Moorish fez3/10/2023 ![]() ![]() As native Moors, he and millions of others were thus exempt from American segregation laws, so long as they had the right identity papers, which only Ali’s temple could notarize (for a small fee). He told of a kingdom indigenous to northwestern and southwestern Africa and the Americas, and that still ruled over Morocco. ![]() Ali’s scripture, the Holy Koran of the Moorish Science Temple of America, often called the Circle 7, professed that there is “no negro, black, or colored race.” African Americans were actually undeclared Moroccans, via ancient Muslim Moors.Ĭuriously, Ali’s version of Moorish civilization bore little resemblance to that of any textbook. He taught followers he’d discovered a forgotten section of the Qur’an in North Africa, after a high priest of Egyptian magic had identified him as the reincarnation of Jesus and all other prophets. Dorman says Ali was John Walter Brister, a Broadway child star and enigmatic circus performer who faked his death and reinvented himself as a Muslim prophet in Chicago.Īli, of course, told a different story. However, a recent book by historian Jacob S. ![]() northeast and founded the Moorish Science Temple of America sometime between 19. Most scholars identify Ali as one Timothy Drew, an orphaned North Carolinian who discovered Islam somewhere in the U.S. I wanted to find out why.ĥ resources to help you become a better ally to Black people But his obscure take on the Muslim faith hasn’t faded away - on the contrary, it’s enjoying something of a revival. Few of those would be likely to recognize Ali’s name or influence. And while his early 20th-century movement was always an outlier, he planted a seed that would see African American Islam grow in vigour and numbers, counting around half a million converts today across various branches. Ali was the first American to tailor Islam to the conditions of Black people. But I quickly learned that “Master Fard” himself once had a teacher, Noble Drew Ali, a man even more mystifying and arguably more consequential. I assumed my story would begin with the Nation’s enigmatic founder, Wallace Fard Muhammad, before tracing his influence on everyone from boxing legend Muhammad Ali to the revolutionary Malcolm X to the first Muslim U.S. It has spawned or galvanized the most consequential African American Muslim groups, most notably the Nation of Islam, the controversial Black nationalist sect headquartered in the Windy City since 1932. It is, in the truest sense, a Black Mecca. When I started researching my book Praying to the West, a travelogue of Islamic communities rooted in the western world, I knew that a trip to Chicago was inevitable. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply.AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |