Baháʼí Faith in Germany
[3] Banned for a time by the Nazi government and then in East Germany, the religion re-organized and was soon given the task of building the first Baháʼí House of Worship for Europe.
[10] Ibrahim George Kheiralla, an early Baháʼí from Lebanon, traveled through Germany in 1892 attempting to making a living but found no interest in his inventions and moved on to the United States in February, 1893.
Fisher used every opportunity, including talking with his patients, to mention the Baháʼí teachings, and in time a few Germans embraced the religion.
The seventh of the tablets mentioned European regions and was written on April 11, 1916, but was delayed in being presented in the United States until 1919—after the end of the First World War and the Spanish flu.
The seventh tablet was translated and presented on April 4, 1919, and published in Star of the West magazine on December 12, 1919 and mentioned Germany.
Show ye an effort and after this war spread ye the synopsis of the divine teachings in the British Isles, France, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Russia, Italy, Spain, Belgium, Switzerland, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Holland, Portugal, Rumania, Serbia, Montenegro, Bulgaria, Greece, Andorra, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Monaco, San Marino, Balearic Isles, Corsica, Sardinia, Sicily, Crete, Malta, Iceland, Faroe Islands, Shetland Islands, Hebrides and Orkney Islands.
"[20]ʻAbdu'l-Bahá praised the German Baháʼís - "individuals...endued with perceptive eyes and attentive ears" were "attracted to the principles of the oneness of mankind" and treated "all the peoples and kindreds of the earth in a spirit of concord and fellowship."
In a wave of anti-German sentiment (see German American internment for similar issues a generation later) Fischer was caught up in charges of espionage for Germany which were dismissed.
[24] As with other German emigrants who converted to the religion, Siegfried Schopflocher who was born in Germany, as an Orthodox Jew, sought out a wider unity and found the Baháʼí Faith while in Canada in the summer of 1921; he was also later appointed a Hand of the Cause.
[4] In 1923 the first Baháʼí National Spiritual Assemblies were elected "where conditions are favorable and the number of the friends has grown and reached a considerable size".
[3] Along with India and the British Isles, the National Spiritual Assembly of the Baháʼís of Germany and Austria was first elected in that year.
[35] In 1930 the national convention included delegates from Stuttgart, Rostock, Hamburg, Schwerin, Karlsruhe, Göppingen, Bissingen, and from Vienna.
[37] In 1935 Shoghi Effendi, then head of the religion, re-organized the German community to cover Austria as well so they shared a regional national assembly.
[38] During the early Nazi period Baháʼís had general freedom; Mary Maxwell Rúhíyyih Khánum, before becoming wife of Shoghi Effendi, had expressed a great desire to learn Spanish.
[23] By 1937 however, Heinrich Himmler signed an order disbanding the Baháʼí Faith's institutions in Germany[4] because of its 'international and pacifist tendencies'.
In May 1944 there was a public trial in Darmstadt at which Dr. Hermann Grossmann was allowed to defend the character of the religion but the Baháʼís were instead heavily fined and its institutions continued to be disbanded.
Designated as the "Mother Temple of Europe",[47] it was dedicated in 1964 by Hand of the Cause Ruhiyyih Khanum, representing the first elected Universal House of Justice.
During the 1960s and 1970s, a small number of Baháʼís visited the Soviet Union as tourists but no attempt was made to promulgate the religion.
In 1986 Friedo and Shole Zölzer and Karen Reitz from Germany traveled into the Soviet Union but remained for only short periods of time.
[52] Continued development of youth oriented programs included the Diversity Dance Theater (see Oscar DeGruy) which traveled to Albania in February 1997.
[57] Former member of the federal parliament Ernst Ulrich von Weizsaecker commended the ideas of the German Baháʼí community on social integration, which were published in a statement in 1998,[5] and Chancellor Helmut Kohl sent a congratulatory message to the 1992 ceremony marking the 100th Anniversary of the Ascension of Baháʼu'lláh.
[58] The religion entered a new phase of activity when a message of the Universal House of Justice dated 20 October 1983 was released.
[62] In 2002 the director of the Ernst Lange-Institute for Ecumenical Studies held a meeting under the auspices of the German Federal Environment Ministry titled "Orientation dialogue of religions represented in Germany on environmental politics with reference to the climate issue" for the interfaith community including the Baháʼís.
[63] In 2005 former federal Minister of the Interior, Otto Schily, praised the contributions of German Baháʼís to the social stability of the country, noting "It is not enough to make a declaration of belief.
The first mention related to Germany in the Baháʼí Faith is when the founder of the religion, Baháʼu'lláh wrote in the Kitáb-i-Aqdas in 1873: O banks of the Rhine!
[73]In 1912, shortly before visiting Germany, ʻAbdu'l-Bahá spoke of the increasing tensions in Europe:[74] We are on the eve of the Battle of Armageddon referred to in the sixteenth chapter of Revelation...
