King and Asia: The Influence of Gandhi’s Concept of Satyagraha on the Non-violence Theology of Martin Luther King, Jr

• 발행기관: 한국민중신학회
• 저자명: Sangkeun Kim
• 간행물 정보: 『Madang: Journal of Contextual Theology』제15권, 1~11쪽, 전체 11쪽
• 주제분류: 인문학 > 기독교신학
• 파일형태: PDF
• 발행일자: 2011.06.30

영문 초록

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-1968), perhaps the most famous martyr on the United States of the twentieth century, was not a mere social justice activist who demanded black rights. Rather his movement was an accumulated theoretical production of contemporary American theology, from the social gospel of Walter Rauschenbusch (1861-1918) to the Bostonian Personalism of Albert Knudson (1873-1953) and Edgar Brightman(1884-1953). Dr. King has interacted with many contemporary theologians through his personal contact or private readings of their theological works, such as the monographs of Walter Rauschenbusch, Reinhold Niebuhr, Paul Tillich and Karl Barth, throughout his intensive academic training from Morehouse College (B. A. in 1948) to Boston University (Ph. D. in 1955). King’s theological perspectives have also been sharpened and deepened by his visits to Africa, Central America, Europe and Asia throughout his short period of life time. As crossing cultural boundaries of other countries and continents, he had numerous opportunities to widen his theological horizon by having religious conversations with the leaders of other great religions. Through these cross-cultural experiences, King was able to claim not only the substantial particularity of his own Christian theology but also the universal dimension of his religious convictions. Among these inter-religious experiences of Martin Luther King, Jr., I would like to investigate his theological journey in Asia. It is my intension to expose the religious influence of Mahatma Gandhi’s concept of Satyagraha onto Dr. Martin Luther King’s theological formulation of the non-violence theology. The final reflection will be added, emphasizing the importance of the economic elements in Satyagraha at the age of globalization.