Fairooz Saiyara who is a MA Student in American Literary Studies, recently co-authored a paper, “Exploring Martin Luther King Jr.’s political theology and the spirit of the civil rights movement revisioning James Cone’s criticism” published in the journal African Identities by Taylor & Francis.
Here is the abstract of the paper:
Martin Luther King Jr., being informed and influenced by Henry David Thoreau and Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, developed a political theology that laid the groundwork for his commitment to nonviolent civil disobedience. His speeches and write-ups in the era of Jim Crow segregation and the Civil Rights Movement reflect his sincerity to nonviolence and philosophy of agape love developing a synthesis between secular and sacred civic religion. However, in raising Black power and Black theology, critiques of King such as James Cone failed to recognize this element of synthesis in King’s thought. This paper explores King’s political theology contesting the criticism made by James Cone about King and the Civil Rights Movement. Criticizing Cone’s (1969) view that ‘all white men are responsible for white oppression’, this paper revisits King’s vision of a biracial army fighting for equality (p. 27). The paper first explores the concept of political theology from the available research and discusses the relevance of King’s political theology closely observing his selected speeches. Then, it investigates the critical remarks of James Cone from selected sources and argues that even though many claim that Cone’s view on King has changed over time, he overall fails to understand King’s political theology.
Find out more about the article here.
