Elijah Muhammad

Elijah Muhammad

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Elijah Muhammad

Elijah Muhammad standing behind microphones at lectern

Elijah Muhammad (born Elijah Poole, October 7 1897 - February 25 1975) is notable for his leadership of the Black Muslims and the Nation of Islam from 1934 until his death in 1975. He is buried at Mount Glenwood Cemetery in Thornton, Illinois.

Early life
Teachings
Leadership History
Legacy
Footnotes
External links

Early life

Elajjah Muhammad was born in Sandersville, Georgia, as one of 13 children of Willie Poole, Sr. (1868–1942) and Mariah Hall (1873–1958). They were related to the prestigious Swint family. Both were sharecroppers. At the age of 16 he left home and traveled about the United States. In 1917 he married Clara Evans, later to be known as Mother Clara Muhammad. In 1923 he finally settled in Detroit, Michigan where he worked at an automobile factory. The young Elijah Poole apparently witnessed three murders (lynchings) of blacks by whites before the age of 20.^[1]

In the early 1930s Muhammad became acquainted with W.D. Fard, also known as Wallace Fard Muhammad. W. Fard Muhammad, then working as a peddler, had already established his Temple of Islam in Detroit. The beliefs taught by Fard, though similar to orthodox Islam in some ways, also differed from it in several essentials. Scholars have identified a wide range of possible influences on Fard's theology including Sufism, the teachings of the contemporary Noble Drew Ali of the Moorish Science Temple, Egyptology, Numerology, Eastern mysticism, Black Nationalism, the earlier ideas of economic independence as espoused by Marcus Garvey, and more. According to Elijah Muhammad, Fard was/is Allah in Person, and a fulfillment of the prophecies of both the Mahdi of the Muslims and the second coming of the Son of Man, long awaited by the Christians.^[2]

On May 26 1931 Fard was ordered out of Detroit. He departed and essentially disappeared in 1934. Elijah Poole, renamed Elijah Muhammad by Fard, became the successor to the Nation of Islam and Supreme Minister. In 1942 Muhammad was arrested in Washington, D.C. on charges of sedition and violation of the Selective Service Act. He was cleared of the sedition charges, but was convicted of the others, specifically for instructing his followers to avoid the draft. Elijah Muhammad was sent to Federal prison for four years.^[3]

Teachings

At the time, the doctrine Elijah Muhammad taught was widely viewed as a black separatist doctrine. He taught that blacks were the original people on the Earth and had been tricked out of their power, conquered and oppressed by the Caucasian people via a global system of white supremacy. ^[4] He further taught that the white race was produced through a series of genetic breeding experiments conducted by a Mr. Yakub. ^[5] ^[6]

According to the official platform, as stated by Elijah Muhammad, the Nation of Islam demands, "a full and complete freedom, equal justice under the law applied equally to all, regardless of race or class or color and equal membership in society with the best in civilized society." The alternative, "justifies our demand for complete separation in a state or territory of our own." ^[7]

The NOI teaches that black people must develop independence in economics, religion, and nationhood. The teachings of the NOI denounce drinking, gambling, physical abuse of black women, and the inability to protect one's family from attacks by violent white America. ^[8]

Unlike many other black leaders in mid-twentieth century America, Elijah Muhammad believed that it made more sense to seek aid from independent African nations rather than going overseas to Africa while their communities at home in America were non-independent.^[9]

Leadership History

Simultaneously, Elijah Muhammad showed pride in his ability to stand equal with whites, and was willing to work with them when this would further the aims of the NOI. He apparently would claim that he lived in a mostly white neighborhood, and he allowed George Lincoln Rockwell of the American Nazi Party to address the NOI, at a time when both organizations were opposed to racial integration.

One of those Elijah Muhammad would influence was an ex-convict whom the world would come to know as Malcolm X. Though Malcolm X would later leave the NOI, the influence of Elijah Muhammad on Malcolm's life was undeniable. The young Malcolm developed his speaking and political outlook within the NOI and under Elijah Muhammad's tutelage.

A rift between Elijah Muhammad and Malcolm X became public when Malcolm alleged to the press that Elijah Muhammad was having sex with various young NOI women and girls working for him, and that he had fathered their children.^[10] A year later, he was forced out of NOI for the release of this information, presciently stating that "I am probably a dead man already."

Legacy

With the death of Muhammad in 1975, the NOI went through a brief period of upheaval. Under the guidance of his son, Warith Deen Muhammad, the NOI was moved into the mainstream of Sunni Islam and began to accept white members. Such shifts away from the original black nationalist teachings of Muhammad soon caused a split within the organization, as some members preferred to espouse Muhammad's original teachings. The best known splinter group is probably the Five Percenters, whose beliefs ventured further from mainstream Islam than that of the NOI. The original organization under Warith Deen changed its name to the Muslim American Society. The name and ideology of the Nation of Islam was appropriated by a splinter group led by Elijah Muhammad's second National Representative, Louis Farrakhan, who re-established it in 1978. Years later, Betty Shabazz, Malcolm X's widow, accused Farrakhan of taking part in her husband's murder. Following this, Ms. Shabazz and Minister Farrakhan appeared to have reached a reconciliation. This was verified at the 1995 Million Man March in Washington, D.C, where although the official estimates of crowd numbers are significantly lower than one million, several hundreds of thousands (predominantly Black men) peacefully attended. Ms. Shabazz attended this event, and she was seated on the stage near the podium, along with several other distinguished attendees.

Warith Deen Muhammad once said in a speech that his father wanted him to change the direction of the NOI into a more orthodox view. Warith said that his father started out preaching black separatism in the beginning because black people needed to show pride in themselves as a people before they could enter into a more orthodox form of Islam.

In the early 1990s the city of Detroit, Michigan, added the name "Elijah Muhammad Blvd." to its Linwood Avenue neighborhood.

One of Muhammad's grandsons, Ozier Muhammad,^[11] is a photographer for The New York Times who has won a Pulitzer Prize.