06/21/2003
IWDM Study Library 
New Africa, a New Mind and a New Beginning @Apollo Harlem, NY

By Imam W. Deen Mohammed
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Allahu Akbar. We praise G-d. We thank G-d. G-d is Greater than everything. We say Allahu Akbar. Yeah. Let me first acknowledge that it is G-d's Will that we be here. If it were not His Will, we wouldn't be here. And we owe Him the Praise in the time for this day and everything.
And we witness that Muhammad to whom the Qur'an was revealed, is our leader, Prophet, last Prophet G-d sent to the world and His servant and His Messenger. And we salute him with the traditional salute, Sa Ala Alahi Wa Salaam, Prayers and the Peace be upon him.
Our greetings of Peace. That's As Salaam Alaikum to you again. Here at the Apollo Theater, a lot of thoughts come to my mind. I'm seeing the one who's gone and I'm seeing all that activity. Yes, I hope they're not here today. I don't want them bothering me.
And comes to my mind, the history here in this area right here in Harlem. We have great history in Harlem. Adam Clayton Powell, I was a teenager, still a teenager and young man and living in Chicago, Illinois. But we couldn't help but be aware of Adam Clayton Powell's leadership.
And when he was hurt by anything, criticism of him, it hurt us too. And also, Percy Sutton who brought this place back to life, he and his children and family. They come to my mind. And Congressman Rangel, they followed one another, and kept this city in Harlem with excellent leadership. Excellent leadership.
So, we aware of all that. And I'm aware too that what has brought me to be the leader I am is something The Honorable Elijah Muhammad used to say very often in his Ministry, in the early days of his Ministry, he used to say before he would begin preaching, he would say to the people, the audience, "Islam is Freedom and Equality." And a little five, six, seven, eight years old and then a teenager hearing that, heard at first from his speeches, from his speeches. And then, when I was about 14, I was in the audience, and I always heard him saying it.
And that's what, I think, went into my life, into my soul and kept me very serious-minded. I always would listen very carefully to anyone preaching. Wouldn't have to be my father. But anyone preaching his teachings, I would give them my attention even as a child and listen to them very carefully.
And I took it very seriously, had great respect for the teachings of my father and those who taught. And I'm convinced of their sincerity. And I'm convinced that G-d was in their work. Yes. And I'm convinced also that the leaders in the history of the African American people that are Christians and that's the great majority, that your leaders too had help from G-d, and G-d has been in that work. And I think G-d stayed with us until we started going after the dollar and forgetting G-d.
But as long as we were trying to be the best human being we could be and respecting sacred matters, G-d was with us. He's still with the few of us. But I think He has left most of us. We're on our own. And that's too bad.
But don't feel discouraged because never in the history of a people where there are big numbers responsible for leading them. Always a few, always a few. And really, the followers of those few were always few in numbers too in comparison to the majority of the people. So it doesn't take a lot of people to keep the life and preserve the life of a people, lifeline of people, the healthy, productive lifeline of a people. It only takes a few.
And I'm glad that Muslims are being numbered now, not as people in some kind of envious or jealous or arrogant competition with Christian leaders, but as friends of good Christians that we are together in this great work. And I'm happy about that.
We have had an identity problem. And I think most of us still don't have a comparable, I would say, identity or a comparable picture of self-worth, self-worth, not as individuals, because as individuals, we have great success. President... Pardon me. Yeah. President Bush, He has Colin Powell with him as the Secretary of State, a great and important position.
But I, along with many other religious leaders and government leaders, government figures, believe that Colin Powell is the most qualified man now available to us to lead this government. Whether it happens, whether it will happen or not, we don't know. But we do feel he's the most qualified leader for the American people, Colin Powell.
And that says a lot for people who just a little over a hundred years ago did not even have freedom in this country. That says a lot. We have made great strides and we have proven ourselves. We have proven our value as human beings in spite of the conditions designed to destroy our humanity or to destroy our human qualities.
We have survived. And I was saying to someone just here, a few... Well been about half an hour ago, maybe, that bad circumstances can be so terrible, they can destroy you, make you a terrible person. Make you a terrible person. But if you can survive those circumstances, it can make you a superhuman, at least in your soul, a superhuman.
And I do believe that the bad circumstances in the history of African American people have made some of us in our souls super humans. Super humans. Yes. Super humans. And let me get to our subject now on the subject, New Africa. This is an expression that our business people grab, New Africa. And they have open businesses in that name, New Africa this, New Africa that.
But it's not limited to that expression. It's not limited to just the business life. That expression, as we understand it in our circle here, carries the meaning of the whole life. We believe that like other people who are called or who have, pardon me, called the area that they chose to live in Newfoundland, New England, this whole area and then the East, North, and the Northeast area, New England, Newark, New Jersey near us, and New York where we are right now, New York. York was in Europe and still in Europe.
But the people who came here, they wanted to bring their life from that land across the waters to this land here. And they wanted it to be their life. So, they named it New York so that they would have an identity with their past life, and it would say to them and to others that, "We want our life to begin here again, have a new start for our life."
And I think more of our leaders will welcome the expression of New Africa as they begin to feel or understand why some of us like that expression, New Africa. For us, that means new stars here. We lost Africa, but we can have a new start here. We can have a New Africa here. And I'm sure New York here is better than New York across the ocean. And I hope that New Africa will be better than Africa across the ocean because, right now, Africa across the ocean is in a terrible mess.
And it's not the fault of the white man right now. At one turn in our history, it was the fault of white people and includes Muslims, Arabs who went over there and left good influences and bad influences, left help and hurt on African people. But now, it's no more the fault of anybody but the African people because they are not in bondage to anybody. They're not colonies of other powers. So, the fault is theirs. And they have gone after the right thing... after the wrong thing, pardon me. They have gone after the wrong thing after trying to pursue excellence for their life. They have gone after the wrong thing as we have gone after the wrong thing after we got equal opportunity in this country, laws passed to protect our citizenship and our rights of citizenship.
We started celebrating having a good time, praying, laughing, dancing, getting high. And we forgot what G-d have done for us over all these many generations. G-d has permitted us to be used and abused more than any other soul of the human being. G-d has permitted that soul of the African people, African American people or the African people to be used and abused. But the G-d that permits that is obligated to do justice by everything.
So, in the measure that He has allowed us to be deprived, He must award us in at least that measure or greater. So, when we look at the sad history as those sad turns of events in our life, beginning with the first one, putting us upon slave ships and bringing us here to be slaves as property of others and following that at the terrible events in our life. When we look at those events and see the damage to our psyche, the damage to our life as human beings and really the threat to our future as human beings. When we see that and realize that we have overcome that. We're still here. We're still human. And we're still performing excellent. Excellent, very excellent way, men and women, that says to us that G-d has not yet finished rewarding us. G-d is not through with us. Freedom and equal opportunity here, that's just the necessary situation or the necessary conditions for us to begin doing what G-d has formed us for. And I say formed us. We are no more Africans like the Africans of the Continent of the Motherland Africa. We are new people. We have a new mind. We have new spirit. We have new sensitivities as a people. We have a brand-new ethos as a race. So, we are different. We are different. We are different in the abstract picture. And we are different in the physical picture. We are not abstractly the same.
That is our mentality is different, spirit different, sensitivity is different, aspirations different, human different. We are not Africans anymore of the motherland. We're Africans of this land, New Africans, New Africa. Yes, this is a fact. Praise be to Allah. So, G-d has formed us a new people.
Recently in the African American neighborhoods, some of our businessmen, investors, business people introduced this language, New Africa. For some of us now, Africa means more than a new page in Black history or a new page in African American history for our business life.
New Africa says for some of us, for New York, New England, New Mexico, say to insightful minds of the people of America. Bad circumstances has caused change in people for their geography also and in the way they view themselves and others, the way they view their life as a people. Most often in the history, it has not been large numbers pressing for change, pressing to get rid of the adverse effects on their lives that caused or caused by circumstances. Small numbers have been pressing for change.
I can recall leaders that I know have helped us to stay in touch with our lifeline as a people and has helped us to make great progress. Benjamin E. Mays and many others, not to mention the government people and other religious leaders and others in education, they have all served to protect our lifeline as human beings, not as people in the culture of the African people because we were separated from that culture, but as human beings.
So, this talk that we are making now, it's not about small matters. It is about major turns of events in the life of a people, this people, our people, African Americans. New powers spreading their influence and changing the world for other nations. Christians and Muslim powers left their help and also their hurt on the Dark Continent. And I got the Dark Continent in quote. That didn't come from us, came from them. Called Africa the Dark Continent, not by choice and by choice.
America's population of African Americans or those of African origins are not in the life of that continent. Adverse circumstances did not leave a way open for life from Africa to be cultivated and established in America. This freedom that the natural world inspires in a people was not ours to have.
For any intelligent student of divine intervention, divine intervention explained the enemy of natural causes and effect and the encounter in our history, the Sacred Ram in the Scriptures of the Christians and I think in ours too if we understand it, the Sacred Ram. Now, here is a Ram. The Ram is the male. Here's a Ram. The Ram is a sheep. Sheep are peaceful. But here is a Ram in the final days leading an army in the war against evil.
I understand that to mean peace-loving soul. The peace loving souls of human beings will one day have to fight for peace. We think of fighting all the time war, jihad. In the physical sense, metal, weapons of metal, swords, iron, etcetera, guns maybe now. Muhammad, the Prophet, wanted us to see a greater warland a more human war when he said, "The ink of the scholar is more precious than the blood of the martyr."
I have come to see and understand that the great war to be fought that's going to bring about the conclusion of the matter, great matters, great issues in the life of humanity, one being. What is the worth of a human being? The human being as G-d created him before he comes to know his environment and begin to be educated in his environment, before the material world is set by him and he begins to benefit from the knowledge he gained in a material world.
What is his value just as a soul or as a human person? Why is there a great issue? It is a great issue because those who achieve status and great worth with their wealth, with their wealth, and with their weapons of war, et cetera, they looked down on that common person and they rejected the common person as having any great value in the building of society. They thought him to be something worthy to employ, to be employed by the rich as a slave, as a servant.
And slavery as you know, it prevailed or existed, continued to exist until recently in our history. So, slavery is now abolished by all civilized societies or nations. They have abolished slavery. And if slavery is going on in any of those so-called civilized lands it is kept secret or is not... they don't want it to be known in the world, to the world. They are ashamed of it. That's what I'm saying, they are ashamed of it. It has been abolished.
And color consciousness and the belief that a black man is inferior to a white man, look how long it lasted but it's gone, it's gone. No one wants to publish such ideas now because it is very unpopular. They're ashamed to admit such. This is a new time that we are living in. But these are great issues for the history of life or the soul of mankind in its effort to establish the best human life and the best human society. These are the great issues. The value of women now finally coming to the forefront and women finally getting their respect. All of this, to me, it says that we're living in the final days, we're living in the final days. The end the time. Not the end of time for the world, but the end of time for the troubles in the world, for the troubles that were not justified by nature.
The natural life did not support those things. They were enemies of the natural life. And they have to be done away with. I have come to believe that these very unnatural and cruel events in our history were permitted by G-d to awaken in our soul, a desire to be His helper to bring mankind, the whole humanity to where G-d wants it to be.
I believe as G-d prepared individuals, some females like Mary, the mother of Christ Jesus, Peace be upon them like the mother of Moses, Peace be upon her. But mostly, what I have in mind are those Prophets from Noah till the last, how He worked with individuals and He was their company. He was their friend. And He worked with them to help them in the world of their time in the circumstances of their time.
I believe that this as G-d has worked with individuals, G-d also worked with people, not individually but with the whole people, with the whole people. And G-d submits that some whole society of people and numbers and big numbers be subjected to a horrible existence so that they will be formed anew of people.
So, misery, rejection, social rejection, misery being put down has been a pressure upon our soul that has pressed out the best. It will press out the words too. But it also presses out the best. And good is always stronger than bad. Righteousness is always stronger than wickedness.
Yes, health is always stronger than sickness. So, it presses. And the worst comes out and the best comes out. But it's the best that stays and prevails. So, G-d has subjected us, has submitted that we be subjected to the worst treatments we recorded in human history. G-d has permitted that we be subjected to form of people anew.
And to me, when G-d speaks of a Ram, when G-d speaks of Christ Jesus as a lamb and when G-d tells us of Muhammad the Prophet that he had an excellent life even before he was called to be the Prophet of G-d, that he was excellent. There was nothing wrong with his human life. G-d didn't call Muhammad to make him a decent man. He was already a decent man. G-d didn't call Muhammad to raise him up into good morals. He already was raised up in good morals.
He didn't call him to teach him to be sociable and kind and to treat family members and strangers with kindness, et cetera. He was already that kind of man. G-d didn't call Muhammad to teach him how to be honest. He already had a reputation on the peninsula of Arabia for being honest. He was called, the honest one before G-d called him to be His servant. He didn't have to teach him to be truthful. He already was already called Sadiq, the truthful one. Before G-d called Muhammad, he was already called these things. And G-d says in the Qur'an addressing this fact, He says he's already lived a lifetime among you saying to the Arab of people his life is already a lifetime. 40 years is a lifetime. The average lifespan was not much more than that.
Back then, they didn't hardly live to see more than 40 years, the average one. And he had already lived a lifetime among them. And he had already been proven that a man does not have to lose his human excellence, doesn't have to lose his moral qualities to sin or to the temptations of devils. He can survive whatever the world throw at him and keep his excellence, his human excellence that G-d gave man when He created Adam in the garden. That the man can keep that and not be spoiled that can survive whatever the world has to throw against it.
So, G-d gave Muhammad as an indication, as a model. But G-d had already given Jesus to the world and Jesus was born among animals, the nativity, little child among animals. But he kept his human excellence. And he lived the life of human excellence, and he died in his human excellence. He died in his human excellence.
So, behind Jesus comes the Prophet who was a living man. He was alive in history, who has made the physical changes upon the world with his life and with those who supported him. He changed the world, physically changed the world, and left the world knowledge and inspired in them, appreciation for higher education and left scientists and scholars to bring not only Muslims into enlightenment but also to awaken in non-Muslim's intellectual life and appreciation for scholarly work.
And thereafter, the Renaissance, the revival of the sciences for the West, he led the world into all of that. And Jesus Christ is a sign of it, a mysterious sign of that, that it would come behind him, the righteous servant of G-d, Jesus Christ, I'm speaking of him now, Upon him be peace, would come a man later. And he would show us in reality all the wonderful things that were given in Jesus Christ as sign or as a mystery.
So that to me is saying that Muhammad too is a sign, Jesus Christ was a sign. He was a sign shrouded in mysteries. Muhammad was an open sign, plain sign, open sign. But both of them are only signs. Where is the real thing happening? The real thing is happening, in the people that need justice, they still need justice. And anyone who study our life, especially a knowledgeable person of Scripture, of how G-d treat matters, of how G-d answered other people in bad circumstances, their bad circumstances obligated G-d to intervene, to be involved. What circumstances we need to bring G-d again to be involved?
When you look at what happened to African people brought here to America enslaved and how we were put down and made to think that we were inferior as a creation to white folks, made us ashamed of our hair, ashamed of our black skin, ashamed of our broad features. What worst thing have been done to any people?
So, I tell any scholar of Scripture, if you can't understand that our condition obligates G-d to be with us, to intervene on our behalf, it obligates even Mother Nature to be on our side. And Mother Nature is on our side.
So, any of you who don't care much for religion anymore, and I don't blame you the way religion is being presented in the world for the last 20 years or more, and the way it was presented when we were put down as slaves and black subjects, et cetera, I don't blame you if you're fed up with religion. But if you have a good preacher like Benjamin Mays and some of the others that I know about, the good fellows, I met them in person, no excuse for you being a bad Christian. You should be a good Christian.
No matter what has happened in your life, you should be a good Christian. No matter what has happened to our people in history, you should be a good Christian because Muhammad survived all the evils and polytheism and ignorance of his time. And that's to tell us there is no excuse for anybody keeping that good morals if you are sane. No matter how bad the world gets, how ugly it gets and put you down, whatever, even though it abandons respects for G-d, if you are intelligent and you got good human sensitivity, you have no excuse for going bad. You're weak. That's why we go bad.
The pressures you take on, only the strong survive. You know that singer, boy I really love that song, Only The Strong Survive, well we're living in a time right now. Ronald Reagan, Bush, no special favors, only the strong survive. And if we get a Democratic leader, a Democrat to go in the White House, if he's not too standing for only the strong survive, he ain't going to be in there long.
In fact, I don't think he even getting there. This is the time of the survival of the fittest. The world have too much waste. And it can't take care of waste the way it takes care of good things. All right.
So, if you want to waste your life and give your life to bad morals, to self-destruction, to violence and indecency, they have a plan for you, only the strong survive. Allahu Akbar. Some of you are ready to accept all that I'm going to say today. But most of you, I don't know. That's why I started off saying we only need a few. Now don't think the learned of the Islamic world like what I'm saying. If you want to run back to them with this, see how they going to react. I'll tell you, don't waste your time. They're not going to like what I'm going to say. No. Yes.
So, Jesus Christ is reported in the Qur'an that he asked for helpers. And some righteous men responded to him. They said, "We are your helpers to G-d. We are your helpers to G-d." What does it mean? "Il ila" means to G-d. What does it mean? We are your helpers to bring the matter to G-d. What is the matter? Justice. We are your helpers to be with you, to support the just cause so that we bring it to G-d. G-d wants man to bring justice all the way to Him.
You bring justice all the way to G-d. Then, justice will be complete. But if we stop showing or bringing justice all the way to G-d, it will not be complete for human beings. Justice can only be complete for society or for human society when we bring justice all the way to G-d. And that's why it is given also in Scripture that the worst form of oppression is false worship, worshiping something that's not G-d. Because anything other than G-d, if you worship it, it's not going to bring you the good life, it's not going to account or materialize for justice and your good life, the excellent life under a just rule, under a just rule.
No rule other than G-d will be full justice for man. And shouldn't that be the reason for those who believe there's a G-d or this world didn't create itself, G-d made it. Shouldn't that be our reasoning? Yes, it should because G-d knows us as G-d says in Scripture, who is better to serve than the one who has been around always?
So, somebody coming up from here and in late time off even 10,000 years ago. What do they know about the complete history of human beings on this earth? And who can know better than the one who created and designed the life in the first place or in the first instance? So this is the logic. This is a logic in Islam for scholars of Islam that no worship other than the worship of G-d can result in the full freedom or emancipation of the human soul, freedom or emancipation of human soul and justice for human society. Nothing, short of the worship of G-d can do that.
I repeat that I believe that Mother Nature has already gone to war in our defense. You see how nature itself is whipping people. Nature itself is whipping people. Nature is whipping governments. Nature is whipping government leaders. Nature, whipping them. And I believe that nature is our defender.
Yes, Mother Nature is our defender defending us, not all of us, but us who want to be good and excellent in our life, and our behavior. Nature is on our side. Mother Nature is on our side. Yes. So, when Jesus asked for helpers, he got helpers. There were righteous men available to him and they said, "We are your helpers to bring the issue to G-d, to bring the issue to G-d."
So, G-d then used men, leaders and used other men to help those leaders to advance His cause, to advance real justice for human society. But if we understand what those symbols and those metaphors are saying that are given to communicate not just a person what's in a person, like Jesus Christ or Moses or Muhammad or Abraham or any of them but is given to communicate something that is in every human being but only expresses itself or produces itself in the real world from a very few, from a very few.
I understand when Jesus was speaking to his following and he said to them, "I in you, and you and me," he was saying that there was a common life that they shared. They shared a common life. And then, G-d gave us Muhammad and Muhammad was told to say by G-d in our Qur'an, in our Holy Scripture. Muhammad was told by G-d to say I am a mortal just like you. I am a mortal just like you. We are to see the connection for these two expressions. The last Prophet saying something. But he's saying something to give further explanation or to make it clearer what the one before him said when Jesus said, "I in you, and you in me."
Now, the more familiar saying you perhaps are calling Muslims who came from church life too as well as our Christians, I guess here, is that Jesus said, "I in the Father." That's probably what you are recalling. But don't forget, it said too of Jesus Christ, I in you, you in me. I don't want you to think I was getting ready to word that wrongly.
But I would like to also say, don't forget that this man is an excellent student of the Bible. And the discussion of the Bible in its wisdom, et cetera I bar none. I'm not intimidated by the Pope or Rome or by the President of the Baptist Union or following what they call the Baptist Conference. Yes. The Baptist National Convention, whatever. No. None of them make me feel uncomfortable.
In fact, I can go to sleep, and they can wake me up and I'll continue the conversation. Yeah. Not bragging. Not bragging. But I have studied diligently. And for over long, many years. And I thank G-d, G-d preserved my innocence and preserved my truthfulness. And I was not selfish. I was not reading the Bible to prove something for myself or to disprove something against somebody else. I read it just to know. I didn't have any prejudices or anything. And G-d blessed me with more than what most Christian leaders have. I assure you that.
And why shouldn't he bless me? I do believe in Divine Intervention? And Mr. Fard was Divine Intervention. Elijah Muhammad, his able spokesperson, Divine Intervention, Malcolm X, my old friend and the mother of this wonderful girl over... I mean, father of that wonderful girl over there, yes, Divine Intervention. Divine Intervention. Yes. Yes. The Civil Rights Movement, Rosa Park, Dr. King taking up the cause, Divine Intervention.
So, I believe in Divine Intervention. Yes. Breaking the lifeline of the Honorable Elijah Muhammad and Mister Fard, cutting you off, cutting the umbilical cord so you can live again, Divine Intervention. Yes. So, I believe in divine intervention. So why shouldn't G-d then If I believe Wallace D. Muhammad is Divine Intervention and he's prepared me to teach you Islam, Qur'an and the way of our Prophet, Prayers and Peace be upon him. I live in a predominantly Christian society. My neighbors are Christians, across the street next door Christians.
When I speak to an audience, it's a Christian public listening or we'll hear it later. And whatever we do in this country, we have to do it amidst Christians on their block, in their neighborhoods. So you think G-d wouldn't prepare me to also live with Christians and then understand what they have as their religion and to help you live better with your Christian neighbors? Yeah.
So, G-d had to educate me both in Christianity and Islam in order for me to serve His cause here in America. And I'll never be bigheaded. If I become swollen headed, if I get a ego, it's a curse of G-d on me. It ain't my nature. Ain't nothing in me want that. Nothing in me want to be big shot. Nothing in me want to be seen. I don't want you to see me. I want you to see what you need to see to help your life. Not me as a person. No. I don't want you to see me. I'm happy not being seen.
As long as you see what G-d wants you to have in your life, for your betterment and for your good future, that's all I want. And because of that, I think that's why G-d has made me the leader of these people that's going to change the world. I should have said changing the world. Yes, because from the moment that they picked us up and singled us out for the abuses, I think we're already being an influence for changing the world, yes, for changing the whole world.
America is more socially mature than any other nation I know of. Why? Because it has used us for its experimentation. It has used us for its experimentation and it's experiment with freedom. Nothing has been more valuable and more important as a factor in their experiment with freedom than the soul and life of our people. Yes. They have used us to awaken the best in their own people. They have used us to bring out the best in their own people. They have used us as a kind of cathartic medicine to purge the soul of their own devilish people so that their people become a healthier and better people for the great plan of their founding fathers because they weren't even fit to support that plan in that terrible diabolic nature they were in before they poured out their misery on us and cured themselves by some kind of a therapy.
Yes, by some kind of therapy, they cured themselves. But who was used? We were. We were used to heal the nation. And now, this nation, as I said, are more socially mature and more healthy as social members in the self-society of mankind than most of the people I know in the nations of the world, most of them. They may be devoted to ritual. They may be devoted to righteousness more than most Americans. They may be devoted to honesty and decency and loving their neighbor. But when it comes to social maturity, most of them are much more deficient or lacking than the average American citizen, much more. They don't have the social maturity of the American people.
Yes. So, it's not a single person that has been a sign for the healing of this sick world. It is a group of people, African American people, that have served as a sign for the healing of the hearts and souls of the world. G-d chose you for that, and He will reward you in equal measure. Whatever the world took from you with God's permission, G-d has to reward you in equal measure.
And didn't the world take away from you your connection with your own lifeline as a society or as a people. Yes. So then, to pay you back, G-d must connect you again with your own lifeline so that you can become a society and a people anew, and a people supported by the excellence of Mother Nature, by the excellence of Mother Nature, of people reconciled with the material world as the hand... pardon me, as the mate or the help meet for the mind of mankind.
Yes. So, you have to become again a lover of G-d's creation in its beauty and in its service to mankind. Become again. This is the natural life of healthy people who are going to progress, who are going to make for progress in the world, who are going to lead the world to progress. That's their beginning. Their beginning is appreciating beauty in the natural world, appreciating the help they get from the natural world, appreciating the utility for industry and human life that G-d has put in the natural world.
So, we need leaders, men and women who will fall in love. If you're not already in love, fall in love with G-d's creation and its beauty and in its service to mankind. Then, you'll become connected again to the natural world as G-d connected the first parent, Adam. You'll become connected again to the natural world. This will situate you for progress more than any other thing will. When G-d says in the Qur'an to us that the first words revealed to Muhammad was Read. He said, "Read, Iqra, Read, in the name of your Lord who created. G-d didn't say Read in the Name of your Lord whose proper name is Allah. He didn't even give Muhammad the name Allah until later.
He said, "Read, in the Name of your Lord who Created." So, the first acquaintance Muhammad was given of G-d was G-d the Creator. Not Allah, special name. G-d the Creator. And G-d had to say this to him again before he understood. He didn't understand. So, G-d repeated, read. He said, "Iqra." Rabbikul Akram. And your Lord is Most Generous. Who is Most Generous? The Creator is Most Generous. Look at all these wonderful things available to you for your benefit, for your use, and to be brought into service for the benefit and progress of human society on the Earth. So, Muhammad began to understand what G-d was saying to him. And G-d connected Muhammad with the objective world in its beauty and in its excellence.
And then, Muhammad was able to read and receive Revelation. It continued until it was completed. And when it was completed. G-d said... Now, has the Shaitan, the Shaitan, given up all hope of tricking you up in matters of your religion.
Yes. So, what does this tell us? That the whole plan of G-d is worked against by the Satan, the Shaitan. And you know, we think Shaitan is some spirit of something. He's a mystery. He's a great mystery. "Oh, you got the devil in you., Not all the time. That's just you in you.
If you ever get Satan in you, wow. Whoa, pity on all of us and you. So yeah, here is the enemy. And it says even hell fire. Scripture is very clear. The hell fire is no superstition. It's real. So, in Islam, we say "An Nar ul haqq" The hell fire is reality. It's reality. And we say that hell starts in this life and heaven starts in this life.
That should bring relief to a lot of you all. I have never read in the description of hell anything much worse than we have already suffered as a people. Burning. We've been burnt, burnt alive. I can't find anything in the picture of hell any worse than what we have already suffer. I am going to bring this to a conclusion very soon.
If you've followed what I've given you so far, we can now know Mother Nature's support for the African American cause. We can now know Sacred Scriptures, comforting words to the orphan, that's us. Not an individual. But all people have been made orphans. Mankinds orphan is African American people. We can now have life and have it more abundantly. An entire lot of people, us, was made an orphan to be used and abused and a racist government by a racist government, a racist government whose soul was poisoned and who was on an ego trip.
Yes. The soul was on ego trip. The soul of the white leadership on an ego trip. And they spoiled their ignorant masses by making that ignorant masses think that it was approved by G-d that black people should be put down. And some ignorant preachers have used the saying in the Bible of the curse of upon Ham to say that we are the children of Ham. And therefore, our blackness, our color is a curse on us. How ridiculous and how far can they be from the truth of their own Bible, from the truth of their own Scripture?
They misread it, misinterpret it, their learned people, guided them, and led them into such misreading to keep them ignorant too, while they carry out their plan to advance their cause at our expense, at the expense of our life and the life of even their own people. We can now do for self as The Honorable Elijah Muhammad said, we can now do for self and harvest our labor. See, in the time of The Honorable Elijah Muhammad, we could do for self but there was no guarantee that we would be able to harvest our labor because our position justified the government to come in at any time they wanted to and break down or tear down everything we had built up and take whatever we had achieved, take it as a due to the government, as something that was due to the government for taxes or something or in some other name.
They could take care of everything or set us against each other and make sure that we would have nothing left, you see. So, they knew that their society, their leaders in their public wouldn't support people condemning the government and condemning the white race as being a race of devils and planning their future inside that government. They wouldn't support that.
They just let you do it as long as it's of some benefit to them. And they needed something to counter the Civil Rights Movement. They needed something to counter long before the Civil rights Movement. They needed something to counter W.E.B Du Bois Movement, NAACP that came after Du Bois. That movement protest, the movement of protests, they needed something to counter. So, I'm sure they saw that, no, don't kill. Don't destroy this foreign life or this foreign thing in our society. Let it live. Down the road we may need it to counter the movement of the people, Black people, who want to rush things and want us to accept them in our society as our equals.
So, The Nation of Islam saying, "Don't have faith in that. Don't trust the white world that they'll ever give you that. Don't trust W.E.B Du Bois hope that this will happen. But separate yourself from these wicked or evil doers and oppressors of your life. Separate yourself from them and establish your own Nation and establish your own Nation. So, I'm sure that the intelligence Department of our country back then in the '30s when it first started, they looked at it and they said, "Yes, it's a threat. But we better leave it alone. We might need it down the road."
Yes. And that's why they let us live, you see. But when the Civil Rights Movement advanced our cause and the government had to make concessions and the thing was opening up to be right, The Honorable Elijah Muhammad was also of old age was becoming to be old and frail, frail and in poor health. And they were fearing that the Honorable Elijah Muhammad, if he would die a young man like Malcolm or young man like someone else, not me, they knew me. They studied it to me too. They knew I was a warrior for peace. They knew that.
So, they weren't afraid of me what I would do. They just didn't want me to get the freedom to do too much. So that's why they made sure that I didn't have much money around to help the cause once my father was gone. So, they made sure that I was poor. They said, "Well, he won't have much money than you." That's one thing. They saw that I didn't have much money. I had to struggle with poor people and no money. But I'm sure they wanted to leave me around. They didn't want to get rid of me, and they didn't want anybody to come up that couldn't manage that leadership like The Honorable Elijah Muhammad managed it. He was a wise man. He didn't do foolish things. Very wise man.
He was like Elijah of the Bible. He used water and fire. But he used it very skillfully. Yes. He wouldn't burn himself up. That's for sure. And he helped keep us out of danger too. But the next leader, who knows? The Intelligence Department say "If they get a young hot-headed leader, he won't be like Elijah, a shrewd strategist. He may make the wrong decisions and may bring people out here to attack the government. He may start a violent revolution or something. So, they were very careful to see that such man didn't succeed him."
And if he did, he wouldn't have nothing to work with. So, before The Honorable Elijah Muhammad passed, they had already started working to destroy the businesses and the economic future of The Nation of Islam before The Honorable Elijah Muhammad passed. In fact, the greater part of the damage to The Honorable Elijah Muhammad's business accomplishments was already done before he passed. But when he passed in, they took us into the Probate court or manipulated us into the Probate court and took the rest and gave us a little, wasn't nothing. Said, "Well, we have to leave them something so that they can reorganize."
This is a lawyer and got the judge approval. Judge said, "Yes." Well, they should have something to reorganize. So, we'll let them have, I forget how much it was, about $30,000 or something. Yeah. No kidding. Really, seriously. So that'll help them get the schools, keep the school, keep their school in Chicago. But what about the schools in all the other places?
So actually, when they told me, they said, "Well, we have to take you down. Will you come down to court for a deputation." I said, "Yes, I accept." And I said, "They don't know I know what deputation means." They're taking me to court to crucify me. That's exactly what it means literally, crucifixion. Yeah. So, it may mean one thing for one person in the procedure. But it can mean also crucifixion. Anytime they want it to mean that, it can mean that because, literally, that's what it means. Crucifixion. Come from the word means to be crucified. So, I take my deputation. I said, "Well this is it."
Well, Honorable Elijah Muhammad had told us, he said, "We're going to lose all of this. This is what The Honorable Elijah Muhammad said in the last several years of his life, last two or three years of his life. He said, "We're going to lose all of this." He say, "But we'll get it back." He didn't mean in his lifetime. I don't think he was speaking. I think it was the angel speaking. G-d was having His angels speak with The Honorable Elijah Muhammad's voice to say to us, all of this is going to be lost. But you'll get it back. Now is a time to get it back.
And lastly, I want to say to you, and mind you, I'm not speaking to only Muslims. I'm speaking to the soul of the African American people because that's the great hero, the great hero for our life and the great helper in the cause of G-d, that hero in the soul of the African American people. We can now be our own man, M-A-N. Thank you.
Takbir! Allahu Akbar!
For more audio and video lectures by the Imam W. Deen Mohammed, call W. Deen Mohammed Publications at 1708-862-7733. All right. Post office box 1944, Calumet City Illinois, 60409. For more Muslim Journal, see local distributors. And thanks for listening.


