African-American Muslims, also colloquially known as Black Muslims, are an African American religious minority. Nonetheless, African American Muslims account for over 20% of American Muslims. They represent one of the larger minority Muslim populations of the United States as there is no ethnic group that makes up the majority of American Muslims. They are represented in Sunni and Shia denominations as well as smaller sects, such as the Nation of Islam. The history of African-American Muslims is related to African-American history in general, and goes back to the Revolutionary and Antebellum eras.
History
Historically, an estimated 30% of slaves brought to the Americas from West/Central Africa were Muslims. They were overwhelmingly literate in contrast to many of the slave owners, and thus were given supervisory roles. Most of these captives were forced into Christianity during the era of American slavery; however, there are records of individuals such as Omar ibn Said living the rest of their lives as Muslims in the United States. During the twentieth century, some African Americans converted to Islam, mainly through the influence of black nationalist groups that preached with distinctive Islamic practices including the Moorish Science Temple of America, founded in 1913, and the Nation of Islam, founded in the 1930s, which attracted at least 20,000 people by 1963. Prominent members included activist Malcolm X and boxer Muhammad Ali. Ahmadiyya Muslim groups also sought converts among African Americans in the 1920s and 1930s.
Malcolm X is considered the first person to start the movement among African Americans towards mainstream Islam, after he left the Nation and made the pilgrimage to Mecca. In 1975, Warith Deen Mohammed, the son of Elijah Muhammad took control of the Nation after his father's death and guided the majority of its members to orthodox Islam. However, a few members rejected these changes, in particular Louis Farrakhan, who revived the Nation of Islam in 1978 based largely on the ideals of its founder, Wallace Fard Muhammad.
Demographics
African-American Muslims constitute 20% of the total U.S. Muslim population. The majority are Sunni Muslims; a substantial proportion of these identify under the community of W. Deen Mohammed. Cities with large concentration of African-American Muslims include Chicago, Detroit, New York City, Newark, Washington. D.C, Philadelphia, and Atlanta. The Nation of Islam led by Louis Farrakhan has a membership ranging from 20,000 to 50,000 members.
Sects
During the first half of the 20th century, a small number of African Americans established groups based on Islamic and Gnostic teachings. The first of these groups was the Moorish Science Temple of America, founded by Timothy Drew (Drew Ali) in 1913. Drew taught that black people were of Moorish origin but their Muslim identity was taken away through slavery and racial segregation, advocating the return to Islam of their Moorish ancestry.
Sunni Islam
Sunni is a term derived from sunnah (سُنَّة /ˈsunna/, plural سُنَن sunan /ˈsunan/) meaning "habit", "usual practice", "custom", "tradition". The Muslim use of this term refers to the sayings and living habits of Muhammad. Its adherents are referred to in Arabic as ahl as-sunnah wa l-jamāʻah ("the people of the sunnah and the community") or ahl as-sunnah for short. In English, its adherents are known as Sunni Muslims, Sunnis, Sunnites and Ahlus Sunnah. Sunni Islam is sometimes referred to as "orthodox Islam". The Quran, together with hadith (especially those collected in Kutub al-Sittah) and binding juristic consensus form the basis of all traditional jurisprudence within Sunni Islam. Sharia rulings are derived from these basic sources, in conjunction with analogical reasoning, consideration of public welfare and juristic discretion, using the principles of jurisprudence developed by the traditional legal schools.
The conversion of Malik el-Shabazz (better known as Malcolm X) in 1964 is widely regarded as the turning point for the spread of orthodox Sunni Islam among Black American Muslims. Encouraged to learn about Sunni Islam after his departure from the Nation of Islam, he converted; others from the Nation of Islam soon followed. Warith Deen Mohammed rose to leadership of the Nation of Islam in 1975 following the death of his father Elijah Muhammad and began the groundbreaking, though sometimes controversial, process of leading Black Muslims out of the NOI and into Sunni Islam. As a result of his personal thinking and studies of the Quran, he became part of Ahlus Sunnah during a term in federal prison from 1961 to 1963 for refusing induction into the United States military.