The Final Call

Who are you?

By Laila Muhammad | Last updated: Dec 11, 2013 - 5:10:52 PM

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The immeasurable, limitless value and beauty of a woman

“To be nobody but yourself in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting.” ~E.E. Cummings, 1955

Have you ever heard women say they only have male friends? Well I have, on numerous occasions, and I have wondered what does that stem from? What has happened in our lives that we prefer to wash our hands of women and deal only with men? What have female to female interpersonal relationships been reduced to?

Women engage in an incalculable amounts of nonverbal communication, hand gestures, nods, sighs, eyes rolling, lip twisting, and peripheral vision watching. Kicking girlfriends under the table, elbowing sisters in seats next to us, sending innuendo status messages, indirect tweets, and posting quotes, we hope other women will get the disapproval message—whether it is a hair style, a garment, shoes, the man she likes, or the man who likes her. That she will know we have cast judgment based on petty things that shouldn’t define people, but have.

When did it become acceptable for women of faith—Christian, Muslim, Hebrew Israelite or other—to use vile language, be at odds with one another, or slander one another? When did it become trendy to take on the culture of uncivilized people?

Jesus said we are in the world, not of the world but we are doing the opposite.

We should realize what we say, and how we say it, reveals to the world how we think which stems from what we feed our minds and bodies. The $64,000 question is who are you? Are you trying to blend in to a world that’s going out? Why do we tend to propagate a culture of slack talk and gossip? Are we perpetuating a culture of the same abuse we’ve suffered in our own lives?

Women of faith are charged with bringing in a new world, how will that come about if we aren’t the vanguard of a righteous society?

We can’t sit in our places of worship week after week, listening to the word of God, leave and live a double life—trading our Sunday best for stilettos and leggings. I dare you to be different; Albert Einstein said “Great spirits have always found violent opposition from mediocrities.” Yes it’s a struggle. A lot of us wrangle with trying to find modest clothing in a world where there is over-indulgence in sexual messages and images. But until we learn how to sew, and produce our own clothes, we will continue to be fashioned by a wicked industry.

The Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan, in a message delivered May 10, 2009 at Mosque Maryam titled “The Immeasurable, Limitless Value and Beauty of a Woman,” asked: “Who are you, Black woman? Do you really know how valued you are in the sight of your Creator? Some women may look in the mirror, and think, ‘Oh, I am not so pretty.’ They may not be considered physically attractive, but physical attractiveness is not beauty, that is why I am teaching on the limitless, immeasurable value and beauty of all women. The beauty of the woman is the matchless beauty of God. This is you on the inside”

“Satan is always after the woman, because his desire is to create an adverse world. He can’t bring the man down unless he goes through the woman, so Satan has to beguile and deceive the woman. Because the woman is so sacred, this is why, in his Saviour’s Day address in 1957, the Honorable Elijah Muhammad taught the subject: ‘The Respect, Control and Protection of the So-Called Negro Woman.’ Brothers: You can never protect a woman that you can’t control. And sisters: I know some of you may think, ‘No man is gonna control me!’ but wait: You are not going to mind being controlled if the man is under The Control of God,” he continued.

“As a mother, you should want to be like the woman that the Dragon was after. But sisters, sometimes you are too weak to make a man child for God because you compromise too much with that which devalues you. You are full of foolishness; sitting in front of the television, watching these silly programs such as ‘reality shows’ and music videos that exploit women. What do you get out of it except that which makes you more and more foolish? You’re going to have to be stronger than you are now, because you are much too weak by compromising with a world that God is taking out.”

Learn to love and value yourself. When you don’t love self, it’s easy to devalue other women. Settle on the best part of people and realize the tongue is more powerful than the sword. Stay far away from gossip, don’t try to justify it. It needn’t be false to be considered evil. I am a bearer of witness that if you think five times before speaking, you will be mindful of your words.

Let’s unite as sisters, as Black women, and be an example to the world, of what real love is. May Allah (God) bless you to discover your gifts and purpose in life, realize your value and beauty and bless you with the light of understanding that you may walk therein.

(Laila Muhammad is a Chicago-based writer and videographer. She is also a Final Call production assistant.)