Abdul Baha is an intelligent, well informed man, of fair sagacity. He was educated at home after the custom of Persia. He says of himself, "I have studied Arabic profoundly and know the Arabic better than the Arabians themselves. I have studied the Persian and Turkish in my native land, besides other languages of the East. But when I visit the West I need an interpreter."[4] He said to Doctor Jessup, "Yes, I know your Beirut Press and your books." His references to ancient and modern philosophers, to historical events and to European writers, quoting from the same, show some familiarity with literature.[5] He repudiates the claims of some of his disciples that he has no literary culture, as that of Abul Fazl[6] or of M. A. Lucas who says:[7] "He has had no access to books, yet his knowledge is unbounded." On this point Professor Cheyne remarks:[8] "His public addresses prove that through this and that channel he has imbibed something of humanistic and even scientific culture. He must have had some one to guide him in the tracks of modern inquiry. I venture to hope that his expounding may not, in the future, extend to philosophic, philological, scientific, and exegetical details. Abdul Baha may fall into error on secular problems, among which it is obvious to include Biblical and Koranic exegesis." "I am bound to say that Baha Ullah has made mistakes and the almost equally venerated Abdul Baha has made many slips."[9]
A word should be said about the number of Bahais. I have many data on this point, but can here give only a summary. Regarding their numbers, the Bahais have indulged in gross exaggeration. "Millions" is the usual figure used by American Bahais. Thus Phelps[10] speaks of "the millions of Bahais in Persia." MacNutt, in "Unity through Love," declares that "His followers number millions from all the religious systems of the world." Kheiralla[11] says: "Abdul Karim, 1896, assured me that the believers in Baha were fifty millions. I wrote to Syria to ask. Sayid Mohammed, secretary of Abbas Effendi, said that the number was fifty-five million souls." Kheiralla afterwards denounces it as a gross deceit. As to Persia, they place the proportion at one-third or one-half. Dreyfus writes,[12] "Probably half the population of Persia is Bahai." Some judicious non-Bahai writers allow them half a million or less in Persia on a basis of ten millions of population. American missionaries, as Jordan at Teheran, Frame at Resht and Shedd at Urumia, calculate that the number in Persia does not exceed 100,000 to 200,000. After careful inquiry I agree with this estimate.
As to other races and countries, let us see. Abul Fazl claims[13] that "Jews, Zoroastrians, and Nusaireyah by thousands" are Bahais. M. Haidar Ali[14] says: "The majority of Zoroastrians are recognized as Bahais in all sincerity." On the contrary Professor Browne writes:[15] "I had been informed that Zoroastrians were accepting Bahaism. However after much intercourse with the Zoroastrians of Yezd and Kerman for the space of three and a half months, I came to the conclusion that few, if any, had adopted the Bahai creed." In India the proportion of Parsee-Bahais is very small.
As to Jews:—Remey says: "In Hamadan there is a large Israelitish following of Baha." A census made by a European Jew showed exactly 59 parents and with their children 194 persons out of a population of 6,000 Jews. As to the United States, I give some particulars in the closing chapter. The census of 1906 reported 1,280 Bahais, which may have increased to two or three thousand. In the Turkish empire they are few, for Sunni Moslems are utterly indifferent to Bahaism. The Egyptian Gazette says of Egypt where Abdul Baha resided for two years, "The new religion has made little perceptible progress; Islam remained indifferent, and the Christian community was ignorant of his presence." Of Syria, Mr. Phelps wrote:[16] "All the Bahais in Acca are Persians. No other nationalities are among them." The inference is plain that no native of Acca had become Bahai through forty years of contact with Baha and his seventy followers. Bahais outside of Persia are probably all told not more than 15,000 and one-third of these are Persians in Russia. Abdul Baha gave the impression that many of the Christians of Persia are converts to Baha. Dr. J. H. Shedd wrote, 1894, "I have heard of no case of a Christian conversion to Bahaism." Dr. G. W. Holmes wrote, 1903, "I do not know of a single Christian in Persia, who has been converted to Bahaism. Some Bahais who made a profession of Christianity turned back to Baha." Rev. J. W. Hawkes declares that in his observation none of the members of the Syrian (Nestorian) or Armenian churches in Persia have become Bahais.[17] I have known of one Armenian family in Resht and two men in Maraga, one of whom was a notorious ne'er-do-well, who kept up his opium using as before.
FOOTNOTES:
[2] Prof. E. G. Browne says ("A Literary History of Persia," p. 311), "The resemblance between these numerous sects, whose history can be traced through the last eleven centuries and a half, is most remarkable and extends even to the minute details of terminology." "The doctrines appear to be endemic in Persia, and in our own days appeared again in the Babi movement."
[3] At that very time the chief of the Vashratis, who held that Sheikh Ali Nur-i-Din, of Tunis, was a Manifestation of Mohammed, and his essence divine, was in exile in Acca. He was in friendly relations with Baha.
[4] Star of the West, April 9, 1913, p. 35.
[5] Phelps' "Life of Abbas Effendi," p. 227.
[6] "Bahai Proofs," pp. 94, 109.