RELG 402 - World's Living Religions
The Moorish Science Temple of America and the Nation of Islam
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The Nation of Islam is an offshoot of the Moorish Science Temple of America.
The Moorish Science Temple of America was founded by Timothy Drew (1886-1929) in Newark, in 1913. Drew called himself Prophet Noble Drew Ali.
In his biography, Drew claimed that he met a High Priest of Egyptian Magic who told him that he (Drew) was a reincarnation of the Buddha, Jesus, and Muhammad, and who trained him in mysticism and gave him what was said to be a lost section of the Quran. This was published as the "Holy Koran of the Moorish Science Temple of America", and turned out to be 19 chapters from "The Aquarian Gospel of Jesus the Christ" (which had been published by Levi Dowling in 1908) and 25 chapters from "Unto Thee I Grant", a guide on how to live, published by the Rosicrucians. Drew wrote the last 4 chapters himself, and claimed that the Moorish Americans were descended from the ancient Moabites who were also the founders of the Holy City of Mecca (this does not agree with what is taught by Islam or the Jewish Tanakh). Drew seems to have thought that the Moabites came from North-West Africa - in fact they lived in the region east of the River Jordan and the Dead Sea.
Drew believed that African Americans were descendents of the Moors of West Africa (which Drew called the "Moroccan Empire"), and should be Islamic by faith. Drew gave "nationality cards" to those who joined his group. They had to proclaim their "Moorish Nationality", and refer to themselves racially as "Asiatics". They added "Al", "Bey" or "El" to their names, and were sometimes known as "Moorish-American Moslems", and sometimes as "Moorish Scientists".
In 1925 Drew moved to Chicago. The movement grew rapidly as Drew preached racial pride and self-help to African-Americans.
Trouble hit the movement in 1929, when Claude Green-Bey, the business manager of one of the Chicago Temples, declared that he was the Grand Sheik, and split from the Moorish Science Temple. A few months after that, he was stabbed to death in another Moorish Science Temple. Drew Ali was suspected of complicity in the murder although he was out of town when it happened. Drew Ali was arrested by the police, but was released, and died soon after his release - some thought his death was due to pneumonia, others suspected murder.
On the death of Noble Drew Ali in 1929 there were several claimants to the position of leader (one claimed to be a reincarnation of Noble Drew Ali) and three rival groups formed, which are still in existence today. One of the claimants was apparently kidnapped and murdered by a rival group; there were gun-battles and shoot-outs with the police.
The situation was complicated further in 1930 when Wallace Fard Muhammed, who was known within the movement as David Ford-El, also claimed to be a reincarnation of Drew Ali and formed his own group which later became the Nation of Islam.
On July 4, 1930 "The Master" Wallace Fard Muhammed (ca. 1891-1934), began preaching in Detroit, and founded the "Temple of Islam".
His three main ideas became the foundational ideology of the Nation of Islam : "Allah is God, the white man is the devil, and the so-called Negroes are the Asiatic Black People, the cream of the planet earth."
His aim was for them to gain freedom, equality, and justice by claiming their own religion (Islam), language (Arabic), and a separate state.
Christianity was said to be the white man's religion, used to promote slavery and subordination.
He appointed Elijah Muhammad (aka Elijah Poole or Robert Poole) as "Supreme Minister".
Fard disappeared (died ?) in 1934, and Elijah Muhammad became the leader of the Nation of Islam and started to teach that Fard was God incarnate.
Elijah Muhammad was born Elijah Robert Poole; his father was a Baptist lay preacher and share-cropper in Sandersville, Georgia. He related that before he was 20 he had witnessed the lynchings of three black men at the hands of white people. To escape oppression and economic difficulties he moved, along with his wife, children, parents, and siblings, to Detroit, where they faced the Great Depression through the 1920s and 1930s. In 1931 Elijah Poole joined the Universal Negro Improvement Association founded by Marcus Garvey.
Marcus Garvey was a Jamaican who had founded the Universal Negro Improvement Association in 1914 in the USA. He taught black self-empowerment, and believed that all black people should return to their rightful homeland, Africa. His teachings became one of the main foundations of the Rastafari religion.
However, in 1931 Elijah Poole attended a speech by Wallace Fard on Islam and black empowerment, and became convinced that Fard was the Redeemer. He joined Fard's movement (which at that time was called the Allah Temple), and was given the name Elijah Muhammad and put in charge of one of the Nation's Temples in Chicago. Elijah Muhammad moved to Detroit, and when Fard disappeared in 1934 Elijah Muhammad took control of the Nation of Islam and told his followers that Wallace Muhammad had been "Allah on earth". There followed a period of confrontations with the law. Elijah Muhammad founded the "Muhammad University of Islam" in opposition to the public school system, and the controversy escalated until Elijah Muhammad and some of the other leaders were jailed in 1934. After that there was a period of internal fighting among the leaders of the Nation of Islam. After receiving death threats, Elijah Muhammad eventually moved to Washington, DC, where he was arrested for refusing to fight "on the side with the infidels", during WWII. Fearing a lynching, he fled to Chicago, where he was arrested for sedition, and sent to prison (1942-1946). He continued to run the Nation of Islam by relaying his commands through his wife Clara and his other ministers. When he was released from prison at the end of WWII he moved the headquarters to Chicago.
In Chicago he taught his own version of Islam, that blacks were the "original human being" and that the whites were an "evil" offshoot who had oppressed blacks for 6,000 years. His message of black racist superiority and militant African-American nationalism was pitched to young black men in the urban slums of the USA. To help them, he also bought businesses and land to provide housing and employment. Eventually the Nation of Islam had controlling interest in a Bank, owned numerous businesses and farms, and owned schools in many of the major cities of the USA.
He died of heart failure in 1975, and was succeeded by his son, Warith Deen Mohammed aka Wallace D. Muhammad.
Malcolm X (1925-1965) had a terrible childhood - one of his uncles was lynched, and it is probable that his father was killed by white supremacists. His mother was committed to a mental hospital when he was 13, and he was sent to a series of foster homes. When he was 20 he was sent to prison for "breaking and entering".
In prison he became a member of the Nation of Islam. He was released from prison in 1952 and became one of the chief spokesmen for the Nation of Islam, preaching Black Supremacy and separation of races. However, there was a clash with the "Supreme Minister" Elijah Muhammed, and Malcolm X left the Nation of Islam in March, 1964.
He also changed his views on racism and became a Sunni Moslem. In 1964 he made the Hajj to Mecca and was welcomed as a guest by Prince Faisal. In February, 1965, he was assassinated by members of the Nation of Islam.
After Malcolm X left the Nation of Islam and was assassinated, Elijah Muhammed appointed Louis Farakhan as his successor and national spokesman.
In 1975, after the death of Elijah Muhammed, his son Warith Deen (Wallace) Mohammed became the leader of the Nation of Islam and changed the focus of the movement. He decided that Fard had not been Allah, and that Elijah Muhammad had misrepresented both Fard and Islam. He revoked the doctrine of black racial supremacy and the desire for a separate state, and honored the Constitution of the USA. He changed the name of the organization several times - it became closer to Sunni Islam, went through a series of name changes, and was disbanded in 2003 after Warith Deen Mohammed retired.
Louis Farrakhan Mohammad, (b. 1933, as Louis Eugene Wolcott) is the current leader of the Nation of Islam.
Louis Eugene Wolcott was brought up in a Christian family, but became a member of the Nation of Islam in 1955 and was given the name Farrakhan by Elijah Muhammed. He became an assistant minister to Malcolm X at the Temple of Islam in Boston, and then principal minister after Malcolm X moved to Harlem.
Farrakhan went along with Wallace Muhammad for several years, and became a Sunni Imam, but left in 1978 to re-found the Nation of Islam on the original principles of Fard Muhammad and Elijah Muhammad.
In 1995, he organized and led the Million Man March in Washington, D.C., calling on black men to renew their commitments to their families and communities, and in 2015 he led the 20th Anniversary of the Million Man March.
From 2005 onwards, Farrakhan started to become interested in Scientology. In 2010 he suggested that members of the Nation of Islam should become "auditors" (learners) of Scientology, though it appears that he does not mean for them to become Scientologists, but to use the "teachings" of scientology.
Although he was initially in favor of President Obama, Farrakhan changed his views in 2012, and referred to Obama as "the first Jewish president" (because of the United Nations military intervention in Libya).
Copyright © 1999 Shirley J. Rollinson, all Rights Reserved
