The idea that Abdullah may have been a “composite figure” originates, in its best-known form, with historian Mitch Horowitz. Faced with the scarcity of surviving records, Horowitz proposed at some point that Neville Goddard’s teacher may not be one historical person. He suggested Abdullah was Arnold Josiah Ford (1877 – 1935), the Harlem-based “Ethiopian rabbi” or that maybe Neville’s later recollections drew together the identities and characteristics of more than one teacher.

Ford though left the United States for Ethiopia around 1930–31 and died there in 1935. Neville studied with Abdullah in New York well into the 1930s and met his secretary in the 1950s who said Abdullah was alive and well enough to want to go back home.

But the viral “composite Abdullah” meme is pretty contagious – enough to infect our research.

Some readers ask whether the Atlantic City Abdoullah and the New York City Abdoullah are two different men who happened to share a name.

In this article we are going to make this specific part of the research as clear as day. Below we lay out, end to end, the documents in the research that trace and show one continuous public figure from 1920s Atlantic City to 1930s NYC at the exact address at 30 West 72nd where Neville studied with Abdullah.

Church of the Religion of Love and of Spiritualistic Phenomena

1920 – The church is founded on February 4, 1920, lawyer Frederick W. Stewart filed a certificate of incorporation with Atlantic City’s County Clerk for the Church of the Religion of Love and of Spiritualistic Phenomena and a meeting at 1708 Arctic Avenue. Prof. M. Abda’llah Guillaume is named high priest and test-giver, “teaching the occult art of the Orient.” The trustees are listed as Guillaume, Bessie B. Payne, and a third woman whose name is spelled two different ways across two papers covering the same filing “Elizabeth M. Maconochie” in one report, “Elizabeth M. Monahan” in another.

Federal Copyright Cards for Books & Music – Atlantic City & 30 West 72nd St, NYC

1923 — Double evidence on October 5, November 27, and November 28, 1923, book copyrights were filed with the Library of Congress in Atlantic City for three works: The Book of Peace or Bible of the Master Student, Science of Applied Mind Control and Wealth of Abdoullahistic Metaphysiology, and The New Covenant of Peace. On these federal registration cards, the Copyright Claimant is listed as G. Modeste Abdoullah, operating out of 1708 Arctic Avenue and 1331 Pacific Avenue, while the Author/Translator is recorded as G. Mahmud Ahmad Abdoullah, a citizen of Algiers. There are also music copyright cards with address 30 West 72nd.

These are federal government records of both names on the same document, for the same work, on the exact same day.

Before October 1926 – Harry Houdini spent the last years of his life and a personal fortune trying to expose fraudulent mediums, employing undercover investigators to do it. One of them was a young operative named Rose Mackenberg, who worked anonymously. Houdini died October 31, 1926.

When Mackenberg finally went public with her account in early 1929, the introduction to her syndicated series said her investigative work happened “during her work with Houdini,” and she only retired and told her story “now that he no longer lives.” That puts the certificate she obtained during her investigation before October 1926.

The certificate itself, reproduced in the 1929 feature, was issued by “The Church of the Religion of Love and of Spiritualistic Phenomena (Mother Church, incorporated Feb. 4th, 1920)” the exact church founded above, certifying “Rev. Allicia Bunck of Philadelphia” (a pun: “all is bunk”) as an ordained minister, signed by “our Divine Prophet-Priest G. Mahmud Ahmad Abdoullah,” signature reading “G.M.A. Abdoullah.”

The Waldorf-Astoria – Women’s Press Club NYC

1927 – The Waldorf-Astoria By 1927, the man behind the church had moved well beyond Atlantic City lecture halls. The Woman’s Press Club held a social meeting at the Waldorf-Astoria at which “G. Madrud Ahmad Abdoullah” (evidently a typesetting slip for “Mahmud”) delivered an address titled “The World’s Greatest Servant Has Become the Master,” on a program alongside J. Campbell White, president of the Biblical Seminary, and Judge C. T. Crain. Source: “Citizenship” the Theme For Press Club Social Day

The Addison Room NYC – Abdoullah 

January–April 1928 — 100 West 72nd Street Weekly notices in the New York Sun through the first months of 1928 show Abdoullah giving open Sunday lectures at 100 West 72nd Street, in the Addison Room which is a rented public lecture hall, not his home or private studio. The topics are consistent with his metaphysical teachings:

• January 15: “Who Isis Truly Is and How We Should Unveil Her”
• January 29: “What Is Truth”
• April 8: “The Ancient Way Restored”
• April 15: “How to Extend Your Being Into All Life Round About You”
• April 22: “Detaching Mind from Self”

30 West 72nd Street NYC

November 1928 — 30 West 72nd Street

He shifts from a rented public hall to 30 West 72nd. A November 1928 New York Times display advertisement shows “G. M. Akhmad Abdoullah” teaching “Soul Unfoldment” on Sundays and Thursdays at 30 West 72nd Street, the exact address Neville Goddard would later recall as the place he studied with his teacher. The same notice lists Zaida Roberts (his secretary) teaching “Twelve Steps of Conscious Mystic Progress” at the same address.

Here it is tied directly, by name, to both Abdoullah and to the secretary Neville would recall meeting years later.

30 West 72nd Street NYC

December 1928 — The Interfaith Stage On December 17, 1928, at the St. Bartholomew Community House on Park Avenue, a discussion titled “What Human Life Is For” was held under the Three-Fold Movement. Four faiths were represented: Dr. Frederick Lynch for Christianity, Swami Paramahansa Yogananda for Hinduism, G. M. Ahmad Abdoullah for Islam, and Rabbi Stephen S. Wise for Judaism.

Here we see he is at 30 West 72nd Street in November, under the exact same name, and a month later sharing a public stage with recognized spiritual teachers.

February 1929 The Exposé Goes to Print Mackenberg’s account of her undercover work ran nationally on February 23, 1929 in the San Francisco Call-Bulletin, the Winnipeg Tribune, and other syndicated papers across the country. The certificate’s signature “G.M.A. Abdoullah” matches the same distinctive spelling used in the 1923 copyright filings and the 1928 Manhattan display ads.

Catskills Society Clipping – 1935

1935 – A Catskills society clipping records “Mrs. Laurens B. Page and daughter… accompanied on the trip by G. Ahmad Abdoullah, the Arabian Philosopher, composer and poet…teaching singing and conducting philosophy classes at his home in New York City and his secretary Miss Zaida Roberts of New York,” during a stay in the Catskills.

Tax Sales Atlantic City – 1966

1966 – Long after his active New York years ended, an August 1966 default tax sale notice published in the Atlantic City Press, concerning the family property at 1709 Disston Avenue, lists the debtor as:

G. M. Abdaillah, a.k.a. Guillaume M. Abda’llah

This is an official 1966 government notice in print, decades after his active teaching years.

Running underneath all of the above are these details: his French-transliterated, Algerian-style spelling ending in “-oullah” is exceptionally rare in early 20th-century American records generally. It surfaces in the 1923 copyright filings, the pre-1926 Mackenberg certificate, the 1928 Manhattan ads, and the 1935 song copyrights.

Six years before Mackenberg’s certificate was published, the same church, the same name, and the same Atlantic City address were already on federal record. One year before he shared a stage with Yogananda, he was renting a public hall a block away from 30 West 72nd.

We sometimes hear: “What if there were two different Abdoullahs renting rooms at 30 West 72nd Street during the years from 1930-1936?”¹

For the “multiple Abdullahs at 30 West 72nd” theory to survive, two impossible things must be true:

• The French-transliterated “-oullah” spelling is a statistical ghost in 1930s federal records. Finding two at one address defies probability.
• Two hypothetical Abdullahs at that exact address would have had to employ the exact same personal secretary, Zaida Roberts, across a seven-year span. Zaida Roberts is named alongside him in the 1928 advertisement, the 1935 Catskills clipping, and Neville’s own memories of talking to his secretary in the late 1950s. A shared name can be written off as a coincidence. A shared secretary is a documented employment record.

This is one man, moving between an Atlantic City vocal studio, a spiritualist pulpit, a Muslim missionary identity, and a Manhattan teaching practice with a distinctive and consistent name the entire time.

For years, the community has coasted on two theories. Isn’t it time to add a viable third hypothesis? The paperwork is right here. We hope you take a look at it.

¹ Social Security Administration national birth-name files contain no entries for Abdullah, Abdallah, Abdalla, Abdoullah or Abdulla in the 1930s (spellings below five births are suppressed). The name first appears above the reporting threshold in 1972, following the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965, which ended the national-origins quota system and opened substantially larger immigration from the Middle East and North Africa.

All Clippings: The Abdullah Investigation Series: Archival Research on Neville Goddard’s Mentor