In many ways, the American Civil Rights Movement reached a tipping point in the 17-minute “I Have A Dream” speech of Martin Luther King Jr. On August 28, 1963, from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, King spoke to over 200,000 civil rights adherents during the what was called “March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom.” Writing for the New York Times, James Reston observed, “Dr. King touched all the themes of the day, only better than anybody else. He was full of the symbolism of Lincoln and Gandhi, and the cadences of the Bible. He was both militant and sad, and he sent the crowd away feeling that the long journey had been worthwhile.”
Towards the end of his speech, King repeated the soundbite, “I have a dream,” followed by another, “Let freedom ring,” using a rhetorical technique called anaphora.
“I say to you today, my friends, so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.
“I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal.’
He went on this way seven more times, and then wound it up:
“I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.”
I had occasion to visit the Lincoln Memorial and stand on the exact spot where King delivered the speech in 1963. I was 15 years old and in third year high school when the March on Washington was made. The state of communications being what it was then–the people in my town relied on the radio and the newspapers and magazines for information, there was as yet no television (there was not even electricity)–the significance of the speech came to me only later, when schools began to use King’s speech in declamation contests, as an example of good oratory, much like Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address or Churchill’s “We Shall Fight on the Beaches.”
I am curious about King’s reliance on Isaiah, Isaiah 40:4-5 in particular, which the King James version renders as follows: “Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low; and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough places plain; and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together: for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken it.”
Once upon a time, a young man similarly used Isaiah to launch his career, and like Martin Luther King Jr. declared his dream, not just for his people, but for all of humanity.
After spending 40 days in the desert, where he was tempted by the devil, Jesus returned to Nazareth, his hometown, and, as was his wont, repaired to the synagogue on a sabbath day, where he was handed a scroll, which he unrolled and read from. The passage was from Isaiah: “The spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because he has anointed me to the bring glad tidings to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, and to proclaim a year acceptable to the Lord.”
The March on Washington and King’s “I have a dream” speech put the arm on the Kennedy administration to get the civil rights legislation going in Congress. It likewise led to King’s being declared TIME magazine’s Man of the Year in 1963, and to his receiving the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964.
No such honors came to Jesus. On the contrary, because in effect he declared that it was of him (the anointed one, the Messiah) that Isaiah spoke–“Today this scripture passage is fulfilled in your hearing”–the people of the synagogue questioned his credentials (“Isn’t this the son of Joseph?”) and brought him to the brow of a hill where they tried, unsuccessfully, to throw him down headlong.
Nonetheless, both Martin Luther King, Jr., and Jesus suffered greatly and gave their lives for their advocacies. King was arrested and jailed, his house bombed, and he himself was assassinated. Jesus died on the cross.
King spoke of a time that was still to come, which he hoped would be soon. Jesus declared the arrival, right that moment, of the Messianic Age.
In any case, as King, citing an old Negro spiritual, urged at the end of his speech, and while I read Luke’s account of Jesus in the synagogue in Nazareth, who announced the fulfillment in him of the words of Isaiah, I, an adherent of Christ, can truly declare, “Free at last! free at last! thank God Almighty, we are free at last!”