Birth: July 1, 1939
Death: August 25, 2021 — Chicago, Illinois
Office: 6th Supreme Grand Sheik and Chairman of the Moorish Science Temple of America
Predecessor: Bro. O Lews El
Successor: Bro. P. Davis El
- David Bailey El served as the sixth Supreme Grand Sheik and Chairman of the Moorish Science Temple of America for twenty-four consecutive years — November 1968 to October 1992
Brother David Bailey El carried Noble Drew Ali’s Temple through twenty-four years without fracture. What he held, the next generation received intact to make your royal ancestry freely available to you today.
Here is that record…
Born Into the Movement
Bailey El did not come to Noble Drew Ali’s teachings as a convert. He was born into them on July 1, 1939 and grew up among the old Moors who had walked with Noble Drew Ali in the flesh. The lessons were not discovered. They were inherited.
At age 9, Bailey El lived under the same roof as Sis. Delia Mealy El — widow of E. Mealy El, the first Supreme Grand Sheik and Chairman and guardian of Noble Drew Ali’s original records. A 1940s U.S. Census records place him inside her household.
He was raised where Noble Drew Ali’s original documents and records were kept under lock and key.
Growing up with a Moorish upbringing, he commanded Drew Ali’s literature line by line — the Holy Koran of the Moorish Science Temple of America, the Divine Constitution and Bylaws, A Divine Warning to the Nation, the Moorish Historical Message to America and The Voice of the Prophet to name a few. He taught them with the fluency of a man who had lived inside them his whole life.
Twenty-Four Years at the Head of the Temple
Bailey El was appointed Supreme Grand Sheik and Chairman of the Moorish Science Temple of America in November 1968 and served in that office until October 1992 — twenty-four consecutive years at the head of the Temple Noble Drew Ali founded in 1913.
He held Noble Drew Ali’s structure steady through decades when outside groups pressed false claims — groups of Moors who had never been designated by Drew Ali. The office did not fracture under him. The records did not leave the Temple. The lineage stayed intact.
Preparing the Succession
Inside the same structure Drew Ali had designed, Bailey El appointed Bro. P. Davis El as Assistant Grand Sheik — placing him in the line of authority and preparing him for the seat at the head of the Temple.
In 1992, Bailey El was removed from the office of Supreme Grand Sheik and Chairman. P. Davis El was confirmed in and became the seventh Supreme Grand Sheik of the Moorish Science Temple of America — carrying Noble Drew Ali’s structure forward without a break in the line.
The Record He Left on Tape
Nine years later after releasing the office of Supreme Grand Sheik and Chairman, Bailey El sat with Supreme Grand Sheik and Chairman E. Braswell Bey on the MSTA public access television programs, including an April 2001.
Here he not only honored the then and current Supreme Grand Sheik and Chairman, E. Braswell Bey, but he also gave high honors to P. Davis El and his demonstration as the 7th Supreme Grand Sheik and Chairman.
D. Bailey El’s voice, his memory and his direct witness of the old Moors are preserved on record for the generations that followed.
Departure from the Temple
Unfortunately by 2005, like so many Moors in the past, D. Bailey El left the Moorish Science Temple of America to start his own group of Moors — a group similar in complexion to the Moorish Science Temple of America but not affiliated with the Temple in any manner. The group of Moors he gathered stood on their own, as they do until this very day, and they do not in any way carry the Temple’s authority.
Sailing on Smoother Seas
Supreme Grand Sheik David Bailey El passed away on August 25, 2021 in Chicago, Illinois, at age 82. Funeral services were held September 15, 2021 at Sacred Memories Funeral Home on East 75th Street.
The Temple Noble Drew Ali founded still stands whole today — records intact, lineage unbroken — because David Bailey El held the line for twenty-four years and handed it forward without a break — before he himself parted ways with the Temple.
The doors to your hidden royal ancestry are open.