In 1985, William D. Watley published Roots of Resistance: The Non-Violent Ethic of Martin Luther King, Jr. He earned a Ph.D from Columbia University and served a pastor of St. James A.M.E. Church in Newark. According to Watley, the following are some of the key points of King's Christian social ethic:
1. There are "demonic forces or systems or orders of evil that dehumanize, oppress, and prevent persons from achieving full humanity." These principalities and powers are spiritual forces which work in political, social and economic institutions, and far too often religious institutions such as the Temple. Persons are involved but the social evil is much more than just personal sin. The oppressor is caught up in this social evil as much as the oppressed though each is affected differently.
2. This social evil must be challenged by forces of good, of justice. The power to do so comes from God working through the Black church and Black religion.
3. While King was a widely read scholar, Watley is convinced that King's Black religious heritage was the primary factor shaping King's theology, ethics and ministry. His Black Church experience and his studies under Black scholars at Morehouse College laid the foundations for his life and ministry. King maintained what Watley called an "evangelical liberalism" midway between fundamentalism and modernism. King took 34 hours from Prof. George Washington Davis while at Crozier Seminary; Davis was an evangelical liberal.
4. In spite of massive social evil, King believed in a moral order in the universe. Part of this belief flowed out of an "African mind-set that did not make the Western distinction between the sacred and profane. Rather, life was viewed as all one piece, and the moral order was inextricably interwoven with the physical universe."
5. Allied with a belief in a moral order in the universe was a strong belief that God works in history. God was active in starting the civil rights movement in Montgomery, Alabama and throughout the movement just as he was in the Exodus. God is immanent as well as transcendent.
6. While King recognized the proper individuality of persons, he stressed the social character of human life. All of life is interrelated. All persons are caught up "in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied to a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly."
7. Another major philosophical/theological concept held by King was personalism. This was not individualism, but a belief that the human being, personhood, was central to truth and life. "The meaning of ultimate reality is found in personality." So God was personal and each human being had a basic worth and dignity. Racism depersonalized both the oppressor and the oppressed. God as a personal God became more and more real as King agonized over racism and struggled against great odds to improve the lot of Blacks.
8. King's nonviolent ethic and method was not developed in a full-blown and final sense prior to the civil rights movement. Instead it was developed and refined in the crucible of reality and suffering. And over the years it expanded to cover economic justice and international peace.
9. Watley believes that King's nonviolent ethic was built upon six principles:
a. Nonviolence was the weapon of the strong. It takes a profound commitment to certain basic values as well as an inner spiritual strength to implement nonviolence as a means to achieve social justice. King despised cowardice more than violence. King's nonviolence as aggressive, not passive.
b. The goal of nonviolence is reconciliation. "The goal of nonviolence is not humiliation or defeat of the opponent but winning of the enemy's friendship and understanding." This does not always happen nor does it happen quickly, but the goal is "to stir the conscience of the opponent or to awaken in the opponent a sense of moral shame." Evil must be exposed before there can be genuine reconciliation.
c. The third principle is that the opponent is a symbol of a greater evil. Nonviolence was "directed against the forces of evil rather than against the persons who committed the evil. The evildoers were victims of evil as much as were the individuals and communities that the evildoers oppressed." So the real issue was not between Blacks and whites but between injustice and justice.
d. The fourth principle is redemptive suffering. There is "moral power in voluntary suffering for others." Suffering without retaliation. Suffering as a moral education for the oppressor. Suffering to redeem. "We will match your capacity to inflict suffering with our capacity to endure suffering." As Paul said, "I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus."
e. Agape. Not only should one refuse to use violence against the oppressor, but one should also refuse to hate the oppressor. Love should create community among humans. King called this new community the "beloved community," his phrase for the kingdom of God, a community of love and justice.
f. The universe is an ally of justice; God loves justice. This principle provides faith and hope to persevere when injustice seems to dominate. A faith in a personal God is the grounds for this principle.
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