Elijah Muhammad

Elijah Muhammad was the fiery leader of the Black separatist religious movement known as the Nation of Islam (sometimes called Black Muslims) in the United States. Muhammad’s preaching of the superiority of the Black race spoke to a generation of Black Americans, particularly in the decades following World War II, when many faced racial segregation and inequality throughout the country. Muhammad and his movement would prove to be influential and controversial, and he would count among his followers Malcolm X and Muhammad Ali.

Early life

Born Elijah Poole in Sandersville, Georgia, in 1897, Muhammad was the son of sharecroppers and formerly enslaved people. His father, Wali Poole, was also a Baptist preacher. He was one of 13 children, and his formal education ended at fourth grade. He married Clara Evans in either 1917 or 1919. In 1923 the couple and their two small children moved to Detroit. He worked, among other places, at a factory making Chevrolets.

Discovering and running the Nation of Islam

About 1930 Elijah Poole, as he was still known, met the founder of the Nation of Islam, Wallace D. Fard. Fard, who had been born in Mecca, Saudi Arabia, and came to the United States sometime before 1930, established in Detroit the Temple of Islam as well as the University of Islam, the temple’s school, and the Fruit of Islam, a corps of male guards. Fard preached that Black Americans must prepare for an inevitable race war and that Christianity was the religion of slave owners.

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Fard mysteriously disappeared in 1934, and Elijah Muhammad, as he had become known in 1931, succeeded him as the leader of the movement. Because of dissension within the Detroit temple, he moved to Chicago where he established Temple No. 2. Muhammad prevented followers from participating in any U.S. political process. In accordance with those beliefs, during World War II, he participated in protests against the draft. Charged with violating the Selective Service Act, he spent four years (1942–46) in federal prison, from which he continued to run the Nation of Islam.

Muhammad slowly built up the membership of the Black Muslims through assiduous recruitment in the postwar decades, especially among African Americans who had moved to cities during the Great Migration and faced discrimination in employment, housing, and policing. He preached a life of discipline that included abstinence from alcohol, crime, and adultery. But the message of racial separation was squarely at odds with the belief structure of many emerging civil rights organizations and leaders. Although many found his Black supremacy preaching distasteful and racist in its own way (he was known to call white people “blue-eyed devils”), the impact he had on the lives of his followers gained notice. George Schuyler, a Black conservative columnist for the Pittsburgh Courier, wrote of Muhammad in 1959:

Mr. Muhammad may be a rogue and a charlatan, but when anybody can get tens of thousands of Negroes to practice economic solidarity, respect their women, alter their atrocious diet, give up liquor, stop crime, juvenile delinquency and adultery, he is doing more for Negroes’ welfare than any current Negro leader I know.

The role of Malcolm X

One of the many with whom Muhammad’s message resonated was Malcolm Little who, while he was in prison from 1946 to 1952, converted to Islam and took the name Malcolm X. When he was released from prison, Malcolm sought out Muhammad and quickly became his key lieutenant.

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Over the next decade, the Nation of Islam would continue to grow, and Malcolm would gain increasing power. A charismatic speaker, Malcolm was Muhammad’s heir apparent by 1961, and he made frequent appearances on college campuses and television debates. But his preaching of Black supremacy stirred concern in both the white community and the civil rights movement. And as Malcolm’s profile grew, his relationship with Muhammad began to cool over a number of issues, including alleged extramarital affairs by Muhammad.

In the wake of the assassination of John F. Kennedy, when Malcolm said that the killing of the president was a case of “chickens coming home to roost,” Muhammad ordered him to not speak publicly for three months. The schism between Muhammad and Malcolm was never repaired; Malcolm was suspended from the Nation of Islam, spoke publicly against Muhammad, and endured death threats. On February 14, 1965, the home he shared with his wife and four young daughters was firebombed. Malcolm charged that the bombing was done “upon the orders of Elijah Muhammad.”

A week later Malcolm was assassinated at the Audubon Ballroom in New York City. Three men, all members of the Nation of Islam, were convicted of the murder, although two of them were later exonerated after what was ruled a grave miscarriage of justice. Muhammad always denied having any role in Malcolm’s death.

The role of Muhammad Ali

In February 1964 a young boxer by the name of Cassius Clay stunned the world by defeating the heavyweight champion Sonny Liston. Clay was close friends with Malcolm, and shortly after the fight, he announced that he was changing his name to Cassius X.

Muhammad saw in the charismatic Clay an opportunity to secure a powerful ambassador for the Nation of Islam and a chance to establish his supremacy over Malcolm. He told Clay that simply changing his last name was not sufficient for someone of his stature and offered him a new name: Muhammad Ali.

Later years

In the last decade of his life, Muhammad continued to run the Nation of Islam from Chicago, but he moderated some of his anti-white positions, saying in 1974, a year before his death, “The slavemaster is no longer hindering us, we’re hindering ourselves. The slavemaster has given you all he could give you. He gave you freedom. Now get something for yourself.”

When Muhammad died in 1975, at the age of 77, the Nation of Islam fragmented. The Nation’s leadership chose Wallace Muhammad (who became known as Warith Deen Mohammed), the fifth of Elijah Muhammad’s six sons, as the new supreme minister. Disappointed that he was not named Muhammad’s successor, Louis Farrakhan, who had succeeded Malcolm as Muhammad’s top lieutenant, led a breakaway group in 1978, which he also called the Nation of Islam and which preserved the original teachings of Muhammad.