Muhammad Ali, Part V: Race and Religion: His Legacy

It is always somewhat dangerous to try to summarize a person’s legacy.  Because it is a summary, it leaves out many aspects of a person, including some that are likely inconsistent with the overall portrait.  We also tend to idealize those who have died.

And yet, as we face today’s issues and challenges surrounding race and religion, we do well to consider those who have gone before us who have faced similar challenges, and evaluate how they responded.  Christians ask, “How would Jesus have responded?”  Those who believe in active non-violence ask how Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., or Mahatma Gandhi would have responded.  Those who believe in more active confrontation may ask how Malcolm X would have responded.

Before embarking on this final post, a few words of summary of my journey thus far.  It began by reading several books and articles about Muhammad Ali, and visiting his birthplace, museum and place of burial in Louisville, Kentucky in June.

I realized almost immediately that as a youth I totally misunderstood Muhammad Ali, seeing him as a loud-mouthed braggart who did not represent the way I thought sport should be played.  However, I learned that this was his way of gaining a national, and eventually international, platform from which to speak.  In previous blogs I have talked about the way Islam transformed his life, his political stance against war and violence, and the deep spirituality that undergirded, strengthened, and directed his life.  Now, Muhammad Ali’s legacy.

It is hard to overestimate the extent of his influence, in part because he may have been the most recognizable person in the world.  Famed sports reporter Dick Schaap wrote in 2001: “I’ve covered sports for 50 years and there is no question that Ali is far and away the most significant, the most charismatic, the most charming person that I’ve ever met in sports.  Nobody else is even in second place.  If the Queen of England, the President of the United States, the Pope and Muhammad walked down Fifth Avenue, a lot of people would say, ‘Who are those three people with Muhammad Ali?’  He was definitely the most recognizable human being on earth and he probably still is.” [Muhammad Ali: Through the Eyes of the World, 372.]  African-American sports sociologist Harry Edwards speaks to the kind of person Ali was: “I’ve been around great athletes all my life, and I’ve long since gotten over being awed by them . . . . I wind up dealing with their problems.  I see their human side, and it was from that perspective that I really came to appreciate Ali.  I don’t know of anyone who doesn’t like Ali as a person.  Even when he did things that rankled, he carried himself in such a way that forgiveness was easy because there wasn’t a malevolent bone in his body.” [Hauser, 450.]

Ali loved children.  He would often slip away form adults in order to play with children.  He loved doing magic tricks for them.  However, because Islam teaches that you should never deceive, after the trick he would always show the kids how it was done.

Ali was extremely generous, perhaps too much so.  He made a great deal of money over the years, and many people, including many in his large entourage, took advantage of that generosity.  But Ali had a massive heart, and he was moved by anyone he saw suffering.  Stories like the following abound:  He was at a dinner honoring him at the Aladdin Hotel in Vegas.  He was awarded a large diamond ring.  Leaving the stage, he passed a little girl who was sitting in a wheelchair.  The mother asked Ali if he would pose for a picture with her daughter.  He posed, hugged and kissed her, and then put the diamond ring in her hand for her to keep. [Ibid., 368.]

His generosity included not just giving away gifts.  One time in Los Angeles a Vietnam veteran was having flashbacks and was on the 9^th story of a building threatening to jump from his balcony.  Ali walked out to him, put his arms around him, and brought him back.  He then spent $1800 on clothes for the vet and for an apartment in which he could live.” [Ibid. 367-68.]

Ali also cared about other fighters.  Ken Norton was only the second boxer to defeat Ali, breaking his jaw in Ali’s 43^rd fight in 1973.  Ali would win their next two bouts.  In 1986 Norton was in a very bad car accident, which left him hospitalized for several months.  Norton writes: “One thing I do remember is, after I was hurt, Ali was one of the first people to visit me . . . . I remember looking up and there was this crazy man standing by my bed.  It was Ali, and he was doing magic tricks for me.  He made a handkerchief disappear; he levitated.  And I said to myself, if he does one more awful trick, I’m gonna get well just so I can kill him.  But Ali was there, and his being there helped me.” [Ibid., 341.]

Another story about Ali speaks to issues involved today in the Black Lives Matter movement.  Pat Patterson was a Chicago policeman assigned to guard Ali in the mid 1970’s.  He writes: “Being with [Ali] affected the kind of policeman I turned out to be.  I was a relatively young man when I met him.  I was about 29, but I hadn’t been on the force long.  And young police, they’re always interested in locking people up.  But with Ali, I realized it was more important to be a peace officer, that people needed help.  He taught me to take time and listen to people.  Watching him, I learned that power shouldn’t be used in a bullying way.  The man was so caring; he cared so much about people. And after a while, you had to know that the way he felt about people was right.” [Ibid., 288-89.]

Actor Dustin Hoffman summarizes Ali well, “They are right when they say fighting was his profession, peace was his passion and grace is his essence.” [Through the Eyes, 190.]

Because of his concern for people, and his recognition throughout the world, at times Ali served as an informal US ambassador.  In 1980 President Jimmy Carter sent him to Kenya regarding the boycott of the Moscow Olympics.  In 1990 he traveled to Iraq to meet with Saddam Hussein.  After 10 days he was successful in having 15 hostages freed.  One of them was Harry Brill-Edwards, who describes his encounter with Ali: “I suppose what impressed me most about Ali was the way he cared for everyone.  He had a kind word or gesture for absolutely everyone he saw.”  Brill-Edwards then had the chance to fly home on a State Department charter, but Ali was not invited on the charter, and Brill-Edwards decided to wait to go on the same flight with Ali, explaining: “I said to myself, I can’t do this. We should be in Muhammad Ali’s presence when we go home.  In the end, six of us stayed on the flight with Ali.  We did it out of sheer gratitude and respect for the man . . . .I told my family when I got home, ‘I’ve always known that Muhammad Ali was a super sportsman; but during those hours that we were together, inside that enormous body, I saw an angel.’”

The world has certainly not overlooked Ali’s legacy.  He has received countless awards, including the Arthur Ashe Courage Award, Sports Illustrated’s Sportsman of the Century, the Presidential Citizens Medal from President Bill Clinton, the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President George W. Bush, and the Otto Hahn Peace Medal in Gold of the UN Association of Germany (DGVN) in Berlin for his work with the U.S. civil rights movement and the United Nations.

On November 19, 2005 the $60 million non-profit Muhammad Ali Center opened in downtown Louisville. It is a wonderful museum displaying not only boxing memorabilia, but it has as a focus Six Core Principles of Confidence, Conviction, Dedication, Giving, Respect, and Spirituality.  Toward that goal, the Center sponsors educational programs on such themes as Gender Equality and Global Citizenship.  On the day I visited, as the Museum was closing for the day, a large group of young folks were being welcomed in to the museum for a special program on global citizenship.  Throughout the Center 19 languages are represented, and the exhibit named the Hope and Dream Wall includes over 5000 inspiring drawings and paintings created by children from 141 countries.

But perhaps for all of us blessed to have children, the most important legacy may be left in the way they see us and describe our lives. Hana Ali, writes: “In the last years of his life, my father, Muhammad Ali, was as beautiful a man with a mission as he had ever been.  He glided across the ring of life as though he were a Messenger of the Spirit.  No obstacle could bring his majesty down.  His step, though slower in pace, was both a testimony and a prayer that he lived in trust and not fear.  No illness could take away his brightness.  It was ever-present in his gleaming eyes and will carry on through the compassion and generosity that flowed like a stream throughout his life.” [ESPN Magazine, 6/27/16, p. 95.]