"Nothing Down" advertisements drew poor Negroes into that store like flypaper. It was a shame,
the way they paid three and four times what the furniture had cost, because they could get credit
from those Jews. It was the same kind of cheap, gaudy-looking junk that you can see in any of
the black ghetto furniture stores today. Fabrics were stapled on the sofas. Imitation "leopard skin"
bedspreads, "tiger skin" rugs, such stuff as that. I would see clumsy, work-hardened, calloused
hands scrawling and scratching signatures on the contract, agreeing to highway-robbery interest
rates in the fine print that never was read.
I was seeing in real life the same point made in a joke that during the 1964 Presidential campaign
Jet magazine reported that Senator Barry Goldwater had told somewhere. It was that a white
man, a Negro, and a Jew were given one wish each. The white man asked for securities; the
Negro asked for a lot of money; the Jew asked for some imitation jewelry "and that colored boy's
address."
In all my years in the streets, I'd been looking at the exploitation that for the first time I really saw
and understood. Now I watched brothers entwining themselves in the economic clutches of the
white man who went home every night with another bag of the money drained out of the ghetto. I
saw that the money, instead of helping the black man, was going to help enrich these white
merchants, who usually lived in an "exclusive" area where a black man had better not get caught
unless he worked there for somebody white.
Wilfred invited me to share his home, and gratefully I accepted. The warmth of a home and a
family was a healing change from the prison cage for me. It would deeply move almost any newly
freed convict, I think. But especially this Muslim home's atmosphere sent me often to my knees to
praise Allah. My family's letters while I was in prison had included a description of the Muslim
home routine, but to truly appreciate it, one had to be a part of the routine. Each act,and the
significance of that act, was gently, patiently explained to me by my brother Wilfred.
There was none of the morning confusion that exists in most homes. Wilfred, the father, the family
protector and provider, was the first to rise. "The father prepares the way for his family," he said.
He, then I, performed the morning ablutions. Next came Wilfred's wife, Ruth, and then their
children, so that orderliness prevailed in the use of the bathroom.
"In the name of Allah, I perform the ablution," the Muslim said aloud before washing first the right
hand, then the left hand. The teeth were thoroughly brushed, followed by three rinsings of the
mouth. The nostrils were also rinsed out thrice. A shower then completed the whole body's
purification in readiness for prayer.
Each family member, even children upon meeting each other for that new day's first time, greeted
softly and pleasantly, "As-Salaam-Alaikum" (the Arabic for "Peace be unto you"). "Wa-Alaikum-
Salaam" ("and unto you be peace") was the other's reply. Over and over again, the Muslim said in
his own mind, "Allahu-Akbar, Allahu-Akbar" ("Allah is the greatest").
The prayer rug was spread by Wilfred while the rest of the family purified themselves. It was
explained to me that a Muslim family prayed with the sun near the horizon. If that time was
missed, the prayer had to be deferred until the sun was beyond the horizon. "Muslims are not
sun-worshipers. We pray facing the East to be in unity with the rest of our 725 million brothers
and sisters in the entire Muslim world."
All the family, in robes, lined up facing East. In unison, we stepped from our slippers to stand on
the prayer rug.
Today, I say with my family in the Arabic tongue the prayer which I first learned in English: "I
perform the morning prayer to Allah, the Most High, Allah is the greatest. Glory to Thee Oh Allah,
Thine is the praise, Blessed is Thy Name, and Exalted is Thy Majesty. I bear witness that nothing
deserves to be served or worshiped besides Thee."