1987-October-30

Muslim Journal

Historical Milwaukee Speech: Part 1

Imam W. Deen Muhammad

Peace be unto you, As-Salaam-Alaikum. We begin in the Name of God, that is Bismil-lah ir-Rahman, ir-Raheem, With the Name Allah, the Gracious, the Merciful, and we pray His peace and blessings be upon the last and universal Messenger, Prophet Muhammad, upon his descendants, his Companions, the Pioneers of the worldwide religion with our Prophet Muhammad, may God be pleased with them, and we pray peace and blessings be on us. Ameen.

We have chosen to speak on Al-Islam, commonly called Islam, in America, today, and we hope to bring before you the concerns of Muslims that we think should be before us today as Muslims, especially as Muslims in America. But before doing that, I would like to refer to the Book of God to the Muslims the Qur'an, and read some notes from Qur'an.

Allah, God Most High says in the Holy Book, Qur'an, that He, Almighty God is the One who sent Muhammad, the Prophet, the Messenger, with the guidance and with the true religion, that it should become the most prominent of all religions, even though that is disliked disbelievers. In the beginning of my talk, I want to say to the Muslims, whether we realize it or not, the influence of the teachings of Prophet Muhammad, and Al-Islam, are the more prevalent and more widespread in the world than the teachings of any other religious representative.

I am not the one who first said that; that has been documented by Muslims and also non-Muslims who have studied the influence of the personality of Muhammad and his teachings. Many may visibly appear to be in greater numbers than Muslims; but when you look at the content of faith, and the practicing people, people who practice their religion, Prophet Muhammad has the greatest number, and also when you look at his influence on the real life of man, as one author established, his influence is greater than the influence of any other man, and he named not only religious figures, but he also named men like Alexander the Great and others, and it is documented in a book by a qualified author; but that's not the point of the talk, it's just to say to Muslims — we are talking to Muslims as well as non-Muslims, this is to Muslims to let you know that one prediction has already come true, in fact, many predictions have come true, but one of the great predictions in the Holy Book has already come true, and that is that the religion of Al-Islam, Islam as it is commonly called, will become the most prevalent religion. I go so far as to say, that many people who identify under other religious labels, as Christianity and others, are in a real sense, motivated more by the teaching of Muhammad the Prophet than they are by those teachings 'they received from their religion.

Muhammad the prophet stressed rational life; intellectual pursuits; he stressed many things that stand before the Western world as great Western values. You should understand that those values were not great Western values before the advent of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH), who brought enlightenment to the dark continent of Arabia, before enlightenment came to Europe, and thereafter to America.

Continuing now, with the Word of God, in the Holy Book, God Most High says, Allah Most High, that is, says, "You have not been sent except to be a mercy for all the worlds. "That's for Prophet Muhammad. Knowing, Muslims, that our Holy Book says this, how can we separate ourselves from the world of man, when our Book tells us that our Prophet has been sent as a mercy to all worlds, to all the worlds. And we know from the study of historians, both Muslims and non-Muslims, that the message of Qur'an, and the period of enlightenment that came with that message for the sciences, math, chemistry, astronomy, medicine, we can go on to name others that again awakened the intellect of the Western man, the European.

We know that that was a mercy to all the worlds. We may not be in tune with that today, ourselves; maybe we have lost the importance of that interest and that intellectual concern, but we know that before use, many centuries ago, there was a great, glorious period of intellectual activity, for the followers of Muhammad the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him), and that made possible the reawakening of the intellect of the Western man in Europe and that great excitement for the mind came to America and America took the lead.

We should look at that and understand that the Prophet that we identify as our Prophet, may not be the Prophet for the other people, the Christians, the Jews and others, but we must accept that he came to be a blessing on all of them.

And again, Allah Most High, says: 'You have not been sent except that you be a good news giver and a warner." Now we know that the Gospel is the "good news" for the Christians, and by it being the "good news" for the Christians, we know the "good news giver" was God, but God, through Jesus Christ, the Prophet (PBUH). So he, for them, is the "good news giver," and the "good news" is the Gospel. We must understand, Muslims, that our Holy Book also contains the "good news" for us, "good news" for the Muslims and it is not only "good news" for us, "good news" for the world, if they would accept it, "as a good news giver, and as a warner." We must understand that the Prophet came to warn man, to alert man for his best interest.

Again, Allah Most High says, "You have not been sent except as a complete blessing to all people; a giver of good news and a warner." Prophet Muhammad is identified in the Holy Book as a complete blessing, a sufficient gift, to all people.

I was at a meeting once, I was invited by the Lions Club; some of you might know about the Lions Club. It's a society that does a lot of good, like the Shriners, the Masons, they do a lot of good, but it is also a kind of secret society, a closed organization. They invited me right after I became leader, when you made me leader, in 1975 of February. It wasn't many months, and they invited me to come and address the Lions Club in Chicago. I addressed them, and one of the questions that was put to me, one of the first questions put to me after I made my short address, (I wouldn't make a long address before them: anybody who's got secrets, I don't want to talk before them too long, you know) one of the first questions they put before me was, how do I see the two great figures, Prophet Muhammad and the Prophet Jesus (peace be upon them both), and I thought about it, and I wondered, how can I answer them? With all these thoughts running through my mind, because when they asked me, right away, I was just overwhelmed with thoughts; I had never thought about it. I said, boy, I can't tell them what's really stirring in me, so I told them. I said, well, Prophet Muhammad, it is reported that he said, 'one day the people will see him and Jesus Christ together.' So I preferred to leave them with that, than to drop the heavy load that I wanted to drop.

But the great difference is, the most considerate concept of Jesus, is the concept of Jesus as a sign. But for Prophet Muhammad, a living reality in the history of man.

Please be patient with me, I won't be here too long, I don't think. Let me continue now, with the Qur'an first.

I have taken these quotes from Qur'an that are very similar, stressing why Prophet Muhammad has been missioned, by God, and you see that what is stressed here in these references to his mission, is him being a warner, and that's what we need now, a warning. We always need a warning. Now we know that Prophet Muhammad was not the kind of Prophet that...he was no "doomsday preacher"; he was a teacher and very rational, I would say, a very obviously rational teacher. He emphasized the rational need in man's life; he built upon the rational need in man's life, he called the mind of man to respect the rational life of his mind, and he considered men dead if they weren't rational — mentally dead, that is, if not really dead.

So we know that the Prophet was not the kind of warner that kept preaching "fire and brimstone; repent from your sins, repent! repent!," he was not that kind of warner. He was a more sophisticated warner, he warned man that if he expected to have a good life on this earth, he has to respect all that God intended for him to be, and if that's not similar to what the Americans uphold, then what is? I hear them saying that on the television, "be all that you can be." There are some people that don't like me, they say 'a Muslim isn't supposed to show similarities between Muslims and non-Muslims, a Muslim is supposed to project what a Muslim is, we aren't supposed to be embracing infidels.' Well, why embrace your brother Muslim when he is an infidel? Some of the biggest infidels are Muslims, or at least people who call themselves Muslims, pretend to be Muslims.

I've heard since I've been here, that an Imam was on the way to deliver his Friday sermon, the most important message of the week, the Friday prayer, the Jumah, he stopped and robbed a bank, before coming to the masjid to deliver a prayer. Now while we read about the Christian infidels and whatever, we are overlooking these much more terrible infidels that are right under our own noses, leading us in prayer.

Now, I'm not saying that that can't happen to other people too, that has happened for other people too, they have had people among them claiming to be true religious people, but were just impostors, pretenders, and when weakness and an opportunity came to test their strength, they couldn't pass it, they did a terrible thing and went bad. In fact, in my lifetime, - I've read some terrible things that people of other religions, leaders of other religions have done, but I don't think any can be worse than that, an Imam stopping to rob a bank before he comes to the masjid. Well, thank Allah he got caught, and I told them, well, if you all were like me, and I didn't have so much to lose, because of the position I'm in, the law wouldn't have to worry about him long.

That's right, I don't care. If you say, hey, you ain't supposed to do that, that's a threat, that's serious, what you are saying, Brother Imam; you ought to protect your welfare better than that, well, I love to protect it, just like I just protected it by saying he wouldn't be a problem for the law enforcement law; if I didn't have so much to lose myself, I'd be waiting for him. Soon as they let him out of court, the problem would be over.

Again, it is said in our Holy Book, of Prophet Muhammad, "You indeed have in the Prophet, a most excellent model of conduct." So here God establishes for us in the Holy Book, that Prophet Muhammad, the last Prophet according to the Revelation of Qur'an, the Revelation of God to us, we have the Last Prophet established as a model of human behavior for us, for the Muslim. So anytime we are worried about how Muslims are behaving, the first thing we should do, is call the misbehavors to the behavior of the Prophet, because God has established for us, Allah in the Holy Book, has established for us, that He has given us Muhammad the Prophet, as the most excellent model for human behavior.

And again, we read in the Holy Book, to make a connection between two great Prophets, Abraham and Muhammad, "In Prophet Muhammad we have the most excellent model for human behavior." For human conduct. For the conduct of man and society. And it is also said in the same Book, our Holy Book, that "surely was given in Abraham (Ibrahim), and in those who followed his Sunnah (the way of Abraham), a most excellent model. And we are told that this is the order, the "millah" of Ibrahim Hanifah. This is Muhammad's order — the order of Abraham, the upright in faith. Well, there's much to be said on this, believe me, much to be said, that I wish I could say, but this is not the time, or the situation for it. Some of you would be bored to death.

(To be continued.)