The Final Call

A new imam and a new day of unity, cooperation

By Brian E. Muhammad -Contributing Writer- | Last updated: Jul 8, 2013 - 11:27:37 AM

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Sister Yasmeen Bint Haneef and Sister Nefertari, Imam Sultan Rahman. (bottom) Chicago Unity Jumu’ah.

(FinalCall.com) - As Muslims across the world are experiencing growth and change amid a climate of trouble and anxiety, an encouraging light of unity, mutual love and respect is emerging among Islam’s diverse communities in the United States.

At the vanguard of the inroad towards harmony is Sultan Rahman Muhammad, a Chicago-based imam, Arabic and Islamic Civilizations Instructor, and organizer. Muhammad is the resident Imam at Mosque Maryam, the international headquarters and National Center of the Nation of Islam (N.O.I.), and was assigned to the position by the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan in September 2012. He is the first person to hold such a post in the movement’s history that began in Detroit, Michigan 83 years ago.

Barriers are breaking and a bridge is building among Muslim communities with the N.O.I. since Minister Farrakhan established the post of imam—the Arabic term for one who functions as an Islamic prayer leader, said Imam Rahman Muhammad.

Born into a renowned family legacy of U.S. Muslims, the imam is a great-grandson of the Most Honorable Elijah Muhammad, the Patriarch and Eternal Leader of the Nation, and the oldest son of the late Imam Sultan Muhammad, who served as personal aide and pilot for his grandfather, Elijah Muhammad. Later he became the imam to Masjid Muhammad in Washington, D.C.

When Minister Farrakhan announced the post of Imam for the Nation of Islam, there were questions and curiosity in and outside the group about the significance of and implications for the appointment.

“We are still in a phase of unfolding this gift that was raised up in the wilderness of North America for our people,” said Imam Rahman Muhammad, discussing the Nation of Islam on the historic landscape of America and the world.

(1) Houston Unity Jumu’ah. (2) Bro. Alif Muhammad, Dr. Hibi Omar, and Bro.Sultan (3) L-R Imams Sultan Rahman, Mansoor Sabree, and Siraj Wahhaj.

“We are a new people with a heritage, all our own, that determines for us a pivotal role in a universal mission for the restoration of humanity,” he said.

Imam Muhammad is currently the Arabic and Islamic Civilizations instructor at Muhammad University of Islam in Chicago, the N.O.I. school, but with assignment as imam, his duties have expanded.

Under Minister Farrakhan’s guidance, the resident imam is facilitating a new class for Arabic language training, leading and conducting Jumu’ah—the Friday congregational Prayer service—and other disciplines connected to the function of an imam. Starting with Nation of Islam student ministers, the class aims at enhancing knowledge and proficiency in Islamic prayer and other practices of the faith.

“The Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan saw fit at this time … for us to begin to develop our national ministry as imams,” Imam Muhammad said in an interview. However, directly quoting Minister Farrakhan, he added, “every imam is not a minister and every minister is not an imam.”

Eventually,  he explained, each N.O.I.-affiliated mosque across the country will have a qualified imam who can lead and teach the prayers in Arabic, “our original language,” as Elijah Muhammad envisioned and described in his book, Muslim Daily Prayers published in 1957.

During an April interview on The Sankofa Experience Podcast, the imam explained establishing the post of Imam is more than an individual appointment. It’s a “monumental development and advancement in the community as far as our ability to link and unite with the Muslim world,” he shared.

Connecting Muslims worldwide undergirds the reason for the initiative, fulfilling a commission from Elijah Muhammad to find a way to unite with the Islamic World. 

“We are not an organization; we are a world,” wrote Elijah Muhammad in his pivotal book Message to the Black Man in America. “I use the same Holy Qur’an that all Muslims use; the book that is universally recognized as being 100 percent true.”

Further the imam touched on how the move raises the value and profile of Islamic scholarship emanating from the Black experience, the Nation of Islam and other indigenous Muslims in the Western Hemisphere. Since Minister Farrakhan publicly announced the post there are positives that have materialized in the way of intra-Muslim networking, collaboration and dialogue. For example Mosque Maryam has hosted several delegations and visits by different Muslim communities from throughout the country for discussions on cooperative efforts.

In addition to the dialogues, Unity Jumu’ah prayer services have been convened in various cities, bringing different Muslim communities together, particularly the N.O.I. and the community under the scholarship and leadership of the late Imam W. Deen Mohammed.

Mosque Maryam’s resident imam has participated in several events in cities around the country, including Charlotte, N.C., Houston, Washingto, D.C., and Atlanta.

The 80 year old Minister Farrakhan addressed the plausibility of an alliance between the N.O.I. and the Association of Imam W. Deen Mohammed while answering a May 20th #askFarrakhan tweet, asking him about the two groups working jointly toward a model Islamic community.

“That was Imam Mohammed’s desire before he returned to Allah. That is my desire and soon our communities that were on parallel lines will become a monorail—One Community serving The One God, honoring and following the example of Prophet Muhammad—peace be upon him,” tweeted Minister Farrakhan.

In a January 28, 2000 interview with the Muslim Journal, Imam Mohammed expressed his hopes and optimism for the two communities coming together again.

“The situation has developed now for us to embrace each other and sit down together and support each other in all good works.”

The precedent for unity is also rooted in the Honorable Elijah Muhammad’s own words concerning Minister Farrakhan and Imam Mohammed. “The Honorable Elijah Muhammad stated at a Table Talk to Minister Farrakhan, “‘Brother, you and my son (Wallace) go and mop up the Wilderness,”’ reflected Imam Sultan.

On occasion Imam Mohammed has stated his desire to explore further areas of cooperation between the two communities in the fields of education and economic development.

Another credence that lends to renewal and Muslim unity is Prophet Muhammad ibn Abdullah (PBUH) prophesies that in the latter days the sun (truth) will arise from the place of its setting in the West.

It appears the unique cultural and geographical position of the Muslims in America, the historical work of the Nation of Islam and the growth of Islam in the Western Hemisphere testifies to the words of the Prophet (PBUH).

“We won’t see clearly our global mission fulfilling the goal of the Prophet—on him be peace; The goal and ultimate promise of Allah, Most High, in establishing a kingdom which is a universal kingdom, if we overlook many of these plain sighted signs in front of us as it relates to the history of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH), the history of all the Prophetic tradition … in light of the mission and message of the Honorable Elijah Muhammad,” exhorted Imam Sultan.