brother, feigning sadness, asked the policeman if they could enter the Master's house to express their condolences to the Greatest Holy Leaf. She turned them away at the door saying that this was not the time. He had attempted a kind of a palace coup. The Greatest Holy Leaf had foreseen that he would attempt just that. The House of the Master was more than a residence; it was the visible administrative centre of the Cause. Other than the Shrine of the Báb, it was the only Bahá'í edifice in the Holy Land at that time. [An account of the passing of 'Abdu'l-Bahá p42]
    		• `Abdu'l-Bahá, Ascension of; `Abdu'l-Bahá, Life of (chronology); Bahiyyih Khanum (Greatest Holy Leaf); Báb, Shrine of; `Abdu'l-Bahá, Shrine of; - Basic timeline, Expanded; `Abdu'l-Bahá, Basic timeline; Haifa, Israel; Bahji, Israel; Mount Carmel; Covenant-breakers; Mírzá Muhammad Ali
    1921 28 Nov Ascension of `Abdu'l-Bahá

    `Abdu'l-Bahá passed away at about 1:00 a.m., in Haifa. [AB452; BBD4; BBR347; GPB311; UD170]
  • For details of His passing see DOMH210-216, AB452, BW1:19-23; BW15:113-15 and GPB310-11. Westerners who were present in the Holy Land at the time included: Grace and Florian Drug, Louise and John Bosch from the USA, Ethel Rosenberg from London and Fräulein Johanna Hauff from Stuttgart as well as American Curtis Kelsey who was in the Holy Land to attend to the electrical installations in the Shrine of the Báb at the time. [AB462-463]
  • Sir Herbert Samuel and Sir Ronald Storrs led the funeral procession. [CH226]
  • This marked the end of the Apostolic, Heroic or Primitive Age of the Bahá'í Faith and the beginning of the Transitional Formative or Iron Age. [BBD35-6]
  • For a photograph of the cable sent announcing His passing see SW12, 15:245.
  • See The Passing of 'Abdu'l-Bahá by Shoghi Effendi and Lady Blomfield.
  • For a pen portrait of 'Abdu'l-Bahá see The Oriental Rose by Mary Hanford Ford pg 158-159
  • Also see AB452-83; HLS93-100.
  • This date marks the beginning of the First Epoch of the Transitional, Formative or Iron Age of the Faith.
  • See an account of the passing of 'Abdu'l-Bahá compiled by David Merrick.
  • See Part IX of The Utterance Project by Violetta Zein.
  • See WMSH26-52 for an account by John and Louise Bosch of the passing of 'Abdu'l-Bahá, the funeral, the reading if the Will, their subsequent time in the Holy Land and Egypt, and their teaching trip to Italy, Switzerland, and Germany. They arrived in New York on the 23rd of April and proceeded to Chicago to attend the National Convention. Shoghi Effendi had entrusted them with eight passages from the Will to be presented to the North American friends.
    		• `Abdu'l-Bahá, Ascension of; Ages and Epochs; Heroic age; Formative Age; `Abdu'l-Bahá, Life of (chronology); - Basic timeline, Condensed; - Basic timeline, Expanded; `Abdu'l-Bahá, Basic timeline; Shoghi Effendi, Life of; Shoghi Effendi, Basic timeline; Holy days; Covenant; Ronald Storrs; Herbert Samuel; Florian Krug; Grace Krug; John Bosch; Louise Bosch; Ethel Rosenberg; Johanna Hauff; Curtis Kelsey; Haifa, Israel
    1921 23 Nov A second suit for the possession of the House of Bahá'u'lláh in Baghdad was decided in favour of the Shi'a claimants. This allowed them to apply to the Peace Court in 1922. [SETPE1p25]
  • Before the application went before the Court the Shi'a group prevailed upon King Faisal to give an illegal personal order to the Governor of Baghdád to evict the Bahá'ís and then return the keys to them. All this was against the opinion of the British High Commissioner. [SETPE1p25]
  • The case was passed from court to court and finally brought before the Court of Appeal in Baghdád which, by a majority of four (the Iráqí members) to one (the British Presiding Justice), decided in favour of the plaintiffs. [SETPE1p25]
    		• House of Bahá'u'lláh (Baghdad); Baghdad, Iraq; Iraq
    1921 19 Nov The passing of Mírzá Abu'l-Ḥasan Afnán, a Persian nobleman and descendant of the family of the Báb. He had lived a long time in the Holy Land, and was very close and attached to 'Abdu'l-Bahá. He realized the impending passing of 'Abdu'l-Bahá he threw himself into the sea. [The Utterance Project; SoW Vol 12 No 18] Mírzá Abu'l-Hasan Afnan; Suicide
    1921 20 Oct Áqá Siyyid Mustafá Tabátabá'í was poisoned in Sangsar. Continual agitation prevented the burial of the body for several days. [BW18:388] Persecution, Iran; - Persecution, Deaths; - Persecution; Sangesar, Iran; Iran
    1921 6 Oct Shoghi Effendi at Oxford - The Michaelmas Term 1921
  • Shoghi Effendi continued his translation work. During his time in Oxford he acquired a love for The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Edward Gibbon and could often be seen reading his abridged copy. He also admired the translation of the King James version of the Bible. [PG191-197]
  • 29 November: Shoghi Effendi was summoned to the office of Major Tudor-Pole at 61 St. James Street in London. [PG198]
    		•  Shoghi Effendi at Oxford; Shoghi Effendi, Life of; Oxford, England; United Kingdom
    1921 (early) Oct Shoghi Effendi visited the Bahá'í community of Manchester. At his first meeting with the friends he reported on 'Abdu'l-Bahá's reaction to the news that Nora Crossley had cut off her hair and offered it for auction to raise funds as her contribution for the construction of the Mashriqu'l-Adhkár in Chicago.
  • See Some Bahá'ís to Remember p56 for the Tablet that 'Abdu'l-Bahá sent to Nora Crossley and the circumstances under which Shoghi Effendi presented it, as well as gifts from 'Abdu'l-Bahá, to her in the presence of the Bahá'ís of Manchester.
  • Although not one to allow pictures to be taken of himself, Shoghi Effendi insisted that a photo be taken of himself with the Manchester group. It can be seen at Worldwide Community of Bahá'u'lláh.
  • See as well Memoirs of Nora Crossely: 1921. She writes that ...all the honours that were showered on me by the Beloved Master, were NOT solely because of my gift to the Mashriqu'l-Adhkár, as most people think, but because I loved Him so much, I was prepared to obey Him, and carry out His wishes, AT ALL COST."
  • See also A Tribute to Nora Crossley by Rob Wienberg and the video based on Rob's paper.
    		•  Manchester, England

    Try also a shorter date like or 1921 or 192

    try also the Chronology Canada — 1921-1 or 1921 or 192

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