Malcolm X’s Letter from Hajj

Never have I witnessed such sincere hospitality and overwhelming spirit of true Brotherhood as it is practiced by the people of all colors and races here in the ancient Holy Land the home of Abraham Muhammad and all the other prophets of the Holy Scriptures for the past week I have been utterly speechless

And spellbound by the graciousness I see displayed all around me by people of all colors I have been blessed to visit the holy city of Mecca I have made my seven circuits around the Kaaba led by a young wolf named Mohammed I drank water from the well of Zamzam I ran seven times

Back and forth between the hills of Manasseh and muddle I have prayed in the ancient city of Mina and I have prayed on an auto-fire there were tens of thousands of pilgrims from all over the world there were of all colors from blue-eyed blondes to black skinned Africans but we were all

Participating in the same ritual displaying a spirit of unity and brotherhood that my experiences in America had led me to believe never could exist between the white and the non-white America needs to understand Islam because this is the one religion that erases from its society the race problem throughout my travels in the

Muslim world I have met talked and even eaten with people who in America would have been considered white but the white attitude was removed from their minds by the religion of Islam I have never before seen sincere and true Brotherhood practiced by all colors together irrespective of their color

You may be shocked by these words coming from but on this pilgrimage what I have seen and experienced has forced me to rearrange much of my thought patterns previously held and to toss aside some of my previous conclusions this was not too difficult for me despite my firm

Convictions I have always been a man and tries to face facts and to accept the reality of life as new experience and new knowledge and full I have always kept an open mind which is necessary to the flexibility that must go hand in hand with every form of

Intelligence search for truth during the past 11 days here in the Muslim world I have eaten from the same plate drunk from the same glass and slept down the same bed or on the same rug while praying to the same God with fellow Muslims whose eyes were the bluest of

Blue whose hair was the blondest of blonde and whose skin was the whitest of white and in the words and in the actions and in the deeds of the white Muslims I felt the same sincerity that I felt among the black African Muslims of Nigeria Sudan and Ghana we were truly

All the same brothers because their belief in one God had removed the white from their minds the white from their behavior and the white from their attitude I could see from this that perhaps if white Americans could accept the oneness of God then perhaps too they could accept in reality the oneness of

Man and ceased to measure and hinder and harm others in terms of their differences in color with racism plaguing America like an incurable cancer the so-called Christian white American heart should be more receptive to a proven solution to such a destructive problem perhaps it could be in time to save America from imminent

Disaster the same destruction brought upon Germany by racism that eventually destroyed the Germans themselves each hour here in the Holy Land enables me to have greater spiritual insight into what is happening in America between black and white the American Negro can never be blamed for his racial animosities he

Is only reacting to 400 years of the conscious racism of the American White’s but as racism leads America of the suicide path I do believe from the experiences that I’ve had with them that the whites of the younger generation in the colleges and universities will see the

Handwriting on the walls and many of them will turn to the spiritual path of truth the only way left to America toward after disasters that racism never we must lead to never have I been so highly honored never have I been made to feel more humble and unworthy who would

Believe the blessings that have been heaped upon an American Negro a few nights ago a man who would be called in America a white man a United Nations diplomat an ambassador a companion of Kings gave me his hotel suite his bed never would I have even thought of

Dreaming that I would ever be the recipient of such honors honors that in America would have been bestowed upon a king not a negro all praise is due to Allah the lord of the world sincerely and Hajj Malik el-shabazz

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