Tuesday, March 29, 2011
Malcolm X and Islam
To be entirely honest I have been extremely frustrated while reading Malcolm X's biography because of the way that he chooses to advocate for a better life for African Americans. I love that he wants black people to appreciate their heritage and value their skin color and hair for what it is and the culture that it represents. These are very good things. I don't even necessarily have a problem with his idea that the 'white man is the devil.' White people have in the past done uncountable wrongs towards the black people in America and beyond. (I wouldn't go so far as to say that there are no good white people though and that even the 'nice' seeming white people have a little devil in them but that is besides the point.) He can believe whatever he chooses to believe and bring as many other people with him as he wishes. If he wants to be separate too then so be it. No, my major complaint is that Malcolm X pushes his ideals through what he deems Islam. The problem for me is that what he professes to represent has nothing to do with Islam in its original and truest form. In fact, there are major theological differences! Malcolm X claims Christianity is the white mans religion and Islam is the black mans but this is rediculous. Black people are christians just as much as white people are muslims. It is kind of ironic really that he decides to hate christianity, the bible, and the white man's God so much because in true Islam they worship the same God. In Core we learned from Professor Raja Tanas that Judaism, Christianity and Islam all share the same God. The difference came with Jesus because they all had different views on him. Now it may be said that he was only being metaphorical when he stated these things but he is wrong even in the basic fundamentals of the religion. For instance, Malcolm X had been a Muslim for years and Elijah Muhammad for over a decade but when Elijah came back from a trip to Africa only then did he correct the mistake of calling his Mosque a temple! He did not even have the right name for his place of worship even after so many years. The same problem goes with their holy day. Malcolm X stated in his list of what the muslims did each day at the 'temple' and stated that they held their services on Sunday! That is a Christian idea because Muslims are supposed to hold their services on Friday because that is their holy day. Finally, I realize that Islam does not necessarily have to be practiced the same way in all places, they are thousands of miles apart. I do wish though that Malcolm X would acknowledge the differences with more than just a couple of disclaimer style lines. If he wants to represent Islam then he needs to represent Islam, not some other version of it. Otherwise at least tell people that it is a different version or sect so that the general population does not get the wrong idea about Islam's values. This is highly important in my view because Islam does not teach hate or racism or anything like that and it does have a heaven (which Malcolm X denied) which is actually rather complicated and has several tiers etc. There is my problem with Malcolm X thus far and hopefully he addresses these problems farther along in his autobiography, otherwise I do not understand why so many people credit him with such wisdom...
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Before Spring Break I went to the courageous conversations dinner and a movie. The movie was called “Pray the Devil Back to Hell” which documented the process that both Christian and Muslim women went through to bring peace to Liberia. This had been the first case that I had ever heard of concerning the two religious people working together and so I was extremely interested yet I had no idea what the video really had in store for me. Liberia at the time had a dictatorship which was debilitating and the rebels who were fighting to overthrow him were even worse. The civilians of the country were caught between two different factions fighting for control and neither cared who got hurt in the process. The militia of both forces did more than just hurt, they forced sheer brutality on the people of Liberia especially the women. For example, one woman told her story where the rebels invaded their village and grabbed her husband and daughter. They told her to stare straight ahead and begin singing. Then, on her left they began to hold her husband down and slowly saw away at his neck. They had on the right, multiple ‘soldiers’ undress and proceed to rape her young daughter. The woman was forced to keep singing and glance at these things and if she were to stop they would kill her too. When the people who began the protest finally found her days later, she was still singing and her daughter had become pregnant. I explain this because I want you to know the violence that these women were facing and trying to stop. We do not have anything like they do here. They did not have cell phones for fast communication or many cars for transportation, yet they did what I doubt that people in our country could do. They banded together despite their differences and demonstrated/protested every day until they could get both factions to go to the peace talks that the United Nations were hosting. They then gathered money to send some women to the place of the talks so that they could make sure that the talks were actually being done especially in a timely manner. When it seemed as though the two factions were wasting time instead of actually acting the women reacted again. The leader had all the women surround the room with the talks inside (They even had to block all of the windows.) and told them that they needed to come to a conclusion before they would be let out. When things started to get dicey their leader was brave enough to take off all of her clothes and refuse to move. This would not work in the U.S. because people here do not care who is naked but in Liberia they saw it as a sign of shame to see their mothers (or elder women) naked. Consequently they were forced to seriously go through the talks. In the end they even got many of the soldiers to disarm themselves when the fighting was over and also helped to vote in a woman as their new leader. This is so different from the U.S. and despite all of the violence I saw it as a refreshing change from the inaction that we tend to have here. Perhaps the people in our country can get off their high horse and learn something from the women of Liberia.
ReplyDeleteAndrea,
ReplyDeleteI think Malcolm's position is that Christianity has been co-opted by whites, and thus has been turned into a white religion. I can see his point. I do like your post on the film. I can see that you found it moving.