RZA

RZA, born Robert Fitzgerald Diggs in Brownsville, Brooklyn, on 5 July 1969, is an American rapper, record producer, musician and actor, the de facto leader and founding member of the hip-hop group Wu-Tang Clan. ¹ He produced almost all of the group's albums and those of its members, developed the alter ego Bobby Digital, scored the films Kill Bill: Volume 1 (2003) and Kill Bill: Volume 2 (2004), and directed The Man with the Iron Fists (2012). ¹

He was named Robert Fitzgerald Diggs after the Kennedy brothers, Robert and John Fitzgerald, whom his mother admired; he and his brother spent summers with their uncle in North Carolina, and his uncle encouraged him to read. ¹ In 1990 he moved to Steubenville, Ohio, where he was arrested for felonious assault and charged with attempted murder; he was acquitted and says the acquittal gave him a second chance. ¹ Back on Staten Island, he formed the Wu-Tang Clan with his cousins and friends, whose debut album Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) was released in November 1993. ¹ He also recorded with the horrorcore group Gravediggaz as the RZArector, and in 1998 released Bobby Digital in Stereo, the solo debut of his Bobby Digital alter ego. ¹ In film he composed for Kill Bill: Volume 1 and Volume 2, directed The Man with the Iron Fists (2012) and Love Beats Rhymes (2017), executive produced the drama series Wu-Tang: An American Saga (2019–2023) and wrote its main-title theme, for which he was nominated for an Emmy Award, and has acted in films including American Gangster (2007) and G.I. Joe: Retaliation (2013). ¹

He is the author of The Wu-Tang Manual (2005) and its sequel The Tao of Wu (2009), and writes on spirituality in his work. ¹

This section sets out different positions as reported in the sources. It is not a verdict by the museum.

His faith as the sources state it. The article's personal-life section states in terms that he was a former member of the Five-Percent Nation, until he and Cappadonna accompanied Tareef Michael to Mecca in January 2024 and reverted to Islam in the Masjid al-Haram, citing an Instagram reel by Michael titled "Sheikh Khalid Amin dictates the Shahadah to RZA & Cappadonna". ¹ Wikidata still carries the Five-Percent Nation as his only religion value. ² That movement is not a legal school, the Mecca report rests on a single social-media citation, and no source names a madhhab for him; his record therefore carries his faith as unknown, with both attestations recorded verbatim. ¹

• The defined source entities cited above, recorded in data/source/.
• Revisions of this article must be dated, and must name the source that changed each fact.