Selflessness

“No Meaning to the Words “Mine” and “Yours”

Source: In New York City, April 1912 p 85

‘Abdu’l-Baha invited everyone in His party back to the Hotel Ansonia for supper. On their way upstairs, they met the “little chambermaid” who took care of ‘Abdu’l-Baha’s suite. She had previously told Juliet Thompson that she thought He was “a great Saint.” ‘Abdu’l-Baha asked her to hold up her apron and emptied the remaining quarters – about eighty – into it. She was surprised, and the Americans explained to her that they were leftovers from His visit to the Bowery, where He had given the rest to the men. “I will do the same with this money,” she declared, “ I will give away every cent of it.” Her decision to imitate His selflessness was a fitting end of His last day in New York City and was yet another example of how “the words ‘mine’ and ‘yours’ lose their meaning” in the presence of ‘Abdu’l-Baha.