King's Letter From A Birmingham Jail

Letter from Birmingham Jail Response Within “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” Martin Luther King, Jr. positions himself as a tired man; tired of waiting, tired of fighting, yet perseveres relentlessly with great momentum. “My feets is tired, but my soul is rested” (“Letter from Birmingham Jail” 6), a message to those who oppose freedom of the black man that this is a battle which will not easily dissipate. Raised by the gospel, King sees everything wrong with what is taught by white Christianity and quickly corrects the error in their ways, drawing reference to the Bible throughout his letter. King shows an apparent dumbfounded-ness toward the South’s religious leaders, who issued a public statement condemning the actions of peaceful protests

1. Ethos, Logos, and Pathos are important aspects in Martin Luther King’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail”. The meaning behind Ethos is to appeal to ethics, which means convincing readers of the author’s credibility, meanwhile Pathos is an appeal to emotion, and is used in literature to convince readers of an argument by getting their emotions involved. Last but not least, Logos is the appeal to logic and is used to persuade readers using a force of reason. These terms are important in MLK’s Letter from Birmingham Jail because the foundation of the letter is built upon ideas of Ethos, Pathos, and Logos.

In Letter From Birmingham Jail, the part I find most persuasive is when Dr. King tells why African-Americans can no longer wait to gain the justice and equality they deserve, and there is not a “right time” to try to gain this justice and equality. It is true that African-Americans cannot not just wait and hope that one day they will gain the equality they deserve. Instead, they must act to gain justice and equality. When people are comfortable, change is unlikely to occur. If African-Americans did not create any tension, they may have never gained the equality they have today.

In Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “A Letter From a Birmingham Jail,” he provides answers to fundamental metaphysical questions regarding the nature of the human soul. Though his letter is addressed to a group of eight clergymen criticizing his direct action campaign in Birmingham, his ultimate aim is the uplifting of human personhood. Underlying King’s letter is a philosophical, hylemorphic anthropology which puts an anchor deep into a certain conception of personhood, and binds all people who are to read it. He looks deeply at the nature of human beings, as rational creatures who are made to love and be loved, and from thence, deliberates that there is a universal Gospel of Freedom and Justice. Martin Luther King, Jr. asserts that there are universal principles justifying what actions are morally right and wrong, just and unjust.

My Personal Response to the Letter from Birmingham Jail A letter excoriating Dr. King and praising the city’s prejudiced police force was issued by a group of Clergymen. While currently in jail at Birmingham as a victim of racism King addresses everybody with intend to bring injustice and aim to stop it for the good of all mankind. Dr. King wrote “Letter from Birmingham Jail” a focus on ethic discrimination as a response to follow clergy men. Dr. King compared Socrates as an important thinker which he created tension to inspire mankind to grow with this current tension that everybody is facing but, encourages nonviolence.

In King’s letter from Birmingham jail, he structures his piece by providing what the white majority has to say, and then afterwards he explains what he has to say. Throughout his piece King summarizes what the white majority has to say, and then he counters it. One example where he uses summary is when he summarizes the white majority’s idea that the non-violent demonstration King took part in was untimely. He starts off his summary with, “One of the basic point in your statement is that the action that I and my associates have been taken in Birmingham is untimely…” He then goes more specific and explains that the white majority is asking why they did not give the city administration more time to act, and continues to summarize the white

The students of Nashville College believed that King’s “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” provided them justification for conducting sit-ins, and boycotts of public areas. King’s letter discussed that in order for negotiations to be made people must first create “tens[ion] and force people “to confront the issue”(2). This idea of tension shows that public demonstrations are the only way that leads to negotiation on Civil Rights. Therefore, King’s letter insinuated that for there to be change, people must do protests like sit-ins. Another way King’s letter gave premise for the students protesting was because he states that “freedom is never voluntarily given” however, “must be demanded by the oppressed.

Nowadays, we could think that the world is an amazing place where thanks to laws everyone can enjoy their live in peace. however, it is not like that, eventhougt there are thousends of laws that should protect people fom iniquities, they just protect mayorities on the population leaving the weak and small groups without legal support. The thought shared by Dr. Martin Luther King on the Letter from Birmingham Jail "An unjust law is a code that a numerical or power majority group compels a minority group to obey but does not make binding on itself", this shows how back in the twenty century laws were not exactly created thinking ethically, and a century after that there are still unjust laws. An example of legal but not ethical law is the

In King Letter to Birmingham jail he talks about on to explain his understanding of segregation and why we are still in it. He also uses many literary devices like parallel structure and many others. I believe he does this to show how he really feels on how we have be treated and how we are thought of. Because of this his message that he's trying to get across is basically why is everying thing that he does, whether it's violent or not, have such an effect on white people whether it's good or bad. Segregation has been around basically ever since the beginning of time and it doesn't look like it's going away anytime soon.

In the words of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in a Letter from a Birmingham Jail, “Individuals may see the moral light and voluntarily give up their unjust posture: but, as Reinhold Niebuhr has reminded us, groups tend to be more immoral than individuals.” While it seems like a singular person has respectful opinions and is generally accepting, large groups are more likely to side on the negative view point on a subject. Whether this is because a larger group is louder with its opinions, or just because it is easy to be persuaded if there are more people with the same views, ‘good’ people are always in the minority. If the amount of good people in the world is low, true justice is near impossible. Then again, what is true justice?