John Whitehead's Commentary

Did it take long to find me? I asked the faithful light. Oh, I'm being followed by a moonshadow.--Cat Stevens, "Moonshadow"

Several weeks ago, a United Airlines flight from London to Washington, DC, was forced to land in Maine after one of its passengers' names was discovered on a government "no-fly" list. According to a Homeland Security spokesman, Yusuf Islam's name had been included on the list "because of activities that could potentially be related to terrorism." After being questioned by FBI agents, Islam was eventually placed on a plane back to London.

His deportation from a country where he'd been welcomed for many years came as a shock to the artist formerly known as Cat Stevens. Since converting to the Islamic religion and changing his name more than two decades ago, Stevens, one of the great pop singer/songwriters of the 1960s and early '70s, has worked as a peace activist and has vocally condemned violence and terrorism as un-Islamic. In fact, just two months earlier, Stevens had been in Washington, DC, meeting with top officials from the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives about his charity work.

So what was it about this peace-loving musician that resulted in his being refused entry to the U.S.? His Muslim name and alleged affiliation with a Palestinian terrorist group might have had something to do with it, although government officials refuse to be specific about their concerns. Back in 1998, Stevens gave the keynote address at a fundraising dinner in Toronto for the Jerusalem Fund, which has been described as a group that helps Muslims in Palestine by financing hospitals, clinics, families in need and orphans.

Although the Canadian government has since identified the Jerusalem Fund as a "front" for the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas, Stevens has denied knowingly giving any money to a terrorist group. In fact, on his website, Stevens has posted numerous statements in opposition to terrorist attacks, including the September 11, 2001 attack. "No right thinking follower of Islam could possibly condone such an action: The Koran equates the murder of one innocent person with the murder of the whole of humanity." He has also donated a portion of the royalties from a four-disk set of his music to the families of the September 11th Fund.

As Stevens described himself, "I am a man of peace, and I denounce all forms of terrorism and injustice; it is simply outrageous for anyone to suggest otherwise. The fact that I have sympathy for ordinary people in the world who are suffering from occupation, tyranny, poverty or war is human and has nothing to do with politics or terrorism."

His quest for inner peace has led him on a colorful journey. Born Stephen Demetre Georgiou on July 21, 1948, and raised Catholic, he changed his name to Cat Stevens after breaking into the music industry at age 18. Although the introverted and shy musician began recording in the late 1960s, he soon found it hard to live up to his publicists' and the public's expectations of a "larger-than-life" image and lost himself in partying, drinking and smoking.

By age 19, Stevens had contracted tuberculosis and was hospitalized, which forced him to take about a year off. He began studying different religions and philosophies, focusing on Eastern ones in particular. He turned toward peace and meditation, covering the mirrors in his hospital room and growing a beard. That period of illness was a turning point in his life. As he put it, "I became aware of my own mortality and the inevitability of death." Although he hadn't yet discovered Islam, Stevens had become determined to search for answers--"for something higher, better and more real."

Upon his return to the music business, Stevens' songs, now more reflective and personalized, with a sense of "searching" in the lyrics, reflected his new insight and contributed to the great success of his next two albums, Tea for the Tillerman and Teaser and the Firecat. Throughout the 1970s, he achieved eight consecutive gold albums, with ten hit singles in the United Kingdom and fourteen in the U.S. But his success, combined with the notoriety of selling 23 million records worldwide, pushed Stevens deeper into self-seclusion and made him more devoted in his search for higher truth.

Gradually, Stevens came to view the materialistic side of the music business with disdain. After experiencing the so-called good life, he was hungry for something else. "One of the most dominant views of man is material," Stevens said. "The motto of this concept is 'Eat, drink and be merry.' The problem was that I had eaten, I had drunk--I wasn't merry."

The '60s generation was one in search of meaning. While the Beatles turned to the East and Bob Dylan converted to Christianity, Stevens looked into Buddhism, Hinduism, Zen and Astrology, eager to learn and find a belief system that satisfied him. In 1976, knowing that Stevens was an avid collector of such books, his brother David gave him a copy of the Koran. After spending a year reading the Koran, Stevens made the Testimony of Faith to become a Muslim. As he said, "The moment I became a Muslim, I found peace." Feeling that his lifestyle as a musician (which included greed, selfishness, idols, competition, drunkenness, etc.) was not compatible with Islam, he abandoned his music career, auctioned off all his musical instruments and changed his name to Yusuf Islam.

Of course, Stevens' conversion to Islam baffled and even dismayed many. Moreover, as a multimillionaire, Stevens could have spent the rest of his life in luxurious obscurity. Yet he chose to champion humanitarian and charitable causes, including some Muslim causes with questionable ties. During the famine of Africa in 1984, he helped establish an international relief organization. In 1990, he visited Iraq with a delegation of British Muslims on a peace mission and, as a result, returned with four hostages. He has helped fund schools for underprivileged children. Stevens is still actively on the peace train and continues to donate over half of his royalty income to charity.

Stevens' songs represent a time when pop music was innocent and the songs advocated principles based on peace and love. And no matter where his journey may lead him in the future, the words Cat Stevens once sang still speak to us:

Well you've cracked the sky, scrapers fill the air,
But will you keep on building higher
'til there's no more room up there?
Will you make us laugh, will you make us cry?
Will you tell us when to live, will you tell us when to die?

ABOUT JOHN W. WHITEHEAD

Constitutional attorney and author John W. Whitehead is founder and president of The Rutherford Institute. His most recent books are the best-selling Battlefield America: The War on the American People, the award-winning A Government of Wolves: The Emerging American Police State, and a debut dystopian fiction novel, The Erik Blair Diaries. Whitehead can be contacted at staff@rutherford.org. Nisha Whitehead is the Executive Director of The Rutherford Institute. Information about The Rutherford Institute is available at www.rutherford.org.

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