Monday, January 21, is Martin Luther King Day in the United States. I dedicated some time over the weekend to read and watch some of his speeches and to see a wonderful CNN special appropriately entitled MLK: Words That Changed a Nation.
Dr. King did indeed change a nation and it was primarily through his words that he catalyzed and led that change. The purity and incontrovertible truth of what he wanted to share with us, the absolute passion and humility with which he spoke and the magic oratory style he was a master of brought his concepts to life in a way that could not be ignored. And as I read and watched this weekend, I realized that those of us who care deeply about or are in whatever way involved in the conflict between Israel and Palestine need to hear his words as if for the first time. We need to understand as never before what Dr. King lived and died for.
Most people know his “I Have a Dream” and “I’ve Been to the Mountain Top” speeches. Fewer people may be familiar with one of his lesser known sermons from 1957, a Sunday church sermon that enunciated so clearly and so beautifully
where the irresistible power of Dr. King’s non-violent movement came from:
"I want to turn your attention to this subject: "Loving Your Enemies." It’s so basic to me because it is a part of my basic philosophical and theological orientation—the whole idea of love, the whole philosophy of love… from the lips of our Lord and Master: "Ye have heard that it has been said, ‘Thou shall love thy neighbor, and hate thine enemy.’ But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them that despitefully use you…
… Certainly these are great words, words lifted to cosmic proportions. And over the centuries, many persons have argued that this is an extremely difficult command. Many would go so far as to say that it just isn’t possible to move out into the actual practice of this glorious command… Far from being the pious injunction of a utopian dreamer, this command is an absolute necessity for the survival of our civilization. Yes, it is love that will save our world and our civilization, love even for enemies."
Martin Luther King, Jr., a Christian preacher, the Moses of his people, understood the power of love as the wellspring of not only spiritual freedom but actual and practical freedom from a real flesh and blood oppressor. It was the same powerful love that one of King’s role models, Gandhi, earlier used to ignite a movement that brought freedom to India. It was the same powerful love that would inspire Nelson Mandela’s leadership of the ANC and eventually lead to the end of one of the world’s most heinous racist regimes ever.
Later on in the sermon, there come a few passages that stopped me in my tracks. I have quoted here what looks like a lot but I guarantee you it is well worth the reading.
Another way that you love your enemy is this: When the opportunity presents itself for you to defeat your enemy, that is the time which you must not do it… Men must see that force begets force, hate begets hate, toughness begets toughness. And it is all a descending spiral, ultimately ending in destruction for all and everybody. Somebody must have sense enough and morality enough to cut off the chain of hate and the chain of evil in the universe...
There’s another reason why you should love your enemies, and that is because hate distorts the personality of the hater… For the person who hates, the beautiful becomes ugly and the ugly becomes beautiful. For the person who hates, the good becomes bad and the bad becomes good. For the person who hates, the true becomes false and the false becomes true...
If I hit you and you hit me and I hit you back and you hit me back and go on, you see, that goes on ad infinitum. It just never ends. Somewhere somebody must have a little sense, and that’s the strong person. The strong person is the person who can cut off the chain of hate, the chain of evil... Somebody must have religion enough and morality enough to cut it off and inject within the very structure of the universe that strong and powerful element of love…
History unfortunately leaves some people oppressed and some people oppressors. And there are three ways that individuals who are oppressed can deal with their oppression. One of them is to rise up against their oppressors with physical violence and corroding hatred. But oh this isn’t the way. For the danger and the weakness of this method is its futility. Violence creates many more social problems than it solves… if they succumb to the temptation of using violence in their struggle, unborn generations will be the recipients of a long and desolate night of bitterness, and our chief legacy to the future will be an endless reign of meaningless chaos. Violence isn’t the way…
But there is another way. And that is to organize mass non-violent resistance based on the principle of love... We must discover the power of love, the power, the redemptive power of love. And when we discover that we will be able to make of this old world a new world. We will be able to make men better. Love is the only way.
Although this sermon was delivered from the pulpit of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama, in 1957, his words speak directly to us: Jew, Muslim, Israeli, Palestinian.
Where and when did we Jews lose the ability to love in the way King spoke of? Where and when did we become so filled with hate that it seems in retrospect that Dr. King’s words were a prophecy of warning? Why has it become so impossible for us to realize that from our position of strength we have the ability and responsibility to begin the cycle of love King preached about on that November day?
Why have our Palestinian cousins never been able to learn the lessons of King, the lessons of Gandhi and of Mandela? For I am sure, were they to follow in those footsteps they would destroy the occupation they so rightfully hate in a way that violence has never nor ever will be able to. In the face of non-violent protest based on love, we too would eventually succumb as other empires before us have. We too would be forced to choose the only path of justice.
How is that we, both Israelis and Palestinians, have learned so little from the history around us and from our own history? How is that we have both wandered so far from the essential principles of love and ‘do unto others as you would have them do unto you’ of our own respective faiths?
Our struggle with the Palestinians may be much older than other similar struggles. But that is all you can say regarding the differences. The British oppression of India lasted centuries in one terrible form or another and was brought to its knees through Gandhi’s vision of love-based non-violence. The oppression of blacks in the United States and in South Africa went on for hundreds of years and involved hatred, cruelties, injustices and violence of unimaginable proportions. They were struggles against an oppressor who once believed blacks weren’t even human but were chattel. And yet even in those circumstances the love based resistance of King and Mandela triumphed.
How can we be so arrogant or perhaps so foolish to claim that what worked for the Indians against the British Empire or for the blacks in America and South Africa can't work for us? Why do we refuse to hear? Where are our Martin Luther Kings? I tell you, if we refuse to hear the words of this great man we are doomed to live this cycle of hate and violence for generations to come. Thank you Dr. King for touching and re-opening my heart. May we not disappoint you so that you may one day truly rest in peace.
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