Martin Luther Quotes

A preacher should have the skill to teach the unlearned simply roundly, and plainly; for teaching is of more importance than exhorting. ~ Martin Luther

When the injunction was issued in Birmingham, our failure to obey it bewildered our opponents. They did not know what to do. We did not hide our intentions. In fact, I announced our plan to the press, pointing out that we were not anarchists advocating lawlessness, but that it was obvious to us that the courts of Alabama had misused the judicial process in order to perpetuate injustice and segregation. Consequently, we could not, in good conscience, obey their findings. I intended to be one of the first to set ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

When God's righteousness is mentioned in the gospel, it is God's action of declaring righteous the unrighteous sinner who has faith in Jesus Christ. The righteousness by which a person is justified (declared righteous) is not his own but that of another, Christ. ~ Martin Luther

Snakes and monkeys are subjected to the demon more than other animals. Satan lives in them and possesses them. He uses them to deceive men and to injure them. ~ Martin Luther

Black Power alone is no more insurance against social injustice than white power. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

It's hard to deny that an alarming number of those who stood for peace, not war, were either killed by deranged lone gunmen or else died in suspicious circumstances. We refer of course to the likes of JFK, Martin Luther King, Benazir Bhutto, Bobby Kennedy and John Lennon, to name but a few. ~ James Morcan

It is always the right time to do the right thing. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

The world bears the Gospel a grudge because the Gospel condemns the religious wisdom of the world. ~ Martin Luther

It is the lot of God's ministers not only to suffer opposition at the hand of a wicked world, but also to see the patient indoctrination of many years quickly undone by such religious fanatics. This hurts more than the persecution of tyrants. We are treated shabbily on the outside by tyrants, on the inside by those whom we have restored to the liberty of the Gospel, and also by false brethren. But this is our comfort and our glory, that being called of God we have the promise of everlasting life. We look for that reward which eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath entered into the heart of man. ~ Martin Luther

Martin Luther King is a notorious liar[] ~ John G. Schmitz

Fore more than a decade - from the mid-1950s until the late 1960s - conservatives systematically and strategically linked opposition to civil rights legislation to calls for law and order, arguing that Martin Luther King Jr.'s philosophy of civil disobedience was a leading cause of crime. Civil rights protests were frequently depicted as criminal rather than political in nature, and federal courts were accused of excessive 'lenience' toward lawlessness, thereby contributing to the spread of crime. ~ Michelle Alexander

Good news from heaven the angels bring,
Glad tidings to the earth they sing:
To us this day a child is given,
To crown us with the joy of heaven. ~ Martin Luther

Peace is not simply the absence of conflict, but the existence of justice for all people. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

Power properly understood is nothing but the ability to achieve purpose. It is the strength required to bring about social, political and economic change. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

Here is the truly Christian life, here is faith really working by love, when a man applies himself with joy and love to the works of that freest servitude in which he serves others voluntarily and for nought, himself abundantly satisfied in the fulness and riches of his own faith. ~ Martin Luther

God made man out of nothing, and as long as we are nothing, He can make something out of us. ~ Martin Luther

War is a poor chisel to carve out tomorrow. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

When I marched with Martin Luther King in Selma, I felt my legs were praying. ~ Abraham Joshua Heschel

I am indebted to my wife Coretta, without whose love, sacrifices, and loyalty neither life nor work would bring fulfillment. She has given me words of consolation when I needed them and a well-ordered home where #Christian love is a reality. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

As a sign of utmost gratitude for his contributions to the Indian society in restoring equal rights of the citizens, I confer him (B.R. Ambedkar) the title "Martin Luther King Jr. of India. ~ Abhijit Naskar

History has thrust something upon me from which I cannot turn away. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

We can no longer afford to worship the God of hate or bow before the altar of retaliation. The oceans of history are made turbulent by the ever-rising tides of hate. History is cluttered with the wreckage of nations and individuals that pursued this self-defeating path of hate. Love is the key to the solution of the problems of the world. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

None can believe how powerful prayer is, and what it is able to effect, but those who have learned it by experience. ~ Martin Luther

The Bible is alive, it speaks to me; it has feet, it runs after me; it has hands, it lays hold of me. ~ Martin Luther

I hope that the opening of the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial will be a life-altering experience that inspires every American to rededicate themselves to the fulfillment of Dr. King's dream. ~ Yvette Clarke

The famous speech Martin Luther King Jr. delivered on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial on August 28, 1963, included the sentence: "I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character". Today's left-wing, through identity politics, affirmative-action policies, and hiring quotas, has shattered that dream. ~ Tammy Bruce

We are nothing with all our gifts be they ever so great, except God assist us. ~ Martin Luther

The reproduction of mankind is a great marvel and mystery. Had God consulted me in the matter, I should have advised him to continue the generation of the species by fashioning them out of clay. ~ Martin Luther

The moral arc of the universe bends at the elbow of justice. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

To comfort a sorrowful conscience is much better than to possess many kngdoms; yet the world regards it not; nay, condemns it, calling us rebels, dissturbers of the peace. ~ Martin Luther

The forces of good and evil are working within and around me, I must choose, and in a free will universe I do have a choice. ~ Martin Luther

After we've discovered what God called us to do, after we've discovered our life's work, we should set out to do that work so well that the living, the dead, or the unborn couldn't do it any better. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

A man does not live for himself alone in this mortal body to work for it alone, but he lives also for all men on earth; rather, he lives only for others and not for himself. To this end he brings his body into subjection that he may the more sincerely and freely serve others. ~ Martin Luther

Saint Paul lives in the Christian imagination as the chief sponsor of Christian contempt for Jews, the avatar of law versus grace, flesh versus spirit, works versus faith, Moses versus Jesus, the Old Covenant versus the New. This brutal dichotomizing was attributed to Paul most influentially by Martin Luther, who used a perceived Jewish legalism, materialism, and obsession with externals as stand-ins for the decadence of his nemesis, the pope. "Because the Papists, like the Jews," he wrote, "insist that anyone wishing to be saved must observe their ceremonies, they will perish like the Jews."39 After Luther, both Protestants and Catholics read Paul as the preeminent tribune of Jewish corruption - a misreading that had terrible consequences, especially in Luther's Germany, where the Volk were defined in ontological opposition to Juden. Paul's ~ James Carroll

Judge Carter sat in stony silence, completely unmoved. At the end of the trial, he pronounced King guilty of conspiracy to violate the 1921 law and ordered him to pay a five-hundred-dollar fine or serve a year at hard labor. Like Judge Carter, the national newspaper and magazine reporters waiting outside for the ruling ignored the black women's testimonies that detailed decades of mistreatment and denied King's leadership in the boycott. Instead, the media turned King into an apostle of civil rights. ~ Danielle L. McGuire

Almost always the creative, dedicated minority has made the world better. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

Let no one drag you so low as to hate them"
-Martin Luther King Jr. ~ Elle Jefferson

I always knew that I was called to do something. I didn't know what, but I finally rationalized after I met Martin [Luther King, Jr.] and it took a lot of praying to discover this, that this was probably what God had called me to do, to marry him. ~ Coretta Scott King

My soul is too glad and too great to be at heart the enemy of any man ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

In the midst of the affliction He counsels, strengthens confirms, nourishes, and favors us ... More over, when we have repented, He instantly remits the sins as well as the punishments. In the same manner parents ought to handle their children. ~ Martin Luther

Merit is a work for the sake of which Christ gives rewards. But no such work is to be found, for Christ gives by promise. Just as if a prince should say to me, "Come to me in my castle, and I will give you a hundred florins." I do a work, certainly, in going to the castle, but the gift is not given me as the reward of my work in going, but because the prince promised it to me. ~ Martin Luther

No believing Christian can be coerced beyond Holy Writ ~ Martin Luther

If all men have "free will" and yet all without exception are under God's wrath, then it follows that "free will" leads them in only one direction - "ungodliness and unrighteousness" (i.e., wickedness). So where is the power of "free will" helping them to do good? If "free will" exists, it does not seem to be able to help men to salvation because it still leaves them under the wrath of God. ~ Martin Luther

A man who won't die for something is not fit to live. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

Freedom has always been an expensive thing. History is fit testimony to the fact that freedom is rarely gained without sacrifice and self-denial. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

Martin Luther King, Jr.'s peaceful, determined struggle for social justice, and Sargent Shriver, who launched the Peace Corps, were early heroes. A career of public service was the ultimate aspiration. ~ Queen Noor Of Jordan

While the question of who killed President Kennedy is important, the question 'what killed him' is more important. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

I'm grateful to God that, through the Negro church, the dimension of nonviolence entered our struggle. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

In a world facing the revolt of ragged and hungry masses of God's children; in a world torn between the tensions of East and West, white and colored, individuals and collectivists; in a world whose cultural and spiritual power lags so far behind her technological capabilities that we live each day on the verge of nuclear co-annihilation; in this world, nonviolence is no longer an option for intellectual analysis, it is an imperative for action ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

It is no longer a choice between violence and nonviolence in this world; it's nonviolence or nonexistence. That is where we are today. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

A person with passion will not look somewhere to see who is not doing it; they will focus and do what they can. ~ Israelmore Ayivor

Now there is a final reason I think that Jesus says, "Love your enemies." It is this: that love has within it a redemptive power. And there is a power there that eventually transforms individuals. Just keep being friendly to that person. Just keep loving them, and they can't stand it too long. Oh, they react in many ways in the beginning. They react with guilt feelings, and sometimes they'll hate you a little more at that transition period, but just keep loving them. And by the power of your love they will break down under the load. That's love, you see. It is redemptive, and this is why Jesus says love. There's something about love that builds up and is creative. There is something about hate that tears down and is destructive. So love your enemies. (from "Loving Your Enemies") ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

God wants to be praised for nourishing and cherishing, for God cherishes all creatures. God is not only the creator, but is also the sustainer and nourisher. ~ Martin Luther

The fewer the words, the better the prayer. ~ Martin Luther

This is that mystery which is rich in divine grace unto sinners: wherein by a wonderful exchange, our sins are no longer ours but Christ's; and the righteousness of Christ is not Christ's but ours. He has emptied himself of his righteousness that he might clothe us in it, and fill us with it: and he has taken our evils upon himself that he might deliver us from them. ~ Martin Luther

As long as we live there is never enough singing. ~ Martin Luther

Hope is a soldier. It fights against tribulations, the Cross, despondency, despair, and waits for better things to come in the midst of evil. Without hope faith cannot endure. On the other hand, hope without faith is blind rashness and arrogance because it lacks knowledge. Before anything else a Christian must have the insight of faith, so that the intellect may know its directions in the day of trouble and the heart may hope for better things. By faith we begin, by hope we continue. ~ Martin Luther

No one is free until we are all free.

Dr. Martin Luther King ~ Barbara Artson

One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws. I would agree with St. Augustine that ' an unjust law is no law at all. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

Too unconcerned to love and too passionless to hate, too detached to be selfish and too lifeless to be unselfish, too indifferent to experience joy and too cold to express sorrow, they are neither dead nor alive; they merely exist. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

Power is love implementing the demands of justice. Justice is love correcting everything that goes against love. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

How great, therefore, the wickedness of human nature is! How many girls there are who prevent conception and kill and expel tender fetuses, although procreation is the work of God. ~ Martin Luther

Jerome has merited hell rather than heaven for it-so little would I dare to recognize or call him a saint. ~ Martin Luther

There is no wisdom save in truth. ~ Martin Luther

In our glorious fight for civil rights, we must guard against being fooled by false slogans, such as 'right-to-work.' It provides no 'rights' and no 'works.' Its purpose is to destroy labor unions and the freedom of collective bargaining ... . We demand this fraud be stopped. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

God can be found only in suffering and the cross. ~ Martin Luther

They were the good old days. Don't give up hope in the bad new
days, which will become then good old days. We appreciate Kennedy because he was killed; Martin Luther King was a great man. If you'd meet Naropa or Tilopa on the spot you'd be pissed off. History is very deceptive, reality is more important. There is a piece of philosophy for you. ~ Chogyam Trungpa

What would it profit us to possess and perform everything else and be like pure saints, if we meanwhile neglected our chief purpose in life, namely, the care of the young? ~ Martin Luther

When we let freedom ring, when we let it ring from every tenement and every hamlet, from every state and every city. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

Somehow this madness must cease. We must stop now. I speak as a child of God and brother to the suffering poor of Vietnam. I speak for those whose land is being laid waste, whose homes are being destroyed, whose culture is being subverted. I speak for the poor in America who are paying the double price of smashed hopes at home and death and corruption in Vietnam. I speak as a citizen of the world, for the world as it stands aghast at the path we have taken. I speak as an American to the leaders of my own nation. The great initiative in this war is ours. The initiative to stop it must be ours. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

A calling is you feel - you look out and see the need - maybe it's the need for the poor, to help poor people. Maybe it's the need to get involved in the race problem, as Martin Luther King was - felt called. ~ Billy Graham

The less I pray, the harder it gets; the more I pray, the better it goes. ~ Martin Luther

It may be true that the law cannot make a man love me, but it can stop him from lynching me, and I think that's pretty important. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

True humility does not know that it is humble. If it did, it would be proud from the contemplation of so fine a virtue. ~ Martin Luther

It really boils down to this: that all life is interrelated. We are all caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tired into a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one destiny, affects all indirectly. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

I'm taking one for the team,
Like Martin Luther King,
taking one for a dream ~ Method Man

Faith is the belief that certain outcomes will happen, and hope is the belief that certain outcomes can happen. So when Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. says, "the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice," he is speaking from a place of faith. He is confident that justice is inevitable, even if it may come in another lifetime. Faith is often rooted in the belief of a higher power, in God. Hope on the other hand would mean reframing the statement to say, "The arc of the moral universe is long, and it will bend toward justice, if we bend it. Faith is rooted in certainty, hope is rooted in possibility, and they both require their own different kinds of work. ~ DeRay Mckesson

At the center of non-violence stands the principle of love ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

Sometimes the curses of the godless sound better than the hallelujahs of the pious. ~ Martin Luther

The universities only ought to turn out men who are experts in the Holy Scriptures, men who can become bishops and priests, and stand in the front line against heretics, the devil, and all the world. But where do you find that? ~ Martin Luther

God is not hostile to sinners, but only to unbelievers. ~ Martin Luther

I have condemned any organizer of war, regardless of his rank or nationality. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

You see, however, which is called the Court of Rome, and which neither you nor any man can deny to be more corrupt than any Babylon or Sodom, and quite, as I believe, of a lost, desperate and hopeless impiety. ~ Martin Luther

I have a dream, one dream, keep dreaming. Dream of freedom, justice dreaming, dreaming of equality and hopefully no longer required to dream them ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

We must beat the Gospel into peoples' heads incessantly because it's the one thing we're prone to forget. ~ Martin Luther

The proverb has it that Hunger is the best cook. The Law makes afflicted consciences hungry for Christ. Christ tastes good to them. Hungry hearts appreciate Christ. Thirsty souls are what Christ wants. He invites them: "Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." Christ's benefits are so precious that He will dispense them only to those who need them and really desire them. ~ Martin Luther

Idiots, the lame, the blind, the dumb, are men in whom the devils have established themselves: and all the physicians who heal these infirmities, as though they proceeded from natural causes, are ignorant blockheads. ~ Martin Luther

So let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

Nothing worthwhile is gained without sacrifice. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

Make a career of humanity. Commit yourself to the struggle for equal rights. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

I contend that the cry of 'Black Power' is, at bottom, a reaction to the reluctance of white power to make the kind of changes necessary to make justice a reality for the Negro. I think that we've got to see that a riot is the language of the unheard. And, what is it that America has failed to hear? It has failed to hear that the economic plight of the Negro poor has worsened over the last few years." - Martin Luther King, Jr., 60 Minutes Interview, 1966 ~ Martin Luther King Jr.

In any nonviolent campaign there are four basic steps: collection of the facts to determine whether injustices exist; negotiation; self-purification; and direct action. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

God foreknows nothing by contingency, but that He foresees, purposes, and does all things according to His immutable, eternal, and infallible will. By this thunderbolt, "Free-will" is thrown prostrate, and utterly dashed to pieces. ~ Martin Luther

To worship God in spirit is the service and homage of the heart, and implies fear of God and trust in Him. ~ Martin Luther

A mighty fortress is our God, a bulwark never failing: our helper He amid the flood of mortal ills prevailing. ~ Martin Luther

My father and mother did not think they should have brought a superintendent into the world. ~ Martin Luther

Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

But in your hearts set apart Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect. 1 Peter 3:15 When you're challenged or asked about your faith, you shouldn't respond arrogantly. You shouldn't be defiant or forceful, as if you were tearing trees out of the ground. Rather, you should respond with fear and humility, as if you were standing before God and answering him. If you were summoned before kings and princes and had prepared yourself well in advance with Scripture, you might think, "Just wait; I'll answer correctly." But the devil will grab the sword out of your hands and give you a shove. You will be disgraced and find out you put your armor on in vain. He can even take your best verses from your hands so that you can't use them, even though you have them memorized. God allows this to happen to subdue your arrogance and make you humble. ~ Martin Luther

If I hit you and you hit me and I hit you back and you hit me back and go on, you see, that goes on ad infinitum. It just never ends. Somewhere somebody must have a little sense, and that's
the strong person. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

We are beginning to regain a knowledge of Creation, a knowledge forfeited by the fall of Adam. By God's mercy we can begin to recognize His Wonderful works and wonders also in flowers when we ponder his might and goodness. Therefore we laud, magnify and thank Him. ~ Martin Luther