05/06/2001
IWDM Study Library
Riverside State Park Address
Collective Purchasing Conference (CPC)
Northeast Distributors 
Harlem NY

By Imam W. Deen Mohammed
Speaker 1: Imam W.D. Mohammed.
[applause]
Imam W.D. Mohammed: . Dear believers, Muslims, brothers and sisters, peace be unto you as we greet in Islam, As-Salaam-Alaikum.
Congregation: Wa-Alaikum-Salaam.
Imam W.D. Mohammed: We thank Allah, that is G-d of all the worlds, the Lord, creator, and Lord of all the worlds. We thank Him for our presence here. We witness that He is one for all His creation and for all people and we witness that Muhammad to whom the Quran was revealed, is the Seal of the prophets, the last of the prophets. G-d's servant and His messenger and our mercy to all the worlds. We thank Allah that this religion has reached us in America and we have accepted it, and now we are in harmony with the spirit and letter of this great religion revealed to Muhammad in the Quran by way of the Angel Jibreel, Gabriel as they call him.
We're thankful to Allah because this is the greatest thing that can ever happen to any people for them to get religion correctly from G-d. We didn't get it easy, we got it the hard way. But so did the people of Moses. They got it the hard way too. They were in bondage, they were under Pharaoh, and Moses as a child or baby, peace be upon him, was sent up the river or down the river, but he went up because he went to a great, great kingdom, the kingdom of the pharaohs. He was sent there and he became one of the workers in the upper level of leadership for Pharaoh and G-d made him know his calling eventually. When he separated from Pharaoh, the troubles started for him and his people.
They were already in bondage, not Moses because he was sent where he could be free with Pharaoh. But once he rejected Pharaoh, then he was in the same situation with his people and G-d guided him. Over a long period of time, he was guided and, finally, his people were liberated. They were free from bondage, and they were free to have their own life and their own establishment. Their own conscience, their own life, their own establishments. I don't think G-d intended less for us. Not all of us, but G-d has blessed a few of us with a religion, Al- Islam. That is our heritage, and I hope you understand this, some of you do.
Islam is our heritage, our natural heritage. It is not only our heritage by history. History said that many of us who are Muslims when we were brought over here as slaves. I have pictures from the newspapers that my father saved showing slaves with a turban on Moroccan style being sold on the auction block, once they were brought here to these shores. We know there's much proof that many of us were Muslims. If we have an African heritage that we want to not lose, isn't it much more important to not lose our Islamic heritage?
This is not just a religion for us, or conversion for us. This is an opportunity for many who had their heritage taken away by force to live in the life that they were in before. To return to the life that they were in before. That's according to history, according to the teachings of the Quran and according to the teachings of Muhammad, His messenger. Every human being is born a Muslim. Now, by that definition in Islam, the Muslims, you should say Islam is my nature, Islam is my natural rights, Islam is my inheritance. Does that make sense?
Congregation: Yes.
Imam W.D. Mohammed: I think it'll make sense to Einstein, to Dr. Dubois, and to a fool half-insane locked up in an institution.
[laughter]
If that doesn't make sense to you, you ain't with what is right. Praise be to Allah. Yes, now, I want to have just a comment or two before giving you my presentation for this time for this occasion. This community is making me so happy.
[applause]
Everywhere I go, where I go now, almost, just about everywhere I go, I may see something looking sloppy and like it's half dead or dead, but everywhere I go, I see bright eyes, bright spirit, dignified people going after class and that makes me so happy.
[applause]
I don't know if you all know me, and it's hard to know me-
[laughter]
-because I will take off class and put on a raw, R-A-W, a raw man's dress to get where I think we have to go. I'll do that. I'll be just as happy in the raw as I'd be all dressed up in class as long as I know we're making progress going where we have to go. That's me. You all know me, many of you know me as a religious man. That's wonderful, I want to be known firstly, as a religious man, but a religious man in Islam is not always a religious man in other religions, especially Christianity. And Christianity, African American or black people [unintelligible 00:08:13]. A religious man in Islam is a man like Muhammad. The model for all Muslims and all of mankind really, according to our scriptures.
Muhammad was a businessman before he was a prophet of G-d. Muhammad was a rounded man. Muhammad, the Prophet, prayers and peace be upon him, he was seen sweeping floors, helping his wife clean up the house. He was seen shopping for his own food in the market. Why should I be different if I represent the office of Muhammad, the Prophet? If I represent his office, and every Imam that claims to follow the Quran, and his tradition, you're representing, whether you know it or not, the office of the prophet, Prophet Muhammad. If I am representing his office, shouldn't I be like him?
If I don't have that nature, I should pray to G-d and try and take on that nature. Where I can be comfortable sweeping floors, comfortable going shopping in the market for my own things. We can't say we follow him and then reject his lifestyle. He didn't have the lifestyle of those who love pomp and glitter of the world. That was not him, he was far from that. But he was not the kind of leader to impose his state on other people. And then G-d said, "Understand that Muhammad began with a few powerful people as his companions."
G-d blessed him to have a few powerful people as his companions before he became a prophet. So when he became a prophet they remained his companions and they were the best of the people to follow him. Like the Khalifa, Abu Bakr, we call them Khalifas now. Like his companions, the sahabis, Abu Bakr, Ali, Othman. All of them, great men. He blessed them with those men but the mass, the majority of followers were poor people, the poor. I don't know if you've heard the story or seen the movie about Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves. The ones who wrote that story, they were looking at Muhammad the Prophet and Ali Baba is supposed to be Muhammad the Prophet, and the forty thieves, means his followers.
So this is a criticism, this is a negative thing, this is a ridicule of our prophet and his followers, his first followers, Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves. But at least they had to tell the truth about his purpose. He wasn't out to get riches, if you saw this movie, Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves or if you've heard of the story. He was not out to get riches. He was out to help those who were oppressed by the rich and he did help them. He took from the rich and gave it to the poor and that's what zakat does. The leader that followed Muhammad, he said, "I will go to war with you if you do not give zakat." That's what he said, may peace be upon the companion of the prophet, Abu Bakr.
He was a mild man but he said I will go to the war with you if you refuse to give zakat. Now that was right after the prophet had been among them walking and talking and living and working for them. What do you think happened over a period of centuries now? What do you think people are doing now? They have left Islam and they are calling themselves Muslim. All over the world. They have left Islam. Very few Muslims, in the Muslim world. Very few Muslim leaders are in the Muslim world. The great majority of them have left Islam and are living like their ancestors were before Islam came. Living like thugs, gangsters, con men, oppressors, etc. That is the state of the Islamic world.
Not coming from me, this is what they say about themselves and what I know about them. I study them, yes. So this is not the only negative I have to bring you here today. One, learned Imam that I admire so much, I pray for him. I pray for Muhammad, prophet first and then after him, I pray for this man. This old man told me once, he said, "Wallace, the beginning of our religion is a negative." So we have to say a negative before we say a positive. It begins with La, no, ilaha illallah, no god but G-d. It begins with a negative, to establish a positive, to bring out a positive and G-d as my witness, I'm going to bring you there. I'm going to come from the negative but coming from the negative, so that we can be more positive.
Praise be to Allah. Now, let me congratulate you who hosted this with Imam, who hosted this event and the organizers and planners, and organizers who initiated it and the beautifully clothed models that have given us this wonderful fashion show, today. I don't know how you all look without these garments, but in these garments they look pretty enough for me to follow them home. You say that's crude. I'm glad I still got a little crudeness in my refinement. If I don't have any crudeness in my refinement, I won't be a complete human being. As G-d as my witness, I've never pursued any woman that I didn't marry. G-d is my witness.
[applause]
I'm afraid I'm married, so desire is here, sisters, but I won't be following you home. Yes, I have nothing to be ashamed of. If I have something to be ashamed of, I go to Allah with it. As soon as I recognize I have something I'm ashamed of, I go right to Allah with it, just like that. I have nothing to be shamed of. I was once threatened by somebody. They said, "Well, you want me to go public with this?" Trying to get me to do something they wanted me to do that I shouldn't have done and I didn't want to do it. I said, "Go public any time you want. Get on the six o'clock news and let me know in advance so I can be watching it." I said, "You help yourself." No, you can't blackmail me. No sir.
I won't do a thing if I'm ashamed to face the people. I'm not going to do it because the people's wrath is also G-d's wrath. G-d's wrath is through the people and through your own nature. So I know not to do anything that will bring the wrath of the people on me. If I do that, you won't see me. If I have fallen to that level, where I'm that weak you won't see me. I'll be gone. You'll say, "Well, he is missing. We don't know whether he is dead or alive but he's been missing a long time." I want you to first know a little something about me. I think I should tell you a little something about my father first that many of you don't know.
The first restaurant that the community had, the Nation of Islam had, the Honorable Elijah Muhammad opened it and he managed it and he made it successful, my father and the leader you admire and love so much. The Honorable Elijah Muhammad. The first grocery store we had was opened, managed and made successful by the Honorable Elijah Muhammad. The first butcher we had was the Honorable Elijah Muhammad. He told us, he said, "I went to the market and I told them, I said, if you will show me how to make the meat cuts, I got a following and we will do big business with you." He said that the owner said, "No problem."
He said he put the Hon. Elijah Muhammad on a apron and then she showed the Honorable Elijah Muhammad the cuts of the meat, the cow, and showed the Honorable Elijah Muhammad on the chart, all the meat and then demonstrated to the Honorable Elijah Muhammad how to make those cuts. He gave the Honorable Elijah Muhammad the chart that he was teaching him from. The Honorable Elijah Muhammad took the chart and hung it up, into the facility that he had bought, with our own money because it was a community. The Honorable Elijah Muhammad was supported by beautiful wonderful people. He didn't have an outside job. He didn't have to because he didn't have to have any work outside, or try to get money from somebody, Arabs or somebody.
He didn't have to do that because the pioneers loved him so much they would give him everything they had and even suffer if they had to, but they wouldn't suffer. They suffered only the loss of money and the loss of the convenience to have certain things but they didn't suffer. They were so happy doing that, happy doing that. That's the kind of followers he was blessed with. A man that would lead the people the way he led the people deserved those followers.[applause]
You say, well why did you tell us those things when you were back there telling us that he was wrong? Because I first had to tell you where he was wrong to break this grip on you, so I could take you where you had to go.
[applause]
It wasn't my intention to tell you anything bad about the Honorable Elijah Mohammed. That was never my intention. It was what I had to do. Now that it's over, we should lift him up because he was much more a Muslim than he was not. He was a believer and a courageous believer. If he had half the knowledge that G-d blessed me to have, there would have been no need for me, you hear me?
[crosstalk]
That man could have got-- so I miss him now. I wish he was with me, but I'd say, "Honorable Elijah Mohammed, you can whip ass but I don't like doing it."
[applause]
Don't say he used a curse word. I will use but I will tell you the picture I had in mind that I said ass. A dumb, stubborn, donkey that balks only when you need him most.
[crosstalk]
Yes, the Hon. Elijah Muhammad didn't tolerate that. He didn't tolerate people, disrespecting their posts, disrespecting their jobs, disrespecting our investments, disrespecting what we want as a life. He didn't tolerate it. I can be patient and pray for you and keep looking at you next day, look at you see if you've improved a bit.
[laughter]
Even if you go back, start going back I'll say, "well they are going to come forward after awhile." Sometimes I hate that side of myself. I wish the Honorable Elijah Mohammed could be resurrected and whip ass.
[applause]
He was a strong man. Nothing could deter him. Nothing could turn him around. The world threats of putting him in jail, the FBI, nothing could turn that man around. Suffering, imprisonment. Suffering and lack of the goods of this world because his followers were extremely poor in the beginning, '30s and '40s and the '50s too. Change only came in the middle half, the last half of '55 going up, big change came. Yes, but nothing could change him. Big shots coming from across the water to question him on what he's teaching. They sit there, he'd say, "Brother, you just don't understand."
[laughter]
Nothing could turn that man around. If he had not been that kind of man we would not be here today. I wouldn't be here, you wouldn't be here. Yes, so now that we are over the troubled waters and we are on the land where we can see what G-d wants us to do with our lives, I want you to know, my father, when the '60s came and he was getting old he said, "We have to make a material showing so our people will come to us." So he went after material things, and to get the material things he knew he had to have to have men who wanted the material things. So the leadership changed from, humble, spiritual, G-d-fearing, G-d-loving people. That's what we were in the '40s and '30s and the '40s and most of the '50s.
To those who want the fancy things of the world, he pretended to be pleased with them because he needed to use them to get his material work done. I came out of prison myself after doing about 14 months in Sandstone, Minnesota, for the same thing he got five years straight for and he did five years, including the jail time he did, I think he was locked up for five years. I came out and when I saw this new group of leaders, this is negative [unintelligible 00:25:46] but for the sake of having more positive in this community, not for the sake of negative, no. I looked at them and I said, "Wow, these people are different. This is not the same nation of Islam." They had big shinny rings on their fingers, long leather coats, long fur coats. Not just the ministers but also their wives. Well, I can't tell you everything.
[applause]
I was successful only because G-d accepted me for my goodness and my intent and also being the son, not just a son but I have to say, the favorite or the favored son of the Honorable Elijah Muhammad. I was favored to be named after the man he called G-d in the flesh. Wallace D. Mohammed. We've got postcards from his teacher right now where his teacher signed Wallace D. he didn't even put Mohammed. Wallace D. All we got was on the postcard, Wallah D. Sometimes he put he put WD and F or Fard, WD Fard. That's how he signed his correspondence to my mother, to my father and to my father's brother Khalat who was supreme captain in the time of the Fard. He sent them cards, and I didn't ask for those cards.
My cousin, the son of my uncle Khalat brought me cards that his father had and showed them to me. My mother, before she passed, she said, "Son, I want you to have these," and she gave me some cards from him. One of the card I'll tell you exactly what it said. It said, "Sister, the new child has come, the new delivery--" something like that, has come. I can't remember exactly whether it was new child, a new baby, a new [unintelligible 00:28:13]. It wasn't baby. But he said, "Has come," I know that. He said, "You promised to give him my name. Take good care of him." That what he said. This is the teacher of my father writing this on a card to my mother. That was not the only card he sent asking about me and telling her how to take care of me. Now, my father was in prison.
My mother took me to see him maybe two or three times. I know two times. He was in prison in Milan Michigan, Milan Federal Correction Institution prison, federal prison. One time she came to me she said, "Wallace, your father sent something from the Quran and he wants me to read it to you." She read it to me and she said and he wants me to give it to you and she gave it to me, the paper that it was on. It was Luqman's advice to his son. The words from Luqman, the chapter Luqman, advising his son. I won't give it all to you to save time I'm just going to give you the part that was for me. "If anyone strives with you to get you to believe of me," this is G-d speaking, "that for which you have no knowledge base, don't obey them. But your parents, keep good company with them, in the world."
Isn't that beautiful? Beautiful. Strong against shirk or false worship but putting the mother up high. That if your mother wants you to believe something that's wrong of me, don't follow it if you have a knowledge, that's against what she is telling you, but still keep good company with her in the world. I could love that G-d, I'm telling you. If I could love that G-d as a human being, I would be kissing him eternally, feet and all. I'd be kissing him eternally. I would have no time to do anything but kiss him, eternally. That's what my love is for G-d, a G-d like that. Yes, so I was given that as a child and I'm a small child. I was younger than my son here. This is the youngest of our children.
He's 10 years old, Mohammed. He looks more like he is eight, he is 10 years old, 11 July sixth. Pretty soon. I'm going to have a nice birthday present for you, Mohammed. Don't worry. He'll be 11 pretty soon. Praise be to Allah. I was younger than he is, maybe about five years or so and I recall that very vividly, as though it just happened yesterday. I recall my mother giving me that. Now, that came from my father. His teacher, said those things to my mother to take care of me. How can a child not love a man that was a stranger, came from another country? But came and talked to my father and won my father's heart. He won my mother's heart. Taught my mother how to cook, himself.
My mother was taught by Mr. Fard himself how to cook the food that we used to eat and that many of us still eat. Brown rice and all that. Bean soup and all that. He taught my mother himself. He was in the kitchen. He's the one that taught my mother. So how can a son not love that person that did it? A father who is locked up and sent a son, by the hand of his mother, words like I shared with you. Do not follow your parents. That's how it goes in Luqman. It says, "If your parents strive with you, to have you associate with me, that which you have no knowledge base, don't follow them but keep good company with them, in the world."
That means for the rest of their lives. As long as they are living, you're supposed to keep good company with them. That's a wonderful G-d. Now, my father said that to me. Don't you know I have to be thankful to him? Don't you know that that endeared me to him more than anything else that he had done? Because, actually, I didn't have a father in my house, until I was 13 years old. No father in my house, except through my mother. I was with my mother and, believe me, she kept him more present than he could have been if he was there physically. When he came and started living with us after imprisonment, we had it easy. Yes, he was mild.
She didn't have to enforce the law for him, he was there and she didn't have to. She could relax a little bit. I said a little bit. She was still and she'd say, "I'll whip the skin off your bones." She was still to be feared, though he was there, milder man, much milder human being, much milder human being. I'm sharing this with you so you can see better, me. If you see me better then you can accept me better. I'm not after money. I never have and I want you to know my father was not after money except for a cause. He never begged. I saw a fancy diamond pin on his tie once and he was conscious of me, and I was conscious of him. When he noticed I was looking at it, he gave me a sign.
He didn't say a thing, he gave me a sign with his face to tell me, "This is not me, I'm not impressed with these things." He didn't have to say a word with his mouth and I was very comfortable. He had fancy cars. Cadillacs, new Cadillacs, but never was he attached to those things. I'm telling you something about my father, that you need to know. He was never attached to those things. But he fooled that little group. He pretended like this is, - oh yes. We've been put, now in heaven brothers, this is heaven G-d promised us. No, that was not him. He was fooling the new leaders, so he could use them to help him build the business to impress our people to come and join Nation of Islam.
I have had to do the same thing. When I started off, I had to use people that I was not compatible with. I had no likeness. I found in them nothing of the spirit that was in me but I had to use them to get support for what I wanted to do at that time and that has changed. Bended until it was straight enough to leave it alone and they were there to help me bend it because they were set among us, to destroy what we had before. So they used me and I used them. The only difference, I used them up and they didn't use me up. Most of them when they saw that I had gotten all out of them that I needed or wanted, they respected me so much.
A big one, maybe the biggest one among them in the leadership, he said to me, he said, "Supreme minister," they called me back then. He said, "Supreme minister, I don't want to hurt you. I know what you want to do. I see what you're doing. So I'm not going to hurt you. I'm just going to go, I'll just leave," and he left. He said, "If anything you ever need from me, just call, just ask." Now that was a man that I pray to G-d to keep him and bless him with a good life here and in the hereafter. That was a strong and honorable man. Another one almost as big as he, he was trying to get me to take on a style, a fancy style as a leader, wear fancy robes looking like a Christian minister's robe, the bishop robes, that wear those big old robes.
Bishop robs, the big old robs. So I pretended to go along for a while. But when he got a chance to actually have him tailor that robe for me, I had to let him know. He was trying at the same time, giving me all kinds of books on high sciences and Christian religion and mysteries of religion and stuff because he had taken such courses like that in college. That was his qualification as a college graduate. He was qualified in religious symbols and mysteries of religion, Christianity. He gave me all these big books. He came with this other big man with a big old book like this after coming with one big that was big like that, he came with another big one. So I had to stop him.
I said, "Those are not the books." I said, "Just a little portion of the Quran is more than you have in all those books." That's what I told him. I didn't get any more of that stuff from him. They stopped. They respected me. Anyway, this one told me, - out of the clear blue sky. We are in the secretary's office, we are just working. He just out of the clear blue sky looked at me, I could see the dislike in his eyes. He said, "Go on and go blind then." Not a word said between me and him on that day, on anything like that, only business. He looks at me in my eyes and said, "Go on and go blind then." He left and never came back. I didn't say a word to him. What was I to say to him? He'd told me to go on and go blind. I wouldn't say anything to him. It's finished with him. I can't help you but I don't want you to help me. He left and never came back. I prayed for him too that G-d would give him good and maybe one day he will come this way. Yes, I do. Because his rejection of me was not personal. He was an agent with a job to do and certainly my rejection of him was not personal. I'm an agent too with a job to do.
[laughter]
[applause]
Praise be to Allah. I could hear somebody saying something. I don't get what you're saying. I don't even have time for it anymore. G-d brought me into the field of great works. I don't have time for that anymore.
That gives you a picture of my father. My mother, I can describe her in one sentence. She lived and died for W. D. Fard and her husband Elijah Muhammad.
[applause]
Praise be to Allah. Nature doesn't give us strong, special people like that often. They don't come often. So I'm going to end this first part of my talk to you or presentation to you today with this. I'm happier now as your leader than I've ever been.
[applause]
It's rejoicing time now. The bad times, troubled times, has gone. It's rejoicing time now. Praise be to Allah. But it's not time to drop our guard. Rejoicing time is a time when you if you're wise, the time when you should be most alert. Because while you're rejoicing Shaitan will come in and do his thing. Brothers come in to the Eggmate Meat Market and I'm pretty thankful to Allah for that facility I'm very proud of it and us that we had the money get it and equip it, not new equipment but we've made a good start. They come in there and they see me with an apron on, cutting the meats up, or something.
In the '50s had to been close to 1960. Whatever time Minister Farrakhan, joining the Nation of Islam that's when it was. He came on a Savior's Day to Chicago as all of you did, who were out of Chicago we were there. He came to the restaurant at the time I was the manager of the restaurant. But how did I get to be the manager of that restaurant? My father started me off on 31st and (unclear) with my brother. Slaughtering live chickens. We slaughtered our own chickens back then under the Honorable Elijah Muhammad. You know what he told us to say before we cut the throat, he told us to say Bismillah. But he didn't have the whole thing but what he had knowledge of he used, he gave it to us. He said, "Say, Bismillah," and then say then said, '(unclear), if you can save your life, save it'."
[laughter]
My brother Elijah, who was assistant supreme captain, he was the one, Elijah knew [unintelligible 00:45:06] scalding them, cleaning the feathers off, and then gutting them and cutting them up. That's what we did when I was about 14 years old. No more than 14, 15 years old. You see where my experience come from. Way back then under the Hon. Elijah Muhammad. A man who knew nothing about running a store, a restaurant, knew nothing about cutting meats. He was no butcher. But he had the courage to go and get the knowledge and do it. Let me tell you, the first cuts he put it in the case, I saw them as a teenager, they looked as beautiful as any cuts I ever seen in any grocery store. The Hon. Elijah Muhammad's cuts, that he made.
What's that doing for me? G-d working through my father to affect me, to get me to be the person that I should be for the job that is coming. How did that affect me? If I had to do something, I'm going to do it and I don't care what I have to do to get it done. Short of displeasing G-d, I going to do it. G-d knows that he had given me a spirit. If I wouldn't freeze to death, I could tunnel through 300 miles of snow 20 feet high with a teaspoon if I had to. I'm not exaggerating. If I didn't die, I can keep at it until I get to that 300 miles place where I would be out of that high snow and ice. I can do that. I got some people who are close around me they would say, "yes, he will do it. He'll live or he'll die. Trying to tunnel through that ice and snow.
That comes from my father and mother, both of them, tenacious people of a tenacious will, tenacious means holding together and refusing to come a loose. Tenacious will and spirit. My mother and my father. Why all that? Why G-d had it that I had mama and daddy and I'd come out like them and their determination to succeed for you. They didn't do that for our family. They did that for you. Can you understand that? One of us, our family must have-- we don't need that kind of exceptional person. We can make it with just a little bit of what my father and mother had. But to get the whole people to go where they're supposed to go you need that extraordinary will power and determination, tenacious spirit and will. You need that. G-d created my mother and father and me for you. Are you are you going to turn us down? I can't understand you.
[applause]
He didn't do it for us, we did it for you.
Congregation: That's why we love you.
Imam W.D. Mohammed: He didn't get you just for us, he got you for the rest of the world. When they see what we accomplish from where we came from, the whole world will be affected. If there is anything powerful enough to straighten the Islamic world up, it's you, you.
[applause]
If we effect the Islamic world, the international world of Islam in a way to make them straighten up and fly right, oh, Muhammad's going to come back to this earth.
[applause]
And thank G-d, we don't have to shed blood. The world is much more civilized and humane than it was way back then. It would be easy, easy and G-d will do it with us or without us. But I know He has chosen us. He didn't choose the Honorable Elijah Mohammed he chose us and he didn't choose the Wallace, he chose us. We cannot stop now.
[applause]
Imam W.D. Mohammed: Praise be to Allah. This is no small thing. My father was not a prophet. He was not a messenger of G-d that got revelation like Muhammad or the messenger and prophet of G-d. In fact he told us, I didn't get mine that way. I got mine from a man, from G-d in the flesh in person. And you know, what he said was wrong, and what he said was right. If a man gives his whole life and purpose to G-d then G-d is in that man. G-d is in his flesh. You know what I'm saying. Well where do you have the Quranic proof of that? I wouldn't say it if I didn't have it. G-d knows, I'll kill myself before I would lie against the Quran.
Allah says in the Quran that He. Where's He? He says He hoovers between a mortal, - (that mean a flesh and blood person) and his heart. If he hoovers between my body and my heart, He is inside me. He is inside me, keeping me, preserving me and you know all of the great religions of the book and Quran and Islam, established by the Quran and Muhammad the prophet (pbuh) say that G-d is everywhere. Allah says he wants us to give our teaching and focus to the house the Holy Sacred House built by Abraham and his son Ishmael. Ibrahim and Ismail the two prophets. But He says also in the Quran whichever way you turn yourself or your face there you will find the face of G-d. Whichever way you turn. He said whichever way. Everywhere G-d. (points in all directions and then points to himself).
[applause]
He is everywhere. He is more present then space, because space changes. G-d does not. Space is weak, it depends on what's there. G-d does not. Actually he is more present than space itself, G-d. And I know, I tell my son and I want my son to know-- Get the best. I don't want him to get a second, or weak dose or message of Islam. I want him to get the best. I didn't have to tell you that. Muhammad could have told you that. He could have told you. You ask him does G-d reside inside of you, he would have said, yes. G-d in the sky? -yes. When we say Allah Akbar we're saying Allah is bigger. He is bigger than the universe. He is bigger than all that you can see and yet as the Old Testament says, isn't it wonderful, "You who are too big for the heavens to hold dwells right here." (points to himself) In this small place. Isn't that wonderful?
Praise be to Allah. This is necessary (unclear). Now before I go further, this is the, - Bismillahir rahmanir rahim, - I want to say this to you. The money world is a cross. A C-R-O-S-S. The money is a cross. On it lives are crucified. We don't have our hopes in money. Money is only a means to an end. We want our families to be comfortable. We want our children to come to have a better condition in this world than we have. We want to finance this religious community. So it will have what it needs to be the strong and beautiful Muslim community following the Quran and Muhammad's way of life under G-d alone. That's what we want. We can't do it without G-d.
Believers want a religious community that they can feel good about. And just like the poorest one of uswho likes to dress up nicely we want to address our community up nicely. We don't want our schools and condition to shame us not to mention how it shames the Quran, or Muhammad's way. We don't want our masjid, our centers shaming us. We don't want our teachers shaming us. We have to bring everything up to par so that we feel good when we look at it and we can celebrate our accomplishments. To do that we have to have money. I'm not the leader that will allow with my endorsement or with my consent, your leaders that claim to be following me, to oppress you and treat you like you're pack animals or slaves.
I won't accept it. If I won't accept it, how are we going to get the money. You don't have enough money for that, to put them in nice cars, nice (unclear) and dress them up nicely. You're poorer than they are. You don't have enough money for that. We got to get the money and the only way I know to get is the way world has gotten it. Business. Business. We have to be business. We have to have business sense and we have to do business in a business way. Bismillahi Rahman Rahim. We cannot lose if we hold on to Allah.
Christianity says, Judaism says, Islam says, G-d will never break off from you. You have to break off from Him. He will never break off from you and then G-d revealed in the Quran, it says hold catch or grip, hold on to the cable, the rope that G-d sent down to you from heaven. A firm hold that we will never break. A firm hand hold for you that will never break. Now you know, G-d created us to be born just like animals of the womb, that are tied to the mother by the, we used to say navel cord, - umbilical cord or navel cord. In this first awakening that we have as human beings we are tied to mother nature. That's a sign of how we are tied to mother nature the way G-d tied us to our mother for while we were in her. We are tied to mother nature in the way we are tied to our mothers that gave birth to us and we can't have life except from her body, while we are in her body. Likewise, those who are still under the grip of nature and have not awaken to G-d's plan for human beings they are tied to the navel cord of mother nature and they cannot get any life except from the materiel world that is nature. G-d has to reveal to them. And like the new baby, have to separated and then take in a breath outside of his mother. We have to be separated from this dependency on natural life in the natural world. To latch onto G-d. To grab a new cord. The new cord is not flesh and blood, the new cord is spirit. The spirit of G-d that comes down from high and connect us to Him, so we can feed on the divine and open up our minds and souls and hearts to a new reality and follow the destiny (unclear). Isn’t it wonderful?
[congregation affirms]
Imam W.D. Mohammed: G-d has done that for us. Let us wake up and respect what he has done for us. Sometimes a great thing can be done for you and you fail even to thank the person that did it. Maybe they died and then you start to think back on what happened and you start to weep and cry, because you didn’t thank them like you should have. "Too late", you thought. Now, it will never be too late to thank G-d except that you die, because G-d is always existing and ready to hear your thankfulness. Bismillahir rahmanir rahim. Qul huwa Allahu ahad. Allah hu samad, Lam yalid wa lam yulad, Wa lam yakun lahu kufuwan ahad
G-d revealed over 14 centuries ago to Muhammad, the seal of the prophets, a mercy to the world telling him and those who follow him to say he, the G-d, is one alone. The unity, but unity is not in the text. It means that if we accept this, this alone will unite us.
[congregation affirms]
Imam W.D. Mohammed: If we accept it, if we accept that picture, that idea of G-d, that alone can bring us together in unity.
[congregation affirms]
Imam W.D. Mohammed: Allahu Akbar. It is also called Al-Ikhlas, but where is Al-Ikhlas in the text? The Arabs when they [inaudible 01:02:58] through the destruction or they are finished with something and they're tired of their [unintelligible 01:03:03], like some of you are in my talk here. [laughter] I’m not holding you, G-d is holding you. I let you go anytime and get ready. Go to the washroom, go out, go back home, go play, G-d knows, I let you go any time you’re ready to leave. I don’t care, I’m going to love you still.
[congregation affirms]
Imam W.D. Mohammed: Praise be Allah. But Allah is holding you and holding me. I can’t rush it up and you can’t rush it. [laughter]
[congregation affirms]
Imam W.D. Mohammed: Praise be Allah. So it's called sura Al-Ikhlas. The Arabs, when they are finished with something they say, Halas. From the same root. Halas. It means finished, (unclear) with it, nothing else can be said or done. They appropriately, gave this name to this chapter and it's very appropriate for them, because the logic here says, “It's finished, there is no more to be said.” What many learned leaders of Islam, scholars and Imams, muftis and everything in the Islamic world don’t know is this. I’m going to tell you right now.
[congregation affirms]
Imam W.D. Mohammed: The Bible ends with Revelations. Says, “It is done. Finished.”, but it wasn’t done. It was not finished. Allah had to give the Quran and the sunnah that finishes the discussion about who is G-d, what is G-d, where is G-d. Finishes it.
[applause]
Imam W.D. Mohammed: Praise be Allah. Now G-d also says, [foreign language]. It’s another trouble spot for theologians, for wise people in religion. Now, you acknowledge that G-d made all of this. The skies, the earth, and all the natural things and the humans beings that he created to also be creators. You heard what I said?
[congregation affirms]
Imam W.D. Mohammed: Human beings he created to also be creators. Where did you get that from brother Imam? [foreign language] He is the best of creators. That’s says that Allah made other creators. He is just the best of the creators.
[congregation affirms]
Imam W.D. Mohammed: What has man created? Goods, comforts, a lot of other things on that side. And hell. [laughter]
[congregation affirms]
Imam W.D. Mohammed: I'm going to address this to you brothers, I like to call you my co-workers, imams in this community. You imams. G-d knows that there is nothing I want to give you except peace. As-sal?mu ?alaykum, Peace be unto you. When I say that, it’s not just a greeting that I’m not conscious off. I wish you to have peace and I wish you to be responsible or obligated to keep the peace. Yes, I do. There is another chapter in the Quran. Bismillahir rahmanir rahim (reading in Arabic) For the protection of the Quraysh. The tribe that Muhammad the prophet was born in. That was his tribe.
If protection is assured throughout or over winter and summer. The two extremes winter and summer. Winter brings death to the earth, the crops and the warm weather brings the life back again. The extreme of both can be very harmful and punishing. Extreme cold can be punishing. Extreme heat can be punishing. The cold will kill your work. The farmer, the agriculturist. The cold will kill your work, but also the heat will kill your work, dry it up. Grass is the most tender and vulnerable to these changes. When the heat comes the grass will die sometimes and (unclear) the days and the night. You go out and look at your grass and it's turning yellow. Too much heat dried it up and it starts to die.
They call us “The Grass Roots” don’t they? They put us in the heat. They want us to be in the high heat all the time to make sure that we have no production, no production in the heat of lust. Lust for women, for sex, lust for money, lust for just playtime. They put us in the lust for life, to burn us up so we cannot have any production. Burn the life out of us. And we are grass only, because we haven’t been favored to get the life that G-d intended for us.
That second life, that second breath of life. Once you get that second breath of life you’re not grass anymore. You're a mush higher creation than grass after you get that second life. Praise be to Allah. For the protection of Quraysh, he went through the winter and summer. The extremes of life that kill you and kill your production. It says, "Therefore, [foreign language]. Therefore, serve, worship the Lord of this house." Now, the house built by Abraham and his son Ishmael.
The descendants of Ishmael is accepted to be or known to be and accepted to be the Arabs. This is saying to the Arabs, "It was your father whose father was Abraham, who built this house and this house is the reason why you are protected from the extremes of winter and summer."
Pilgrims were coming there before Muhammad the prophet. Pilgrims stayed in there. Because that house have lost its meaning and connection with G-d in the right way, but it still was a connection with G-d, only with 369 gods so history says. That they have placed in that house 369 household G-ds. Some will say that they will give them better crops if we pray to them, their crop would be better. If you needed rain pray to this one, the rain will come. If you needed money, pray to this one, money will come. If you needed healing, pray to that one, healing will come. They had a god for almost everything.
If you want the land to bear more, pray to the god of fertility. But they had that kind of attachment to that house and their gods were in that house. And because they all shared that belief, they all would come once a year to make circles around the house, just as we do now. The only thing they didn't have the dignity that we have. They thought it was nice to go around the house in the nude. They would go around the house in the nude, naked. This is history. They would go around the house in the nude. What does it mean? What that tells us about them and that house? It tells us that they believed that house was the beginning of creation for human beings.
That house represented how the, first life of a human being. The first life of a human being is naked. The baby is the first life of human being and the baby comes here naked. So they saw that house as the house that protected the first human being, the most ancient of houses, I could tell you a lot on that house. G-d is saying through Muhammad, to his people, the Arabs, He's saying to them, "You didn't do this yourself. G-d bless you with this little situation, where you got a house, you have lost the purity of it, but still you got the house and it brings all of you from different places once a year to this place and that's how you survive the winters and the summer. The extremes of the winter and the summer."
The merchants would get rich once a year like they do now. The merchants would get rich from doing (unclear). They would get rich, because they saw when people are coming in, they have to stay there for the duration of the time of the pilgrimage and they have to have food, they have to buy them so the merchants would be ready with a big bazaar and the food would be there and everything and they're paying for all. They're paying even for the water. Like some of them right now, they charge you for water. If you don't want to pay them you can go and get your own water. But for convenience, if you're real thirsty you'll buy the water. How much for the water? Give me a dollar. Then never mind.
G-d gave them that security, from the extremes of life. Cold winters and summers that burn up your production. G-d reminded them of that so they would listen to Muhammad and respect where he is coming from. This was not the only chapter or only piece of revelation that caught the Arab's attention. But this is from the powerful piece of revelation from G-d that caught the Arabs attention. Now you may say, "Well, this revelation is not to Arabs." You're correct, it's to all of us, because all of us live in the extremes of winter and summer and G-d have given all of us original, innocent, virgin nature. That if we return to it, we can have a good life that will protect us from the extremes of winter and summer.
When you love your original creation as G-d made, not a lying human being, a truthful human being, not a rebellious human being, an obeying human being. Every baby comes here. Not lying to us, but being true, with his affections and everything else. If the baby doesn't like you he isn't going to hug and kiss you, until he learns psychology and lying from us. That baby won't hug and kiss you. That baby will reject you. And when it gives you its affections it's true and sincere.
You will have the life that you can build from. Build and build and build and you can break off from there, because if you stay in that life, human beings all over the world can connect up with you.
Because that's the life G-d gave them originally too. Innocent life. Truthful life. Not hypocritical life. So if you stay in that life eventually the whole world can connect up, because that's the life G-d gave every human being before they were Asian, African, European, black, white and other colors. He gave them that life. They are born human before they are born in any other identity. If you would stay in that original purity of the human He created, you can connect up with the world of mankind and all of you can have protection from the extremes of winter and summer.
[applause]
We can't stop now. They'll have to kill me and all those who are with me. We will not stop now. They couldn't stop us before. Now you have the second breath of life, you're wasting your time.
Who gave, [foreign language]. The One who fed them against hunger and who made them safe or secured from fear. Isn't that wonderful? You know when we hunger we start to be afraid about life. Oh I'm going to die if I don't get something. Right? Hunger and fear goes together. The extremes of the one, gives the extremes of the other.
Referring to the pharaoh of ancient Egypt. Pharaoh got to be so mighty with his people and (unclear) and their buildings, their great building works. He got to be so mighty that he actually began to think he is the only G-d existed. He laughed at Moses at the G-d that Moses represents. He told his builders, "Build me a ladder. Let us go up in the sky to see if we can find that G-d. That Moses follows. Just making fun. Moses responded to him a certain way. Abraham responded to him in this way. He threatened to cut Abraham off the life (on Abraham and the prophet be peace). Abraham said, [foreign language], "He who gave me my creation, who created me will guide me, shall guide me." With that he appealed to the intelligence, that should be rational intelligence in the pharaoh, but he also at the same time gave an emphatic and conclusive statement to pharaoh. You're wasting your time with me. I will not be guided by you. You're not from G-d's Almighty. The G-d who created me is the One that shall guide me. He was making an emphatic statement to Pharaoh saying, "Never will you get me", but at the same time he appealed to the intelligence of pharaoh.
He was saying to pharaoh, guidance comes from the creation of G-d. G-d created things to guide the intelligence of human beings. Pharaohs you should know this better than anybody. All of the science you've got. Science of [unintelligible 01:21:18], science of plants, science of construction, all that you got. Chemistry and all the sciences you got. You know you didn't get those sciences from yourself, you got those sciences from studying what G-d created. So he was appealing to his good senses his rational senses at the same time. [foreign word], "He who created me, shall guide me."
He was saying to Pharaoh, "You lie. You don't give G-d credit for your guidance. I'm telling you I'm not like you Pharaoh. I worship the G-d that guides me through His creation. He created me and gave me guidance in His creation. That's the G-d I worship. I'm not going to be a hypocrite like you, pharaoh." You get all the help from creation that G-d made and then claim yourself as G-d. Don't you know those pharaohs exists today?
[congregation affirms]
The secular world, the public school system, the colleges and universities. They take G-d out of the picture, so you will worship them as the great minds that have brought all of this science and wisdom and knowledge etc. When they have done nothing, but study G-d's creation over a period of hundreds and thousands of years and piled it, compiled it, and piled it up to where they now have storehouses of nothing, but science and knowledge, but how did they come to that, they went through what G-d made and studied it. Right?
[crosstalk]
What sciences do they have about human beings? The science of skin? That's my skin. You studied it and found out why my skin exists and keeps itself (unclear). That's all you did, you got that knowledge out of studying the human skin. Science of bone, science of the eye. You don't have anything except you get from what G-d did, and got it. What do you have that you didn't go to what G-d did? Nothing. Absolutely nothing.
[applause]
Now that's a fact and Islam taught, the Quran taught, the prophet Muhammad taught to make that clear. It says [foreign language], Is it not for Him both the creation and the command over it? Man wants the command over it to have power over other men. He wants the command over it so he can become the boss over other men. So the question is put to the man. It is not for G-d both the creation and the command over it? Are you the creator of these things? Did you lock these sciences up in matter? Did you create nature that had this kind of discipline to educate you. No you didn't.
G-d the Creator did, and even your own self. He created you too, and gave you designs and gave you (unclear) over your matter over your (unclear) and gave you systems that can be studied, because they follow the logic. They follow a definite order and a definite logic. G-d made that to be put it in to your head. Now why don't they acknowledge Him to the masses of people? Why don't you acknowledge him to the public? It's a great sin, it's a great sin on the modern world that they let these schools operate and don't introduce them to G-d first.
[applause]
You didn't bring about anything that you're using. You didn't create it. You didn't make its laws, you didn't make its patterns. you didn't make these system and you can't bend them, you can't change them. You got the benefit from all of these. Before you tell the child anything about education, you should tell the child without the creation, matter that you see, the sky, the birds and our bodies and animals our bodies that you see is created by power we don't know and can't comprehend. We wouldn't have anything to teach you in this school. That what they should tell them first then they will be educating children and educating people who will have the strength and you'll be free to make much more of their lives than what they are making of their lives today.
Because you can have a PHD, you can have many PHDs and you can fall down to the lowest of the low. Drugs, liquors, lust for the things of this world can bring that PHD down to the lowest of low. Disappointment, something he attached himself to or she attached herself to disappoints you, fall down sometimes to the lowest of the low. But if they were to introduced education correctly, begin with the G-d that made the world out of which all knowledge comes, (Arabic) He has extended everything and included everything connects everything, expanded everything, upon knowledge and mercy, upon knowledge and mercy. What is G-d telling us? Telling us everything created, has to be knowledge to us and everything created, has some mercy to us. Doesn't civilization, the world of education for a society bring not only knowledge, but also a more compassionate world to live in. A more comfortable and a more merciful world to live in. G-d has said that by way of revelation to Muhammad the prophet. Yes, this is necessary what I'm doing.
[congregation affirms]
Yes. That statement from the prophet Abraham, father Abraham peace be upon him. To the pharaoh, the one that was oppressing the people and claiming to be himself the only G-d. It connects man with creation, so that man can be connected to his G-d. The first words given to Muhammad was not Bismillah. The first words given to Muhammad was iqra, read. Bismi, with the name. [foreign language], who. [foreign language], created. Created.
Muhammad was lost in the world. He only had the umbilical cord to live on. He was lost in the world. The second breath in the table from the heaven did not come to him yet. G-d was trying to wake him to his mission, but his mind, he was not conditioned for it. He was not raised in Christianity, he was not raised in Judaism. He had no knowledge of previous scriptures. He didn't know revelation, how it comes about or anything. They were worshippers, his people were worshippers of idols, and he had such a highly refined human nature, that he didn't worship idols, but he didn't know how to worship G-d. Except that he was obedient and he didn't have a connection with G-d. So G-d said to him, "Read," and he said, "I can't read," and G-d said to him, a second time read, and he repeated, "I can't read."
This is in the Bible, this is fulfilled in the Bible. It says in the Bible, "There'll be a book and someone will come upon that book and that person, cannot be able to read, not be a reader. That person will take that book to someone and say, "Can you read this for me?"
And the first person--It's in the Bible, I'm giving you word for word how it goes in the Bible. The person said, "I cannot, I'm sorry, I cannot read letters." He goes on to another person and the second person said, "I can read letters but the seal, I can't break the seal." That's what he's saying. That person said, "The seal, I can't break the seal."
G-d comes now, and what did the Bible say, "This condition will be the condition (unclear) the end of time. That there will be darkness covering the whole earth" That was the time that Muhammad was born, in the dark ages. There will be darkness covering the whole of earth and it also says in the Bible, "That there will be a famine."
It says that, "It won't be a famine of food, it will be a famine of hearing the word of the Lord." That's what's the famine will be. All over the earth. At the time Muhammad came in. Our prophet, the seal of the prophets, the last. That's the kind of times he came into.
So he came in, and G-d, speaks through him to the world. Telling them, telling the world. The world of the enlightening scriptures. The world of theologians, the world of the learned in religion. He's telling them, "That's how it was (unclear)."
Now, listen to my story, this is how it's been opened up again. I came to him, no one put the light into the world again after darkness had covered the whole world in all this world, but the G-d who sent the light in the first place says that, "I have come to Muhammad and I took him who had not been taught by you all, and I told him to read from My (unclear) and he couldn't read. Not even for Me, he couldn't read, but when I connected him with creation, he started to read."Praise be to Allah.
[crosstalk]
I know you educated ones, you understand what I'm saying. And you know the beauty and the value of what I'm saying. Whether you accept it or not, you know it. But many of these here, they can't appreciate it, like you can because they don't know the sciences of the material world and they don't know how to connect those sciences with the G-d that made the material world, and how to appreciate what G-d has done through man while he was still in the womb of his mother, not even outside of himself or flesh.
What G-d did to him, made him so wise with the powers of creation. With the wonderful powers of creation, and just wanted to be born again, that's all, so he can have even a bigger and even more capacity, -and even a more scientific and more knowledgeable if he would just accept the breath of the bigger reality that G-d has waiting for him, if he would just come out of his (unclear) and be born again.
[crosstalk]
G-d says in another place, He said--and believe me, the Bible bears witness of what I'm saying to you. The prophets in the early scriptures, parts in the Bible, the writers of the Bible, how did they find G-d? They're still there, in the Old Testament.
They look at, like Abraham did, they observed the natural phenomenon. They observed the natural world and its workings, stars, sun, rain, thunders, lightning. They observed all those things. Rivers and everything and animals being fed by the land from the land and because of the water, the land is revived.
They looked at all that and here is what the prophet said in the Old Testament, he said, "I know by Your handiworks." meaning what you have done. Handiworks, Meaning Your art, Your creation that is so beautiful and done so artistically, I know by the works that I'm looking at, that, there is a G-d behind all this. That's how they came to know G-d.
G-d says, in our Holy book, "Who has said to my worshippers the goods of the world are not for them." G-d asked a question, "Who has said to my worshippers, the goods of the world are not for them?" Now G-d doesn't have to answer that, but we can. We know who said to us the goods of the world are not for us. Maybe you got an imam where you came here.
[laughter]
He said no I'm going with the stick to sunnah, and the prayers, and the rituals and we're not supposed to go after the dunya.
[laughter]
That's one of those dumb spirits that is saying that with his action if not his mouth. The goods of the world are not for us. (unclear), "Who has said to my worshippers the goods of the world are not for them?" G-d says, to the contrary, "Such is for them in this present world and exclusively for them in the latter ."
That's what G-d says.
Congregation: Yes Sir.
Imam W.D. Mohammed: "Such is for them in this world and exclusively for them in the latter." What does that say? G-d is saying, "You, enslavers of human beings, you (unclear), who live on the labor of human beings and have it easy, and not send them into the fields of the universe to plough the earth, to bring out the sciences, to bring out the products so they can go where I want them to go.
You're holding them back claiming to be holy, and not of this world and telling them that they are not supposed to have these things. But who's feeding you? They are feeding you, who's clothing you? You want them to clothed you.
Who's putting you in a nice car? You want them to put you in a nice car. Who is keeping your rent paid? You want them to keep your rent paid. Who will buy you a nice house? You want them to do that. But you are telling them," "Stay away from those things." You're telling them, "I want you to get no more money than what I need."
[crosstalk]
(unclear section) and sometimes when things get so hard, that you believe that man is approved by G-d, (unclear) … you'll go out and do something unlawful. You'll go out and break the law, so you can give him the money so he won't be put out of doors. We will stop that buddy.
[applause]
G-d is the provider. He provides for us, and abundantly. Abundantly. Don't forget what I said in the beginning. Muhammad the prophet was a businessman before he became a prophet.
G-d is the one who fed against hunger, and secured us against fear. Just as He did for the tribe of Quraysh. He has fed us against hunger and he has secured us against fear. Yes He has.
Those who truly believed and followed my father in his way, you didn't (unclear). You didn't hunger, you gave your all, but you didn't hunger. There was always someone, we had a brotherhood, and a sisterhood. There was always someone you could go to, to eat, you didn't have to be hungry.
[applause]
Isn't that wonderful?
[applause]
Imam W.D. Mohammed: And the courage that he gave us to go forward with our lives behind him, had no room for fear. He feared nothing. He didn't fear a white man, anything.
Yes, before Muhammad was a prophet he was a business man. G-d guided him to order the business life of the people of the peninsula called Arabia. And, that work went off to Arabia, into Africa, Egypt, Sudan and other places, and went the other way, towards Europe, Persia, now known as Iran, Iraq, all those places were touched by his works.
And they ordered their economic life, under a prophet. Under a man that came to guide people in religion.
And G-d says, that He shall raise up among the (unclear) one like unto Moses. Didn't he mention Moses? To take the people out of Egypt into another land? So that they could be the leaders and the builders of a new order on this earth? Man like Moses.
And I believe to be like Muhammad. And to be like Muhammad, means to be like Moses in that respect. G-d guided them and they became builders, great builders. And led them into strong economic system. A strong economic system, that would take care of all the people and all the nations that would come into it. It wasn't limited to one people or one man but the system was made for all people and all lands.
Yes, a system regulated by zakat. By zakat. G-d says [foreign language]. "Oh believers, save your own self and your families from the fire of hell." From hell fire. But he didn't say hell fire, he said, normal, just fire.
See a fire that cooks your food, and a fire that warms your house is not hell fire, but a fire that (unclear) your food, and makes your house cold, is hell fire.
In other words, passions that make your life comfortable and good, is good fire. And passions that make your life uncomfortable and bad, is hell fire. Bad passions that take us to hell. How do you know this brother imam, where do you get the authority to talk like that?
It's not put like that in the Quran, [foreign language] "The flames of fire that leap up over your sentiments by the hearts of people."That's what it says. Why is it not (unclear). I know exactly what G-d is describing? Describing greed in the body, lust in the body, that burn out the good sentiments of human beings, and throws their life into hell.
That's what it's talking about. This isn't spooky stuff. G-d is not the G-d of spookism. G-d is the G-d of reality. He made the first reality. And it becomes unreal, because of man's plans and (unclear). And using it, and abusing it. And G-d has a (unclear) that's not like that, to bring us back to its true reality.
The world in the beginning wasn't called a bad place, it was called Eden. A garden of paradise. And this is also reinforced by what Muhammad said, that G-d did, he said, "G-d told the angel Jibreel. He said “come I will show you my creation."
And Jibreel came and G-d showed him his creation and Jibreel looked at his creation and he said, "Oh my Lord--(unclear) Jibreel the (unclear). He said, "Oh my Lord, how can anyone go wrong in such a marvelous creation?" Like the Garden of Eden, or better, because that was before even the serpent was there.
And G-d, I guess within a twinkling of the eye, showed him the world after Satan had done his thing. And Jibreel looked at it he said, "My Lord, how can anyone go straight in such a world?" Don't think that this universe is bad. Don't think that the earth that feeds us, G-d says, that from the earth He feeds you.
Isn't that what He says? From the sky and the earth He says he feeds you. Well how can it be bad? If G-d chose to make the earth to feed me. (unclear section). It says He spread the earth out as a carpet, as a lush carpet.
G-d is not putting down the world, G-d is raising up the world, as a beautiful picture with great values and great use for you. That is what G-d is doing. So why do we get this kind of thing to put it down?
No. no, no, - you don't want to get your heart on that, if the Imam has put his heart on making money, then the only reason why he needs a helper is because he didn't put his heart on making money. He guided us to the Quran and the sunnah, but now he's going back to what his father did. Going make some money, make money for us. I'm not going to help. Now they don't say that to you. Let me continue.
[crosstalk]
It will be said. Yes. The flames of passion leaps over the sentiments of the heart and puts us into hell fire. This has happened to many of our so called leaders in the M.A.S, in the Muslim American Society.
[crosstalk]
And they are working against us. They're not working with us, they are working against us. The selfish thing in their hearts, makes them rivals instead of brothers. They're our rivals they still don't want to help us. And they didn't just come about. They're among us, and they're organized secretly.
And they're organized secretly long ago even before I became your leader. They organized and set themselves over you by the show of support for my father in the first phase and by the show of support for me in this phase. They pretend to be with me and what I'm about. Years ago, a few joined, but most of them worked against our collective buying program.
You will recall that, many of you. Those faking Islamic support, behind our religious initiatives, gave open support to the great man Elijah Muhammad. Gave open support to his economic program. Back there, they hung around to rob the believers.
Their being among us here, is to rob the believers. As religion teaches, in its first progression, human nature is attracted to the darkness of mystery and secrecy.
So if you can kiss the baby still in the womb of nature, of the natural world, and have him been, freed from that, to be connected with the divine light, with a divine word, you can lead that baby in darkness.
Congregation: Yes.
Imam W.D. Mohammed: In the womb, the life is in darkness. And it is happy there, it is comfortable there, it does no work to merit any credit in the world. It has to be freed before it can do work, to merit credit to the world. All the credit goes to the imam in whose stomach you are.
[applause]
They want us slaves, that's what they want, they want us slaves, while we live and after we die. But, while we live and after we die, G-d will have us, and G-d will have us, not in their grip but free.
[applause]
The life and the power, is G-ds' right over man. We are taking our life back. We've been doing it ever since I came into the picture. And we can't stop now.
[applause]
We are taking our life to where G-d would have it. We're not going to stop until we get there. We're not going to stop halfway, with just half of our life, to satisfy our slave makers, who want to just suck our blood until we're gone from this earth. No.
Congregation: Al-hamdu-li-lahi
Imam W.D. Mohammed: G-d is saying to you imams, that have shown me by you not coming out in the Muslim Journal, making a statement of support of what I'm doing, in the way of business. I'm saying to you, if you're against me, and you're against us.
[applause]
Congregation: Please say it brother.
Imam W.D. Mohammed: And you are hypocrites in the time of our lives.
[applause]
I don't want anything for you but a better life for you. G-d is my witness. I've loved you. I've shared more of my knowledge and understanding with you, than I've shared with anybody else. Because of me, and the blessings of G-d in me, you have become the speakers with the voices and with the impressive lectures that you give.
[applause]
And I shouldn't be nice to anybody, that keeps robbing us, and taking from us, but don't want to see us have what G-d wants us to have. (unclear section) Our jihad is with you (unclear) imams.
[applause]
Congregation: Free us from them.
Imam W.D. Mohammed: We have tolerated these conspirators long enough. We're too busy now to tolerate them.
So like G-d empowered Muhammad, our prophet, the universal model for human beings, the mercy to all the worlds, just like G-d empowered him, to say what he had to say, He has empowered me to say to you almost the same words.
Fight us with all you have, we will stay Muslims, Americans, business people and halal.
[applause]
The game is over here. I'm not going to (unclear) them. One place I used to go their graduation almost every year. You know why they wanted me to go to graduation? They didn't want me to go their graduation in the first years, they were getting speakers from outside.
And they would be, but they learned from me, that I wanted to help their school, and that they didn't have to pay me or give me anything. To save money, they knew I would attract a lot of people to their banquets, and they would get a lot of money. To save money, they started inviting me every year, but I didn't accept money from them. You will not get that kindness again.
[applause]
And you know who I'm talking to. They know exactly who I'm talking to. The MAS, as an organization does not belong to you.
Congregation: That's right.
Imam W.D. Mohammed: I'm talking to those Imams that fake support.
Congregation: That's right.
[applause]
Imam W.D. Mohammed: To rob all of us. It does not belong to you. I'm the one that gave you that (unclear), G-d gave it to me to give you (unclear). I'm the one that who had to [inaudible 01:56:29] before I gave it to you.
(unclear section).. you go on where you want go, but, we are still the Muslim American Society, and that's our name.
[applause]
And those who are standing firmly for what I represent, we are going forward without you. Our progress is going to put you where you belong, in the poor house, for good.
[applause]
Yes, G-d's blessed you with the Hon. Elijah Muhammad and, blessed you with freedom through his son. Yes, you had no freedom before, blessed you with freedom through his son.
That's why you have your own administrations, in your local places and you do your own thing, in your local places it's because, through his son, you were given that freedom.
Now you take that freedom and use it against me and what I'm trying to do. You don't deserve anything but problems.
[applause]
And (unclear), is just what you're going to get.
[applause]
Dear believers, history repeats itself. G-d blessed those rebellious, arguing followers of Moses, to be led out of bondage into the promised land. And they got out there and they (unclear).
G-d said, according to the Bible, "This generation can't be used. You have to live there, in the wilderness for 40 years, until a new generation unfolds.
Now you know all of Moses people are not in that (unclear). Moses had followers that were not like that. Let them live in the wilderness, as we go on to paradise, we go on to the promised land.
[applause]
I conclude by saying to you, "You have gotten a glimpse of what we can do, for ourselves and isn't that what it's all about?
And let me tell you, the obligation on us to stand up on our own feet, and to be responsible for our own families, and for our own neighborhoods, for the areas that we live in, the obligation on us is as must as a holy obligation, as saying your prayers and making your Hajj as witnessing there is but one G-d, yes it is. Why? Because we were once connected with G-d, Allah. And many of us who came over here as slaves were connected with the Quran and Muhammad.
That was taken away from us. Our (unclear), our possession, our holy sacred possession was taken away from us, and we were raised up as slaves, and beaten down to the position of inferior people.
Now, to bring that back, to make that connection again, and give these people again, their babies are innocent maybe they were guilty, maybe they didn't keep the law, maybe they didn't respect the Quran, maybe they didn't respect the way of Muhammad, so they can bear what was done to them.
But what about their children? Their babies? We're innocent and G-d will save the innocent.
He will destroy the whole universe to save the innocent. So don't think I don't have power.
Congregation: You do now.
Imam W.D. Mohammed: I have the power of the prophets because what I'm doing is the work of the prophets. And G-d, started this, not me. Thank you. Peace. As-salaam-alaikum.
[02:01:28] [END OF AUDIO]

