• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

By Root 1695 0

could achieve their goals. Second, the Nation of Islam argued that Americanism and Christianity had brought blacks only slavery and social death. Thus the Nation presented to its converts a comprehensive global system of race, “pitting black Islam against white Christianity in a worldwide and historic struggle.” The essential tenets for the Nation’s religious remapping of the world rested on Yacub’s History—that whites were the devil, that Wallace D. Fard Muhammad was God in person, and that Elijah Muhammad had indeed been chosen by that God to represent his interests on earth. Despite Malcolm’s support for the Nation’s moves toward Islamization, as late as December 1963 he agreed with Yacub’s History and embraced the notion that Muhammad’s contacts with Fard were with Allah in human form. In his interview with Lomax in late December 1963, he insisted vigorously that Elijah had talked with God personally. When Wallace Muhammad in early 1964 expressed his belief that Fard was neither Allah nor God, Malcolm dissented.

Yet if Elijah Muhammad’s greatest sin was not in impregnating his subordinates but in fraudulently representing himself as Allah’s Messenger, then the Fard narrative was a myth. Were Yacub’s History also false, then people of European descent were not devils to be fought against, but individuals who could oppose racism. Even at the level of NOI class instruction, a new religious remapping of the world based on orthodox Islam would not necessarily stigmatize or isolate the United States because of its history of slavery and racial discrimination. Instead of a bloody jihad, a holy Armageddon, perhaps America could experience a nonviolent, bloodless revolution. At some point, Malcolm must have pondered the unthinkable: it was possible to be black, a Muslim, and an American.

There were also the practical implications of leaving the Nation. Without its backing, Malcolm would lack the financial means to travel across the country, to hold press conferences or give public speeches. He recognized that if he was to continue as a public figure, he would need to establish a secular organization, dedicated to his own political ideals and staffed by devoted assistants. With such a group, he could negotiate new relationships with civil rights organizations and their leaders.

By the time Malcolm returned to Miami Beach only a few days before the Clay-Liston fight, wild rumors were swirling. Publicity about Clay’s NOI affiliations had swept through Miami, pleasing no one except perhaps Malcolm. The fight’s promoter, Bill MacDonald, had to gross $800,000 to break even, and the stories were turning off white fans and depressing the box office. Days before the fight, scheduled for February 25, less than one half of the Miami Convention Hall’s 15,744 seats had been sold. When Malcolm returned to Miami to rejoin Clay’s entourage, MacDonald threatened to cancel. A compromise was reached when Malcolm agreed to maintain a lower profile, at least until the night of the fight. In return, the Muslim minister would receive celebrity treatment and a ringside view—seat 7, his favorite number.

Malcolm primarily saw his role as Clay’s spiritual mentor. No one gave the brash pretender any chance of winning. Yet Malcolm reassured Clay that his impending victory had been prophesied centuries earlier. Clay’s win, he predicted, would not only be a triumph for the Nation of Islam, but for seven hundred million Muslims across the globe. But Malcolm’s continuing fascination with Clay, and the outcome of this particular bout, was at least in part influenced by his problematic status inside the Nation. The fight would be held only one day prior to the annual Saviourʹs Day convention, and here Malcolm saw an opportunity. He contacted Chicago headquarters and offered a deal: he would accompany Clay, once victorious over Liston, directly to Chicago to appear at the convention, in return for his full reinstatement. Chicago rejected the offer, in part because officials still doubted Clay’s boxing abilities, but primarily because by late February they