Nation of Islam collection

1959-1976

The Nation of Islam was founded in Detroit (Mosque No. 1) in the early 1930s. Elijah Muhammad, its spiritual and supreme leader, established the group's headquarters in Chicago (Mosque No. 2) with significant chapters in New York, Boston, Los Angeles, and Philadelphia. Malcolm X, Muhammad's most famous disciple, helped build the Nation of Islam into a national membership organization, from which he resigned in 1964. After Muhammad's death in 1975, his son Warith Deen Muhammed (Wallace Muhammad) steered the organization closer to traditional Islamic beliefs and practices; he renamed it the World Community of al-Islam in the West, and later the American Muslim Mission. A dissident group led by Louis Farrakhan broke away from Muhammed in 1978, and reconstituted the Nation of Islam using the original teachings of Elijah Muhammad. The collection consists of core Nation of Islam liturgical texts; instructions and letters from Elijah Muhammad to ministers and members (Laborers, Fruits of Islam, and Muslim Girls Training); materials from various Louisiana branches; and several compilations of radio broadcasts, Saviour's Day addresses, published articles, presentations, and lectures at spiritual meetings. Also included are religious teachings and exegesis issued as Ministers' Kits in 1975 and 1976, as part of the gradual change introduced by Warith Deen Muhammed after his father's death regarding "the teachings of the Holy Quran as they will be taught by the Office of the Honorable Elijah Muhammad.".