The autobiography of Malcolm X (36 page)

Hundreds more Muslims and curious Negroes drove their own cars. And Mr. Muhammad with his personal jet plane from Chicago. From the airport to the rally hall, Mr. Muhammad's motorcade had a siren-screaming police escort. Law agencies once had scoffed at our Nation as “black crackpots”; now they took special pains to safeguard against some “white crackpots” causing any “incidents” or “accidents.”

America had never seen such fantastic all-black meetings! To hear Elijah Muhammad, up to ten thousand and more black people poured from public and private transportation to overflow the big halls we rented, such as the St. Nicholas Arena in New York City, Chicago's Coliseum, and Washington, D.C. 's Uline Arena.

The white man was barred from attendance-the first time the American black man had ever dreamed of such a thing. And that brought us new attacks from the white man and his black puppets. “Black segregationists . . . racists!” Accusing us of segregation! Across America, whites barring blacks was standard.

Many hundreds arrived too late for us to seat them. We always had to wire up outside loudspeakers. An electric atmosphere excited the great, shifting massesof black people. The long lines, three and four abreast, funneling to the meeting hall, were kept in strict order by Fruit of Islam men communicating by walkie-talkie. In anterooms just inside the halls, more Fruit of Islam men and white-gowned, veiled mature Muslim sisters thoroughly searched every man, woman, and child seeking to enter. Any alcohol and tobacco had to be checked, and any objects which could possibly be used to attempt to harm Mr. Muhammad. He always seemed deathly afraid that some one would harm him, and he insisted that everyone be searched to forestall this. Today I understand better, why.

The hundreds of Fruit of Islam men represented contingents which had arrived early that morning, from their Temples in the nearest cities. Some were detailed as ushers, who seated the people by designated sections. The balconies and the rear half of the main floor were filled with black people of the general public. Ahead of them were the all-Muslim seating sections-the white- garbed beautiful black sisters, and the dark-suited, white-shirted brothers. A special section near the front was for black so-called “dignitaries.” Many of these had been invited. Among them were our black puppet and parrot attackers, the intellectuals and professional Negroes over whom Mr. Muhammad grieved so much, for these were the educated ones who should have been foremost in leading their poor black brothers out of the maze of misery and want. We wanted them to miss not a single syllable of the truths from Mr. Muhammad in person.

The front two or three press rows were filled with the black reporters and cameramen representing the Negro press, or those who had been hired by the white man's newspapers, magazines, radio, and television. America's black writers should hold a banquet for Mr. Muhammad. Writing about the Nation of Islam was the path to success for most of the black writers who now are recognized.

Up on the speaker's platform, we ministers and other officials of the Nation, entering from backstage, found ourselves chairs in the five or six rows behind the big chair reserved for Mr. Muhammad. Some of the ministers had come hundreds of miles to be present. We would be turning about in our chairs, beaming with smiles, wringing each other's hands, and exchanging “As-Salaam-Alaikum” and “Wa-Alaikum-Salaam” in our genuine deep rejoicing to see each other again.

Always, meeting us older hands in Mr. Muhammad's service for the first time, there were several new ministers of small new Temples. My brothers Wilfred and Philbert were respectively now the ministers of the Detroit and Lansing Temples. Minister Jeremiah X headed Atlanta's Temple. Minister John X had Los Angeles' Temple. The Messenger's son, Minister Wallace Muhammad, had the Philadelphia Temple. Minister Woodrow X had the Atlantic City Temple. Some of our ministers had unusual backgrounds. The Washington, D.C., Temple Minister Lucius X was previously a Seventh Day Adventist and a 32nd degree Mason. Minister George X of the Camden, New Jersey, Temple was a pathologist. Minister David X was previously the minister of a Richmond, Virginia, Christian church; he and enough of his congregation had become Muslims so that the congregation split and the majority turned the church into our Richmond Temple. The Boston Temple's outstanding young Minister Louis X, previously a well-known and rising popular

singer called “The Charmer,” had written our Nation's popular first song, titled “White Man's Heaven is Black Mali's Hell.” Minister Louis X had also authored our first play, “Orgena” (“A Negro” spelled backwards); its theme was the all-black trial of a symbolic white man for his world crimes against non-whites; found guilty, sentenced to death, he was dragged off shouting about all he had done “for the nigra people.”

Younger even than our talented Louis X were some newer ministers, MinisterThomas J. X of the Hartford Temple being one example, and another the Buffalo Temple's Minister Robert J. X.

I had either originally established or organized for Mr. Muhammad most of the represented temples. Greeting each of these Temples' brother ministers would bring back into my mind images of “fishing” for converts along the streets and from door-to-door wherever the black people were congregated. I remembered the countless meetings in living rooms where maybe seven would be a crowd; the gradually building, building-on up to renting folding chairs for dingy little storefronts which Muslims scrubbed to spotlessness.

We together on a huge hall's speaking platform, and that vast audience before us, miraculously manifested, as far as I was concerned, the incomprehensible power of Allah. For the first time, I truly understood something Mr. Muhammad had told me: he claimed that when he was going through the sacrificial trials of fleeing the black hypocrites from city to city, Allah had often sent him visions of great audiences who would one day hear the teachings; and Mr. Muhammad said the visions also buoyed him when he was locked up for years in the white man's prison.

The great audience's restless whisperings would cease . . . .

At the microphone would be the Nation's National Secretary John Ali, or the Boston Temple Minister Louis X. They enlivened the all-black atmosphere, speaking of the new world open to the black man through the Nation of Islam. Sister Tynetta Dynear would speak beautifully of the Muslim women's powerful, vital contributions, of the Muslim women's roles in our Nation's efforts to raise the physical, mental, moral, social, and political condition of America's black people.

Next, I would come to the microphone, specifically to condition the audienceto hear Mr. Muhammad, who had flown from Chicago to teach us all in person.

I would raise up my hand, “_As-Salaikum-Salaam-_”

“_Wa-Alaikum-Salaam!_” It was a roared response from the great audience's Muslim seating section.

There was a general pattern that I would follow on these occasions:

"My black brothers and sisters-of all religious beliefs, or of no religious beliefs-we all have in common the greatest binding tie we could have . . . we all are _black_ people!

"I'm not going to take all day telling you some of the greatnesses of The Honorable Elijah Muhammad. I'm just going to tell you now his _greatest_ greatness! He is the _first_, the _only_ black leader to identify, to you and me, _who_ is our enemy!

"The Honorable Elijah Muhammad is the first black leader among us with the _courage_ to tell us- out here in public-something which when you begin to think of it back in your homes, you will realize we black people have been _living_ with, we have been _seeing_, we have been _suffering_, all of our lives!

“Our _enemy_ is the _white man!_ ”And why is Mr. Muhammad's teaching us this such a great thing? Because when you know

_who_ your enemy is, he can no longer keep you divided, and fighting, one brother against the other! Because when you recognize who your enemy is, he can no longer use trickery, promises, lies, hypocrisy, and his evil acts to keep you deaf, dumb, and blinded! "When you recognize _who_ your enemy is, he can no longer brainwash you, he can no longer pull wool over your eyes so that you never stop to see that you are living in pure _hell_ on this earth, while he lives in pure _heaven_ right on this same earth!-This enemy who tells you that you are both supposed to be worshiping the same white Christian God that-you are told-stands for the _same_ things for _all_ men!

"Oh, _yes_, that devil is our enemy. I'll _prove_ it! Pick up any daily newspaper! Read the false charges leveled against our beloved religious leader. It only points up the fact that the Caucasian race never wants any black man who is not their puppet or parrot to speak for our people. This Caucasian devil slavemaster does not want or trust us to leave him-yet when we stay here among him, he continues to keep us at the very lowest level of his society!

“The white man has always _loved_ it when he could keep us black men tucked away somewhere, always out of sight, around the comer! The white man has always _loved_ the kind of black leaders whom he could ask, 'Well, how's things with your people up there?' But because Mr. Elijah Muhammad takes an uncompromising stand with the white man, the white man _hates_ him! When you hear the _white man_ hate him, you, too, because you don't understand Biblical prophecy, wrongly label Mr. Muhammad-as a racist, a hate-teacher, or of being anti-white and teaching black supremacy-”

The audience suddenly would begin a rustling of turning . . . .

Mr. Muhammad would be rapidly moving along up a center aisle from the rear-as once he had entered our humble little mosques-this man whom we regarded as Islam's gentle, meek, brown- skinned Lamb. Stalwart, striding, close-cropped, hand-picked Fruit of Islam guards were a circle surrounding him. He carried his Holy Bible, his holy Quran. The small, dark pillbox atophis head was gold-embroidered with Islam's flag, the sun, moon, and stars. The Muslims were crying out their adoration and their welcome. “Little Lamb!” “As-Salaikum-Salaam!” “Praise be to Allah!”

Tears would be in more eyes than mine. He had rescued me when I was a convict; Mr. Muhammad had trained me in his home, as if I was his son. I think that my life's peaks of emotion, until recently, at least, were when, suddenly, the Fruit of Islam guards would stop stiffly at attention, and the platform's several steps would be mounted alone by Mr. Muhammad, and his ministers, including me, sprang around him, embracing him, wringing both his hands . . . .

I would turn right back to the microphone, not to keep waiting those world's biggest black audiences who had come to hear him.

"My black brothers and sisters-_no_ one will know _who_ we are . . . until _we_ know who we are! We never will be able to _go_ anywhere until we know _where_ we are! The Honorable Elijah Muhammad is giving us a true identity, and a true position-the first time they have ever been _known_ to the American black man!

“You can be around this man and never dream from his actions the power and the authority he has-” (Behind me, believe me when I tell you, I could _feel_ Mr. Muhammad's _power_.)

"He does not _display_, and _parade_, his _power_! But no other black leader in America has followers who will lay down their lives if he says so! And I don't mean all of this non-violent, begging-the-white-man kind of dying . . . all of this sitting-in, sliding-in, wading-in, eating-in, diving-in, and all the rest-

"My black brothers and sisters, you have come from your homes to hear-now you are _going_ to hear-America's _wisest_ black man! America's _boldest_black man! America's most _fearless_

black man! This wilderness of North America's most _powerful_ black man!"

Mr. Muhammad would come quickly to the stand, looking out over the vacuum-quiet audience, his gentle-looking face set, for just a fleeting moment. Then, "As-Salaikum-Salaam-'

“ WA-ALAIKUM-SALAAM!”

The Muslims roared it, as they settled to listen. From experience, they knew that for the next two hours Mr. Muhammad would wield his two-edged sword of truth. In fact, every Muslim worried that he overtaxed himself in the length of his speeches, considering his bronchial asthmatic condition.

"I don't have a degree like many of you out there before me have. But history don't care anything about your degrees.

"The white man, he has filled you with a fear of him from ever since you were little black babies. So over you is the greatest enemy a man can have-and that is fear. I know some of you are afraid to listen to the truth-you have been raised on fear and lies. But I am going to preach to you the truth until you are free of that fear . . . .

"Your slavemaster, he brought you over here, and of your past everything was destroyed. Today, you do not know your true language. What tribe are you from? You would not recognize your tribe's name if you heard it. You don't know nothing about your true culture. You don't even know your family's real name. You are wearing a _white man's_ name! The white slave-master, who _hates_ you!

"You are a people who think you know all about the Bible, and all aboutChristianity. You even are foolish enough to believe that nothing is _right_ but Christianity!

"You are the planet Earth's only group of people ignorant of yourself, ignorant of your own kind, of your true history, ignorant of your enemy! You know nothing at _all_ but what your white slavemaster has chosen to tell you. And he has told you only that which will benefit himself, and his own kind. He has taught you, for his benefit, that you are a neutral, shiftless, helpless so- called 'Negro.'