MLK. An American Prophet.

by BurnTheShips 4 Replies latest jw friends

  • BurnTheShips
    BurnTheShips

    When Martin Luther King, Jr. brought his nonviolent campaign against segregation to Bull Connor's Birmingham, he laid siege to the bastion of Jim Crow. In Birmingham between 1957 and 1962, black homes and churches had been subjected to a series of horrific bombings intended to terrorize the community. In April 1963 King answered the call to bring his campaign to Birmingham. When King landed in jail on Good Friday for violating an injunction prohibiting demonstrations, he took the opportunity to meditate on the counsel of prudence with which Birmingham's white ministers had greeted his campaign. King's "Letter from a Birmingham Jail" was the result.

    Reading the "Letter" nearly fifty years later is a humbling experience. Perhaps most striking is King's seething anger over the indignities of segregation:

    I guess it is easy for those who have never felt the stinging darts of segregation to say, "Wait." But when you have seen vicious mobs lynch your mothers and fathers at will and drown your sisters and brothers at whim; when you have seen hate filled policemen curse, kick, brutalize and even kill your black brothers and sisters with impunity; when you see the vast majority of your twenty million Negro brothers smothering in an airtight cage of poverty in the midst of an affluent society; when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six-year-old daughter why she can't go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on television, and see tears welling up in her eyes when she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children, and see the depressing clouds of inferiority begin to form in her little mental sky, and see her begin to distort her little personality by unconsciously developing a bitterness toward white people; when you have to concoct an answer for a five-year-old son asking in agonizing pathos: "Daddy, why do white people treat colored people so mean?"; when you take a cross-country drive and find it necessary to sleep night after night in the uncomfortable corners of your automobile because no motel will accept you; when you are humiliated day in and day out by nagging signs reading "white" and "colored"; when your first name becomes "nigger," your middle name becomes "boy" (however old you are) and your last name becomes "John," and your wife and mother are never given the respected title "Mrs."; when you are harried by day and haunted by night by the fact that you are a Negro, living constantly at tip-toe stance never quite knowing what to expect next, and plagued with inner fears and outer resentments; when you are forever fighting a degenerating sense of "nobodiness"; then you will understand why we find it difficult to wait. There comes a time when the cup of endurance runs over, and men are no longer willing to be plunged into an abyss of despair. I hope, sirs, you can understand our legitimate and unavoidable impatience.

    In addition to King's witness, King's prophetic call permeates the "Letter." Why did King presume to come from Atlanta to Birmingham? King writes:

    I am in Birmingham because injustice is here. Just as the eighth century prophets left their little villages and carried their "thus saith the Lord" far beyond the boundaries of their home towns; and just as the Apostle Paul left his little village of Tarsus and carried the gospel of Jesus Christ to practically every hamlet and city of the Graeco-Roman world, I too am compelled to carry the gospel of freedom beyond my particular home town. Like Paul, I must constantly respond to the Macedonian call for aid.

    King's prophetic call must have been both a source of strength and of concern. His strength was manifest; he rarely let his concern show. Perfection is not a condition of the prophet's call, and King was both imperfect and aware of his imperfections. His unbending strength is all the more remarkable.

    It is difficult to comprehend that Martin Luther King, Jr. was only 39 years old at the time of his assassination in Memphis on April 4, 1968, or that the prospect of his death weighed so heavily on his mind. He seems too young to have accomplished so much, or to have maintained his judgment under such trying circumstances. The magnitude of his own trials must have had a deep impact on him.

    In the speech he gave in Memphis the day before his assassination, he movingly recalled his first confrontation with death:

    You know, several years ago, I was in New York City autographing the first book that I had written. And while sitting there autographing books, a demented black woman came up. The only question I heard from her was, "Are you Martin Luther King?"

    And I was looking down writing, and I said yes. And the next minute I felt something beating on my chest. Before I knew it I had been stabbed by this demented woman. I was rushed to Harlem Hospital. It was a dark Saturday afternoon. And that blade had gone through, and the X-rays revealed that the tip of the blade was on the edge of my aorta, the main artery. And once that's punctured, you drown in your own blood -- that's the end of you.

    It came out in the New York Times the next morning, that if I had sneezed, I would have died. Well, about four days later, they allowed me, after the operation, after my chest had been opened, and the blade had been taken out, to move around in the wheel chair in the hospital. They allowed me to read some of the mail that came in, and from all over the states, and the world, kind letters came in. I read a few, but one of them I will never forget. I had received one from the President and the Vice-President. I've forgotten what those telegrams said. I'd received a visit and a letter from the Governor of New York, but I've forgotten what the letter said. But there was another letter that came from a little girl, a young girl who was a student at the White Plains High School. And I looked at that letter, and I'll never forget it. It said simply, "Dear Dr. King: I am a ninth-grade student at the White Plains High School." She said, "While it should not matter, I would like to mention that I am a white girl. I read in the paper of your misfortune, and of your suffering. And I read that if you had sneezed, you would have died. And I'm simply writing you to say that I'm so happy that you didn't sneeze."

    Here he paused to look back on what he had achieved with the time he had been granted:

    And I want to say tonight, I want to say that I am happy that I didn't sneeze. Because if I had sneezed, I wouldn't have been around here in 1960, when students all over the South started sitting-in at lunch counters. And I knew that as they were sitting in, they were really standing up for the best in the American dream. And taking the whole nation back to those great wells of democracy which were dug deep by the Founding Fathers in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. If I had sneezed, I wouldn't have been around in 1962, when Negroes in Albany, Georgia, decided to straighten their backs up. And whenever men and women straighten their backs up, they are going somewhere, because a man can't ride your back unless it is bent. If I had sneezed, I wouldn't have been here in 1963, when the black people of Birmingham, Alabama, aroused the conscience of this nation, and brought into being the Civil Rights Bill. If I had sneezed, I wouldn't have had a chance later that year, in August, to try to tell America about a dream that I had had. If I had sneezed, I wouldn't have been down in Selma, Alabama, been in Memphis to see the community rally around those brothers and sisters who are suffering. I'm so happy that I didn't sneeze.

    Looking beyond his accomplishments, he likened himself to Moses, the prophet par excellence, and testified to the source of the prophet's voice:

    Well, I don't know what will happen now. We've got some difficult days ahead. But it doesn't matter with me now. Because I've been to the mountaintop. And I don't mind. Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now. I just want to do God's will. And He's allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I've looked over. And I've seen the promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land. And I'm happy, tonight. I'm not worried about anything. I'm not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.

    http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2010/01/025412.php

  • wobble
    wobble

    A truly great man. Thanks for sharing that Burn.

    As Jesus said, a prophet is not welcome in his own country.

    Seems as though he knew he was not long for this world, but the evil perpetrators of his callous murder achieved the opposite of what they intended.

    To this day his martyrdom, and hence his words resonate, they make me want to fight racism, hatred and intolerance, wherever I come across it.

    love

    Wobble

  • BurnTheShips
    BurnTheShips

    Early morning, April 4
    Shot rings out in the Memphis sky
    Free at last, they took your life
    They could not take your pride

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=56mjwycKuXA

  • PSacramento
    PSacramento

    MLK had balls the size of church bells !

    I told my little girl about his "I have a dream" speach and when I was done she asked me why I had tears in my eyes?

    I told her that few people are born that touch us ( people that didn't even know them) in such a profound way and that those people tend to be people that believe so strongly in Love and in the Lord's message of Love and how it was so prophetic of him when he said " I might not get there with you..."
    We can never forget that it has always been indivuduals like MLK that make for these amazing changes in our world.

    Nice thread BTS

  • Chalam
    Chalam

    Agreed, humanitarian and a man of God.

    I have had a few records with his speeches for many years.

    You can get many of them online now.

    Martin Luther King Jr.

    Martin Luther King, Jr.

    Martin Luther King

    Dr.Martin Luther King Jr.

    In the words of Stevie Wonder

    Stevie Wonder - Happy Birthday

    You know it doesn't make much sense
    There ought to be a law against
    Anyone who takes offense
    At a day in your celebration
    'Cause we all know in our minds
    That there ought to be a time
    That we can set aside
    To show just how much we love you
    And I'm sure you will agree
    It couldn't fit more perfectly
    Than to have a world party on the day you came to be

    Chorus
    Happy birthday to you
    Happy birthday to you
    Happy birthday
    (Repeat)

    I just never understood
    How a man who died for good
    Could not have a day that would
    Be set aside for his recognition
    Because it should never be
    Just because some cannot see
    The dream as clear as he
    That they should make it become an illusion
    And we all know everything
    That he stood for time will bring
    For in peace our hearts will sing
    Thanks to Martin Luther King

    Chorus
    Happy birthday to you
    Happy birthday to you
    Happy birthday
    (Repeat)

    Bridge
    Why has there never been a holiday
    Where peace is celebrated
    all throughout the world

    The time is overdue
    For people like me and you
    You know the way to truth
    Is love and unity to all God's children
    It should be a great event
    And the whole day should be spent
    In full remembrance
    Of those who lived and died for the oneness of
    all people
    So let us all begin
    We know that love can win
    Let it out don't hold it in
    Sing it loud as you can

    Chorus
    Happy birthday to you
    Happy birthday to you
    Happy birthday
    (4x)

    (Background Stevie)
    Happy birthday Ooh yeah
    Happy birthday,
    To you

    We know the key to unity of all
    People
    Is in the dream that you had so
    Long ago
    That lives in all of the hearts
    Of people
    That believe in unity
    We'll make the dream become
    A reality
    I know we will
    Because our hearts tell us so

    Blessings,

    Stephen

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