Islam in the United States

The earliest documented cases of Muslims to come to the United States were two West African slaves: Ayuba Suleiman Diallo, who was brought to America in 1731 and returned to Africa in 1734,and Omar Ibn Said in the mid 19th century. There has been some speculation that a Moor slave Estevanico of Azamor, who had converted to Christianity 14 years before his arrival in North America in the early 16th century, was at least the first born Muslim to enter the historical record in North America. There is also a dubious tradition of an Egyptian named Nasereddine who settled in the Hudson Valley during colonial times.Once very small, the Muslim population of the US increased greatly in the twentieth century, with much of the growth driven by rising immigration and widespread conversion. In 2005, more people from Islamic countries became legal permanent United States residents — nearly 96,000 — than in any year in the previous two decades.

Recent immigrant Muslims make up the majority of the total Muslim population. Native-born American Muslims are mainly African Americans who make up a quarter of the total Muslim population. Many of these have converted to Islam during the last seventy years. Conversion to Islam in prison, and in large urban areas has also contributed to its growth over the years. American Muslims come from various backgrounds, and are one of the most racially diverse religious group in the United States according to a 2009 Gallup poll.

A Pew report released in 2009 noted that nearly six-in-ten American adults see Muslims as being subject to discrimination, more than Mormons, Atheists, or Jews.

 

Muslims in early United States

Estevanico of Azamor may have been the first Muslim to enter the historical record in North America. Estevanico was a Berber originally from North Africa who explored the future states of Arizona and New Mexico for the Spanish Empire. Estevanico came to the Americas as a slave of the 16th-century Spanish explorer Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca. After joining the ill-fated Narváez expedition in 1527, Cabeza de Vaca and Estevanico were captured and enslaved by Indians, escaping to make an arduous journey along the coast of the Gulf of Mexico. In 1539 Estevanico guided the first Spanish explorations of what is now the American Southwest.

N. Brent Kennedy has speculated that during the period 1567-1587, Moors and Turks were brought to the present-day Carolinas by Sir Francis Drake and/or by Portuguese or Spanish expeditions, and that some of these intermarried with Native Americans, giving rise to the Melungeon communities of Southern Appalachia. Amadou-Mahtar M'Bow, a Senegalese educator and former UNESCO director, has made similar assertions.The claim is not widely accepted.

One tradition has it that an Egyptian named Nasereddine settled in the Catskills near the Hudson River during the 1600s. He befriended the Mohawk chief Shordaken and sought the hand of his daughter Lotwana in marriage. Rejected, he poisoned Lotwana and in consequence was caught and burned at the stake.

In 1790, the South Carolina legislative body granted special legal status to a community of Moroccans, twelve years after the Sultan of Morocco became the first foreign head of state to formally recognize the United States. In 1796, then president John Adams signed a treaty declaring the United States had no "character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquillity, of Mussulmen".

Alexander Russell Webb is considered by historians to be the earliest prominent Anglo-American convert to Islam in 1888. In 1893 he was the only person representing Islam at the first Parliament for the World's Religions.

Slaves

Drawing of Abdulrahman Ibrahim Ibn Sori who was a Muslim prince from West Africa and made a slave in the United States.

 

There is limited academic research regarding African Muslims transported to North America as slaves. Historical records provide sparse information regarding both ethnic origins and cultural differences. However, some contemporary authors and historians speculate a sizable percentage of slaves possessed at least some knowledge of Islam. Slaves began arriving in North America during the 1520s. By 1900, roughly 500,000 Africans were sent to this area, representing 4.4% of the 11,328,000 slaves imported worldwide. Historians estimate that between 15 to 30 percent of all enslaved African men, and less than 15 percent of the enslaved African women, were Muslims. These enslaved Muslims stood out from their compatriots because of their "resistance, determination and education" It is estimated that over 50% of the slaves imported to North America came from areas where Islam was followed by at least a minority population. Thus, no less than 200,000 came from regions influenced by Islam. Substantial numbers originated from Senegambia, a region with an established community of Muslim inhabitants extending to the 11th century Michael A. Gomez theorized that Muslim slaves may have accounted for "thousands, if not tens of thousands," but does not offer a precise estimate. He also suggests many non-Muslim slaves were acquainted with some tenets of Islam, due to Muslim trading and proselytizing activities. Historical records indicate many enslaved Muslims conversed in the Arabic language. Some even composed literature (such as autobiographies) and commentaries on the Quran.

Despite living in a hostile environment, there is evidence that early Muslim slaves assembled for communal prayers. In limited cases, some were occasionally provided a private praying area by their owner. Two of the most widely known examples of Muslim slaves in North America are Ayuba Suleiman Diallo and Omar Ibn Said. Suleiman was brought to America in 1731 and returned to Africa in 1734. Like many Muslim slaves, he often encountered impediments when attempting to perform religious rituals. For example, it is said that a white child threw dirt at Suleiman’s face after catching him praying. However, Suleiman was eventually allotted a private location for prayer by his master. Omar Ibn Said (ca. 1770 –1864) is among the best documented examples of a practicing-Muslim slave. He lived on a colonial North Carolina plantation and wrote many Arabic texts while enslaved.

Born in the kingdom of Futa Tooro (modern Senegal), he arrived in America on December 27, 1807 aboard the ship Heart of Oak, one month before the US abolished importation of slaves. Some of his works include the Lords Prayer, the Bismillah, this is How You Pray, Quranic phases, the 23rd Psalm, and an autobiography. In 1857, he produced his last known writing on Surah 110 of the Quran. In 1819, Omar received an Arabic translation of the Christian Bible from his master, James Owen. This Bible is housed at Davidson College in North Carolina from a donation by Ellen Guion in 1871. Although Omar converted to Christianity on December 3, 1820, many modern scholars believe he continued to be a practicing Muslim, based on dedications to Muhammad written in his Bible. In 1991, a masjid in Fayetteville, North Carolina renamed itself Masjid Omar Ibn Said in his honor.

Another example is Bilali (Ben Ali) Muhammad, a Fula Muslim from Timbo Futa-Jallon in present day Guinea-Conakry, who arrived to Sapelo Island during 1803. While enslaved, he became the religious leader and Imam for a slave community numbering approximately eighty Muslim men residing on his plantation. He is known to have fasted during the month of Ramadan, worn a fez and kaftan, and observed the Muslim feasts, in addition to consistently performing the five obligatory prayers. In 1829, Bilali authored a thirteen page Arabic Risala on Islamic law and conduct. Known as the Bilali Document, it is currently housed at the University of Georgia in Athens.

Modern immigration

Small-scale migration to the U.S. by Muslims began in 1840, with the arrival of Yemenites and Turks, and lasted until World War I. Most of the immigrants, from Arab areas of the Ottoman Empire, came with the purpose of making money and returning to their homeland. However, the economic hardships of 19th-Century America prevented them from prospering, and as a result the immigrants settled in the United States permanently. These immigrants settled primarily in Dearborn, Michigan; Quincy, Massachusetts; and Ross, North Dakota. Ross, North Dakota is the site of the first documented mosque and Muslim Cemetery, but it was abandoned and later torn down in the mid 1970s. A new mosque was built in its place in 2005.

• 1906 Bosnian Muslims in Chicago, Illinois started the Jamaat al-Hajrije (a social service organization devoted to Bosnian Muslims). This is the longest lasting incorporated Muslim community in the United States. They met in coffeehouses and eventually opened the first Islamic Sunday School with curriculum and textbooks under Imam Kamil Avdić (a graduate of al-Azhar and author of Survey of Islamic Doctrines).
• 1907 Lipka Tatar immigrants from the Podlasie region of Poland founded the first Muslim organization in New York City.
• 1915, what is most likely the first American mosque was founded by Albanian Muslims in Biddeford, Maine. A Muslim cemetery still exists there.
• 1920 First Islamic mission station was established by an Indian Ahmadiyya Muslim missionary, followed by the building of the Al-Sadiq Mosque in 1921.
• 1934 The first building built specifically to be a mosque is established in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.
• 1945 A mosque existed in Dearborn, Michigan, home to the largest Arab-American population in the U.S.

Construction of mosques sped up in the 1920s and 1930s, and by 1952, there were over 20 mosques. Although the first mosque was established in the U.S. in 1915, relatively few mosques were founded before the 1960s. Eighty-seven percent of mosques in the U.S. were founded within the last three decades according to the Faith Communities Today (FACT) survey. California has more mosques than any other state. Black Muslim movements

Main article: History of the Nation of Islam, and American Society of Muslims

Mosque Maryam in Chicago, the headquarters of the Nation of Islam (NOI).

During the first half of the 20th century few numbers of African Americans established groups based on Islamic and Black supremacist teachings. The first of such groups created was the Moorish Science Temple of America, founded by Timothy Drew (Drew Ali) in 1913. Drew taught that Black people were of Moorish origin but their Muslim identity was taken away through slavery and racial segregation, advocating the return to Islam of their Moorish ancestry. The Nation of Islam (NOI) was the largest organization, created in 1930 by Wallace Fard Muhammad. It however taught a different form of Islam, it promoted Black supremacy and labeling white people as "devils". Fard drew inspiration for NOI doctrines from those of Noble Drew Ali's Moorish Science Temple of America. He provided three main principles which serve as the foundation of the NOI: "Allah is God, the white man is the devil and the so called Negroes are the Asiatic Black People, the cream of the planet earth". In 1934 Elijah Muhammad became the leader of the NOI, he deified Wallace Fard, saying that he was an incarnation of God, and taught that he was a prophet who had been taught directly by God in the form of Wallace Fard. Although Elijah's message caused great concern among White Americans, it was effective among Blacks attracting mainly poor people including students and professionals. One of the famous people to join the NOI was Malcolm X, who was the face of the NOI in the media. Also boxing world champion, Muhammad Ali.

Malcolm Shabazz Mosque in Harlem, New York City, formerly known as Mosque No. 7.

 

After the death of Elijah Muhammad, he was succeeded by his son, Warith Deen Mohammed. Mohammed rejected many teachings of his father, such as the divinity of Fard Muhammad and saw a white person as also a worshipper. As he took control of the organization, he quickly brought in new reforms. He renamed it as the World Community of al-Islam in the West, later it became the American Society of Muslims. It was estimated that there were 200,000 followers of WD Mohammed at the time. He introduced teachings which were based on orthodox Sunni Islam. He removed the chairs in temples, with mosques, teaching how to pray the salah, to observe the fasting of Ramadan, and to attend the pilgrimage to Mecca.It was the largest mass religious conversion in the 21st century, with thousands who had converted to orthodox Islam.

A few number of Black Muslims however rejected these new reforms brought by Imam Mohammed, Louis Farrakhan who broke away from the organization, re-established the Nation of Islam under the original Fardian doctrines, and remains its leader. As of today it is estimated there are at least 20,000 members. However, today the group has a wide influence in the African American community. The Million Man March in 1994 remains the largest organized march in Washington, D.C.The group sponsors cultural and academic education, economic independence, and personal and social responsibility. The Nation of Islam has received a great deal of criticism for its anti-white, anti-Christian, and anti-semitic teachings, and is listed as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center.

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