Mr. Muhammad told me that his older children's lack of formal education reflected their sacrifice
to form the backbone for today's Universities of Islam in Detroit and Chicago which have better-
qualified faculties.
Master W. D. Fard selected Elijah Karriem to be the Supreme Minister, over all other ministers,
and among all of those others sprang up a bitter jealousy. All of them had better education than
Elijah Karriem, and also they were more articulate than he was. They raged, even in his
presence, "Why should we bow down to someone who appears less qualified?"
But Mr. Elijah Karriem was then in some way re-named "Elijah Muhammad," who as the Supreme
Minister began to receive from Master W. D. Fard for the next three and a half years private
teachings, during which time he says he "heard things never revealed to others."
During this period, Mr. Elijah Muhammad and Master W. D. Fard went to Chicago and established
Temple Number Two. They also established in Milwaukee the beginnings of a Temple Number
Three.
In 1934, Master W. D. Fard disappeared, without a trace.
Elijah Muhammad says that attempts were made upon his life, because the other ministers'
jealousy had reached such a pitch. He says that these "hypocrites" forced him to flee to Chicago.
Temple Number Two became his headquarters until the "hypocrites" pursued him there, forcing
him to flee again. In Washington, D. C., he began Temple Number Four. Also while there, in the
Congressional Library, he studied books which he says Master W. D. Fard had told him contained
different pieces of the truth that devil white man had recorded, but which were not in books
generally available to the public.
Saying that he was still pursued by the "hypocrites," Mr. Muhammad fled from city to city, never
staying long in any. Whenever able, now and then, he slipped home to see his wife and his eight
young children, who were fed by other poor Muslims who shared what little they had. Even Mr.
Muhammad's original Chicago followers wouldn't know he was at home, for he says the
"hypocrites" made serious efforts to kill him.
In 1942, Mr. Muhammad was arrested. He says Uncle Tom Negroes had tipped off the devil white
man to his teachings, and he was charged by this devil white man with draft-dodging, although he
was too old for military service. He was sentenced to five years in prison. In the Milan, Michigan,
federal prison, Mr. Muhammad served three and a half years, then he was paroled. He had
returned to his work in 1946, to remove the blinders from the eyes of the black man in the
wilderness of North America.
I can hear myself now, at the lectern in our little Muslim Temple, passionately addressing my
black brothers and sisters:
"This little, gentle, sweet man! The Honorable Elijah Muhammad who is at this very hour teaching
our brothers and sisters over there in Chicago! Allah's Messenger-which makes him the most
powerful black man in America! For you and me, he has sacrificed seven years on the run from
filthy hypocrites, he spent another three and a half years in a prison cage! He was put there by
the devil white man! That devil white man does not want the Honorable Elijah Muhammad stirring
awake the sleeping giant of you and me, and all of our ignorant, brainwashed kind here in the
white man's heaven and the black man's hell herein the wilderness of North America!
"I have sat at our Messenger's feet, hearing the truth from his own mouth! I have pledged on my
knees' to Allah to tell the white man about his crimes and the black man the true teachings of our
Honorable Elijah Muhammad. I don't care if it costs my life... ."
This was my attitude. These were my uncompromising words, uttered anywhere, without
hesitation or fear. I was his most faithful servant, and I know today that I did believe in him more
firmly than he believed in himself.