Adelbert Muhlschlegel

In memoriam

Adelbert Mühlschlegel (June 16, 1897 – July 29, 1980) was a prominent German Bahá'í from a Protestant family. His father was a high-ranking army medical officer in ther service of the King of Wurttemberg and his mother was the daughter of a Protestant priest. Adelbert finished secondary school during WWI and then served in the medical corps but he increasingly longed for spiritual enlightenment. He became a Bahá'í in 1920, and received a Tablet from the Master: "O thou son of the Kingdom! Thy letter hath been received. It was like unto a bag of musk. When I opened it, the fragrance of the love of God was perceived. It is my hope that thy rivulet may develop into a sea and surge with the breezes of divine guidance, casting a wave to the East and another to the West. Be thou deeply thankful to thy teacher and show unto her heartfelt and spiritual gratitude, because it was she who caused thee to hear the divine call and it was through her that thou didst attain to eternal grace. Thou wert earthly and thou becamest heavenly; thou wert in darkness and thou didst attain illumination; thou were of the world of matter and thou becamest divine, and thou didst obtain a portion and share of the eternal bestowal. Be filled with happiness and derive joy from the melody of the Supreme Concourse!" In 1922 Adelbert opened a medical practice in the working class environment of eastern Stuttgart. He began participating in the teaching work of the small German Baha'i community; giving talks and translating Bahá'í literature into German. In 1924 he was elected to the National Spiritual Assembly of Germany and served until it was disbanded in 1937. In 1927, Adelbert married Herma Weidle, who had been born in Stuttgard in 1902. The couple had 2 girls and 3 boys, one of whom died in early childhood. In 1936 the family made a pilgrimage to the Holy Land and met with Shoghi Effendi, the Guardian of the Baha'i Faith. In 1937 all Baha'i activities and institutions were banned by order of the Gestapo owing to the Faith's "international and pacifist teachings", and a great part of Dr Muhlschlegel's library was confiscated. Communication was opened to the Holy Land, however, as Herma traveled regularly to Zurich for singing lessons. After the war, their home became a Baha'i meeting place, and the NSA was re-established with Adelbert elected. He was appointed a Hand of the Cause by Shoghi Effendi in February 1952, after which he traveled to visit the Baha'is in many countries, including Scandanavia, India, Iran, Africa and South America. Herma died in 1964 after a long and difficult illness, throughout which Adelbert cared for her. He later moved to Austria and married Ursula Kohler, the secretary of the National Spiritual Assembly of Austria. She became his close companion and coollaborator. The couple pioneered to Athens, Greece in 1977; and Adelbert passed away there in 1980.

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