Hope lives for city in inspirational leaders

JEFF GERRITT

Johnson has been nominated again for Best Community Leader in Steve Harvey's annual Hoodie Awards, to be announced next month in Las Vegas. He was national runner-up last year. Voting in the best community leader category takes place on Aug. 26. Support Johnson next Tuesday at www.raphaelbjohnson.com or www.steveharvey.com.

While out on bond, Johnson graduated from Cass Tech High School and found solace and strength in the Nation of Islam. After receiving an 8- to 25-year sentence in 1993, Johnson spent 12 years in prison, six of them in solitary. In prison, Johnson read more than 1,300 books, covering philosophy, science, religion, history and other subjects. Read more...

Lifting up the community

TuscaloosaNews.com

An outdoor revival was held at the Nation of Islam mosque in Tuscaloosa on Thursday. Maurice Muhammad, head of the Nation of Islam Tuscaloosa Study Group, and minister Olivia Davis of Just Jesus Outreach Ministries, said the purpose of the street revival was to “unify people by breaking down the walls of the churches and mosques” and “to reach the unreachable and touch the untouchable.” Muhammad said if Jesus and Elijah Muhammad were alive today they’d be working together, as Muslims and Christians should. Read more....

Min. Farrakhan's Magnificent Answer on the Honorable Elijah Muhammad

By Jabril Muhammad

Do you think you would have come to the position in which you are without your having come to the realization that the Honorable Elijah Muhammad is yet physically alive?

Without hesitation he responded: Never, never, never could I have reached the point that I'm reaching, or have reached, and am still reaching right now, had I not come into that realization.

In education there is a thing that is called a plateau of learning. When one reaches a plateau of learning, and stops there, the process of learning stops and the process of intellectual death begins. So when I saw my leader as dead, the fountain of my spiritual and intellectual growth had died. Read more...

Melody Moezzi's book War On Error: Real Stories of American Muslims

By Irfan Yusuf

Indeed, the complete absence of a non-migrant (or distant migrant) African-American Muslim voice in Moezzi’s book is troubling. There is much bitterness among African-American Muslims about what many see as the dominance of migrant Muslims from the Middle East and Asia in Muslim religious and community affairs. African-American Muslims – whether of the more heterodox “Nation of Islam” variety or from more mainstream denominations - are a growing force in American Islam. America’s first two Muslim Congressmen are both African-American. It seems curious that Moezzi could not find a single African-American Muslim prepared to talk about his or her faith on the record. Read more...

Barack Obama through Muslim Eyes

By Daniel Pipes

Some American Muslim leaders also perceive Obama as Muslim. The president of the Islamic Society of North America, Sayyid M. Syeed, told Muslims at a conference in Houston that whether Obama wins or loses, his candidacy will reinforce that Muslim children can "become the presidents of this country." The Nation of Islam's Louis Farrakhan called Obama "the hope of the entire world" and compared him to his religion's founder, Fard Muhammad. Read more...

Muhammad Ali's former manager and son of the Honorable Elijah Muhammad dies

Jabir Herbert Muhammad, the former manager of boxing legend Muhammad Ali, died Monday at the age of 79.

The Chicago Sun-Times reported Tuesday that Muhammad, the son of Nation of Islam founder Elijah Muhammad, died at the University of Illinois at Chicago Medical Center just days after undergoing open-heart surgery. Read more...

The upcoming Million DJ March, ripple effect of the Million Man March

By Vanessa E. Jones

Shaw, who came up with the idea for the event two years ago, says she received permission from Nation of Islam minister Louis Farrakhan to use the term Million DJ March, which mirrors the name of the Million Man March that Farrakhan organized in 1995.

The event's founder and organizer, Amorette Shaw, who identifies herself as A. Shaw on the Million DJ March website (www.themilliondjmarch.blogspot.com), has recruited iconic old school rapper KRS-One and Green Lantern, a mixtape DJ who came to prominence through Eminem. Speakers will include DJ Scientific and Harald Blakeslee, managing director of the Texas music distribution company BCD Music Group. Among the performers are DJ K-Sly and MCs Joell Ortiz and NYOil. Panels will focus on the legacy of the mixtape, and on Friday, a complimentary dinner will cover the subjects of insurance and retirement planning. Read more...