What’s In a Name

Hotep!!! (Peace)!!!

Take notes!!!!!!!!!!!

A Blackman born on October 7, 1897, by the name of Elijah Poole, was one of many descendants of enslaved Afrikans in America living under the weight of overt racial oppression with no end in sight. But this would all change for Elijah Poole. The Honorable Elijah Muhammad would come into a deep level Black nationalism and Sunni Islamic teachings. He combines both ideologies into a Black liberation movement called the Nation of Islam. Although there existed two major Black nationalist movements in the Black community in early twentieth century before the Nation of Islam, such as the Moorish Science Temple of America, founded by Noble Drew Ali, and the Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA), founded by the Honorable Marcus Gavery; at the end of 1920s, these two movements were made to be less attractive for Black people by the racist power structure in America. White supremacy, and the system of racism, attacked the Moorish Science Temple and the UNIA movements to discredit them in the eyes of Black people. Eventually the Moorish Science Temple of America and the UNIA will fade to the side in Black America. However, all was not lost to Black people. A new movement for Black empowerment came into existence challenging White domination of the entire world, particularly the Afrikan world community. This new movement would be called the Lost Found Nation of Islam in the Wildernesses of North America. For short, this organization would be known as the Nation of Islam. Elijah Poole joined the Nation of Islam in 1930. He would rise in the ranks to leader of the movement by 1933. To adhere to the Black nationalism and Islamic teachings of Nation of Islam, Elijah Poole gave up his slave surname to rename himself Elijah Muhammad. His leadership was so respected in the Nation of Islam that he would later be called the Honorable Elijah Muhammad-the Messenger of Allah. The Most Honorable Elijah Muhammad (NOI) co-founded the Nation of Islam on July 4, 1930, The Nation of Islam became major a Black nationalist movement in America. The founder of the Nation of Islam was a man named Master Fard Muhammad. He was born in Makkah (Mecca) Saudi Arabia on February 26, 1877. The Honorable Elijah Muhammad taught Black people that our names were slave names given to us by White slave-masters. He often was quoted saying, “Blackman and Blackwoman go free in name as well as in fact!” He taught Black people that white slave owners forced enslaved Black people to give up their Afrikan and/or Islamic names in American and European slavery. Many Black people came from Islamic empires in Afrika, therefore masses of enslaved Black people bore Afrikan and / or Islamic names. Under the system of slavery in America, and in Europe, White slave masters replaced our beautiful Afrikan and/or Islamic names with slave names to indoctrinate us into slavery. The White slave -masters also gave us the name n-word. But for you new millennial Hip Hop heads to understand what I mean, the Whiteman gave us his government names and the n-word. This was an effort by the slave masters to legally and racially disconnect and de-center Black people from their Afrikan and / or Islamic traditional cultures into Whiteness and Black self-hatred. Fortunately, from the Nation of Islam grew an Afrikan centered Black consciousness to reclaim our Black identity from White domination through embracing Afrikan and / or Islamic names to reconnect us to mother Afrika.

When the Nation of Islam came on the scene as a way to liberate ourselves from racial oppression, many followers of Elijah Muhammad gave up their slave names when they joined the Nation of Islam. They received the X, which represented the stolen Afrikan or Islamic name. For example, like Malcolm X. When he came through the Nation of Islam, he was given the name Malcolm X. He dropped the slave name Little. But when he left the Nation of Islam, and grew in Al-Islam and Black nationalism , he took on the name Omawele El Hajj Malik El Shabazz. The name Omawele is from the Yoruba nation of Nigeria in West Afrika. It means a Child Comes Home. El Hajj is the name you receive when you take your Islamic pilgrimage to the Holy City of Makkah, Saudi Arabia as a Muslim. It is actually spelled in English as Al Hajj. Shabazz was his Nation of Islam name he received in the organization. It means the lost tribe of Black people.

The Nation of Islam was so powerful and influential in the Black community in the 1950's, 60's, and early 70's that many non-Afrikan American NOI members began to change their slave names to Afrikan or Islamic names. They wanted names that would not identify them with American and European slavery.

When Imam Warith Deen Muhammad, the seventh son of the Most Elijah Muhammad came into the leadership of the Nation of Islam in 1975, he led the largest conversion of Black people to Sunni Al-Islam in American history. With this move, many newly converted Black Muslims began to change their names from the X to Islamic names. In time, even Imam Warith Deen Muhammad changed his birth name from Wallace Deen Muhammad to Warith Deen Muhammad. He fully embraced his Black and Islamic culture by completely changing his slave first name to an Islamic name.

At the death of the Most Honorable Elijah Muhammad in 1975, his seventh son, Warith Deen Mohammad (once named Wallace Muhammad) took over the leadership of the mighty Nation of Islam. In three years, the Nation of Islam, the largest Afrikan centered Black Islamic organization in America was dismantled. There was no more Nation of Islam. It was replaced by Sunni Al-Islam. All of the Nation of Islam's mosques were closed for public meetings that were at one time used as a platform for organizing Muslims and Black people for liberation struggles. They were turned into Masaajid (mosques) now just used for salaat (prayer). The Fruit of Islam (F.O.I) and Muslim Girls Training-General Civilization Class (MGT-GCC), the weekly military training of Muslims, Blackmen and Blackwomen,were abolished. Its' Black liberation theology tafsir (Arabic for interpretation) on Al-Islam was replaced by a more conservative American and Arabic centered tasfir. After three years, the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan who join the Nation of Islam under the Most Honorable Elijah Muhammad and Malcolm X, could not take the destruction of Nation of Islam moving forward. He left Imam Warth Deen Mohammad's leadership in 1978. He saw how the fall of the Nation of Islam, help set the Black community back deeper under the yoke of oppression in America. Therefore, he went on to rebuild the teachings of the Most Honorable Elijah Muhammad, and the Nation of Islam, to fight against White domination and Black oppression. He reestablished the F.O.I (Fruit of Islam) and MGT-GCC (Muslim Girls Training- General Civilization Class) for the training of Muslims, Blackmen, and Blackwomen to help empower Muslims, Blackmen, and Blackwomen. The Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan inspired a whole new generation of Black people in the 1980s, to the present, on the necessity of liberating ourselves from slave names for an Afrikan and / or Islamic name.

When the Black Power Movement burst on the scene in the late 1960's and early 1970's, it challenged Black people to culturally accept their Blackness.

Greatly Influenced by the Most Honorable Elijah Muhammad's Nation of Islam and his student Malcolm X, Black Power leaders like Dr. Maulana Karenga, Imamu Amiri Baraka (formerly Leroy Jones), Amina Baraka, Sonia Sanchez, Maya Angelou, Kwame Ture' (formerly Stokely Carmichael), and Original Black Panther Party founders Dr. Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale. They began to wake Black people up to the fact that their slave names were a by-product of European colonialism, racism, and white supremacy. They taught that one way to fight white cultural oppression was to give up your slave name and replace it with an Afrikan name.

The Black Power Movement understood that a redefined Afrikan identity was absolutely necessary for Black Liberation.

In the late 1980's and early 1990's, there was a resurgence of Afrikan centered Black Consciousness. Leaders like Minister Louis Farrakhan, Dr. Khalid Abdul Muhammad, Minister Conrad Muhammad (now Rev. Conrad Tillard), Sistah Souljah, attorney Malik Zulu Shabazz, Ras Baraka, and Hip Hop artists Chuck D and KRS-1, contributed to this new movement for Black Power and Black Identity.

This is why, and how, I legally and officially changed my slave name to Bashir Muhammad Akinyele when I grew in love with Al-Islam and Afrikan centric Black consciousness in the 1990's.

I became Bashir Muhammad Akinyele in the Muslim Ummah (Community) and in the Afrikan centered Black conscious community. I am now Bashir Muhammad Akinyele outside of the Muslim Ummah (Community) and outside of the Black conscious community. I am now Bashir Muhammad Akinyele on all my bills, Insurance papers, marriage certificates, birth certificates, work IDs, credit cards, teacher licenses, driver licenses, the media, social media, and social security cards.

If you call my house, my wife and my children will tell you that my husband's and my father's name is Bashir Muhammad Akinyele.

The name Bashir is Arabic for one who brings good news. Muhammad is Arabic for One Worthy of Praise or Who Praises Much. The name Akinyele is Yoruba for a Strong One Befits the House.

In February a years ago, while I attended Masjid Ibrahim in Newark, NJ for Sataatul Jamaa'ah (Friday's Congregational Prayer); my good friend, Anthony Timmons is a teacher in the Newark Public Schools in New Jersey. He is Black Muslim. Anthony Timmons told me that he legally, and officially, gave up his slave name. I was elated with the news. His new Islamic name is now Abdul Shaheed, which is Arabic for Servant and Witness Bearer.

I really respected his move to change his name! Brother Abdul Shaheed is one of many brothers and sisters that have, and are, giving up the slave names in America. But what we must learn now is to fully grow our character into these beautiful Afrikan and Islamic names. But that is another lesson for another time family. For now, this is how and why Black people are giving up their slave names in America.

In this new millennium, I wonder who will become the next wave of Black political, cultural, and religious leaders to shape and mold our next generation's Black Identity.

Hotep!!!!!

-Bashir Muhammad Akinyele is a History Teacher, Black Studies Teacher, Community Activist,

Chairperson of Weequahic High School's Black History Month Committee in Newark, NJ, commentary writer, and Co-Producer and Co-Host of the All Politics Are Local, the number #1 political Hip Hip radio show in America. I can be reached at (bashir.akinyele@gmail.com).

#Hotep

#afrocentricity

#nationofislam

#kemet

#blackthelogy

#kwanzaa

#blackstudies

Note: Spelling Afrika with a k is not a typo. Using the k in Afrika is the Kiswahili way of writing Africa. Kiswahili is a Pan -Afrikan language. It is spoken in many countries in Afrika. Kiswahili is the language used in Kwanzaa. All over the world, Kwanzaa is recognized as a Pan-Afrikan centric holiday celebrated from December 26 to January 1.