Martin Luther King, Jr. Quotes About Enemies

• 

  Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into friend.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Love, Friendship, Change

  Martin Luther King (Jr.) (2012). “A Gift of Love: Sermons from Strength to Love and Other Preachings”, p.50, Beacon Press

• He who is devoid of the power to forgive is devoid of the power to love.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Love, Forgiveness, Wise

  Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (2012). “A Gift of Love: Sermons from Strength to Love and Other Preachings”, p.64, Beacon Press

• In the End, we will remember not the words of our enemies but the silence of our friends.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Friendship, Wisdom, Kings

  "The Trumpet of Conscience". Martin Luther King, Jr.'s steeler lecture at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama, November 17, 1957.

• We must develop and maintain the capacity to forgive. He who is devoid of the power to forgive is devoid of the power to love.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Inspirational, Relationship, Inspiring

  "Loving Your Enemies" by Martin Luther King, Jr., Christmas, 1957.

• Have we not come to such an impasse in the modern world that we must love our enemies - or else? The chain reaction of evil - hate begetting hate, wars producing more wars - must be broken, or else we shall be plunged into the dark abyss of annihilation.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Love, Hate, War

  Martin Luther King (Jr.) (1968). “I Have a Dream: The Quotations of Martin Luther King, Jr”

• Love is creative and redemptive. Love builds up and unites; hate tears down and destroys. The aftermath of the ‘fight with fire’ method...is bitterness and chaos, the aftermath of the love method is reconciliation and creation of the beloved community...Yes , love-which means understanding, creative, redemptive goodwill, even for one’s enemies-is the solution

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Hate, Mean, Fighting

• We are called to speak for the weak, for the voiceless, for the victims of our nation and for those it calls enemy, for no document from human hands can make these humans any less our brothers and sisters.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Brother, Hands, Justice

  Beyond Vietnam -- A Time to Break Silence, Delivered 4 April 1967, Riverside Church, New York City

• Returning hate, adding deeper darkness to a night that is already void of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Stars, Hate, Loss

• There may come a time when it will be possible for you to humiliate your worst enemy or even to defeat him, but in order to love the enemy you must not do it... The Greek language has another word [for love]. It calls it agape. Agape is more than romantic love. Agape is more than friendship. Agape is understanding, redemptive goodwill for all men. Agape is an overflowing love, a spontaneous love, which seeks nothing in return. And theologians would say that it is the love of God operating in the human heart. When you rise to love on this level you love all men, not because you like them, not because their ways appeal to you, not because they are worthful to you, but you love all men because God loves them. And you rise to the noble heights of loving the person who does the evil deed while hating the deed that the person does. And I think this is what Jesus means when he says, “Love your enemies.”

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Life, Jesus, Hate

  "Loving Your Enemies". Sermon Delivered at the Detroit Council of Churches' Noon Lenten Services, kinginstitute.stanford.edu. March 07, 1961.

• It is a tragic mix-up when the United States spends 500,000 for every enemy soldier killed, and only 53 annually on the victims of poverty.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  War, Soldier, Enemy

• I think the first reason that we should love our enemies, and I think this was at the very center of Jesus' thinking, is this: that hate for hate only intensifies the existence of hate and
  evil in the universe.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Jesus, Hate, Thinking

  Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (2013). “A Time to Break Silence: The Essential Works of Martin Luther King, Jr., for Students”, p.24, Beacon Press

• Here is the true meaning and value of compassion and nonviolence, when it helps us to see the enemy's point of view, to hear his questions, to know his assessment of ourselves. For from his view we may indeed see the basic weaknesses of our own condition, and if we are mature, we may learn and grow and profit from the wisdom of the brothers who are called the opposition.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Brother, Compassion, Views

  Beyond Vietnam -- A Time to Break Silence, Delivered 4 April 1967, Riverside Church, New York City

• If your opponent has a conscience, then follow Gandhi and nonviolence. But if your enemy has no conscience like Hitler, then follow Bonhoeffer.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Enemy, Opponents, Bonhoeffer

• Agape is disinterested love. . . . Agape does not begin by discriminating between worthy and unworthy people, or any qualities people possess. It begins by loving others for their sakes. . . . Therefore, agape makes no distinction between friend and enemy; it is directed toward both.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Faith, People, Enemy

  Martin Luther King (Jr.) (1964). “A Martin Luther King Treasury”

• There's another reason why you should love your enemies, and that is because hate distorts the personality of the hater. We usually think of what hate does for the individual hated or the individuals hated or the groups hated. But it is even more tragic, it is even more ruinous and injurious to the individual who hates. [...] For the person who hates, the true becomes false and the false becomes true. That's what hate does.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Hate, Love You, Thinking

  "Loving Your Enemies". Speech delivered at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church, Montgomery, Alabama, November 17, 1957.

• Love even for enemies is the key to the solution of the problems of our world.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Keys, Our World, Enemy

  Martin Luther King (Jr.) (2012). “A Gift of Love: Sermons from Strength to Love and Other Preachings”, p.46, Beacon Press

• Loving Your Enemies... Far from being the pious injunction of a utopian dreamer, this demand is an absolute necessity for the survival of our civilization. Yes it is love that will save our world and civilization; love even for our enemies.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Peace, Our World, Civilization

• Was not Jesus an extremist in love? - "Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, pray for them that despitefully use you."

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Inspirational, Jesus, Love You

  Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (2013). “The Essential Martin Luther King, Jr.: "I Have a Dream" and Other Great Writings”, p.98, Beacon Press

• There is some good in the worst of us, and some evil in the best of us.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Forgiveness, Worst Enemy, Evil

  Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (2015). “The Radical King”, p.39, Beacon Press

• A time comes when silence is betrayal. That time has come for us in relation to Vietnam. A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift, is approaching spiritual death.I knew that America would never invest the necessary funds or energies in rehabilitation of its poor so long as adventures like Vietnam continued to draw men and skills and money like some demonic destructive suction tube. So I was increasingly compelled to see the war as an enemy of the poor.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Uplifting, Spiritual, Betrayal

  Beyond Vietnam -- A Time to Break Silence, Delivered 4 April 1967, Riverside Church, New York City

• 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.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Jesus, Love You, Thinking

  "Loving Your Enemies". Speech delivered at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church, Montgomery, Alabama, November 17, 1957.

• Please be peaceful. We believe in law and order. We are not advocating violence, I want you to love your enemies... for what we are doing is right, what we are doing is just -- and God is with us.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Believe, Order, Law

• In order to love your enemies, you must begin by analyzing self.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Love You, Self, Order

  Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (2013). “A Time to Break Silence: The Essential Works of Martin Luther King, Jr., for Students”, p.22, Beacon Press

• Another reason why we must love our enemies is that hate scars the soul and distorts the personality.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Hate, Personality, Soul

  Martin Luther King (Jr.) (2012). “A Gift of Love: Sermons from Strength to Love and Other Preachings”, p.49, Beacon Press

• So when Jesus says "Love your enemies," he is setting forth a profound and ultimately inescapable admonition.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Inspirational, Jesus, Love You

  Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (2012). “A Gift of Love: Sermons from Strength to Love and Other Preachings”, p.67, Beacon Press

You May Also Like:

Malcolm X

Mahatma Gandhi

Nelson Mandela

Rosa Parks

Martin Luther King III

Coretta Scott King

Martin Luther