Sermon: This is all Bishop’s thinking. Don’t lash out on me via Twitter or in the comments. Consult everything with Bishop if you have complaints.

Bishop: On March 9, 2010, the 13th anniversary of The Notorious B.I.G.’s passing, many people took to Twitter to pay their respects, pay homage and carry on the legacy of Biggie Smalls. I’m an avid Biggie fan from Brooklyn so you know I followed suit. I noticed many of the people that were praising Big for his rhymes and his life were also trying to degrade the life and time of Big’s once rival Tupac Shakur. I would see many tweets on how Pac wasn’t real or that he couldn’t touch Biggie lyrically. Really? After 14 years we’re still on this “taking sides” note? It wasn’t one person that sparked me to write this, it was a vast amount of people.

Let’s put it in perspective – both Tupac Shakur and Biggie Smalls are two different people, two different rappers from two different walks of life. Just because they had a rivalry does not mean there’s a way to compare them both. They may have similarities in their art form but in no way can they be easily compared. I never knew these men personally but I have heard all of their music as well as viewed many documentaries to get an idea of how they were although there are probably personal traits that they expressed around loved ones many may not know of.

Both Big and Pac grew up in one parent homes. One can understand how Big was easily lured and turned on by the street life because he had no siblings as Pac did. Big remained in his Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood his whole childhood while Pac moved from Harlem to Baltimore to the Bay Area up until he was 19 years old. The constant moving is never a good experience for a young person because it’s a constant mentality of having to start over, establish themselves and get closer to people that you will eventually move from in time.

The mothers of Big and Pac possessed intelligent minds and morals which they tried to bestow upon their children. Voletta Wallace was a school teacher that had gotten her Master’s degree. Pac’s mother, Afeni, was a revolutionary in the Black Panther movement which is why Tupac was so sensitive yet combative. Both Big and Pac were said to be very studious in school in their early years. Their minds may have succumbed to the environment that had surrounded them.

It looks as if it were a survival method. Big and Pac were forced to learn to survive in the streets or get rolled over. Big took to the drug game quick whereas Pac couldn’t hack it. This doesn’t make Pac any less of a man. It just wasn’t in him. Pac was community oriented and I couldn’t see him slinging something his mother had an addiction to. Big had a child to support and the corner was his idea of making the quickest dollar. I’ve seen in documentaries that he worked in the local Met Food as a teen but it probably didn’t last long.

I’ve heard may stories that Pac was coming into his “thug life” persona once he had played the role of Bishop in the movie “Juice”. This may partly be true but I don’t think that’s the whole reason. Tupac was 21 years old doing that movie. He was still basically a child at that. All that money and fame may have gotten to his head thinking he was unstoppable and invincible for him to think he’s above the law. I truly believe Pac deeply delved into “thug life” while doing “Above the Rim”. In the movie “Notorious”, Pac mentions he’s around certain people for his role in “Above the Rim” and Biggie warns him of the company he keeps. Pac was always around that lifestyle growing up but he was introduced to it through the character Bishop and stuck with it in the character of Birdie.

You can also hear the change in tone and topic on his album around this time. “Me Against the World” was filled with paranoia and prophecies of death. Biggie understood everything that came along with this territory and he adopted it with “Ready to Die”. I believe Big had no idea of the events that were to take place on November 30, 1994. Pac was supposed to be murdered that night and it failed. Pac held Biggie responsible simply for the fact that he felt Big should have warned just as he did with the company he was keeping.

We all know Pac hit Biggie with many lyrical assaults before and after his death. Biggie never directly responded. “Who Shot Ya” was not aimed at the Pac in any way. It was recorded for a Mary J Blige record and only the first verse was supposed to be used. Biggie’s whole attitude was laid back and mellow when it came to dissing Pac on wax. He never wanted to. “Long Kiss Goodnight” was intended for Tupac. Being that he passed, many of the bars remained on the record while ad libs were removed that were aimed at Pac. Many have said that Big wanted no parts of Pac on wax and that’s why there was no response. I think Big took the high road not saying anything but the outcome was still negative.

Ignorant and senseless acts of violence had plagued both the lives of these men. Unfortunately, they met their demises the same way they would depict it in their music. Pac came off as a gangster engulfed in “thug life” because he had so many emotions he wasn’t afraid to show but kept them on guard with his combative behavior. We saw him become a man. Big saw this in Pac and this is what made their friendship work for the length of time it did. They died tragic ways but led significant and incredible lives that changed the world. They will always be remembered for what they brought to music. If they were alive today, I believe there may have been a slim chance that they could have put their differences aside and reconciled especially if their mothers had stepped in to mediate. Kill all the talk about who was better and who was more real. They were two different people wit two different but similar stories to tell. Remember, chances are they’re up in heaven, smiling down on us, wishing we can see them kickin’ it like that night on November 30, 1994 never happened.