French letters by Shoghi Effendi
I’m publishing here some letters written in French by the young Shoghi Effendi Rabbani (1897–1957) to Laura C. Barney (1879–1974). They come from the till now almost forgotten Laura Dreyfus-Barney Collection at the French National Baha’i Center Archives (Baha’i National Center, Paris), which I researched in August 1996.
Little has been said about Shoghi Effendi’s French education, and I hope that the following letters will be an appreciated contribution to this subject.
I reproduced the first three letters after my own photocopy of the originals’ photostats, and the last one after my photocopy of the original itself.
- First letter, to Laura Barney, circa late 1903. Shoghi Effendi is then six years and a half old.
- Second letter, to Laura Barney, 1904:
- Third letter, to Laura Barney, 1905:
- Translation of a Tablet from ‘Abdu’l-Baha to Edith Ruhiyya Sanderson, dated 1915 (cf. The Bahá’í World, 1954–1963, vol. XIII, p. 889–890). In Shoghi Effendi’s own hand.
