St. Paul recorder., 1961-05-12
THE BLACK MUSLIMS IN

| Beacon Press. ZI6 PIP. $4.S5
BY Ted POston In the NY. POST
DR.. Ralph Bunche told a re-
cent Los Angeles press conference
that the Black Muslin movement
among American Negroes is "es-
capist, defeatist and unlikely to
meet with great success"
"They operate on the assump-
ton that there Is no solution
to the problem Of race reIa-
tiOns," Bunche said. ITO my way
Of thinking this reasoning Is en-
tirely erroneous"
The error may well be on the
part of the UN Undersecretary
and the many Negro and white
leaders who tend to dismiss this
mushrooming hate movement with
deprecating comparisons to the
Marcus Garvey Back to Africa"
phenomenon and other flamboyant
cults of the past.
Few Americans - white or
black-easiIy face up to the fact
that uncOunted thousands of our
cOlOred citiZens-sOme 100, 900 of
whom call themselves Black
Muslims-have given up on the
American dream.
Many whites, including some lib
erals who accept with complac-
ency and even mild derision Mar
tin Luther Kings doctrine of Love
thy enemy" find it difficult to be-
lieve that a sizable segment of
the population hates them-indi-
vdually and collectively-because
they are white.
But no one can dispute the con-
tention of c. Eric Lincoln, social
scientist, ordained minister, a Ne
gro and author of THE Black
Muslims in America" when he
says:
There is among American Ne
groes an increasing hostility for
the white mana hostility born Of
despair. The world around us is
in cataclysm. 1t is hard to wait
for tomorrow for what everyone
else has today, especially in an
atomic age when tomorrow may
never arrive"
This is the soil of an unfulfilled
democracy which has spawned this
indigenous hate movement And its
phenomenal and still spiraling
growth is brilliantly outlined by
Lincoln in what Gordon w. Airport
calls in a foreword "one of the best
technical case studies in the whole
literature of social science"
The Black Muslims are not the
first group to appeal effectively
to lower levels Of the Negro pro-
letariat for separation and escape
from a white dominated society.
Lincoln rightfully traces their
ancestry back to the Moorish
Science Temples of Noble Drew
Ali in 1913 and more directly to
the Detroit cult established by
Wallace D. Fard, predecessor of
Georgia-born Elijah (Poole) Mu-
hammad, the present all-powerful
Black Muslin leader.
But, as Lincoln points out,
American history has not here
tofore produced an archetype of
the Black Muslin Movement"
Although they violate many of
the tenets of the real Moslem re-
ligion, the Black Muslims are Gag
erly courted by Nasser and other
Arab leaders who may prefer to
see them eventually recognized as
official and pro-Nasser Moslem
co-relgionists here, since they far
outnumber the $4,000 orthodox
Moslems in this country real
Moslems who reject the preten-
sions of the black nationalist
group.
The anti-white, anti-integration
and anti-Christian tenets Of the
Muslin movement have been wide
ly publicized by the nations mass
media, but little has been revealed
of its monolithic operation and
ultimate goals, until publication OF
this significant study.
Lincoln shows how the articu.
late and dedicated directors Of the
movement are seeking with more
success than is Acknowledged tc
discredit all responsible Negro
leadership; how they seek to re-
place the Negroes Christian faith
with "a religion with no distinct
God, no after-hfe and no heaven
a religion of her-and-now
powered and energized by hate
hate"
In one instance, the Muslims
took over a whole Baptist congreg'
alton in Richmond, Va
Despite all this, the Muslin!
effectively promote industry anc