BLACK MUSLIMS

Separation

In the early part of the decade the news media paid increasing attention to what they called the Black Muslims, members of the Lost-Found Nation of Islam, headed by the Honorable Elijah Muhammad. Muhammad insisted that early in the century he had come into contact with a mysterious W. D. Fard, who was later identified as Allah himself. When Fard disappeared in 1933, Muhammad took control of his organization and its Detroit mosque. Muhammad's ideas rested on a foundation of black separatism with trappings of Islam. Blacks were the original people. Whites were devils who became the oppressors of blacks. Islam was the true religion and the natural religion of blacks. They should leave the slave religion of Christianity and separate themselves from the larger white culture.

Malcolm X

Muhammad served a brief prison sentence for encouraging his followers to refuse the draft in World War II. On his release he began to rebuild his movement from his new headquarters in Chicago. One of his most astute moves was to recognize the potential of a recent convert, Malcolm Little, who had taken the name Malcolm X. (Members of the Nation of Islam replaced their "slave" names with X, indicating their plundered African background.) Malcolm X expanded the organization on the East Coast from his mosque in New York. A brilliant speaker, he attracted the attention of the news media and rarely left its spotlight until his assassination in 1965.

Growth and Self-Sufficiency

The Nation of Islam anticipated some of the issues of black power in its program of self-help and self-reliance. Black Muslims rejected drugs, alcohol, and pork. They dressed in sober costumes and were encouraged to patronize businesses owned by the Nation of Islam. At its height in mid-decade the organization had an estimated three hundred thousand members.

CASSIUS CLAY (MUHAMMAD ALI)

After confirming rumors that he was now a Muslim, Cassius Clay, the new world champion, said that Allah had been in the ring with him in his fight with Sonny Liston. But, he clarified, "I am not a Black Muslim, because that is a word made up by the white press. I am a black man who has adopted Islam. I want peace, and I do not find peace in an integrated world. I love to be black and I love to be with my people.…Why do I want to get bit by dogs, washed down a sewer by fire hoses? Why does everybody attack me for being righteous? Why don't people leave me alone?"

Source:

Huston Horn, "The First Days of the New Life of the Champion of the World," Sports Illustrated, 20 (9 March 1964): 57.

Scandal

The movement was rocked by scandal in mid-decade with charges that the Muhammad family profited from the organization and that Elijah Muhammad had maintained a series of sexual relationships with certain of his secretaries, having children by some. These stories, along with the expulsion of Malcolm X from the group and his subsequent assassination, caused membership to decline.

Sources:

James Baldwin, "Letter from a Region of My Mind," New Yorker, 38 (17 November 1962): 87-88;

Alfred Balk and Alex Haley, "Black Merchants of Hate," Saturday Evening Post, 236 (26 January 1963): 68-75;

Bruce Perry, Malcolm: The Life of a Man Who Changed Black America (Barrytown, N.Y.: Station Hill Press, 1991);

George Plimpton, "Miami Notebook: Cassius Clay and Malcolm X," Harper's, 238 (June 1964): 54-61.

Black Muslims African-American religious movement in the United States, split since the late 1970s into the American Society of Muslims and the Nation of Islam. The original group was founded (1930) in Detroit by Wali Farad (or W. D. Fard), whom his followers believed to be "Allah in person." When Farad disappeared mysteriously in 1934, Elijah Muhammad assumed leadership of the group, first in Detroit and then in Chicago. Under his leadership, the black nationalist and separatist sect (then called the Nation of Islam) expanded, mainly among poor blacks and prison populations. Although the group numbered only about 8,000 when Muhammad took over, it grew rapidly in the 1950s and 60s, particularly as a result of the preaching of one of its ministers, Malcolm X . Tension between Muhammad and Malcolm developed, however, and Malcolm's subsequent suspension (1963) and assassination (1965), possibly by Muhammad's followers, caused great dissension in the movement. When Muhammad died in 1975, his son, Wallace D. Muhammad (later Warith Deen Mohammed ) took over, preaching a far less inflammatory version of Islam. He aligned the organization with the international Islamic community, moving toward Sunni Islamic practice, and opened the group (renamed the World Community of al-Islam in the West, then the American Muslim Mission, and later the American Society of Muslims) to individuals of all races. In 1977 a group of Black Muslims, led by Louis Farrakhan , split off from the organization, disillusioned by the son's integrationist ideals and lack of allegiance to his father's brand of Islam. They named themselves the Nation of Islam and sought to follow in the footsteps of Elijah Muhammad. In the late 1990s the Nation of Islam began to embrace some traditional Islamic practices, and Farrakhan and Mohammed publicly declared an end to the rivalry between their groups in 2000. W. Deen Mohammed resigned as head of the American Society of Muslims in 2003.

Bibliography: See L. E. Lomax, When the Word Is Given (1964, repr. 1979); C. Eric Lincoln, The Black Muslims in America (1973, repr. 1982); C. E. Marsh, From Black Muslims to Muslims (1984).

Black Muslims. Members of an African American nationalist religious movement. It was founded in Detroit in the 1930s by Wallace D. Fard (sometimes Ford, later known as Wali Farad). He was known as Prophet Fard, the Great Mahdi, and the Saviour. The movement was called originally The Lost-Found Nation of Islam, subsequently The World Community of Islam in the West. Fard hailed black (as they were then called) people as the founders of civilization, and predicted the destruction of Caucasians and Christianity and the establishment of a Black Nation after the final judgement of the white race.

Elijah Muhammad took over the movement on Fard's disappearance in 1934, assuming the titles ‘Minister of Islam’ and ‘Prophet’. Malcolm X became Elijah Muhammad's chief aide in 1963 before breaking away to found the Muslim Mosque, Inc., and the Organization of Afro-American Unity. He was assassinated in Feb. 1965.

When Elijah Muhammad died in 1975, his son, Warith Deen ( Wallace D.) succeeded and endeavoured to bring the movement closer to mainstream Islam throughout the world. A splinter group, led by Louis Farrakhan (see ELIJAH MUHAMMAD), took the name Nation(s) of Islam. This continued the emphasis on separation from white people, and included a theme of anti-semitism.

Black Muslims African-American nationalist movement in the USA. It aims to establish a separatist black Muslim state. Founded in Detroit by Wallace Farad in 1930, the movement was led (1934–76) by Elijah Muhammad. Helped by the rhetorical power of the preacher Malcolm X, the organization grew rapidly between 1945 and 1960. Factions developed within the movement, and Malcolm was suspended in 1963. In 1976, the movement split into the American Muslim Mission and the Nation of Islam. The former (led by Elijah's son, Wallace Muhammad) preached a more integrationist message. The Nation of Islam, led by Louis Farrakhan, claimed to uphold the true doctrines of Elijah Muhammad, and preached a more racially exclusive message. During the 1980s and 1990s, the Nation of Islam gained greater popularity in the USA. Mass demonstrations, such as the ‘Million Man March’ (1995) in Washington, D.C., and controversial speeches generated huge media attention. Today, total membership is c.10,000.

BLACK MUSLIMS

BLACK MUSLIMS. SeeNation of Islam .

Black Muslims, see Nation of Islam