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The Moorish Science Temple of America is a religious organization founded in 1913 by Noble Drew Ali. Its main tenet was that African Americans were descended from the Moors and thus were originally Islamic.

Contents 1 Noble Drew Ali's beginnings 2 History 2.1 Early history 2.2 Schism and the death of Drew Ali 2.3 The 1930's 2.4 FBI surveillance 3 Factions 4 The Prophet's teachings 5 The Prophet's practices 6 Notes 7 References 8 External links

Timothy Drew was born in January 8, 1886, in North Carolina, USA. The accounts of Timothy Drew's childhood are varied, from him being the son of two former slaves who was adopted by a tribe of Cherokee Native Americans, to him being the son of a Moroccan Muslim father and a Cherokee mother. He is recorded, perhaps apocryphally, as saying, “When I was born, it turned black dark in the daytime. The people put their hoes down and came out of the fields.”

According to the Moorish Science account, at the age of 16, he joined a circus and became a stage magician, befriending a band of Roma ("gypsies") with whom he traveled the world. It was supposedly during these travels that he met the high priest of an Egyptian cult of magic. In one version of Drew's biography, the leader saw him as a reincarnation of the founder of the cult, while in others he considered him a reincarnation of Jesus Christ. According to the biography, the cult trained him in mysticism, and bestowed upon him a lost version of the life of Jesus.

This text came to be known as the Holy Koran of the Moorish Science Temple of America (which, in this case, is never spelled Qur'an), or, somewhat more informally, as the Circle Seven Koran due to its cover, which features a red "7" surrounded by a blue circle. Drew changed his name to Noble Drew Ali, the Prophet, and returned to the United States.

In 1913 Drew Ali formed the Canaanite Temple in Newark, New Jersey.^[1] Forced to flee town for his views on race, Drew Ali and his followers settled in Philadelphia, Washington D.C., and Detroit. In 1926, in Chicago, he officially registered Temple No. 9.

In the late 1920's, it was estimated that the Moorish Temple had 15,000 members in 17 temples,^[2] despite scrutiny, and possibly harassment, by the Chicago police.

Following a conflict over funds, the business manager of the Chicago Temple, Claude Green Bey, splintered off, declaring himself Grand Sheik and taking a number of members with him. On March 15, Green-Bey was stabbed to death at the Unity "mosque", 3640 Indiana Avenue, Chicago.^[3] Although out of town at the time,^[4] Drew was arrested as an instigator along with other members of the community. Allegedly beaten by police, Drew was released on bond pending an indictment.

Shortly after his release, Drew Ali died at his home in Chicago on July 20, 1929.^[5] Although the exact circumstances of his death are unknown, speculation was that it was due to injuries received at the hands of the police, or from being beaten by other members of the Moorish community,^[6] or even pneumonia.^[7] However, one Moor told the Chicago Defender that "The Prophet was not ill; his work was done and he laid his head upon the lap of one of his followers and passed out".^[8]

At the Unity Conference later that year, the governors declared C. Kirkman Bey as the successor to Drew Ali, naming him Grand Sheik. However, John Givens El, Drew's chauffeur, declared that he was Drew reincarnated, leading to a division within the temples.^[9]

In the 1930's, the community was further split when Wallace Fard Muhammad, known within the church as David Ford-El, also claimed to be the reincarnation of Drew Ali. When his claims were rejected, he broke away from the Moorish Science Temple and moved to Detroit to form his group, one which would eventually become the Nation of Islam.

Despite the turmoil and defections, the church grew. It is estimated that church membership in the 1930's reached 30,000, with major congregations in Philadelphia, Detroit, and Chicago,^[10] a community large enough to support two publications: the Moorish Guide National and Moorish Science Monitor.

During World War II, the Science Temple (specifically the Kirkman Bey faction) got the attention of the FBI, who falsely suspected the Moors of collaborating with Japan. The FBI was alarmed by doctrines and prophecies that the world order would one day invert and put the Asiatics of the world back in charge, as the Temple taught was the original order of things. The FBI created a file on the organization which grew to 3,117 pages, but produced no evidence of any connection or even much sympathy between the Empire of Japan and the temple.

It is estimated that in the 1950's the community had 10,000 members in 15 temples.^[11]

The neutrality of this section is disputed. Please see the discussion on the talk page. This section has been tagged since December 2007.

Bro C. Kirkman-Bey [1], the Prophet’s translator, became the head of what would eventually be the largest group, and which currently claims the name "Moorish Science Temple of America, Inc". This came about over him splitting away from the Grand Body in 1934, in disagreement with the head E Mealy El over the usage of a self-proclaimed title "Supreme Grand Advisor and Moderator" which did not exist within the group. Currently, this faction of the Moorish Science Temple of America has been particularly successful in the prisons.

Another faction developed into the so-called Reincarnated Temples, led by the Prophet’s former chauffeur, Bro. John Givens El, who thereafter called himself "Noble Drew Ali, Reincarnated". Givens El, and the brothers Richardson Dingle-El and Timothy Dingle El who succeeded him, taught that the Prophethood of Noble Drew Ali remained intact and passed on to them at the death of each before them, similar to the succession of authority from father to son or grandson in Shia Isma’ili Islam. From the work of the Dingle El brothers came the splits of the Temple No. 13, and the creation of a faction headed in Baltimore, MD, called the Noble Order of Moorish Sufis [2] in Baltimore. Founded by the former Grand Mufti Sultan Rafi Sharif Bey on July 7, 1957, this group later led to the founding of the Moorish Orthodox Church and the Moorish League. The Order of the Resurrection with its Second Heaven Order of four degrees was co-written by Sheik Rafi Sharif Bey and Sheik Timothy Dingle El.

The smallest faction continued their faithfulness to the original teachings of Noble Drew Ali and his successor whom he appointed Bro. E. Mealy El as the Grand Sheik/Supreme Grand Sheik. This faction is still in existence, but with probably the fewest adherents out of the three; this group claims true lineage to the Prophet, and has various followings by a few separate factions formerly held together by Mealy El's step-grandson D. Bailey El (ex Grand Governor, now expelled for embezzlement), succeeded by Sheiks in Chicago that he appointed prior to his official termination as Grand Governor and Sheik; that particular grand body has a few temples throughout the country and are continuing the works of Noble Drew Ali.

The Holy Koran of the Moorish Science Temple of America is held to be a collection of knowledge kept secret by the Moslems of the East, now brought back to light by the Prophet. As such, Noble Drew Ali did not claim to be the author of the work, per se, although the final section of the Koran, Chapters 45-48, are in his proverbial hand. The Koran is in three major sections. Chapters 2-19 contain the lost history of Jesus as a child and young man, His travels and teachings in Palestine, Egypt, Europe, and India. The ministry of John the Baptist also figures heavily in this section. The most probable source for this material is the Aquarian Gospel of Jesus Christ, although the man credited with this work, Levi H. Dowling, as in the case of Noble Drew Ali, did not claim authorship, but rather suggests that it is a revealed, pre-existing text. The second major section of the Koran, Chapters 20-44, seems to be derived from the Ancient Egyptian text used by the Rosicrucians called Unto Thee I Grant, and consists largely of discussions of various aspects of the human condition. The third and final section, apparently penned by Noble Drew Ali, himself, contains a collection of histories of Asiatic peoples and the founding of Christianity, as well as an overview of the mission and intent of the Science Temple. In addition to these three sections, Chapter 1 serves as a sort of Creation story, a discussion of the fundamental nature of humans, how they came into being, and what their relationship to God is. This chapter is a slightly revised section from the introduction to Levi H. Dowling's text rather than from the "Aquarian Gospel." There is also a quick epilogue between Chapters 19 and 20, summing up the events portrayed in the first section as the story of the lives of Jesus and John the Baptist.

A major theme of the Moorish Science Temple is teaching or returning nationality to members of the Asiatic Nation of North America. The Science Temple was an early proponent of the Black Power movement in America, although Marcus Garvey is celebrated by the Moorish Science Temple as the Forerunner of the Prophet. The temple's doctrine was that of racial tolerance and equality, and the structure of the religion theoretically embraced all races. Drew Ali taught that Moors were "Asiatic", that there are only two races on the planet, Europeans and Asiatics. The peoples of Asia, Africa, and the Pacific, as well as Latin Americans, and indigenous peoples of the Americas are all considered Asiatic, as well as Moslems in Moorish Science Temple teachings. Drew taught that Europeans represent the "Lower Self" (Satan), and were driven out of Mecca by the Asiatic Moslems. Drew said that the empowerment of the Moorish people could only be found through an acceptance of Islam, although the Moorish Science Temple's definition of Islam was very different from the conventional one, and was more of a theosophistic combination of many religions, including Buddhism and indigenous religions. The theology of the church was lenient and inconsistent, if not non-existent, although there were consistent themes of universal love and pride.

Doctrine of the temple was unconventional, including stories about Christ and Apollo battling, and the Greek Gods watching over his tomb before his resurrection, as well as the descendants of Sub-Saharan Africans should be referred to as "Moors" or "Moorish Americans" instead of Negroes, Blacks, or today, African-Americans.

Members of the Temple wear fezes, and a turban (including Drew, who wore a Cherokee feather in his) and add the suffixes Bey or El to their names to signify their Moorish heritage. The ushers of the Temple wore black fezzes, and the leader of a particular temple was known as a Grand Sheik, or Governor. Drew began to teach the Moorish Americans how to become better citizens, and make more impassioned speeches, urging Moors to reject the derogatory labels such as Black, colored, and Negro—and for Americans of all races to reject hate and embrace love. He believed that Chicago would become a second Mecca, and the temple began selling remedies such as Moorish Tea and issuing members of the church membership cards that authorized them as Moslems and declared that they were citizens of the United States.

Drew Ali was also known to have had several wives^[12] and, according to the Chicago Defender, he could marry and divorce at will.

• Chicago Defender (1929) "Drew Ali, 'Prophet' of Moorish Cult, Dies Suddenly", July 27, 1929, page 1.
• Chicago Tribune (1929) "Cult Head Took Too Much Power, Witnesses Say", May 14, 1929.
• "Timothy Drew" (1999) Religious Leaders of America, 2nd ed. Gale Group, 1999. Reproduced in Biography Resource Center. Farmington Hills, Mich.: Thomson Gale. 2007.[3]
• McCloud, Aminah (1994) African American Islam, Routledge.
• Padhdiwala, Tasneem (2007) "The Aging of the Moors", Chicago Reader, November 15, 2007, Vol 37 No 8.
• Scopino Jr., A. J. (2001) "Moorish Science Temple of America", in Organizing Black America: An Encyclopedia of African American Associations, Nina Mjagkij, ed., Garland Publishing, p. 346.

This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding reliable references. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (November 2007)

• The Moorish Science Temple of America, Inc.
• University of The Moorish Science Temple of America
• The Moorish Science Reading Room run by members of the Moorish Orthodox Church
• An article at the website by the National Secretary of the Noble Order of Moorish Sufis for history of the Moorish Science Temple, Noble Order of Morish Sufis, and Islam in America
• The Immortal Birth Book, Moorish Science Temple
• Asiatic Missionary by Rashid El
• Moorish Science Temple The Divine and National Movement of North America Inc., #13 (wesbite of the Newark Temple)
• Supreme Wisdom | Circle 7
• Noble Drew Ali featured in an article on "Indigenous Islam"
• Chris Zambelis, "Florida African-American Group Inspired by al-Qaeda Ideology," Jamestown Foundation Terrorism Focus, Volume 3, Issue 27, July 11, 2006.
• FBI Surveillance Documents of the Moorish Science Temple
• The Circle Seven Koran
• The Moorish Holy Koran and other documents online
• Seven Seals Publications
• Moorish Science in the news World War 4 Report, Sept. 21, 2005
• Frank Lewis El Bey & Lawrence Ross El factional website
• Noble Drew Ali (1886 - 1929) - Find A Grave Memorial: