dancing-then getting mad when a poor, scraggly husband comes in tired and sweaty from
working like a dog all day, looking for some food.
We had dinner there at Philbert's home in Lansing. "I've got a surprise for you," I told him when
we came in. "You haven't got any surprise for me," he said. When he got home from work and
heard I'd been there introducing a Muslim sister, he knew I was either married, or on the way to
get married.
Betty's nursing school schedule called for her to fly right back to New York, and she could return
in four days. She claims she didn't tell anybody in Temple Seven that we had married.
That Sunday, Mr. Muhammad was going to teach at Detroit's Temple One. I had an Assistant
Minister in New York now; I telephoned him to take over for me. Saturday, Betty came back. The
Messenger, after his teaching on Sunday, made the announcement. Even in Michigan, my
steering clear of all sisters was so well known, they just couldn't believe it.
We drove right back to New York together. The news really shook everybody in Temple Seven.
Some young brothers looked at me as though I had betrayed them. But everybody else was
grinning like Cheshire cats. The sisters just about ate up Betty. I never will forget hearing one
exclaim, "You got him!" That's like I was telling you, the nature of women. She'd got me.
That's part ofwhy I never have been able to shake it out of my mind that she knew something-all
the time. Maybe she did get me!
Anyway, we lived for the next two and a half years in Queens, sharing a house of two small
apartments with Brother John AH and his wife of that time. He's now the National Secretary in
Chicago.
Attallah, our oldest daughter, was born in November 1958.
She's named for Attilah the Hun (he sacked Rome). Shortly after Attallah came, we moved to our
present seven-room house in an all-black section of Queens, Long Island.
Another girl, Qubilah (named after Qubilah Khan) was born on Christmas Day of 1960. Then,
yasah ("Ilyas" is Arabic for "Elijah") was born in July 1962. And in 1964 our fourth daughter,
Amilah, arrived.
I guess by now I will say I love Betty. She's the only woman I ever even thought about loving. And
she's one of the very few-four women-whom I have ever trusted. The thing is, Betty's a good
Muslim woman and wife. You see, Islam is the only religion that gives both husband and wife a
true understanding of what love is. The Western "love" concept, you take it apart, it really is lust.
But love transcends just the physical. Love is disposition, behavior, attitude, thoughts, likes,
dislikes-these things make a beautiful woman, a beautiful wife. This is the beauty that never
fades. You find in your Western civilization that when a man's wife's physical beauty fails, she
loses her attraction. But Islam teaches us to look into the woman, and teaches her to look into us.
Betty does this, so she understands me. I would even say I don't imagine many other women
might put up with the way I am. Awakening this brainwashed black man and telling this arrogant,
devilish white man the truth about himself, Betty understands, is a full-time job. If I have work to
do when I am home, the little time I am at home, she lets me have the quiet I need to work in. I'm
rarely at home more than half of any week; I have been away as much as five months. I never get
much chance to take her anywhere, and I know she likes to be with her husband. She is used to
my calling her from airports anywhere from Boston to San Francisco, or Miami to Seattle, or, here
lately, cabling her from Cairo, Accra, or the Holy City of Mecca. Once on the long-distance
telephone, Betty told me in beautiful phrasing the way she thinks. She said, "You are present
when you are away."
Later that year, after Betty and I were married, I exhausted myself trying to be everywhere at
once, trying to help the Nation to keep growing. Guest-teaching at the Temple in Boston, I ended,
as always, "Who among you wish to follow The Honorable Elijah Muhammad?" And then I saw,
in utter astonishment, that among those who were standing was my sister-Ella! We have a
saying that those who are the hardest to convince make the best Muslims. And for Ella it had
taken five years.
I mentioned, you will remember, how in a big city, a sizable organization can remain practically
unknown, unless something happens that brings it to the general public's attention. Well, certainly
darsice
(darsice)
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