My Brother Jermaine: Becoming Muhammad Abdul-Aziz Sharif
Muhammad Abdul-Aziz Sharif, a noble name, one that Jermaine Jackson claims as his own: praiseworthy servant of the Exalted One, and honored leader. A name given to him upon converting to Islam in August of 1989.
I remember when news of his conversion swept through my small Islamic community in Syracuse, New York, where I was a grad student. A convert to Islam in 1984, I was so happy for him. We all were. There was no internet back then, so I knew little else about him or even the story of his conversion. Intent on my studies, I watched hardly any TV and even if I were to tune in, my miniscule portable black and white TV would have provided little news. The fact that Jermaine was a Muslim never left me, though. So, when I recently rediscovered the Jackson 5, I was naturally drawn to Jermaine. Muslims consider all who profess the faith as our brothers and sisters. I regard him similarly and the more I learned about Jermaine and his Islam, the more respect I gained for him.
So, let’s begin with his conversion story, the one he conveys in his 2011 memoir, and in a 2010 Al-Arabiyah interview. (There is a conversion story that circulates through the internet, but I have never been able to trace it directly to him). Jermaine and his five brothers and three sisters were raised Jehovah Witnesses. As the faith dictates, they did not celebrate holidays like Christmas or birthdays. Jermaine and his brother Tito would proselytize, knock on people’s doors to spread to word, as did Michael and La Toya (and maybe other siblings, but I know of these four). Jermaine dutifully acted in accordance with the religion, but he harbored doubts. As he told the Al-Arabiyah interviewer he always had questions, such as “how many are going to heaven and what do we have to do to get there.” When he asked for guidance, he never felt “complete from the answers.”
After his marriage to Hazel Gordy ended in 1988, Jermaine wrote that he craved solitude, to search for something missing. In 1989, Jermaine, on instinct, followed elder sister Rebbie on her concert tour through the Middle East. While in Bahrain, his friend Ali Qamber invited him to meet the family. Jermaine interacted with the Qamber children and they so impressed him with their manners, that every negative perception he had about Islam melted away. His mind traveled back to his family home and conjured a memory of his friend, the great Muhammad Ali giving da’wah to his mother, a staunch Jehovah’s Witness. This recollection stirred a place deep within that he was now ready to receive. As he told the Al-Arabiyah interviewer: “I felt so pure, so special. I’d grown up as a Jehovah Witness…but I never felt a connection until I embraced Islam.”
The Muslim holy places called to Jermaine, and he and Ali Qamber spontaneously journeyed from Bahrain to Mecca, and they performed the Umrah, as the Hajj season had just recently passed. While in the Mesjid Al-Haram, the huge open-air home of the black draped Ka’aba, Jermaine resonated with the harmony and order of Islamic worship. Everyone united in ritual: He made seven counterclockwise circuits around the Ka’aba with dozens and dozens of pilgrims and stood shoulder to shoulder in neat rows with his new brothers to perform the five daily prayers. Of this experience he wrote: “As I prayed…I started to feel as if I was gliding not walking. From nowhere, I felt the rush of being onstage and hearing a crowd’s roar. I felt euphoric without anything tangible before me.”
Jermaine reveled in being part of the world-wide observation of the Ramadan fast. The emphasis on cleanliness and reverence for the Qur’an, Islam’s holy book also resonated: “Order, cleanliness, and respect. Just as I was raised.” Exhilarated, he returned home, determined to live his life in accordance with Allah’s will and “become a better human being.”
The latter phrase, Jermaine used consistently when interviewers asked about his Islam, and little else: Islam helps him become a better person. Oh, he was always excited to tell interviewers who asked that he was a Muslim, and he proudly shared his Muslim name, but I would frustratingly get little additional insight. Even though Barbara Walters once called him, the “most outspoken” of the Jackson brothers, due to the generosity with which he granted interviews, Jermaine is naturally quiet and reserved, and by his own reckoning, “shy.” Given that Jermaine’s life is subject to such intense media scrutiny, maybe he likes keeping that aspect for himself and for those close to him. I don’t blame him. As a convert myself, I do sometimes lose patience with people who press me for information about my conversion story. It is difficult to share something so personal with a veritable stranger.
Still, my predilection towards him drove me to learn more and surprisingly I found almost all I needed to know from his appearance on the 2007 Celebrity Big Brother UK. Here, Jermaine’s routine Islamic practices revealed him to be a serious, practicing Muslim. I will discuss his participation in house activities and subsequent interviews next, where Jermaine cracks opens the door of his practice and beliefs just a bit wider for all to see. And as I learned more about his faith, the more grateful I became for the blessings Allah grants me.