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The End Of A Nation: Warithuddin Muhammad And Muslim Identity In The Nation Of Islam, Derek R. Galyon

Pursuit - The Journal of Undergraduate Research at The University of Tennessee

Warithuddin Muhammad’s tenure as the leader of the Nation of Islam (NOI) saw the attempted implementation of universalist doctrine that differed significantly from the particularism practiced by the movement’s founding prophet, Elijah Muhammad. Despite an apparent desire to distance the movement from Elijah Muhammad’s teachings of the intrinsic link between Blackness and Islam, race remained important for both Warithuddin and his followers. By partially embracing universalist interpretations that purported to view each race as inherently equal from an Islamic viewpoint, Warithuddin could easily be characterized as having tried to “deracialize” the Nation of Islam. With this shift, one would expect …