Religion
Mohamad Jawad Chirri
1905–1994 · imam, founder of the Islamic Center of America
Lebanese-born Shia scholar who came to Detroit around 1949 and founded the Islamic Center of America, opened on Joy Road in 1963 and now housed in Dearborn's landmark Ford Road mosque.
- Born
Lebanon- Died
Dearborn, Michigan
aged 89- Also known as
- Imam Chirri · Muhammad Chirri
- Detroit years
- 1949–1994
- Field
- Religion
01 / The Detroit story
The Detroit story
Chirri was born in Lebanon in 1905 and trained at the seminaries of Najaf in Iraq. He came to the United States in the late 1940s at the invitation of Detroit's small Shia Lebanese community, which was forming the Islamic Center Foundation Society. Chirri set out to build a proper mosque; in 1959 he traveled to Egypt and won support from President Gamal Abdel Nasser, while local families pledged their own homes as collateral. The Islamic Center of Detroit opened on Joy Road on Detroit's west side in the early 1960s and was later renamed the Islamic Center of America. Chirri led it for more than three decades, wrote books on Shia Islam such as The Shi'ites Under Attack, and represented the community to American officials. He died in Dearborn in 1994; his congregation moved into its large new mosque on Ford Road in 2005.
Highlights
- Invited to lead Detroit's new Shia congregation around 1949
- Met Egyptian President Nasser in 1959 to fund the mosque
- Islamic Center opened on Joy Road, Detroit, in 1962–1963
- Led the Islamic Center of America until his death in 1994
- Author of The Shi'ites Under Attack
02 / Their Detroit places
Their Detroit places 2
Where they lived, worked, performed and liked to hang out. Closed and demolished places stay here too, because they are part of the city's history.
Founded · 1963–1994
Islamic Center of Detroit (Joy Road Mosque)
Closed · 1963–2005
The first Islamic Center building on Joy Road in Detroit, funded with community pledges and a gift from Nasser; the congregation left for Dearborn in 2005.
Founded · 2005–
Islamic Center of America
The present mosque of the congregation Chirri founded, opened on Ford Road in Dearborn in 2005.