Stanford
The Martin Luther King, Jr. Research and Education Institute

“Outline of Lecture in Social Philosophy”

Author: King, Martin Luther, Jr.

Date: October 3, 1961?

Location: Atlanta, Ga.?

Genre: Speech

Topic: Martin Luther King, Jr. - Education

Details

Outlining his introductory lecture for the Social Philosophy seminar he teaches at Morehouse College, King provides a broad overview of philosophy.1 King’s lecture was directly informed by Will Durant’s The Story of Philosophy, which was listed as a source for subsequent lectures.2

“Phi is that thinking which seeks to discover connected truth about all available experience.3

The meaning of Philosophy (phileia to love sophis—wisdom) It is the love of wis­dom. Plato once called philosophy “that dear delight.”4 It is the wooing of wisdom. It is the delightful search for meaning. “Life has meaning,” said Browning, to find its meaning is my meat and drink.”5 Thoreau once said “To be a philosopher is not merely to have subtle thoughts, or even to find a school, but so to love wisdom as to live according to its dictates, a life of simplicity, independence, magnanimity and trust”6

The Philosophy bitterly subpoenea every creed + institution to appear before the judgment seat of reason7

Science is analytical description, Philosophy is synthetic interpretation.8

Science observes processes and constructs Means. Phi criticizes and coordinate En

  1. Philosophy includes five fields of study

    1. metaphysics or ontology
    2. epistimology
    3. logic
    4. esthetics
    5. ethics9

    Social Phi is the study of ideal social organization: monarchy, aristocracy, democ­racy, socialism, anarchism, feminism.

  2. Distinguish between ethics an csocial philosophy
    1. on deals with individuals an the other with society
    2. Aristotle’s Golden mean and Kant’s Categorial Imperative10
    3. But the ethics of the ind and society should be one.

  3. Now before discussing the Republic, let us say a few words about Plato the man. It is impossible to discuss Plato without saying something about Socrates

    1. He was a great phi. He had an unassuming simplicity that made him a teacher beloved of the finest youth in Athens11
    2. They loved his modesty of wisdom. He did not claim to have wisdom, but only to seek it lovingly. He was wisdom’s amateur, not its professional {Know thyself}12
    3. There were philosophers before him. Thales + Heraclitus; Parmenides + Zeno; Pythagoras and Empedocles. But they were physical philosophers. They dealt with the nature of the external or measurable world. Socrates said what is man13
    4. So he went about uncovering assumptions and questioning certainties. Socratic method is a way of teaching in which the master professes to impart no information, but draws forth more and more definite answers by means of pointed question. It is a demand for accurate definition.14
    5. It was this unswerving devotion to the search for truth that lead to his death and immortality. The rest of the story all the world knows, for Plato wrote it down in prose more beautiful than poetry.15

    The need for intelligence

  4. This was Plato teacher. He revered Socrates. “I thank God that I was born Greek and barbarian..”16

    He returns to Athens in 387.

    He created for himself a medium of expression in which both beauty and truth migh find room and play—the dialogue. At times Plato is difficult to understand because of this intoxicating mixture of phi and poetry17 The Dialogues remain one of the priceless treasures of the world18

  5. The most comprehensive of his dialogues is the Republic. He we find his meta­physics … It is a great document “It is a feast for the elite, served by an unstinting host.19

1. King taught the course with Morehouse professor Samuel W. Williams. He accepted the offer to teach on 1 August 1961 (see King to Benjamin Elijah Mays, 1 August 1961, p. 258 in this volume). Eight students enrolled in the course (Morehouse College, Class roll, Seminar in Social Philosophy, 27 January 1962).

2. See King, Notes for seminar in Social Philosophy, October 1961–May 1962.

3. Cf. Edgar Sheffield Brightman, An Introduction to Philosophy (New York: Henry Holt, 1925), p. 4. During his first year as a graduate student at Boston University, King took two courses—Philosophy of Religion and Seminar in Philosophy—with Brightman, earning an A- and B+, respectively (see Introduction in Papers 2:5, 18). King had a copy of Brightman’s book in his personal library.

4. Will Durant, The Story of Philosophy: The Lives and Opinions of the Greater Philosophers (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1933), p. 1. King had a copy of Durant’s book in his personal library.

5. Cf. Durant, Story, p. 1.

6. Cf. Henry David Thoreau, Walden, or, Life in the Woods (Boston: Ticknor and Fields, 1854), p. 18. Durant used the same Thoreau quote in his introduction (p. 1).

7. Cf. Durant, Story, p. 7.

8. Durant, Story, p. 2.

9. Durant, Story, p. 3: “Specifically, philosophy means and includes five fields of study and discourse: logic, esthetics, ethics, politics, and metaphysics.”

10. In his notes for the class, King defined Aristotle’s road to virtue as “the middle way, the Golden Mean. Excess and deficiency are Vices/ the Mean is Virtue” (King, Notes for seminar in Social Philosophy, October 1961–May 1962). In another set of notes, King quoted from Immanuel Kant’s formu­lation of the Categorical Imperative: “‘Treat every human being, including yourself, as an end in himself and not as a means to the advantage of anyone else.’ In other words respect yourself and others” (King, Notes, Seminar in Social Philosophy, 3 October 1961–23 January 1962, p. 304 in this volume).

11. Cf. Durant, Story, pp. 7–8.

12. King wrote “Know thyself” in the margin. Cf. Durant, Story, p. 8.

13. Cf. Durant, Story, p. 9.

14. Cf. Durant, Story, p. 9.

15. Cf. Durant, Story, pp. 9, 11.

16. Cf. Durant, Story, p. 13.

17. Cf. Durant, Story, p. 14.

18. Durant, Story, p. 15.

19. Durant, Story, p. 16.

Source: MCMLK-RWWL, Morehouse College Martin Luther King, Jr. Collection, Atlanta University Center, Robert W. Woodruff Library Archives and Special Collections, Atlanta, Ga.