Letter From Birmingham Jail Analysis Essay

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When Jesus was born, he became the driving force for change in the world; much like Dr. King did when he lead the peaceful protests in the civil rights movement. Jesus taught people to love thy neighbor, including the gentiles, which in King’s day would have been the equivalent of whites and blacks getting along. When King wrote his famed “Letter From a Birmingham Jail”, he called upon white leaders in the church to support the cause of African-American population. The white clergymen who received his letter responded by telling King he was an extremist. King replied with this response “... as I continued to think about the matter I gradually gained a measure of satisfaction from the label” (5). He then goes on to explain that by their own definition, they would label their own lord, Jesus, an extremist. This is also not the only label Dr. King had to respond to in this letter.
When King opens his letter he explains why he is in Birmingham because he is labeled as an “outsider coming in” (1). However, King explains, he was invited and not simply did not just choose to come on his own merits. King drew many parallels between himself and Paul in the opening paragraphs about being invited to preach and lead. King noted that, just as he had to leave his home town and preach the word of freedom to towns that invited …show more content…
This is yet another similarity you could draw between King and religious leaders in the Bible. Jesus, and later Paul, was in a situation much like that of King with the pharisees, or Jewish leaders, at the time; they feared the change that Jesus would bring just as white people feared the change King would bring. Both Dr. King and Jesus saw something that they found unacceptable in the world; with Jesus it was the lack of compassion and love in the world, with Dr. King it was the lack of equality in the
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