Martin Luther King

Martin Luther King

I have chosen to write about a prominent, black Christian who is very

well known to us today.

Martin Luther King was born on January the 15th, 1929 when inequality

and racism between blacks and whites was still a normal part of life.

He grew up as the son of a Christian minister in Georgia. As the

grandson of the Rev. A.D.Williams, and the son of Martin Luther King

Sr, King’s roots were in the African – American Baptist Church.

As a young boy, Martin Luther King would notice, when he went out, how

his family and other black people were treated. This made him angry,

but he dealt with it not by using violence, but by peaceful protests.

King was very much influenced by the non-violent strategy that Mahatma

Gandhi used for a social change.

When King was a lot older, he witnessed something which changed his

life forever. A black woman had been sent to jail for not giving up

her seat for white man on a bus. Martin Luther King, being the Baptist

minister, decided to organise bus boycott to enable the discrimination

to stop. From then on Martin Luther King began protesting for the

black community. He did this in many ways, for example, he organised

speeches, marches, letters, protests, rallies, strikes, boycotts,

campaigns, sit-ins and many more.

Martin Luther King was married to Loretta Scott on June the 18th,

1953. He had four children, but it was exceedingly difficult to

protect his own family as many people had tried to assassinate King,

for example, with bombs.

On April the 4th, when Martin Luther King was only 39, he was shot

dead in Memphis, Tennessee by a white man names James Earl Ray.

As Ki...

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...g how this thing is going to come out.” In

this quote he is making his people feel a lot more comfortable, and

also as if they are not alone. Therefore, the people must feel a lot

safer in the hands of King, and feel an intimacy with him also. Also,

to them, Martin Luther King must have been inspiring.

Towards the end of his speech “I have a dream,” he states “…we will be

able to speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and

white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able

to join hands and sing in the words…” King is talking about uniting

God’s children with one another and fulfilling God’s idea of making

each individual equal. Therefore, from this point, we can see that

King was influenced by some of the teachings of Jesus and wanted to

satisfy them and make them apply to reality.