Abstract
A significant aspect of the legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr. more than six years after his death is to be found in the neoteric discipline known as Black theology. King is usually thought of as a civil rights activist and as a devotee of the philosophy of nonviolence. A few writers have taken King seriously as a theologian, but few indeed have noted the significance of his life and message in the emerging Black theology of the 1960’s and 70’s. The theologically oriented journal, The Christian Century, commenting on the continuing, though diminishing, influence of King in 1973, noted the political involvement of such followers of
King as Andrew Young, Robert Brown, and Jesse Jackson as being consistent with King’s emphasis on grasping the levers of political power, but no connection was made between King and a young Black theologian like James H. Cone.1 A recent book devoted to an examination of King as a thinker makes no reference to Black theology and no suggestion that King’s thought was in any way relevant to this new intellectual movement.2 Yet there are very real ties that bind Black
theology and King together. To be sure, Cone’s relationship with King is quite different from Young’s. Cone, who has been labeled a “radical” Black theologian, is no disciple of King, and yet he acknowledges that he found the basic principles of his theological system in the life and message of King. And the genius of King’s theology is not simply his dream of the beloved community, but also his commitment to Black liberation and his understanding of God as the divine Liberator.