Ambassador to Humanity: ‘Abdu’l-Bahá through the eyes of others

Robert Weinberg holds a BA Honors degree in visual art and music from the University of Brighton, and a Master’s in Art History from the University of Buckingham. He has worked for three decades as a radio journalist and producer. He is the author of nine books including major biographies of early British Bahá’ís such as Lady Blomfield and Ethel Rosenberg. He served as Director of the Bahá’í International Community’s Office of Public Information in Haifa, Israel from 2009–13. He is currently Chair of the National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of the United Kingdom.

I have had a passion for researching and teaching about the Bahá’í Faith for more than half of my life. My fascination with American Bahá’í history and with the first American Bahá’í, Thornton Chase, caused me, in 1980, to switch my academic field from planetary science to history of religion in the United States. As I was finishing my doctorate in that field at Harvard University in 1990, I drew up plans to create a Bahá’í Studies institute that would offer courses, encourage research, and publish. Instead, I was hired by the National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of the United States to start a research office at our national Bahá’í headquarters in Wilmette, Illinois. Some of the responsibilities of the research office led to the creation of the Wilmette Institute, which ​focuses on most of the tasks of the institute I originally conceived. Meanwhile, I have also remained involved in academia, teaching religious studies part time at DePaul University in Chicago and currently at Indiana University South Bend, just a mile from home. I have also published four books on aspects of Bahá’í history (including a biography of Thornton Chase) and one introductory textbook on the Faith. Listen to Robert’s interview on ‘A Bahá’í Perspective’ podcastSee Faculty Bio