Malcom X & Muhammad Ali pictured right.*
The Nation of Islam (NOI), in its rejection of the names imposed by white slave owners, encouraged its members to abandon their "slave names" and replace their surnames with "X"—a symbol of their lost African heritage. Yet, in a striking twist of irony, many then adopted Arabic names that directly translate to "slave" in another context. Names like Abdul (slave of), Abdullah (slave of Allah), Abid (slave/worshipper), and Abida (female slave/worshipper) became common among converts, unwittingly reinforcing the very concept of servitude they sought to escape.
This contradiction underscores the deep complexity of identity reclamation among African Americans navigating religious and cultural self-definition. The NOI’s emphasis on Islam as an alternative to Christianity, which they viewed as the "white man’s religion," led many to embrace Arabic and Islamic traditions without fully reckoning with their historical implications. Arabic-speaking societies, including Muslim-majority regions, were deeply involved in the trans-Saharan and Indian Ocean slave trades, including directly capturing and selling slaves to the West. The term abeed (slaves, plural of abd or slave) is still used in Arab popular vernacular to refer to Black Africans.
Thus, the effort to sever ties with European oppression led to the adoption of another linguistic and historical framework, which carries the same subjugating connotations. The rejection of "Johnson" or "Smith" in favor of "Abdullah" or "Abdul Rahman" represents not an escape from servitude, but rather a tragic exchange—one more recent oppressor’s legacy for a prior oppressor. The true liberation they sought might have required a deeper interrogation of both Western and Eastern historical narratives.
Ironically, while many sought refuge in Islam as an alternative to Western oppression, the Eastern slave trade persisted for centuries longer—only ending due to pressure from Western abolitionist movements. Some of the last holdouts included Saudi Arabia, which officially abolished slavery in the 1960s, and Mauritania, which didn’t criminalize it until 2007. This history complicates the idea of Islam as a liberating force for Black Americans.
* Muhammad Ali formerly known as Cassius Clay,