"We can never fall off,” said Brand Nubian’s Sadat X to Fab 5 Freddy, “’cause this is God right here.”
Filming a 1992 episode of Yo! MTV Rapsin front of the Five Percenters’
headquarters, Allah School in Mecca (aka Harlem, NYC), the dreadlocked
Lord Jamar ran down the long list of classic Five Percenter MCs. It
read like a hall of fame from the East Coast’s golden age: the World’s
Famous Supreme Team, Rakim, Big Daddy Kane, Poor Righteous Teachers,
and Lakim Shabazz—rappers who used their consider- able skills to
espouse the street gnosticism of the Five Percent Nation. And it don’t
stop.
Though condemned as heretics by Sunni Muslims and demonized by law
enforcement, the Five Percenter move- ment has thrived in various forms
until the present day, due in large part to the sense of purpose and
dignity that gods brought to the microphone. “The music just sounded
really intelligent, with some of the terminology that they used,” said
50 Cent in 2006.”
They studied their lessons, so they speak a certain way,” he said,
causing Five Percenters like Rakim to “ap- pear a lot more intelligent
than the other artists who were out there just rappin’.” The Five
Percenters bridged the gap between hip hop’s humble beginnings and New
York’s long tradi- tion of black Muslim consciousness. Alternately
known as the Nation of Gods and Earths, the movement began in the early
1960s with Clarence Edward Smith, a decorated Korean War vet who joined
the Nation of Islam’s Harlem mosque under its minister, Malcolm X. As
Clarence 13X (the 13th member named Clarence to drop his “slave name”),
he became absorbed in study of the mosque’s secret “Supreme Wisdom
Lessons.”
In these tran- scribed dialogues between Elijah Muhammad and
his teacher, W.D. Fard, who established the fi rst NOI mosque in
Detroit in 1930, Clarence was taught that images of God as a white man
in the sky were only a trick of the “devil.” “There is no mystery God,”
read the lessons. Rather than waste time searching for someone who did
not exist, Clarence learned to recognize himself and all black men as
living gods. As the “best knower” among the Gods, Fard was elevated to
the status of “Allah.”
In 1964, Malcolm X broke with the Nation of Islam amid bitter political conflicts, causing a schism among Harlem’s Muslims. Hewas gunned down the following year. The FBI, which closely monitored
the Nation of Islam, considered Clarence to have followed Malcolm after
the split; but despite their mutual respect, Clarence couldn’t relate
to Malcolm’s Sunni Islam, which rejected the idea of black gods and
white devils. He soon found himself in a no man’s land. While loving
Elijah’s lessons, he was on the outs with the mosque.
The reasons given are varied, but Clarence might have been frustrated by the strict codes of conduct. To register in the Nation of Islam meant no music, no drinking or smoking, no gambling, no girls, wearing bow ties, and standing on corners selling newspapers. Clarence was concerned that the most vital truth of the teachings—that the black man is god—would be lost on those who couldn’t conform.
Leaving the Nation and losing his “X,” Clarence went to pool halls and corner dice games to share the secret lessons freely with teen hustlers, dropouts, and throw-outs. Drawing up his own self-styled message, Clarence taught that reefer “referred” the mind, while shooting dice revealed the mathematical properties of the universe.
According to the lessons, 85 percent of society remained deaf, dumb, and blind to the truth, having been deceived by the “slave-makers of the poor,” the 10 percent. That left only a sliver of humanity, a mere five
percent, to liberate the minds of the masses. Clarence told his young
disciples that they were this messianic Five Percent, “poor righteous teachers” bringing truth to “all the human families of the planet Earth.” You are gods, he said. And for the street kids, he was no longer Clarence; they called him Allah. This
offended New York’s Sunni and NOI camps alike, but the Five Percenters evolved their own understanding of Islam. Allah read his new name as an acronym for “Arm, Leg, Leg, Arm, Head,” signifying the divinity of man, and he broke down “Islam” as “I Self Lord And Master”—placing Five Percenters beyond the rules and regulations of the mosque.
Declaring that Five Percenters were no longer Muslims, Allah/Clarence instructed them to drop their Islamic names and take on his—making all Five Percenters their own Allahs, no longer dependent on Clarence or any self-proclaimed prophet.
“Know you are Allah,” he told a young student, who would rename himself Allah B; “never deny yourself of being Allah, even if the whole world denies you...it’s your own doubt that can stop you from being Allah.”
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