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IWDM Study Library
IWDM 25th Anniversary Address

By Imam W. Deen Mohammed
Imam Abdul-Malik:
So I hope you will accept my introduction, and please let's give a wonderful round of applause to our leader, and visionary Imam Warith Deen Mohammed. Takbir-AllahuAkbar!
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
We Praise The lord, keeper of all the world, who cares about his creation, and particularly his human creation. And the best of his human creation, his servants, the messengers, the prophets. And the leader among those messengers and prophets, is the last prophet, the seal of the prophets, Muhammad, to whom the Qur'an was revealed more than 14 centuries ago. We salute him to the traditional salute. Salaahu Alayhi W Salaam
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
the prayers and the peace be upon him Wa Ba’ad, and what follows of that salutation. We witness that G-d is one. We worship none but him, and we witness that Muhammad is a mercy to all the worlds. Who are the messengers and servants of G-d.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
We are very happy to be here in Louisville, Kentucky, at this beautiful, grand, exquisite structure, the Galt House. I didn't know Louisville was as big as it is. I had the wrong impression for all these years. I knew they had a big fellow from here, Muhammad Ali, the greatest far that ever struck. This has really been a great visit for us thus far, and I think it's going to just keep moving with more and more energy until it concludes sometime this evening. So let's be grateful to our G-d, firstly, and let's be grateful to all of those that helped us along the way to become better human beings, more conscious of ourselves as a social group, lost from Africa, not knowing how to get back there, and trying to find our way to establish our life individually and our life collectively here in the new world, the United States of America. Let us be grateful to every one from slavery to today that have done something to help us on this planet, the path to our honor. And the greatest honor we can ever have is the right relationship with our creator, our maker, G-d, Allah, Subhanahu Wa Ta'Ala, Glorified and highly praised is He.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
I'm prepared to go right now and start right now, but I made a little change in the program. And obviously the program keepers, or the program holders here did not know of that change. There was one of the Imams among the many who worked hard to have us go forward and be successful in the right way and in the right picture, who has worked with me very diligently, very faithfully, for now better than maybe eight years. And he is very significant in the success that we have realized in these recent years, in the last five years. And he is none other than Imam Abdul-Malik, the resident Imam of Baltimore, Maryland. And I ask you to hear him now.
Imam Abdul-Malik:
Peace be unto you, As Salaamu Alaikum, We witness that G-d is One, having no partners in the rule of the Heavens and of the Earth, and we witness that Muhammad is his messenger. We pray the prayers of peace upon Muhammad and what follows. Dear people, dear Muslims, this is a very wonderful day, a very special day reflecting on 25 years of Imam W. Deen Mohammed's leadership, of his influence not just upon the nation of Islam's membership and admirers, but also his influence upon the world's language and religion, the world's language and religion our society's language and religion. Our Christians and Jews perceive themselves as religious people, and their relationship with this life and the Muslims, this is very significant.
Imam Abdul-Malik:
And reflecting on these 25 years, which I was part of 20 of those 25, there has been no more important evolution or change than the change that the society in which we live in, the United States of America, and this world society has changed their perception of Islam, has changed their perception of the practice and the picture of Islam. Now because of this special man, the special influences that formed his life, we can live in America and anywhere in this world and proudly declare ourselves to be believers in G-d having no partners, and followers of Muhammad the prophet, leader of the international followers or the international community of Muslims. That is due, in my perception, mainly to the work and the dedication and the devotion of our leader, Imam W. Deen Mohammed. AllahuAkbar!
Imam Abdul-Malik:
It wasn't just his interest to help the harvest of his father's' work, his followers, the members of the Nation of Islam to conform to the great picture and the great practice of Islam. That was, of course, the immediate concern and the immediate interest. But there is also something that shaped him in his mind and that shaped his language, his soul, and that was the very serious study, the very serious devotion to the study of the Holy Qur'an and of the life, tradition, and example of Mohammed the prophet. No one who has seen that clearly can go away from it without a better, improved idea and perception of their humanity.
Imam Abdul-Malik:
And because of that influence on his mind, he was obligated, because of his faith, to share with the great numbers of the followers of the honorable Elijah Muhammad the true picture of Islam. And through that 25 years of change and evolution, that great community, the harvest and followers of the honorable Elijah Muhammad, the powerful membership calling them into this Nation of Islam, one time called the Black Muslims, as Minister Akbar Muhammad said, is perhaps the biggest influence for Muslims around the world coming to a true idea of their faith and a truer grasp of their life as Muslims, a more serious grasp of their life.
Imam Abdul-Malik:
Again, we have to credit and applaud and acknowledge with our hearts and with a true sense of truth who is responsible for that, Imam W. Deen Mohammad. AllahuAkbar. and it says in the Holy Qur'an, it says, "Let not the people's hatred of you let you swerve from upholding justice. Be just, for it bears an affinity to the G-dliness of G-d." The world's perception of the African American people, lies. America's perception of its former slaves, lies. Untruths. The questioning the humanity of this group. But even that, and in spite of the important work that Mr. Fard is responsible for, still Imam Mohammad was true to his commitment to the Islamic life, to live the life of a Muslim. And they introduced that light to him from the teachings of the Nation of Islam, but they also required him and encouraged him to give his attention to what G-d says in the holy Qur'an, to devote himself in the holy Qur'an. He found these words in the holy Qur'an and other inspiring words and insisted that we go in the direction that we have gone. And look at where we are.
Imam Abdul-Malik:
Now, I'm not going to take any more time, but I just want to mention something that he has mentioned. I'm going to mention this on my own, but he has mentioned this before me, so I'll mention it feeling I'm justified in mentioning it. I am his son-in-law. AllahuAkbar, And my wife, I don't see her, we have a new daughter. A new daughter, And her name reflects something very special, his daughter. We agreed to name her her name, Hagar Chiara Mohammed. Hagar from the wife of the Prophet Ibrahim, peace be on him, and the mother of Ishmael the prophet. And Kiara from the great leader of the Focolare people, the Focolare movement,Chiara Lubich.
Imam Abdul-Malik:
I was favored by G-d to make the Umrah in Ramadan this year, and while I was there, I had to read. And I talked to my wife, Bakeerah, and I said to her, "Maybe we should name the baby Hagar." And she said that, "Well, Daddy said that if we have a girl, maybe we should name her Kiara." So I said we should name her both. I don't want to put pressure on my two month old daughter, but she's a symbol. Her symbol is that we are truly Muslims living the life of Muslims in this world, the life of the correct picture of Islam in this world, the life of the approved Islam approved by G-d in this world. And our devotion to that life does not separate us from good people anywhere that they are. So our daughter, she will carry this name with great pride for many years in her grandfather's leadership. Thank you very much. Peace be on you.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
I was so comfortable I just forgot. Praise be to Allah. Before I begin the address to you today, let me say that last night was a wonderful, beautiful, high spirited night. The program was wonderful, and it was actually conceived by... The idea itself began with Imam Clyde Rahman of Cleveland, who is a great promoter of fundraising for us in our community. He's often coming to me to get my permission for him to do something in my name. I'm conscious of the fact that sometimes I wonder how I'm going to pay my phone bill. I know where to go to get the money, now. I'm not hopeless, because if I just tell you all I need money, you're going to get it. I know this.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
I'm not saying I'm hopeless. I'm not hopeless. I don't like to ask for money. And that happens to me very rarely now. Very rarely am I without money to pay all of our bills because of you supporting us so faithfully, supporting the ministry, and before the ministry the Mecca fund. Most of you that started out with me when I first established my own ministry separate from the Nation of Islam, you started out with me then, you remained with me ever since, and those who are on the list of donors now supporting my ministry, most of them are the same ones that supported me from day one. That's faithful. That's loyalty.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Yes. So, when I'm asked what do I think of the effort to raise funds for me and my ministry, right away I hesitate. I don't feel that I should agree to it, because you're already doing that. You're doing that on your own and you're doing the beautiful job of supporting Imam W. Deen Mohammed. But we know we can use more money for many things. We would like to have a budget that would take care of our staff, our employees for a year in advance. We would like to have that. We don't have it. So I listen to Imam Clyde Rahman, and he doesn't know really how to get my agreement. He doesn't know how. I only see it in here right now. He doesn't know how to get me to agree to something like that. Like he said, "Imam. Imam. Imam, we want to do something big for you. We want to give you a million dollars, maybe two million dollars." "I'm listening." "Can we do it? Can we do something for you?" "I'm listening."
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
I'm thinking, too, at the same time that I'm listening to him. I'm thinking of time. And he said, "25 years of your leadership." I said, "You're right." "And we want to do something for you." I said, "Okay. I agree." I agreed because of the time, 25 years, and I agreed because I think we need something like this to give us the opportunity to reflect and recall our steps of 1975 under leadership of the most unique Black man that I know of in the history of Black people, the honorable Elijah Muhammad.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
We need this day to recall where he put us and where we have come since that time. This has given us the opportunity. And Allah is with us, G-d. Those who don't know who Allah is, G-d. G-d says to us in our Holy Book "Say to them," meaning the Christians and the Jews and also another group that is called Sabians, and they still exist. Some Sabians still exist. "Say to them, our G-d and your G-d is one and the same G-d." So we know who Allah is. And now, I think the intelligent, educated people of the world know who Allah is. They know that Allah is G-d, the creator of the Heavens and the Earth. G-d for everybody. Yes.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
So, I know that it has been that G-d that has been with us all the time. When they brought us from Africa to be worked here as slaves, sold to slave masters, G-d was with us then. The day that they declared us free, and some of us were so hungry for an opportunity to develop our minds, to educate ourselves, writers on that day of freedom say slaves could be seen in the fields when they heard the news resting on their plow with some paper or list or book in their hands trying to read. Look what they were doing when they heard that they were free: trying to read. Why? Because they had been held back from the freedom to learn, to educate themselves, to read. That's what they were held back from. These writers didn't say that when they heard the declaration that they were free, they rushed to get a bottle of wine. They were seen rushing to get some liquor. Some were seen rushing to go somewhere and eat. Some were seen dancing all in the field. I don't know of any writer that has said they were dancing in the fields. Think about that.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
The writers said that they were seen resting on their plow cap trying to read some piece of literature. That should tell us a lot. What does it tell us? It tells us that the most precious part of our life is our human intellect. Our human intellect. The mind that wants to learn. The mind that wants to be an instrument for the betterment of the individual's life and for the betterment of the individual's environment. the world all around him or her. That's the most precious part of our life. You'll say, "Oh, no. Our heart is the most precious part." Believe me, if your mind dies, your heart can keep living, and you are virtually dead. We know the importance of the heart. The heart is the mate of the intellect. They're mates, like males and females. They work together for the good of life. And the heart must be right for the intellect to get benefit and do the good work that G-d created it to do. The heart must be right.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
But we know a heart can be wrong and the intellect can be very productive. If that wasn't true, we wouldn't have all this great production we have in Chicago. And we know a lot of it is owing to the works of criminals, liars, thieves, oppressors. Chicago, I'm sorry. I'm beating up Chicago, not Louisville, Kentucky. I wouldn't dare say that about Louisville, Kentucky. Yes. So a lot of the great work we have in big cities like Chicago, we know that work is the work of a lot of people who are corrupt. So the mind can still produce though the heart is corrupted. But the mind can't produce as G-d intended for the mind to produce unless the heart is right. The heart has to be right.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
But if the heart is right, the heart only wants to assist the mind. It doesn't want to lead the mind. The heart only wants to assist the mind. So the heart's just like a loving, sweet, gentle wife of the intellect, of the mind. And it can be ignorant too, like the mind can be. Nat King Cole told us that in his song "My Foolish Heart." And it touched me. I was a young man, 14 years old, with hair starting to grow on my chest and already on my lips. I had these things, sideburns growing down to my chin almost. I was a hairy young fellow. I'm in trouble. All that energy growing that hair, I've got to be in trouble. And he said, "My foolish heart," I went and bought his record. I went and bought that record right away. I bought that record. "My Foolish Heart." Because it was sure in pain. That pretty black girl had me in constant pain.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
I was smelling her long after she was five miles away from me at her house and I'm at my house. I could still smell her like she was right there beside me. I don't know what she used, but that soap had a wonderful smell. My nose knew when it smelled that, she was there. So our hearts can be foolish. Our minds should be the boss, nort our hearts. Now, the heart just enables the mind to keep going straight, like a woman, a good woman. A good wife. She will let her husband take the lead, especially in matters of the world. She will let her husband take the lead. When I say matters of the world, I mean even matters that he is more familiar with than she is. Even the decoration of the house. Say, "Honey, I want this house decorated." She'll tell him to do it. Very few women will say, "Honey, I'm going to decorate this house. Go get me some paint, get this, and that." No, she'll say, "Honey, I want this house decorated."
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
And she may be really a better selector of the right colors and everything, the right paint and everything than he is. But she respects him so much in his position of the man of the house, that she will pretend that she doesn't even know too well what to do about this job of decorating the house. And sometimes he's ignorant enough to think really she doesn't know. But she gets the house decorated. And that's the way the heart is, too. The heart sometimes knows the mind is foolish and the heart will very, very easily suggest to the brain that maybe you're wrong. It won't strongly suggest that. It will very subtly, easily ease up on the brain. "You might be wrong."
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
We call that the whispers from our souls. We always say, "Oh, that's a whisper from our soul." But who knows what is considered the soul? Who knows where the soul is located in our bodies? We don't know. It could be in the stomach, like some far-Easterners think. The soul is in the stomach. It could be where the heart is. It could be your heart. It even could be up here. We don't know where the soul is. We don't know where its center is. But I think most likely it's where the heart is. The center is where the heart is. That's my opinion.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
So much for that. We need this day of celebration to thank the life and the struggles that we have made to get where we are today. I mentioned yesterday evening at the banquet our precious work to advance our life, to free us eventually from prejudice. But I was sitting there enjoying the meal. That chicken was so tender I ate it all, and a little more than I usually eat. Two big pieces of tender breasted meat. I ate it all. I was trying to be, what do you call it? Sophisticated. I'm going to leave a piece, so when they pick up the plate, they say, "Oh, he must have starved." You know? I said, "Hey, I can't handle this. This sophistication needs to go out the window." I ate the last little piece.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
And the music was so beautiful. My half brother, that man's got a voice that he can sing. (clapping) he can sing. I mean, he has a beautiful voice. Professional skills as a singer, a vocalist. I'm not saying this to tell him to go into that business now. You don't want to do that, because you're more valuable to us where you are now as a preacher for G-d's cause. And we hope he will stay there, not go into entertainment. In fact, any one of you in such positions here, if you have professional skills of that type, you can make more money with us than you can out there in the world of entertainment. Yes, we'll make you a star. You'll sing for us and you'll get the money too. Praise be to Allah.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Yes. I was thinking of our precious pressures, and I said to myself, the honorable Elijah Muhammad was certainly the creation of precious pressures." And most of our great minds and producers are the creations of great pressures. We are all a people who have lived under pressure for all of our lives, from generation after generation. Anytime you think of your position in the world of societies, the African American people, if you are conscious, you're going to be under pressure.
PART 1 OF 4 ENDS [00:34:04]
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
There is a pressure on your mind and your heart that we have been held back and we need to do more to catch up with the world. No matter how much advancement we see in our name, through an individual, or in an individual, like Oprah Winfrey, like Bill Cosby, and many others. That's not near enough to remove the pressure of the poor representation that a people of 30 million making good income when you compare our income to others, and yet our picture in the world as a people is nothing for us to be making any big celebration of.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Yes, we can't celebrate yet the achievement of the race. We can't celebrate yet the achievements of the race. If we would right now take a holiday to celebrate the achievements of the race, our race, our people, we would really be celebrating the achievements of our people back in time, not now. Because the last 20 years almost we have not been achieving as a race, we've only been achieving as individuals.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
So that's created pressure on us, yeah. And some of us are conscious. Minister Farrakhan is conscious. My Imam W. Deen Mohammad is conscious and many of you on both sides in the Nation of Islam and here, many of you are conscious, and you are not happy with the picture that you have and the world has of yourself as a people.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
You're not happy with that. And many of you are supporting our business effort not because you want to have wealth, you're supporting that business effort because you see that there is a chance, there's a good chance, that it will be a contribution to the betterment of that picture of us as a people that should be responsible for much more of our life than we are responsible for. And I know that's why you are with us, and you are the best, and we are going to be very successful.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Because we have a business group, we call our private distributors, private label distributors, having as our instrument our purchasing instrument CPC, Collective Purchasing Conference. I know we are going to be very successful. And it's because the people who make up this group, this business group, are not in it for selfish reasons. We are in it because we want to see our personal families dignified, but also because we want to see our group family, the race, dignified.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
And another thing that's so special, the practical special thing about this group, is that we know that there's no dignity, not true dignity, not lasting dignity, unless we are serving G-d Almighty that made all these things possible.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
These pressures, pressures, pressures, I'm a scientist in my own right. the Honorable Elijah Muhammad, the environment that he produced, created for our minds, following strictly instructions from his teacher, the one we were taught to call savior, W.D. Fard or Fard Muhammad, W.F. Muhammad, Fard Muhammad, even different names. And all those names have a message for us.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
He didn't do anything unnecessarily. Yes, they produced an environment, like a great magnet, and we were like dust, iron dust. Dust, and that magnet just hoop, so powerful it just bring us a gush of iron dust. As soon as the magnet came into our presence a gust of iron dust just hoop, and climb up to that magnet, that's how powerful that magnet was. We couldn't break from the teachings of the honorable Elijah Muhammad, too powerful.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Some of us left the walls of the temple, got out from under the pressure of coming to the meetings three or four times, five times a week. That other pressures. But that dust is still clinging to the magnet. Couldn't get away from it.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Some of us smoke a cigarette and a Muslim walk in, you try to swallow it or [crosstalk 00:40:27] brother, powerful magnetism. A people under great pressure. Under pressure to prove the white world of supremacy, of white supremacy, a lie.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
They lie against your birthrights. They lie against your inheritance. They lied against your original pattern that's with G-d. No one has a pattern on our creation but G-d. And they lied against the original pattern that's with G-d, and Frederick Douglas couldn't stand the pressure.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Elijah Lovejoy, you know about that Elijah? He way back there, he couldn't stand the pressure. David Walker couldn't stand the pressure. Booker T. Washington couldn't stand the pressure of to prove white supremacy a lie. [Dubois couldn't stand the pressure. Mr. Fard came when Drew Ali was very popular with his Moorish Science Temple and Noble Drew Ali couldn't stand the pressure. He had to rise up against it.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Mr. Fard came when Father Divine was preaching if you want to see Jesus look at me. He called himself Father Divine. White man didn't do anything about it either, because the white man understood the pressure. Yes. and the Honorable Elijah Muhammad, he couldn't stand the pressure. He heard that there's an invitation to go a long way, he asked no questions. And that's what my mother said, that my father told me, that he heard Mr.Fard] speak for the first time he asked not one question, only thing he asked was, "How can I become a follower, a member?'
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
And the story is told, that my family, that my father and mother, and by us now. That's true. That on that night he had one dime in his pocket. And he took out that dime and gave it to Mr. Fard when he asked for charity. Can you imagine Mr. Fard asking for charity in 1931 while the Great Depression was on? The Great Depression was on. And we had to fight the white people stand in soup lines. You can imagine where the African Americans and blacks were, man whites was standing in soup lines. Rich whites lost all their money. They were jumping out a window killing themselves.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
This is history. Had to commit suicide because they couldn't stand it. Now you know how Elijah Muhammad is, if he had a dime I'm sure he was saving that to pitch in to his friends and maybe to become a shareholder and one third of a bottle of whiskey. Hell, he had that dime in his pocket for, and I know this because my father and mother told me about that situation at that time.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
And he gave his last dime to Mr. W. D. Fard And here's what Mr. Fard said, the man was psychic, the man was psychic, he didn't tell Elijah, my father, he said to the people, "Elijah just gave me his last dime." And he named him that night, Elijah Kareem, Kareem because he was generous, and Kareem has two strong meanings, one is generous, giving freely, for good causes, and the other meaning is honorable in law, Kareem, honorable in law.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
So he gave him that recognition because he was on that night, that evening, generous. Very generous, giving to a good cause. Giving to a good cause is awesome. And look, it had to be the will of G-d that he didn't have 11 cents to give. He didn't have 11 cents to give, he had 10 cents. That's all he had. And 10 represents your conscience. Your mind, your active living mind, your conscience. He had 10 cents, he had a dime.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Now you who know about fighting, boxing, you know the referee want to know that you have your head pinned. And if you're not by 10, it's all over. One thing I'm happy about, when you come to me, I don't need you to brag on me, this particular respect I know that G-d has eased my way and has given me knowledge for the path, and I can walk it baby.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Praise be to Allah. Yes, I'm not bragging, I'm rejoicing. I'm thankful. Praise be to Allah. Yes. So the Honorable Elijah Muhammad was already in the grip of G-d, yes he was. G-d had him over there with one dime in his pocket. So that it would be in the record as a symbolic testimony to the fact that G-d was there with the Honorable Elijah Muhammad, and he came as a hopeless black man, beat down by poverty and beat down by the ugly image of his race that white world gave him. Beaten down. Beaten down to the prime vegetation, beaten down and spiritless, his wife had to bring him to the meeting. He couldn't come on his own.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
My mother in law came today. A lot of you don't know that. The first meeting with Mr. W Fard thr Honorable Elijah Muhammad, brought to that first meeting by his wife and our mother, Sister Clara Evans Muhammad.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
We're celebrating 25 years. Wheels are rolling, and the ride is good., Praise be to Allah. Yes. So, my mother said, she said, now, my sister Rais is here. I like it when I'm talking to you about the past that she's here. I have a witness. And I don't think there's any of us who can recall this as well, as vividly as my sister.I guess that's [the blessing of Allah too, Allah has conditioned her, prepared her to retain what happened, to give it to us when we need to.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
And I'm sure she can give much more than I give of this, but my mother said to me, she said, "Son," she said, I said ... I'm going to talk, I have to give you this other little piece of it. It was a girlfriend of hers who told her about the meeting. She didn't know about Mr. Fard either. A girlfriend of hers told her that there's a man and he's saying that we were not always like we are. That we were once living in our own land and we wore fine silks.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
And he said to my mom, according to my mom's words to me. She said, "I'm going back." And I don't know what the night was, I can't recall, I'm not going to try to say it. But she said, "I'm going back to the meeting." She said, "Would you like to go with me?" And my mother said, "Yes."
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
She said, at the time, she said, "I thought that maybe I might hear something or see something that would help Your father." Great pressure, Great pressures, on the soul of the African American, on the soul of the black people, great pressure because of the lie told against our worth as human beings in the world of human beings. Great pressure.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
You know if you tell, especially, friends, if you tell a child something ugly, very ugly against how that child perceives his parent you put a terrible, terrible pressure on that child's heart and mind. Likewise, when you tell a people who don't know, have been separated and excluded from information, separated from and excluded, kept out of information, so they don't have access to the records. They don't have access to the facts of history. And you tell them that they're subhuman.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Put it in documents that protect the order of this society, the Constitution of these United States. That he's three fifths of a man. Three fifths of a man. And then we know that. we hear that, we know it ... is giving more to the soothing teachings of the Honorable Elijah Muhammad, that respects my dignity and my huiman worth and makes me feel good. So that fire begin to enter, begin to quiet, so let our service solidify and growth comes rain touches us This is wonderful.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
That's exactly what is happening. The Honorable Elijah Muhammad and others started it, but we're here to keep it going. Yes, we want to keep before you the great soothing, soothing reality. So you won't be too occupied with the wrong that the white world has done to you. There was a psychology, if you can engage a person in something that you control you can take over their lives completely.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
If I can keep you angry with me, day and night, I don't have to worry about you going anywhere. Because while I'm holding you pschologically. Because you won't see that you're wasting too much time with me, even though I'm a big fellow in your life, you're wasting too much time with me, you're acting like I'm dying to keep your own life, and to deal with your own life, you can't keep your mind on me all the time. So when I was a young minister.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Around 1954 or five, I recognized that. , I recognized that we in the Nation of Islam were being kept from freedom to work and produce more for ourselves, by the habit of just dwelling on the white man is evil, and the devil, and the reason for us having all our problems. We dwell on it so much that I say, how can we really free ourselves to work on our own life and to build up our ownself up, if we're going to spend all this time dwelling about this white man, the devil.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
So you know what I said to them as a young minister? I was 23 years old when I said this. I said to them, you make the devil more important than you make G-d. Because when you talk about the devil all the time and talk about G-d only a little, that's what I told them then.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Oh you are criticizing the Nation of Islam, criticizing your father. My father didn't think that. He heard it. He knew it. He never once told me to stop. I even went further than that. We just reviewing the history, I went even further than that. I told the ministers, I said, We are wrong to say in the name of Allah and in the name of the Honorable Elijah Muhammad. I say this sounds like the Christians, who say in the name of G-d, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
I said nowhere in the Holy Quran, where I have read in the name of G-d and in the name of something else and somebody else. that's inappropriate. I have to admit that I was young and naive. But G-d's hand was on me, just as his hand was on my father. Because my father reached into his pocket and gave his last dime. Yes, so I told them that was wrong.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Now you say, what's your father? Did he put you out there? No, he didn't put me out there. The only one that openly resisted me, or showed that he was not going along with that suggestion was our supreme captain at that time, Raymond Sharieff. He would make a point of getting up behind me, and he would say, "In the name of Allah, and in the name of his dear holy apostle. His messenger the Honorable Elijah Muhammad." He would stand before me saying that.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
And I was young and naïve, but I was mature at the same time. You think I got up there and said, "Oh he's telling you all what he shouldn't." I was just quiet and calm. I never got up and even indicated that I was displeased with what he did. But I kept on doing it, what I thought was right.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Chicago, New York, all around the United States, they fell in line with my suggestion. Malcolm and all of them started saying. In the name of Allah as I suggested them to say, and we thank Him for the Honorable Elijah Muhammad. and they followed my advice. So either way it got there, my choice was growing on the Nation of Islam. To change it so that it will one day be where we are today.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
And I'm sure Raymond Sharieff was the first one, to go tell my father that he said not to say [in your name, in my father , i don't know what he said, he probably said ... I don't know what he said about that one. I'm psychic too. He probably said, is that so? And left it just like that. Not because he feared me. Don't ever think that. That man feared nobody, but his treacher, Mr. Fard, the one that he thought was G-d in the flesh. He didn't fear me.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
One time they were reporting on me so much that my father ... I . guess he said, well just in case they are telling the truth , I better check this. He said, "Son." you know how he talked, said, "Son. if you come against the 50 stone you'll get bruised. He said, but if the 50 stone comes against you you'll get ground to pulp."
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Even if you thought you were bad, that would make you tremble a little bit. That was good for me. Maybe I was feeling my cherrios . I know one thing, I sure never did worry about a thing.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
You know, the power of creation is the will of G-d. Listen to what I'm saying. The real power of creation is the will of G-d. G-d created it. His will is in it. It can't exist except his will be in it. He can't create something, with His will, or I should say he would not, it is not logical, that's what I mean when I say can't, it's not logical that the creator would create something with the power of his own will and then leave it to exist separated from his will.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
It also needs the support of His will, of what He created. So, whatever he has created it still has the support of his will, or it has an influence, and in it, in his nature, in development, it has His will as the strongest influence. And we call that will, the will, or force, life force, the will of life, or the life force.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
And nothing is stronger than the life force. The life force is so strong that G-d permits us to do something that he forbids us to do. Yes, and He said I'm about to make a Khalifah, they didn't want the world changed. The Angels didn't want the world changed, they had no dissatisfaction, until G-d mentioned what he was about to do, they were pleased. And I know there's some of you saying, well how can angels be wrong? Iblis was their leader according to the Qur'an, that's how they can be wrong. He hadn't yet manifested as Satan, the arch-enemy of man's nature, that G-d gave it.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
He hadn't manifested yet. But when it testt came it was manifest that Iblis was not a true willing servant of this creation. He thought he was. He even claimed that his defiance was not really to defy G-d, but then his defiance was because he was condemned, that the man that G-d was going to make from mud, fashioned into shape was not equal to him in worth.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
He said to G-d, "You created him from mud. fsashioned into shape. And you created me from a fire that gives off no smoke." Think about that. Or from a fire, they translate of a scorching wind. But in another place- Its a fire
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
I know some people like that, I know some minds out there. They get heated up and repent nothing. See smoke means its giving up its impurities it's giving up its impurities it's repenting. That's what it means in scriptural language,that smoke, smoke in that connection means it's repentant. The spirit is repentant.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
So he said you made me of fire that gives off no smoke. He was talking about purity. He's so pure that there's nothing in me to repent. But this creature you are going to make,, he is going to have to repent, and G-d says, "Yes. to them, there's going to be trouble on Earth because of my creating him. There'll be bloodshed, yes. But I know what you know not," G-d said to the angels. "So when I have breathed into him of my spirit, to make sajdah. I understand that.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
So what is G-d saying? That man in his first form is not the man that G-d created man to be. But when he had been inspired by the word of G-d and the will of G-d had become active in his life and the driving force of his body, not his flesh, but the will of G-d comes into him, and the driving force of his body, then your angels submit. I Bear witness that if you come to that state the angels will make sajdah to you. AllahuAkbar
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Yes, my cousin just sat down. Yes, so, Iblis, Allah says, revealing to Muhammad for all of us, he said, Iblis became puffed up with pride, puffed up witrh pride, Istakbir. He refused to bow with the angels. To say with his power, "I accept the man that you have created, G-d." He refused. And his refusal established him before man had even been put on his mission, is created, but not put in his mission on his mission, already the great arch enemy was there.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
We think of the devil as a threat to man's life, or his moral life, or his obedience to G-d. But we don't think of him as the enemy of all mankind. That's what he is. He's the enemy of all mankind. Because every person in the human family, no matter what the color, no matter what the level of advancement for that person, education-wise, or material-wise, every person is created for the life environment of the Khalifah. For the life environment of the Khalifah.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
And you are not going to be satisfied in your souls until you have the life environment of the Khalifah. What is the life environment of the Khalifah? We can get a people that [inaudible 01:07:20]. G-d says that he created the man, that he created him to be the Khalifah and he's made to be of service to that man. Meaning male and female, if you understand the religious language, the scriptural language. To be of service to that man, that Khalifah, whatever is in the sky, and whatever is in the earth.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
The Genesis tells a similar story and the Quran makes it more understandable. The difference is said they put the man in the garden and then charged the man with the responsibility to keep the garden, and he made everything ...
PART 2 OF 4 ENDS [01:08:04]
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
the trees and everything, for that man. The garden was made for that man. Yes. Don't think of the physical images. This flesh here. Don't think of that. That's not the form that G-d establishes in that great dignity, called khalifah. Spirit behind y'all's success. That's the topic of my talk, the spirit behing our success. Life is concrete, physical, like this, my flesh, my clothes and my things, material, and life is abstract or transparent like the air. You can't, you see throught it. It doesn't hold an image. What do you think is the better part of you? Your physical picture or your abstract picture? I hear some saying abstract picture. That is true. That is true.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
If you think of yourself as a human being, in human form, in a human body, in a human, physical picture, but the best part of you is not that picture that shows up in the mirror, the material mirror. But the part that is transparent, you will be in a position to have happiness that you haven't the experienced, if you have not been thinking that way before. That pretty girl in Hollywood that's recognized for her performance as an actress and her beauty, for your beauty starts to fade. Often she loses her mind and may even commit suicide.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Think how many lives that have gone to live in Hollywood that could have been saved if they had been told this truth that we are dwelling on right now. It's a truth that all of us really know but we don't give it much thought or attention with our minds. Yes, life transparent is much more productive as tools are instruments that the body is concrete, that we can see as material.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Dear people, believers, I was born a card carrying member of the Nation of Islam. A lot of you don't know that. When I was born, a card was issued and it said Wallace D. Mohammed Is a Muslim. A member of the Nation of Islam. If you find him other than a Muslim, take his card and punish the said bearer]. Find the one that carried that card. That's what it said. You tell me that I wasn't formed in a very special way, by a very special environment, I was. Coming under this kind of language and health by the magnetic attraction for menbers of the Nation of Islam within the Nation of Islam for Blacks who had lost their dignity and courage etc. Oh buddy,
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
That's a very special environment. Whether for good or bad its a very special environment. Now, if it's for good, it's going to produce a very special people that will live and work for good, for goodness. The Honorable Elijah Muhammad, his name was before, so you might hear students of the history of Nation of Islam refer to him now as Elijah Poole Muhammad, he built the Nation of Islam. However, his teacher Mr. W.D.Fard conceived the idea. It was his idea, and that body's language. The term "body" refers to the Nation of Islam. The language of the Nation of Islam.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Do you know all of us were kept from the world? Kept from the influences of the languages of the world? And I'm not talking about Spanish, English, no no. The language of the world, we were kept from the influences of the languages of the world. Their language, their culture, their language of theology, their language of physics, et cetera. We were kept from their languages of the world. You couldn't convince us, no matter how much education you had from the world. You couldn't convince us that our idea of reality was not right. You can't do it now., because of the power of magnetism, of the language environment that we were put in, that was created for us, for the new growth, for the new birth, for the new development of a people.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Being shaped and created all over again for a new and mighty role in the life of ourselves and in the life of mankind. I hope you're hearing what I'm saying, I know some of you are. You don't have to be educated. I don't have a college education. I only have three hours credit in English, and I did that so I could just speak a little better and stopped saying "ain't you" and "I ain't feeling you." i'm trying to dignify my own tongue a little bit. That's the only reason why I read that. Not that I don't want to go there. I wish I had the time to go to several colleges. I do, and to get several degrees. That's what I hunger for] in my mind and in my intellect. I do. But I don't have time right now, to work in the field it's too demanding for me to go in there from this work.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
So I study on my own. Don't think I don't study. I study on my own, like Elijah Muhammad did after he was awakened in his mind. He studied. He did a lot of self studying. He told me, he said, "Son, I didn't have a good penmanship, I didn't have a good hand, but I taught myself to write a good hand, penmanship." Mr. Fard said to the members of the Nation of Islam, he said, ... listen to this please, you students, quote, "To speak well, you must learn to put your mathematical theology in its proper terms." In its proper terms.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
So what does that say? That the language that the language I gave it to you], the terms that I have put here are improper. The challenge to your intellect is to now study it and put it in the proper terms. So it's problem solving, isn't it? That's problem solving. The teacher gives you a problem. It's a problem. It's not work. You have to then study that problem and work it out successfully and come up with the right conclusion. or the right answer. So here's Fard giving us the language of the Nation of Islam and telling us that you will not be successful unless you learn to put your mathematical theology in its proper terms in the proper terms.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Do we have any old soldiers here whose been around ,Stand up. Let me see how many here who memorized or is familiar with what I'm saying. Everybody that's been reading or hearing what I've said ... I remember that, I don't have to bring fire out of heaven. I can bring fire out of the earth. short burst. Praise be to Allah the point here is to share with you in this 25th year celebration an observation that enabled me to present the spirit behind our success long before there was an occasion for me to tell you. I've always known the spirit behind our success. Since the day that I became aware that I was to take a stand in this cause, I knew the spirit behind our success. I didn't know all the language. The language was still a great puzzle in my mind. I'm talking about the of Mr. W.D Fard. It was still a great puzzle in my mind, some of it, but I understood what was the spirit behind our success. It was my own humanity. Theres a tape of me in 1955 [in his possession, and he brought a copy of it to me.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
I was amazed, but I disciplined myself as the guest speaker invited by Imam, minister, parden me, Malcolm X to speak in I think it was the New Jersey area. I'm pretty sure it was New Jersey area, and I spoke for what seemed I think about an hour and fifteen or about an hour and a half. For all that length of time I was listening to the tape just a couple months ago, listening to it in my car playing it in my audio tape recorder, player and I didn't say anything during all that time that I couldn't say to you right now and feel comfortable. . Nothing against the Qur'an. Nothing disagreeing with Qur'an. Nothing against the concept of G-d that we should have as Muslims that's in the in the Qur'an.. Nothing against Muhammad. Nothing that would even make any believer think that I had some idea that conflicted with Allah had said about about Muhammad the prophet. Nothing.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
And I'm telling you I didn't know Imam W. D. Mohammed back then, but now I can tell you, Imam W.D Mohammed In 1955 was on the job. AllahuAkbar.. Of lifting up dead matter of African American people so that they would become conscious of its destiny, with his Lord. Yes, by doing what? By appealing to the powerful life force in human beings. Yes, the life force that is there in our lives because of the will of G-d, each in our creation. I was appealing to him and the crowds responded, the audience responding to me. I was just talking about our humanity. I recall something of that right now that I've said to them. I said, "This world has deprived you of your original individuality ." That's what I said then. Your original individuality, that G-d gave you and the Honorable Elijah Muhammad wants you to have it back. That's what I said. What's wrong with that? I could say that in Mecca, anywhere. Nobody would be disturbed.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
No. And I just kept addressing it, the need for us to awaken to the original identities because Muhammad was told, the Honorable Elijah Muhammad, was told to tell us from his teacher to tell them that they are Muslims. That's their identity They are Muslims. But I saw more in that statement than just Muslim. I didn't think he meant that we are Muslims in a religious sense only. I thought that he meant that our original nature, our original type was Muslim and that's exactly what Muhammad the prophet left with us.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
I came to see that the spirit that was working in us to keep us achieved of this, the charges against our own human world in a white supremacist world. The spirit moving in us to help us achieve was really the will of G-d inherent in our nature and it was our true human identity. The true human identity is the effect of the will of G-d on your essence to form you in the pattern and in the picture G-d wants you to be. So we have a right to be dissatisfied being called niggas and negroes. We're dissatisfied even being called Black. Now a lot of you don't know that, but you are not satisfied being called Black and I know how good it makes you feel brothers of the Nation of Islam. Yes I'm a Blackman feel real good on the surface, but deep down there in your spiritual core, something is not yet satisfied.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Because to say to a Black man just to tell a white man, I'm not happy with my own color. That's what makes you feel so good. You could tell a white man now It used to make you feel ashamed... Somebody call me Black and then around the corner call another one of us Black you would have a fight on your hands. But it was the Honorable Elijah Muhammad working the strategies that was the teachings of Mr. Fard. It was that, that brought us not to be ashamed of black, the color black, and to wear it with pride. Mr. Soul, what's his name? James Brown. I saw him in person and I watched him I wanted to congratulate him. For what? For the song, "I'm Black and I'm Proud.". So what I did, looked like he just came to a standstill in his thoughts and sensitivities like I put it in the hymnal , so he was like dead not existing and then he when he came back alive, he said, "It was your father who changed me and made me want to sing that song."
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
But I'm trying to explain to you now why its such a happy thing that you are with now, I'm Black, I'm Black. It's because the white man has said for 400 years, at least 300 years, that Black is a shame on humanity, that identity is a shame on the human person. So you want something to give you relief from that condemnation, of your legitimate human worth. So when you told you're Black and proud and given some kind of logic behind it, oh, we're so happy to have it, but I repeat, deep down in the core of your life, in your soul, you are still not satisfied, because you are more than Black. You're much more than Black. Before you were Black, you were something else greater. And what in the hell was that!
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Before you were African, you were something greater. You were a human being. That's the greatest identity that any creation could have. Nothing could be better in creation than that identity Human being. And all the other identities are to accumulate in response, demanding, "I'm human so I will dress well. now I have my ties, my cultural identity, my ethnic identity clothing the first one, the human essence." So the ethnic identity is an expression of growth and an expression of my human identity necessary because I am in a material environment, a cultural environment, and I have to communicate there in all of these forms or expressions.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
But my human identity has to communicate in the cultural life. It has to communicate in the political life. It has to communicate in the political life. It has to communicate in all these lives the human identity and all other identities are going to be destroyed. first the development of the human identity and all the other identities are going to be destroyed. Bring the person back to his true human identity and he will start growing again, unfolding again, expressing himself again in all of the other languages and forms, and they will all be beautiful. Every garment you throw upon this human form will be beautiful. It was the Satan who caused you to slip out of the original dress. He caused your father to slip out of the original dress that he's put them in.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
And what was that original dress? The dress of righteousness. The dress of righteousness. The human form is sacred. It becomes deformed if we put untruth and unrighteousness in it. That deforms it more than anything else. So we're going to keep the human form we have to remain innocent in truth and we have to remain moral and good, morally good. Loving moral excellence and loving excellence that is compatible with our original human nature that G-d himself made. Yes. Yes, you are going to be a man. If you are in that form.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
According to the last Prophet Muhammad Salalahu Alayhi Wa Salam, the prayers and the peace be upon him, who received the sacred book the Qur'an, the term Muslim names man's prehistory, spiritual life or nature as well as the person who has consciously accepted Islam as his great life, the Qur'an as his book and Muhammad as his messenger. So, Muslim meaning has two very important meanings in Islam. Muslim means one who follows the guidance of G-d the Qur'an and the prophet the Messenger, Allah said and who obey G-d and obey his messenger. So those who follow that, they're Muslim. They're called Muslim.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
But long before us, there was a conscious Muslim and a system of knowledge to establish Muslim life on this planet. There was the inherent Muslim in your very creation. Your very creation is Muslim. The world of Western science calls this homo sapien. The world of science calls it human being in this prehistory for the [inaudible 01:32:08], but the world of religion especially the Qur'an calls it Muslim. Every child is born Muslim and circumstances make the child something else. That's the teaching from Muhammad the prophet, verified in the record, hadith collected by Bukhari a Russian, way in the early teachings of Islam and by the other scholar, the other researcher collector of Hadith Muslim, Bukhari and Muslim.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
I hate to have to go out to eat, I won't permit it. now you know you can't be faced with starvation, that soon because I saw some of you eating breakfast like you wasn't going to have lunch. The terms Muslim and Islam are derived from the verb Aslama, which means "to be resigned to be at peace." Resigned to be at peace. That means it is your comfort, it is your human comfort to be at peace. It's not something that you impose upon your spirit or upon your life against its will. It is something that your own life and will wants to be in as a state for your life, a state of peace.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
So resign to peace. That's what it means. Now, the Furqan or the origin of Islam explains this existence of this kind of state, of this kind of person in his soul, in his prehistory soul. When I say pre-history I mean before man learned to have a society, before man had learned to write and record things. When man was yet what they call primitive, when he was yet what they call primitive, not having a refined language, et cetera. This was already his nature. The nature to long to be connected with his G-d and to be in a state of peace for his soul.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
When you study the development and growth of societies from so-called primitive order to advanced orders, you see man forming in the spiritual community before he forms as any other kind of community. That's because he is originally spiritual. The will of G-d His influence on him makes him spiritual. He's originally spiritual. As scripture says, as it was in the beginning, so shall it be in the end. G-d made you to be spiritual in the beginning, and after this world of materialism walk your spiritual life, depriving you of your humanity, again you will have to be revived, recreated again with the word of G-d in His will and His word, to again become a spiritual community.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
So Islam is a spiritual community. So Islam is a spiritual community, the Ummah of the prophet, it is a spiritual community, returning us back to our original identities, the abstract picture that's much more important than the material or concrete picture. So Allah says in the Quran G-d that is, let there be not any altering in the pristine nature created by G-d. In Arabic it says this religion Islam Deen Al-Fitr after a [Arabic]. This religion of Islam is the religion of the origin. The religion of the origin, the beginning in the garden of paradise. That which He patterned human society upon, G-d patterned human society upon. La Takdela, (positive laws) that there be no change, no altereing in the pristine nature created by G-d.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
So G-d revealed to Muhammad that he created human beings correct, not inferior, not sinful. He created you perfect in your original life that was in the garden of paradise before you were seduced out of your form by the satan and that this religion that he gives you now is not something taken from scholars, not something taken from idealest and imposed upon your original self, but it is a complement to your original self. G-d knows what complements the original pattern that he created. So he's given you that. that complements the original pattern that he created so you will grow on that pattern and be happy and feel self-fulfilled, feel that you've been completed for the first time as a person.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
W.D Fard Did not give us religion. Do you hear that, brothers? W.D. Fard Did not give us religion but it affected us the way religion affects us. But he did give us the sacred book, the Quran, and he gave us knowledge that there are other Muslims, that there are many Muslim nations on this earth, and he did give us a desire to be connected with them. The Honorable Elijah Muhammad used to say over and over again ,when he spoke weekly at the temple, at the temple, at the temple, brother, he said, "When you join the Nation of Islam you automatically become a member in all of the nations of Muslims on this earth." isn't that what he told us? You automatically become a member, he said, in all the nations of Muslims.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
So he taught us and gave us desire to be connected, as one, with all the Muslims on the earth. That mean Arabia, Egypt, wherever we are, Nigeria, Pakistan, every place. So we had it subtlely put in us because that other magnetism was so powerful, we couldn't even hear clearly what the Honorablr Elijah Muhammad was saying, when he said when you were first coming anyway. When we first came we were so desperate we could be told anything and we joined the Nation of Islam, you become a member, a citizen of ... he said citizen of every Muslim country on this earth.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Yes, he gave us the Qur'an and he gave us a connection with all other Muslims, but strangely Mr. Fard was told to use, pardon me, but strangely Mr. Fard told the Honorable Elijah Muhammad to use the Bible, the Bible of the Christian world to give us, who are so-called negroes throughout that time, a new way of thinking reality and hence ... another mind that would more forcefully searching the past to the freedom or to its freedom or to the freedom of African American people.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
So how does it affect it like that? I'm speaking from my own personal experience. That's the way it affected me. Now I know that some of you all didn't come in the Nation of Islam to have a full life, to have a new life, to have a full life, to know who you are and to know what your relationship is with G-d, matter and man. A lot of you didn't come here with that, but the way I was born in the Nation of Islam, the Nation of Islam already existed when I was born. My father was already preaching the message given to him by his teacher Mr. Fard when I was born. I was born in 1933,
PART 3 OF 4 ENDS [01:42:04]
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
... and it affected me. I don't know how it affected all y'all. I'm sure it affected some of you all the way it affected me. I know it because I can look in your eyes and you can see, look in a man's eye and see just like you're inside him or what's there in him is stirring in you. You recognize that. [crosstalk 01:42:21]. There's John Hasan an the investigator in Chicago, Nation of Islam investigator, temple investigator, John Hasan and a few others that I knew. When I looked in their face I knew the same thing that was moving in me was moving in them. But the majority, I don't think you had that but thank G-d you did have an interest to make you join, because if you didn't you wouldn't have all these numbers here tonight. Because there's just a few of us have that desire for the whole life that G-d created for us. We don't want part of it. We wouldn't be happy in our souls until we had all of it. That was in me, that was moving in me.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Now, would you believe me if I told you that I'm still on the introduction? I haven't even started on the page. But I'm telling you that now because long ago, an hour ago I realized that you don't need anything but the introduction. We don't need to know what we going to do in the future. You need to understand the past. That's what got you locked up and held back and chained. You need to know what the past. I'll tell you about the future next time. I'm summarizing this vocally. See, I had to say it out, I couldn't say it without letting you know. So summarize this opening. My own strenuous and deeply penetrating strudies. now If you don't believe that I was deeply involved, totally involved in the study of the environment of the Nation of Islam, its language environment. So that's where the life is. That's where the grip is. That's what you were contained in, you were contained by, the language of the Nation of Islam, and not only you. Every people are contained in language or by language, every people and there formed by language. You can't even be formed as a human person, anm intelligent human person, unless you learn to speak the language of your order or your society.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
This is science. Just recently I read in the Chicago paper that a mother awfully deranged, it had to be, kept her little daughter imprisoned at home in a baby-like environment for 13 years. After 13 years they discovered this girl and they're wondering now, can this girl develop? Can her intelligence develop? Can her mind develop? Can she develop as a conscious member of a human society? They are wondering. I pray Allah that she can recover. It hurt me so bad. I had to turn the news off. I just turned the TV off. It was too painful to keep listening, that this poor girl had been kept back from development, from a chance to develop as a human person and grow with a human intellect in a social nation, had been kept from that by her own mother. The type of environment, slave environment most of our foreparents were in on the plantations of cruel slave masters was designed to do just that, keep you from human growth so that you could work like animals in the fields for them. You all should never stop rejoicing in your souls that help came, and this powerful White America had to let us go. Thank you.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
So my own deep, strenuous studies, penetrating studies in the Nation of Islam's language. I studied at Glennon [inaudible 01:46:53] for more than 40 years, for at least 40 years, yes, brought me to observe and discover that Mr. [Fard, the one we call savior and G-d in person(from the Honorable Elijah Muhammad)in planning our independence and our Independence Day. Now you listen to this. He planned, he worked hard, he sacrificed from his family. He left his family. He sacrificed his time. He left home and separated from all other interest and devoted himself completely to working a strategy that would bring us to a mind, that would free us and establish us as independent thinkers. The most important activity of the intellect which is the most so important life of the human being is what? The power, the freedom, the ability to think and to think for your own interest, think for your own interest. We were deprived of that as people, and it was Mr. Farad who labored hard with a strategy to bring us out of that condition White supremacy world put us in so that we could stand up and not be his followers.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Mr. Farad had no interest in us following him. He was a true liberator. A true liberator don't liberate you for you to follow him. A true liberator liberates you so you can be free to follow G-d. to follow the supreme authority of G-d and be slave to none but G-d. That's a true liberator. To plan this deliverance he grafted his own methodology. I say grafted because his methodology is not original when you study it as I have. You'll see that it has traces of this and that in it. He got it, he collected it from the environment that he was in and he saw the ___________in the United States of America and I already mentioned it. Noble Drew Ali, Frederick Douglass, Marcus Garvey, Booker T. Washington I mentioned them already. They had us divided. Some choosing Booker T. Washington , his thinking, others choosing Dubois, his thinking, some following Drew Ali his religious idea, some following father Divine, his religious idea. But all these men were appealing to those who had become discontented and had given up hope that the White world would ever give them justice. All these men were appealing to those who had become distrustful of American leadership and were ready to have something different.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
So these men were there because he wanted to save people. Mr. Farad wanted the people who had become discontent or as the Bible say, "Go out and find that donkey that has no tie on him." And if anybody asks, "What are you doing?" Taking that donkey. Tell them that that I said that its useful. That's the Bible. And Farad acted in the role of that man, said the same thing. How do we know that? The honorable Elijah Muhammad said, You are a baby people. Nobody wanted you but our savior.. Isn't that what he said? So you were donkeys going around with no collar, no indication that a master owned you. You were without anyone to claim you. Just going about like donkeys with no masters and just like the savior of the Bible, the New Testament, Farad told the honorable Elijah Muhammad. He said, "Don't try to get the educated ones." He said that talented tenth that was Dubois on the intellectuals in Black America during that time, during the early '30s. He said that the talented tenth, he said. They are little bloodsuckers, of the people.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
. That's what he said. So for a long time during the '30s, during the '40s and even during the '50s we didn't have them among us. We didn't have black intellectuals among us.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
It was only when the honorable Elijah Muhammad changed his focus from Nation of Islam secret or say special teachings to getting something of material to have material showing to impress more African Americans to come into the Nation of Islam. It was only then in 1947 he started that. By 1949 we rebirth the mesage. By 1952 we were all hearing the message. By 1955 Malcolm had made the message spread all over the United States, Malcolm X. Thank you so much, yes. So you see, this teacher of my father, he had the same strategy, the same plan. He wanted to build his new world with materials that had not been influenced and made obedient to the thinking of the church or the white man's world. But they were free to break with the church or the white man's world because they were dissatisfied with their existence and and they didn't that White America, this government would ever give them justice and those was the ones that he wanted he took them.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
I don't have time to tell you all that in the lessons that's given in the Nation of Islam. So he grafted his own methodology and used it or made it become the lifeline in our thinking and in our feeling and sentiments to free us and really bring us to a complete freedom, free us mentally. He emphasized mental resurrection, mental life, mental resurrection. Farad and Elijah did not belittle, and this is what I came to discover, did not belittle the freedom spirit of our freedom fighters up from slavery, Frederick Douglass and all the rest, but made of us new bottles, I'm using scripture language Bible, new bottles for a new and stronger wine of the grapes from the old vineyard, spirits with a new psychological twist, but of the grace of the old vineyard.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Many years back in the Nation of Islam I can recall at the temple singing this song. This used to be regular routine, every time we had a major meeting on Sunday we had to sing the song. I won't give you all the song, (singing)"We're united with our nation, and we will soon be free." So you tell me that Mr. Farad didn't tap into the freedom stream of Frederick Douglass and all the rest? Yes, he did. He wasn't appealing to any new hunger in our souls. He was appealing to an old hunger in our souls and he woke up Wallace D. Mohammed. in the manner of my brother who used to be assistant supreme captain of the Nation of Islam, I want to speak to old timers, old soldiers that's his thing, old soldiers. Do you know from what vineyard Savior Farad get grapes to make that drink with that new twist? From the vineyard of people up from slavery. Yes, the grapes of our own soldiers, yes. So Mr. Farad was kind of a bartender, wasn't he? Yes, he was, and he made a powerful mix. He mixed the stimilants of Frederick Douglass, Booker T. Washington, father Divine, Noble Drew Ali. He mixed it all together and came up with one to really hook us. Oh boy, have we become addicted.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
What did the trick was an extracted story of our origin. I say extracted because G-d has blessed me in my searching for over 40 years to find traces of even his Yakub history that we thought was just completely new composition. It's not. That story of the origin of the world and the origin of man. This powerful and magnetic story of creation was not to be found in any books anywhere, not in his composition that we read but to be find in history. I found pieces of it here and there. There is no force or power in the will in man, in us, in man to rise up against our worth and our identity as a creation of G-d, against the lie or statement wrongfully made against our religion, our legitimacy as a human creation equal with all human creation made by G-d. Nothing is more powerful than that. The life force is checked by these lies and the life force is the strongest force in human beings or in any animal, in anything for that matter. It's our strongest force and then you havechecked my life force with your lies?
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
They say truth crushed to the ground, shall rise again. But what is the greatest truth in human life? It is the truth of my reality that G-d gave me. That's the greatest truth and if you lie to me concerning that reality, the greatest force in humanity will rise up against you. That's the force of true mind creation creation right and legitimate. You wonder why the Nation of Islam can get these young men that nobody else can get and do with them what nobody else could do. It is because the message and strategy of the Nation of Islam for taking the person out of the world they're in and putting them in a new language environment is more powerful and more appealing to blacks that are still lost in their souls, from that destination that they were created for and when they hear the language of Nation of Islam they can't help but following like zombies, no criticism, but like zombies, zombies this myth not reality. Well, some people think it's real, some Southern people, they think it's real. The zombie when the right appearance happen in the environment the zombie wakes up and he's not conscious of what's affected him, but he's compelled it might be you. I saw a picture of some zombies and the person died not because the zombie killed him. The zombie had just come to hug him. he was shocked and had a heart attact and died.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Okay, there is no force more powerful than a will and a wrongfully zealous person or oppressed person to prove their legitimacy at the wellspring of human life, the life force that wants compellingly to be the person that G-d made you to be, conform to the pattern for your creation that G-d has made. That's powerful. The spirit behind our success is our ennobling human spirit, that spirit that wants to establish us in the excellence, in the nobility that we were created for. It is the spirit of the refiner in our own life. See, that original life itself, it's the refiner in the life, it's the refiner in the life and it wants to purify your moral life. It wants to give more spirit to your human spirit so your human spirit can get in the world from your mother in the world. It wants to give its spirit to that spirit so that you are really powerful to meet the challenges of life before you. It wants to strengthen your appetite or make you more hungry for your destiny with G-d. It wants to make you more hungry so it works as a refiner inside of that life force as a refiner.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
This is the life urge. That refiner urges us on and on to be better and to have larger and larger achievements for not only ourselves but also for our group, our people who have been put down. Understand this, we were never put down as individuals. We were never put down as individuals. There were always individuals that the white man took to their sides loved them, treated them like sons and daughters, but it was the people, it was us as a group that was really put down and by the group being put down the burden fell on even that individual that the white man took to his side because he was conscious that he was a member of the group and no matter how well off he was as an individual. His knowledge that he was a member of the group weighed heavily on his mind and soul because he knew that he could never be respected until his people were respected and that's still the case.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
We can never have individual, personal, separate, private respect until we have that as a group. That's what the honorable Elijah Muhammad knew and he preached to us to have us do what Islam wants us to do and that is feel it's your personal, private, individual duty and life interest to develop yourself and improve yourself so that the whole is improved. The ultimate aim or the ultimate result or the ultimate reward is not for me as an individual, it is for me as a member in a group. Now, if Muslims all the world would do, would respond to that, would be conscious of that obligation on the individual. We are not to live our private lives, our separate lives for only individual and personal gain or results. We're to do this so that the whole Ummah of Islam, the international community of us will be improved and come closer and closer to fulfilling its obligation to G-d and to Muhammad the Prophet, to be the model community the nation from our community under G-d, a witness to all other communities for G-d, a community of excellence, a community of justice, a community of righteousness, obedience to the one and all that has no slaves , but give up all slaves so that they can be free to serve G-d.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
This is a beautiful picture of human life that isIam wants] for us on this Earth and we are conditioned for Islam. I agree with Minister.Farrakhan and I agree with the teachers of the Nation of Islam, now the present teachings, that we have been conditioned to be the best followers of Islam, to be that group that G-d says, Let there come out of you, (meaning out the of the Muslims) a group doing all that is good, refusing to do what is bad, witnesses for G-d and not fearing the criticism of any criticiser. so I conclude with these words, it is not freedom from material restraints on us, it's freedom from all restraints on us in our effort to please our G-d. If any restraints are on us holding us back from our life urge which wants to satisfy our G-d born into the man and woman that G-d created us to be, if any restraints on that life force working against us and is greater than any other. Don't you know that moral life is greater than immoral life? The proof of it is there is more moral life than immoral life. Yes, it is, whether you know it or not, yes, it is, and people that want to produce, they are more powerful than people that just want to have pleasures and have fun..
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
The best pleasure can only be had by the producer. Yes, I've been with people who just want to live for pleasure. When you live to produce then you have established yourself to get the best pleasures, the fulllest amount of pleasures, yes. If you really want to have the fullest amount of profits be a true Muslim and work for self and others, work for the whole community life. Do that and you'll have the greatest amount of happiness. This is so rewarding to me. This work makes me so happy. I didn't know happiness equaled to this from many other things, or any other activities or our efforts. No, this is my happiness, this is my paradise. That's why G-d said, "Enter you my worker." HIs servant means my worker. Pleased and pleasing meaning you will please your G-d and you will please yourself because happiness comes because I have done my job as G-d has directed me. I obeyed him and worked as he wanted me to work and my work has given me happiness in my soul and made myself pleasing to me and G-d said, "Now, sir, you're also pleasing to me." Please and please.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
So this buried in us, this power inside of us that begins with our own identity, true identity needing to free itself from cross charges against it. It might adjust itself as it goes on or as we have an opportunity to live in society and manifest itself as a new social spirit, a new community spirit. That's why we are so happy today is because we are in the new social spirit, in the new community spirit. It is a higher expression and a larger expression of that life urge that comes from the original self, though we were Muslims. He said give them this question. And what is my own self? He didn't say the answer is my own self is an African. He didn't say own self is a black man. He said give them this question Elijah, what is my own self? He said, "Give them the answer, my own self is a righteous Muslim."
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
So I advise you, I urge you, from this day forward to not partake the name for your species from science. Your species is not homosapien. That's a later development in your nation. You become homosapien once you come in contact with matter. Once you're freed from your mother's womb you begin to grow up to become a homosapien. But before history, before deliverance from the womb you're Muslim, having the life force in your body that G-d put there by his will to serve his will and you'll never be at peace, poor man, until you have that form again and be conscious of it. So I never think of myself as homosapien in my original life body.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
I think of myself as Muslim in my own original life body and that is why Muhammad the Prophet said peace be upon him, "Every child is born Muslim, don't have to be made a Muslim. Every child is born Muslim and it is his environment that he's put in that makes him a Christian, a Jew or something else. This is what our prophet is talking about. So be happy, be happy. The day of deliverance is here. Freedom is here, yes. We are free completely. I call it rescue. You didn't know I was a little poet did you? I call it rescue. When I awoke in the morning, it was 7:23.
Imam W. Deen Mohammed:
Slowly I started to reach the ideas I strained through my life to see. I stood up to and my knees were saying how wonderful, how rejuvenating it is for the oppressed to rest their minds indeed. From the sins of men who consciously eat from that forbidden tree. Your words only oh G-d, made to rescue us from that tree we would have been their still long after 5:25. We would have been out of the way still at that enslaving, grinding mill, without a way to survive. Only your word could clear our name to break the chains. Only your spirit from thee could have us see how to set our whole life free.
PART 4 OF 4 ENDS [02:15:50]


