Yet what seemed to some Christian outsiders like a move toward
biblical repentance was, according to expert observers, actually a common
tactic in Farrakhan’s messaging: using Christian language to apply to the
African American movement’s own theology.
“It sounds like, because he used Jesus, that he’s talking about
the biblical Jesus,” said Atlanta preacher Damon Richardson, who was born and
raised in the Nation of Islam but found Jesus—the Christian one—at 16.
“I’ve got pastors and friends who are sharing the video, saying,
‘Hallelujah, praise God for this conversion,’ and they are not doing the
research.”
Farrakhan gave his remarks earlier this month at a Washington
church where he has guest-preached for decades, and posted a clip on Facebook
which has been viewed by more than 1.3 million people.
The 84-year-old minister
said:
I thank God for guiding me for 40 years absent my teacher. So my
next journey will have to answer the question. I'm gonna say, I know that my
redeemer liveth. I know, I'm not guessing, that my Jesus is alive. I know that
my redeemer liveth and because he lives I know that I, too, will pass through
the portal of death yet death will not afflict me.
So I say to the devil, I know I gotta pay a price for what I’ve
been teaching all these years. You can have the money, you can have the
clothes, you can have the suit, you can have the house but, me, you can’t have.
His language rings familiar for churchgoers. But Richardson, an
urban apologist speaking on Facebook
in response, said the clip offers a lesson in the importance of using sound
hermeneutics—including understanding how a message was originally intended and
received.
Farrakhan restructured the Nation of Islam in the 1970s following
its longtime leader and his mentor Elijah
Mohammad, who died in 1975. He ultimately declared Mohammad as a new savior
sent from Allah.
“When he says, ‘I know that my redeemer lives,’ this is a
reference to the fact that he believes Elijah Mohammad, while physically
absent, is physically alive,” Richardson said. (This is a shift in the Nation
of Islam’s theology, since founder Wallace Fard Muhammad was originally seen as
the savior and was even honored with a holiday called “Saviours’ Day.”)
“When [Farrakhan] says, ‘I know I’m going to have to pay a price
for what I’ve been teaching all these years,’ this is not a denouncing of the
teaching. This is an affirmation that he believes what he has been teaching is
right,” Richardson said. “The price is death, imprisonment, or some sort of
persecution for exposing the identity of the devil, who the Nation of Islam
teaches is the white man.”
Even after Christians’ due diligence on Farrakhan’s latest
remarks reveal that he has not moved away from his own teachings, they can
continue to pray for him and all in the Nation of Islam, said apologist and
church planter D. A. Horton.
The Nation of Islam began as a black nationalist and Islamic
movement to “teach the downtrodden and defenseless black people a thorough
knowledge of God and of themselves.” In a 2000
interview with CT, theologian Carl Ellis described the Nation of Islam
among several groups with “a theology based on the historical core cultural
issues of African Americans—dignity, identity, significance, empowerment—along
with various doctrines that claim God is black and the white man is the devil.”
Though its numbers aren’t as high as during the 1960s and 1970s,
the group under Farrakhan continues to have a presence in major cities and a
closer relationship with some black churches who ascribe to black liberation
theology, according to Richardson.
“His relationship with the black church has grown over the year
because of his tendency to use Scripture and Christian language,” Richardson
said in an interview with CT. “It’s the skin of the truth, stuffed with a lie.”
Farrakhan has made hundreds of references to Jesus over the
course of his ministry and incorporated God’s son in his teaching, including
attributing the light shining from the east (Matt. 24:27) to Elijah
Mohammad.Many Nation of Islam speakers also follow the “language, symbols, and rhythm of black church culture” in their style, according to Washington pastor Thabiti Anyabwile.
“It is definitely a deceptive means that the Nation of Islam will
use to lure unsuspecting Christians,” said pastor Ernest Leo Grant II, who has
written about the need for a new approach to defending
the Christian faith in the inner city.
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