No. 024
the transatlantic slave trade
2026 · 12 of 22 · 3:23
Words & music: Harold Lilly Jr.
Plays the film from this page.
The transatlantic slave trade has been documented to have been a business deal that left a group of people in a bad way. Hey, if you lose your language then you lose the ability to pass down your history you lose your history you forgo the deed to your inheritance and you become something other than yourself which is against your Original nature, but there was no one that could speak their language. So they did what they had to do and their kids did what they had to do and their kids did what they had to do and their kids did what they had to do and their kids did what they had to do and those kids set the stage for my Great Grandparents—As I started to think about my particular birthplace the Capitol of the colony of the beginning of the country Richmond, Virginia. I remember being taught as a kid that if slaves were caught with a book they could be killed. Then I thought about “Read in the name of thy Lord Who creates” then I say I wonder if the biggest crime in the history of slavery was not the physical evils done to a group of people but forcing illiteracy on a group of people for over 450 years. Whooo. That’s a lot to consider when I started to stumble upon the ramifications of a people not knowing their language I had to jump into action well action jumped into me. I decided that I would be the person who could speak their language and I would do it through music but I would be allowed the Permission to remember something most people cannot actively remember. God has allowed me to remember what the beginning of the country sound like. Yep! No doubt about it, I already engage with it during a successful year as a songwriter. 23 years spent writing songs in LA for the biggest stars in the world. No one knew that all I was doing was going to a well that is only found at the beginning of the country. I did need not know how to get there. I’m from there. I love there. There raised me. There fashioned me. There built me. There is where—there was no one who could speak their language. Maybe the language was Arabic? Maybe the Book was the Quran? Maybe? Maybe not? Slaves weren’t allowed to read. Islam first word is Read out of the mouth of Prophet Muhammad (may peace be upon his name). This essay is an attempt— No not an attempt. I’ve done it already. This essay is proof of what I’ve done. What am I doing? I’m teaching a Music Lesson. A Music Lesson of Music Lessons. A Music Lesson that took 1400 years, 450 in America, 44 years of my life, and 69 years of My Mother’s life to Create. All Praise Be To Allah for Music Lesson H1!
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