The year 2013 marks the centenary of the reported founding of the Canaanite Temple in Newark, New Jersey. That was the very earliest form of an indigenous African-American Islam, one completely distinct from normative Islam, the 1,400 -year-old religion from Arabia founded by Muhammad. From this movement came Elijah Muhammad, Malcolm X, and Louis Farrakhan.
 Noble Drew Ali, founder of the Moorish Science Temple of America. |
Timothy Drew (1886-1929), an American black who called himself Noble Drew Ali, founded the Newark temple and then, in 1925 another, better verified organization, the oddly named Moorish Science Temple of America. His ideas derived mainly from four unlikely sources—pan-Africanists, the Shriners, Ahmadiyya Muslims, and white racists.
From pan-Africanists such as Edward Wilmot Blyden and Marcus Garvey, he appropriated the notion of Christianity as the religion of whites and Islam that of non-whites. As a practicing Shriner, Noble Drew Ali borrowed traits from this organization, such as the use of "Noble" before one's name, the requirement that men wear fezzes, and a network of lodges. From Ahmadis he took Arabic personal names, the crescent and star motif, the prohibition of pork, and the notion of Jesus traveling to India. From white racists came the idea that accomplished black Americans are not Africans at all but "Moors," "Moorish-Americans," or "Asiatics," a mythical northwest African people, the Moabites, who migrated to sub-Saharan Africa.
 Noble Drew Ali's scripture, The Holy Koran of the Moorish Science Temple of America. |
Noble Drew Ali hoped that by avoiding association with Africa, inventing a new identity for American blacks, and urging them to be loyal to the United States, they would appear to be new immigrants and, like other newcomers, would escape entrenched racist stereotypes and avoid segregation. But such was not to be. As the historian Richard Brent Turner writes, "Noble Drew Ali did not understand that the melting pot was closed to black people in the 1920s."
MSTA declined with Noble Drew Ali's death in July 1929. The organization still exists with a following of about a thousand adherents. One member, Clement Rodney Hampton-El, was convicted for his part in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing and sentenced to 35 years. Another, Narseal Batiste, got 13½ years for planning to blow up the Sears Tower in Chicago.
The Temple had a key role as precursor to the Nation of Islam (NoI), which came into existence in July 1930. MSTA began the dual tradition, subsequently picked up by NoI, of appropriating the imagery of normative Islam without its content and then using this folk religion as a vehicle to escape white racism. Both focused primarily on un-churched American blacks and served as a bridge for them to convert to normative Islam. Many MSTA traits – the term "nation," the "Asiatic" identity, the rejection of Negro and Africa, the identification of Islam with "people of dark hue," the prediction that all whites would be destroyed, and the leader's claim to prophethood and even at times divinity – survived in NoI.
 Clement Rodney Hampton-El, convicted World Trade Center terrorist. |
Since Elijah Muhammad's death in 1975, the momentum has been away from MSTA and NoI in favor of normative Islam, with its over a billion adherents. MSTA and NoI cannot compete against the depth, gravitas, and resources of this world faith. NoI has been bleeding members to normative Islam, to the point that it hangs on thanks mostly to the prominence of the elderly and sick Farrakhan (b. 1933). After his passing from the scene, NoI will likely follow MSTA into a rapid decline, with African-American Muslims overwhelmingly adopting normative Islam.
Despite their insignificant futures, MSTA and NoI retain their importance because nearly all of today's approximately 750,000 African-American Muslims – and a potentially much larger community in the years ahead – trace their roots to that Canaanite Temple in Newark a century ago.
Mr. Pipes (DanielPipes.org) is president of the Middle East Forum. © 2013 by Daniel Pipes. All rights reserved.
Jan. 13, 2014 update: I received a rebuttal of this article today from Shaykh Ra Saadi El - Moorish Mahdi of The Moorish Science Temple of America-1928, so I posted it and responded to it here.
Feb. 23, 2014 update: Louis Farrakhan, head of the Nation of Islam, today belatedly acknowledged the role of the MSTA as precursor to the NoI, saying of Noble Drew Ali: "I salute my brother: He is the first man to bring Islam to us in the way he tried to bring; and, I thank him and I thank Allah for him!"
June 3, 2015 update: The MSTA is being exploited by the crazed Sovereign Citizen's Movement. Here's one example, from Philadelphia: Rebecca Lyn Harmon, a lawyer, moved into a loft apartment in July 2014, then stopped paying rent in September on the grounds that she, as an "Aboriginal Indigenous Moorish Americans," are not bound by United States laws. Harmon (who also goes by R. Lynn Hatshepsut Ma'atKare El and Rhashea Lynn Harmon) was evicted in May, the locks were changed, and then she and three companions broke into the building. On arrest, they claimed to be rightful owners of the property by virtue of their Moorish heritage. Harmon accused the apartment owner of war crimes. Dec. 21, 2018 update: In a similar squatting case, Joel Fedd and his nephew claimed that a just-sold $500,000 house in Gwinnett County, northeast of Atlanta, belonged to him by right of his Moorish identity.
Apr. 1, 2020 update: Jacob S. Dorman's The Princess and the Prophet: The Secret History of Magic, Race and Moorish Muslims in America (Beacon) verifies and deepens the chronology set above: Noble Drew Ali founded a mosque, the Canaanite Temple, in Newark in 1913, possibly other mosques from South Carolina to Washington, D.C. starting in 1923 (p. 186), and finally the Moorish Science Temple of America in Chicago in 1925. Dorman does some fine detective work to identify Noble Drew Ali's real identity and name: an entertainer named John Walter Brister.
July 4, 2021 update: A police encounter in Massachusetts with members of the "Rise of the Moors" organization has MSTA back in the news.
Sep. 26, 2021 update: One Hubert A. John of Los Angeles, aka Jaleel Hu-El, broke into Shanetta Little's house in Newark, New Jersey, claiming it as his own. For details, click here. Excerpts:
In documents Mr. John posted online, he refers to Ms. Little's house, which was built in the 1950s, as his "ancestral estate," but according to the Essex County prosecutor's office there does not appear to be a connection.
On June 16, Ms. Little came to inspect her dream home. She had closed on it in February and was planning renovations before moving in. ...
She tried to unlock the door but was puzzled: the locks had been replaced. The next day, she returned with a locksmith and was confronted by two men, one of whom was Mr. John and who said the house was his. After a heated exchange she called the police.
When the police arrived, both Ms. Little and Mr. John showed documents claiming the house was theirs, according to a report of the incident issued by Brian A. O'Hara, the Newark public safety director. She shared the property deed proving ownership, Ms. Little said, he the fabricated papers bearing the Al Moroccan seal.
The men "claimed to be sovereign citizens of the Al Moroccan Empire and that their status permitted them access to the property," Mr. O'Hara's report said. The officers verified that Ms. Little bought the house in February, and they asked the men to leave. They did.
Thirty minutes later, Mr. John returned, brushed past Ms. Little on the porch, she said, opened the door with his own key and locked it behind him. When Ms. Little called the police a second time, they returned with a SWAT team.
