Elijah Muhammad

Elijah Muhammad (born Elijah Robert Poole, later Elijah Karriem; October 7, 1897 – February 25, 1975) was an American religious leader who led the Nation of Islam from 1933 until his death in 1975. Under his leadership, the Nation of Islam grew from a small Detroit-based movement into a nationwide organization with tens of thousands of members in the United States during the civil rights movement. The group promoted black nationalism and a distinctive theology which taught that white people were a race of "devils" created by an evil black scientist named Yakub, and that there were multiple gods, each a black man named Allah. Elijah Muhammad taught that he himself was the messenger of these gods.

In the 1930s, Muhammad formally established the Nation of Islam, a religious movement that originated under the leadership and teachings of Wallace Fard Muhammad and that promoted black power, pride, economic empowerment, and racial separation. Muhammad taught that Master Fard Muhammad is the 'Son of Man' of the Bible, and after Fard's disappearance in 1934, Muhammad assumed control over Fard's former ministry, formally changing its name to the "Nation of Islam".