Pilgrim Notes
Exported from Holy-Writings.com on 2026-06-19 - 1 clipping

Source: Bahá'í Library Online (bahai-library.com), curated by Jonah Winters. Used by permission of the curator. Original citation: Hassan Safa Baghdadi, Pilgrim Notes, bahai-library.com.
──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────

Pilgrim Notes

Hassan Safa Baghdadi

1974-?

Pilgrim Notes of Hassan Safa Baghdadi

At the request of the Universal House of Justice, as per circular from the
Department of Publishing at the World Centre, sent to various European NSAs and
to the Persian NSA asking for tape recorded and written memories of those who
had had the great honour and privilege of meeting the Master Abdu'l-Baha.
The NSA of France in its letter No. 5296 dated October 15, 1974 including a
copy of the circular letter from the Department of Publishing dated September
2, 1974 also asked me to write these memories and to have them tape recorded
with the aid of Mr. Diviod Ned Blackmer.

The undersigned Hassan Safa Baghdadi had the remarkable privilege of
meeting the Master three times in his life-time: at the age of 3, at the age of
6 of which I very well recall certain details such as the breakfast taken by
Abdu'l-Baha in company of the ladies of the house each morning after reading
a prayer, the samovar was there steaming, the small cups of tea (istikans) were
served together with whole-meal bread and white cheese. I see Abdu'l-Baha
in the House of Abbud in a large room on the first floor surrounded by many
Baha'is, and we children were sitting on the floor, the arms folded, etc.,
and the third time (I met Him) at the age of 18, i.e. during 19 days from
December 27, 1919 until January 15, 1920.

In Damascus, our residence, we took the train, my mother and I at 8
o'clock in the morning, and arrived in Haifa at 7 p.m. Arriving to the
Master's house my mother was ushered in, and accommodated in the house, and as
there were a great deal of pilgrims present in Haifa, approx. 100, the eastern
Pilgrim House close to the Shrine of the Bab was therefore completely full, so
they put me up in a room of the Shrine contiguous to the Tomb of the Bab.
That room is one of the six rooms of which the building of the Shrine was made
at that time; my roommates were Fadel Mazindarani, the well-known teacher, and
Subhi, the Master's secretary who left the Cause later on. What a good luck to
have spent 19 days in close vicinity to this holy place! Did I deserve such a
conspicuous honour? The next morning I went down to the Master's house and I
was in the small basement room right underneath the Master's drawing-room
together with 3 persons from Persia, and there we were, when unexpectedly the
Master came in to visit us. He lovingly bade us welcome saying Marhaba!
Marhaba! Welcome! Welcome! After a while, one of the Persian friends asked
Abdu'l-Baha whether the hopes repeatedly claimed for in Europe's newspapers
were well-founded, saying that the Versailles Treaty had put an end to the war
for ever. Abdu'l-Baha had a smile, and replied no, since the Treaty of
Versailles was containing the germs of the next war, and that that war would be
so terrible that the 1914/18 war would seem like a child's play in comparison.
In the course of days I saw the Master go down to the garden every morning to
receive a nosegay of all colours from the gardener Ismail Aghe, and
Abdu'l-Baha would give a flower to each one of the pilgrims standing in a
line, bidding them Marhaba, Marhaba! We preciously kept these flowers in
remembrance of our Master. Every evening at 8 o'clock there were meetings in
the drawing-room where Abdu'l-Baha would talk to the friends about news
received from the Baha'i world, and about questions of the hour. Every
Sunday towards 4 o'clock the Master would call all the Baha'is -- pilgrims
and residents -- together in the large middle room of the Shrine, on the
Western side fronting the sea, where He would speak to the friends of various
subjects, and where prayers would be chanted after which the Master would stand
up and go towards the entry of the Tomb of the Bab, followed by all the
friends present; there He would pour out rose water in the hands of each and
then ask Shoghi Effendi to chant the Tablet of Visitation with his melodious
voice, and that is how the Sunday afternoons would come to an end.

One evening on a meeting in the Master's drawing-room a high English
official arrived. Abdu'l-Baha said to him "you see, I'm gathering all the
friends here, with me, to protect them, and save them from spending all their
evenings in the casinos".

One Sunday afternoon, during the gathering in the large middle hall of the
Shrine of the Bab, Abdu'l-Baha declared to the friends present, pointing
out with His finger at Haifa bay and Akka that He was seeing the bay full of
ships loaded with pilgrims from all over the world, that the towns of Akka and
Haifa would join together in one centre, that Mount Carmel will be covered with
light, that crowds of pilgrims will walk up the steps leading to the Shrine of
the Bab, and that even the kings will climb these steps, barefooted, carrying
nosegays on their heads to come and render homage to His Highness the Bab.

On another day, all the pilgrims were taken to Bahji for the visit of
Baha'u'llah's Sepulchre, and as usual, Abdu'l-Baha would water the
friends' hands with rose water, and then in the midst of the crowd of pilgrims
would chant Himself the Tablet of Visitation with His sonorous and captivating
voice. What wonderful effect on the hearts and souls to see the Master before
oneself, and to hear Him sing so wonderfully! One feels like being carried far
away from this material level, and vibrate in a spiritual space! Besides, a
very strong spirituality emanates from the surroundings of Bahji and of Mount
Carmel, a phenomenon which is felt even by Non-Baha'is. I remember having
read an article by Maurice De Kobra describing his visit to Mount Carmel in
1928. That writer was impressed by the deeply spiritual atmosphere of Mount
Carmel, and was unable to explain himself the reason of this.

During that pilgrimage I met late Dr. J. Esslemont who had been staying in
the Holy Land for some months in order to have his famous book reviewed by the
Master. For reasons of discretion he was wearing an oriental red fez. I also
saw my uncle Dr. Zia Bagdadi who arrived from the United States at the
beginning of December 1919, and Mrs. A. Parsons from Washington with her son
Jeffry. Dr. Zia who stayed with the Master in Haifa for 9 months wrote down
from day to day the meaning/sense, not the text of Abdu'l-Baha's statements.
Back in the United States in September 1920 he sorted out his notes and made
two hand-written volumes of it in a very beautiful Arabic script. These books
have never been printed since. When Dr. Zia died in 1937 in Georgia USA, his
widow, my aunt, Zeenat Baghdadi, returned according to the beloved Guardian's
instructions to the Middle East, came to visit us in Baghdad, and showed us the
two hand-written books. I marvelled at all the accounts Abdu'l-Baha had
given during nine months, most important questions, and a lot of very very
amusing stories and anecdotes, for the Master liked very much to divert his
guests and friends and make them laugh. I therefore immediately decided to
copy these two books by hand, adding up to about 300 pages. After having done
so, I returned the originals to my aunt Zeenat who now is a pioneer in Saida
(Lebanon) half-way between Beyrouth and Akka. I had entrusted my family in
Baghdad with my hand-written copies, since in the meantime living in Persia
they had asked for them for the sake of reading them again. I believe they are
with my sister Sarah Baghdadi, at present living in Baghdad. But owing to the
persecutions which our community in Baghdad had to suffer, and to the
confiscation of all the Baha'i literature since the beginning of 1973, and to
the sentence end of 1973 and beginning of 1974 of 26 Baha'i persons for life
imprisonment, 2 others for 15 years and 4 others for 10 years, and 12 persons
sentenced to 500 Iraqi Dinars of fines, then released, after this terrible
repression I fear these copies have been lost.

Among Abdu'l-Baha's statements noted by Dr. Zia re a future war there
is this: My uncle asked the Master to confirm that it was correct that certain
American Baha'is back from their pilgrimage in Haifa had told friends in the
USA, attributing it to the Master, that there would be a terrible war which
will destroy half of humanity. Is this correct? The reply was YES. Dr. Zia
added in his notes: I was so terrified by the Master's reply who seeing the
anguish of the friends present, changed the subject and turned to amusing
stories. On another occasion, the Master said in reply to a question as
whether there would be a war of religion that there will be an economic war but
no religious war.

On October 28, 1974 the very spiritual friend Mr. David Ned Blackmer on a
teaching trip in Tours, and made responsible by the NSA to tape record my
memories had the kindness to do so, and except some slight alterations is about
the same as the present written statement.

One day Abdu'l-Baha invited me with another friend to accompany Him in
his afternoon walk. He slowly bent his steps to the German colony, and
knocking at the door of a German family He asked after their health and said
some encouraging words to them. A walk that took about one hour.

I may be excused if after 55 years I could not remember many things since
with 19 years of age one picks up quite a lot of things, and I couldn't find my
note book. In August 1923 I had the privilege of visiting our dear Guardian
and the Holy Shrines at Bahji and on Mount Carmel.

METADATA

Views665 views since posted 2025-10-26; last edit 2025-10-26 02:16 UTC;

previous at archive.org.../baghdadi_pilgrim_notes
Language
English
Permission
author
History
Source unknown. Formatted and proofread by J. Winters, 2025.
Share

Shortlink: bahai-library.com/7100
Citation: ris/7100

select Collection:
Archives
Articles
Articles-unpublished
Audio
Bibliographies
BIC
Biographies
Books
Chronologies
Compilations
Compilations-NSA
Compilations-personal
Documents
East-asia
Encyclopedia
Essays
Etc
Excerpts
Fiction
Glossaries
Guardian
Histories
Introductory
Letters
Maps
Music
Newspapers
NSA-documents
NSA-letters
Personal
Pilgrims
Poetry
Presentations
Resources
Reviews
Scripts
Software
Statistics
Study
Talks
Theses
Transcripts
Translations
UHJ-documents
UHJ-letters
Video
Visual
Writings

home

sitemap

series

chronology

search:
author

title

date

tags

adv. search
languages

inventory

bibliography

abbreviations

links

about

contact

RSS

new
-- Pilgrim Notes (Used by permission of the curator)