The Greatest

Out of my head

The Thrilla In Manila – the third and final fight of the Mohammad Ali vs Joe Frazier rivalry – was the greatest boxing match I’ve ever seen. It was also beyond brutal. Two great fighters (Ali, of course, was the greatest) pummelled each other for fourteen fierce rounds in crippling heat and humidity. Neither one was willing to give in or give up – till Frazier’s corner refused to let him get up for the 15th and final round.

The bout was a showcase of not just physical skills but also of human spirit and human courage. Later, Ali would say that was the closest to death that he had ever come. The match reaffirmed Ali’s greatness as a boxer even if he was never quite the same again as a pugilist (neither was Frazier). To Ali it was worth it: “What I suffered physically was worth what I’ve accomplished in life. A man who is not courageous enough to take risks will never accomplish anything in life.”

But Ali’s greatness lay not just in his fighting skills. He was not merely a boxing champion. He was great because he became a standard-bearer for the fight against oppression. He was a champion because he became the voice of the silenced. He provided strength to the weak by standing up against injustice and standing up for what he believed what was right. He gave up almost everything – titles, money, fame, access, respectability – for his beliefs by refusing to be drafted into the US army during the Vietnam conflict.

“I ain’t got no quarrel with them Vietcong,” he said. “Why should they ask me to put on a uniform and go 10,000 miles from home and drop bombs and bullets on Brown people in Vietnam while so-called Negro people in Louisville are treated like dogs and denied simple human rights? No I’m not going 10,000 miles from home to help murder and burn another poor nation simply to continue the domination of white slave masters of the darker people the world over. This is the day when such evils must come to an end.

“I have been warned that to take such a stand would cost me millions of dollars. But I have said it once and I will say it again. The real enemy of my people is here. I will not disgrace my religion, my people or myself by becoming a tool to enslave those who are fighting for their own justice, freedom and equality. If I thought the war was going to bring freedom and equality to 22 million of my people they wouldn’t have to draft me, I’d join tomorrow. I have nothing to lose by standing up for my beliefs. So I’ll go to jail, so what? We’ve been in jail for 400 years.”

He would fight for the underdog and for what was right all his life. He was with the indigenous American people when they marched from California to Washington, D C to protest plans brewing in the American Congress to basically eliminate their land, water, hunting, fishing and legal rights on reservations across the US and virtually end all social services. Because he believed in Jason Rezaian’s innocence, Ali wrote to the Iranian government to release the jailed Washington Post reporter accused of spying.

When his friend, the Jewish comedian Billy Crystal, told Ali he couldn’t join him in a run on a golf course in a country club because the club didn’t allow Jews, Ali was incensed. “They don’t allow Jews? I’m a Muslim and they allow me! I will never run there again, little brother, I promise you.” And he didn’t.

The world loved him. He was pretty (as he reminded us often). He was funny (“I’m so fast that last night I turned off the light switch in my hotel room and got into bed before the room was dark.”). He was a poet: “I am America. I am the part you won’t recognise. But get used to me. Black, confident, cocky, my name not yours. My religion, not yours; my goals, my own; get used to me.”

He was courage personified as he showed us again when he battled the disease that had ravaged his body and forced his trembling hands to hold and light the Olympic torch at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics. The same disease would take his speech from him – a supreme irony for a man who was as quick with his mouth as he was with his hands. But Ali refused to give in to despondency or bitterness: “This life is not real. I conquered the world and it did not bring me satisfaction. God gave me this illness to remind me that I’m not number one. He is.”

We loved him in Pakistan because he was all of the above and more. He was also Muslim and a world champion. He was a hero. He was our hero. But heroes are to be emulated. The pity and irony is that as a country and as a nation our religious and spiritual journey has been the exact opposite of the great man’s.

“A man who views the world the same at 50 as he did at 20 has wasted 30 years of his life,” Ali said. He did not waste his life. He learned and he observed and he grew. His religious journey took him from a more extreme and militant version of Islam to the mainstream and ultimately to an even more inclusive, Sufi-inspired spirituality.

“Hating people because of their colour is wrong. And it doesn’t matter which colour does the hating. It’s just plain wrong,” Ali said. He also stated, “[It] don’t matter what religion you are, if you’re a good person, you’ll receive God’s blessing,” and “Rivers, ponds, lakes and streams – they all have different names, but they all contain water. Just as religions do – they all contain truths.” In Pakistan we have surely and steadily moved away from our Sufi-inspired Islamic traditions to a more rigid orthodoxy and some to even more extremist and militant versions of our basically peaceful religion. We have failed our hero.

When David Frost asked him how he would like to be remembered, Ali gave him his recipe for life: “I’d like for them to say: He took a few cups of love. He took one tablespoon of patience, one teaspoon of generosity, one pint of kindness. He took one quart of laughter, one pinch of concern. And then, he mixed willingness with happiness. He added lots of faith, and he stirred it up well. Then he spread it over a span of a lifetime, and he served it to each and every deserving person he met.”

The interfaith memorial service for Muhammad Ali – which he himself had planned in great detail before his death – was a testament to his own beliefs as a true Muslim whose heart was huge and capacity for acceptance was great. Muslim, Christian, Jewish, Buddhist, Native American speakers all gave eulogies and presidents and senators and comedians and spiritual leaders spoke in his honour.

For a few hours the world stood still in its remembrance of a wonderful and great man the likes of whom we are unlikely to ever see again. He brought the world closer together during his life. He did it again in his death.

The writer is a freelance columnist.

Email: Kmumtaz1@hotmail.com

Twitter: @KhusroMumtaz