by Muhammad Ali
When Elijah Muhammad said that White people were devils, he was mainly talking about some of the history of America. White people slaughtered the Indians, enslaved Black people and robbed them of their cultures so they had no real identity.
Elijah Muhammad was not teaching hate when he told us about all of the evil things the White man has done any more than Whites are teaching hate when they tell you what Hitler did to the Jews. That’s not hate; that’s history.
We knew that not all White people were bad and that there were Black people who did wrong, too. Some White people wanted to help us and in their heart meant us no harm, but how were we to know who they were?
The way Elijah Muhammad put it was like this: what if there were one thousand rattlesnakes outside your door, and maybe one hundred of them wouldn’t bite you, didn’t mean you any harm. But they all looked alike, so you couldn’t tell the mean ones from the nice ones. What should you do? Should you open the door and hope that the hundred snakes that wouldn’t harm you will come together and form a shield, protecting you from the other nine hundred snakes that want to harm you? Or should you close the door and stay safe?
Through it all, I had people of different faiths and nationalities all around me. My trainer, Angelo Dundee, was Italian. Bundini Brown, my assistant trainer, was a Black man, but he was Jewish. Gene Kilroy, my camp manager, was White. Ferdie Pacheco, my ring doctor, was Cuban. And Howard Bingham, one of my closest friends, is Black and Christian.
I loved them all and considered them my family.
I never hated anybody, not then and not now.
I was just proud of who I was, and Islam helped me feel that way.
* * *
My faith has evolved over the years, and I now follow the teachings of mainstream Sunni Islam. But, a part of me will always be grateful to Elijah Muhammad and the Nation of Islam for opening my eyes and giving me something greater than myself to fight for.
Changing my name was one of the most important things that happened to me in my life. It freed me from the indignity done to my family by slavemasters who took away our family name and gave my ancestors the master’s name, like they weren’t human beings—only property.
I have always been a spiritual person; God doesn’t speak to me in a voice. It’s more like a feeling, a sense of what I have to do.
Whatever that is, I’m in tune with it. The first time I felt truly spiritual in my life was when I walked into the Nation of Islam’s temple in Miami, Florida. I felt like I had finally come home.
the day
I MET ISLAM
NO ONE MADE me decide to become a Muslim. I made up my own mind. I was still in high school when I first heard about the Nation of Islam. It was 1959 and I had traveled to Chicago for a Golden Gloves tournament. The Nation of Islam was led by Elijah Muhammad, and what he and his followers were saying about Black pride really got me thinking. Their self-confidence and military discipline also caught my attention. When I went back to school, I tried to do a term paper on them but my teacher wouldn’t let me because many White people, and some Blacks as well, thought the Nation of Islam was a pretty scary bunch.
One day in 1960 a Muslim minister—Abdul Rahaman, formerly called “Captain Sam” Saxon—came to see me. He was a follower of Elijah Muhammad, and he wanted to know if I’d be interested in coming to his mosque to hear more about the history of our forefathers. At that point in my life, I had never heard any Black man talk about his forefathers, except as slaves. This clean-cut, intelligent brother didn’t have to ask me twice. I went to the meeting.
I saw a minister standing on a stage in a simple room filled with men, women, and children who were all dressed modestly. So I took a seat and began to listen. The things he said really shook me up. Things such as that the Black man was the original man on earth and how we 20 million Black people in America (at that time) didn’t know our real identities or even our original names. That we were direct descendants of Black men and women kidnapped and brought here from Africa, and that we had been stripped of all knowledge of ourselves and our heritage. That we were taught to hate ourselves and our kind. Now, I had known this much about our history, but what came next was new to my ears.
He went on to say that’s how we so-called Negroes had come to be the only race among mankind that loved its enemies.
Now I was a kid who catches on quick. I said to myself, “Listen here! This man is saying something!”
As I continued to listen, I hoped that nobody would ever hit me in the ring as hard as this brother minister was doing now. He said the Chinese were named after China, the Russians after Russia, the Cubans after Cuba, the Italians after Italy, the English after England, and clear on down the line. Everybody was named after someplace they could call home—everybody but us.
He said, if I say look for Mr. Chung, you look for a Chinese man. If I say look for Mr. Gonzales, you look for a Cuban or a Spaniard. If I say Mr. Weinstein, you look for a Jew. If I said Mr. Morning Star, you know he’s a Native American. If I said Mr. Mobutu, you know he’s an African.
But if I said Mr. Green, or Mr. Jones, the man could be Black or White. Because in slavery we were named after a White person. He was our master and we were his slaves. If his name was Robinson, we were Robinson’s property and, therefore, were called by his last name. Our identity was determined by the names of our masters, and if we changed masters, our names changed, too.
Even my own name, Cassius Marcellus Clay, wasn’t really my own. Cassius Marcellus Clay was a White man from Kentucky who owned slaves. So, I was named after a slave owner, and to me my name represented hundreds of years of injustice and enslavement.
The minister said that today we were all free. We didn’t have chains on us. We weren’t anyone’s property, but we still had names like Green or Jones. He asked what country we so-called Negroes were named for. Well, boom! That really shook me up.
I didn’t join the Nation of Islam right then, but the seed was planted. I attended a lot of meetings in different places and never came out confused by something I hadn’t known or thought before. When I got more involved, Jeremiah Shabazz, the Nation’s regional minister, came from Atlanta to see me. He asked me questions that made me think even deeper about my concept of Jesus, such as, if Europeans and Americans worshiped a White Christ why was it that Black Americans didn’t worship a Black God?
I thought about my father back in Louisville, Kentucky, painting murals of a White Jesus in Baptist churches all over town. Who said Jesus was White? What painter ever saw Jesus?
I remembered that all the pictures on the walls of public places were always of White people. There was nothing about us Black folk. I saw little Black boys and girls straightening their hair so it would look like White people’s hair. I learned that in Islam, God and his prophets cannot be brought down to the level of human imagination. There are no pictures of God or of his angels or prophets because no single race should be able to identify with God through the color of its skin.
I wasn’t a member of the Nation of Islam yet, but whatever I believe, I believe, and I always stand up for what I believe. Before long I was in meetings, calling out just like the rest of the people.
Elijah Muhammad later gave me the name of Muhammad Ali. Muhammad means “worthy of all praises,” and Ali means “most high.”
The day I met Islam, I found a power within myself that no man could destroy or take away. When I first walked into the mosque, I didn’t find Islam; it found me.
THE MEANING
behind the message
IT’S NATURAL TO want to be with your own. Bluebirds fly with bluebirds, pigeons want to be with pigeons, eagles want to be with eagles. They are all birds, but they want to be with birds like themselves. In nature, all the animals stick together with their own kind, so why didn’t we stick together?
The Nation of Islam’s main focus was teaching Black pride and self-awareness.
Why should we keep trying to force ourselves into white restaura
nts and schools when White people didn’t want us? Why not clean up our own neighborhoods and schools instead of trying to move out of them and into White people’s neighborhoods? The Nation of Islam taught that integration would work only after Black people had something for themselves. We didn’t hate anybody; we just wanted to be with our own. Black people were in trouble; we needed to help ourselves first.
The slum wasn’t in the neighborhood; it was in the heart and soul of the people.
We needed to clean up our self-image and love ourselves the way God made us. Then we could work and live together in a peaceful manner. Charity must first begin at home, and that’s all we were trying to do—take care of ourselves.
God bless the child that has its own.
Well, Black people didn’t have anything that was our own.
When I became a Muslim, I was on my way to entering what I called “The Real Fight Ring,” the one where freedom and justice for Black people in America took place.
It’s just a job.
Birds fly.
Grass grows.
Waves pound the sand.
I beat people up.
MY FIGHTING
Had a Purpose
WHEN YOU SAW me in the boxing ring fighting, it wasn’t just so I could beat my opponent. My fighting had a purpose. I had to be successful in order to get people to listen to the things I had to say.
I was fighting to win the world heavyweight title so I could go out in the streets and speak my mind. I wanted to go to the people, where unemployment, drugs, and poverty were part of everyday life. I wanted to be a champion who was accessible to everyone. I hoped to inspire others to take control of their lives and to live with pride and self-determination. I thought perhaps if they saw that I was living my life the way I chose to live it—without fear and with determination—they might dare to take the risks that could set them free.
I knew that my boxing career wouldn’t last long. I had to be loud, proud, and confident. The world was watching and I knew that many people did not like everything about me. But sometimes all you have to do is breathe, and people will have an opinion on how you drew that breath. I couldn’t live the way that others wanted me to live. If I had stayed in Louisville and never become a boxer, I could have died and it would never have made any news. But because I was boxing, and winning, when I said something people took notice. I had to use that attention to advance my real purpose.
personality
Boxing made me feel like somebody different, and I didn’t think it was bragging to say that I was something a little special.
THE MAJORITY OF people have two different personalities: One that the world sees, and one they have in their private life. Some people think that my illness has dramatically changed my personality. They see me today as a quiet, soft-spoken, modest man. When they think of my personality during the years I was boxing, most people would have described me as a loud, boastful, arrogant upstart. The truth is, my personality really hasn’t changed that much.
It’s true that I don’t talk as much now, but that has more to do with my illness than my personality. The outgoing and spontaneous person that the world knew while I was boxing was a persona that I created to sell tickets and promote my career. In my private life, I am quiet and reflective by nature. I have always been curious about the world around me and my place in it.
GORGEOUS GEORGE
LEARNING TO BE A SHOWMAN
WHEN I WAS young, I never thought about the effect all my teasing and boasting might have on people. I was too busy selling tickets, playing around, and trying to promote my fights with my greatest asset—my mouth!
I never took the verbal sparring seriously. It was all showmanship, which I learned from one of the best, champion wrestler Gorgeous George. Not that I was ever really modest or humble, but when I was new to boxing, I did a radio program and Gorgeous George was on before me. That’s when I learned how self-promotion and colorful controversy could draw in the crowds.
When the radio host asked me about an upcoming fight, my response was pretty tame compared to the one George gave about a wrestling match he was going to have in the same arena. George said: “I’ll kill him; I’ll tear his arm off. If this bum beats me, I’ll crawl across the ring and cut off my hair, but it’s not gonna happen because I’m the greatest wrestler in the world!”
That really made an impression on me because I couldn’t wait to see that match. I didn’t care if he won or lost. I just wanted to be there to see what happened.
Me, and a thousand other people.
I went to the match and he came down the aisle with these two beautiful girls carrying his robe so it wouldn’t get dirty—real conceited, arrogant. And I’m looking at him and thinking, boy, he needs a good whuppin’.
I just wanted the other man to give it to him.
Gorgeous George was arguing with someone ringside, and the guy was yelling back at him, “You need a killing! You’re going to get killed tonight!” Well, the guy had a lady with him and I saw Gorgeous George reach over and take the mug of beer from the guy and throw it in his face—got his suit all messed up. I found out later the guy was part of the show, but it was very exciting.
And I thought to myself, all these people are here to see this guy get beat. They all paid to get in. And I said to myself, this is a good idea.
So that’s when I really started shouting, “I am beautiful. I am the greatest. I can’t be beat, I’m the fastest thing on two feet, and I float like a butterfly and sting like a bee. If you talk jive, you’ll fall in five …”
I started writing boxing poetry for the first time when I fought Archie Moore.
When you come to the fight
Don’t block the aisles
And don’t block the door
For you all may go home
After round four.
I won the fight in the fourth round, as I predicted I would. And over the years, seventeen out of twenty-one of my predictions came true. That’s a miracle. I don’t know how I did it. I started making predictions to sell tickets and my predictions started coming true.
When I said a fight would end in a certain round, it did. After a while people started coming up to me in the streets, saying, “If you don’t get that man in the round you said, I’ll lose my house, or I’ll lose my car.” Knowing that people were making bets like that, based on my predictions, made me nervous. But of all the fighters that I faced in the ring, Archie Moore was the only man that came close to matching my mouth. He had a clever response to almost every thing I said.
Like everything else I did, the critics had something to say about my poetry. They called my poems terrible. They said that they were the ravings of a madman.
I told those critics that I bet my poetry would be quoted and published more than any of the poems written by poets they liked. People who criticize usually talk about what they wish they could do. So, I never paid much attention to critics about anything negative.
Every time I opened my mouth, I could back it up.
The critics only made me work harder.
I talk to God every day,
If God is with me,
No one can defeat me.
MALCOLM X
A LEADER AND A FRIEND
I MET MALCOLM X for the first time in Detroit in 1962. I had driven up from Miami to Chicago to hear Elijah Muhammad address a large meeting, but Malcolm was the highlight of the evening for me. He carried the message that there was a special religion for the Black man. He was a charismatic speaker, and when he spoke, he could hold you spellbound for hours. Malcolm was among the most hated and feared men in America. I never understood how so many people feared a man who was only pursuing freedom and justice for his people. Perhaps it was because Malcolm was misunderstood; people usually fear what they don’t understand.
Malcolm X was a man of great vision and pride. He had a good sense of humor and a quiet intelligence.
It didn’t take us long to become friends. In time
, Malcolm became my spiritual adviser. He started calling me his younger brother. We had a lot of good times together.
When I was getting ready for the title fight against Sonny Liston, Malcolm was especially supportive. I flew Malcolm and his family into town a few weeks before the fight. When Malcolm came to my training camp in Miami, he talked to me about David and Goliath. He told me that I was young, strong, and skillful. He told me that he knew I would win because time was on my side.
Malcolm helped me focus on my strengths and he strengthened my belief in myself.
I had worked long and hard to get Liston’s manager to give me a shot at the title. For a long time they kept ducking me. Then one day they finally gave in. I’m not sure what did it, but I think I irritated Sonny’s manager so badly, that he agreed to the fight just to get rid of me. Nobody expected me to last one round, let alone win.
Sonny Liston was big and strong. I believed that I could win, but I was still a little scared because of his reputation.
Sonny had already beaten the world champion, Floyd Patterson, twice—knocking him out in the first round once and taking just over two minutes to bring him down in the second fight. Liston was bad! By comparison, people were calling me a novice. The odds were seven to one, and they weren’t in my favor. I figured that the only way I would ever get to Liston was by psyching him out.
My plan was to make him so mad at me that when the fight began, he’d be so unnerved that all he’d want to do would be to kill me. If that didn’t work, I hoped that he’d think my behavior proved I was insane, and that you could never tell what a madman would do. Either way, I hoped he’d forget all he knew about boxing. I could take care of the rest.
