E-mail a friendDr. Cornel West
original airdate April 4, 2008
A renowned scholar, Princeton professor Dr. Cornel West has written/edited more than 20 books, including Race Matters and Democracy Matters. Outside of academia, he's been described as an "intellectual provocateur," with lectures, TV and film appearances and his spoken-word CDs. He provides philosophical commentary on all three Matrix films, and his disc, "Never Forget: A Journey of Revelations," combines hip-hop and intellectual dialogue. West has also taught at Harvard, Yale and Union Theological Seminary.
Princeton University professor discusses Dr. King's lasting legacy. Full interview. (9:57)
Dr. Cornel West
Tavis: As we close out our week here in Memphis, I'm pleased to welcome Dr. Cornel West back to this program. The distinguished professor at Princeton is a best-selling author and spoken word artist whose latest CD is called "Never Forget: A Journey of Revelations." Dr. West, it's always nice to see you.
Cornel West: Always a blessing for me, my dear brother.
Tavis: One could say that Martin's life was a journey of revelations, yes?
West: Absolutely, though, brother. I want to thank you for really building on the rich legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr. We are here in this sacred place. It's consecrated space not simply because of Martin's life, but the degree to which he's connected to all these other brothers and sisters of all colors who are willing to love and serve humanity and justice.
Martin Luther King, Jr. in so many ways was first and foremost a Christian preacher and he preached great sermons, but his greatest sermon was his life. This is very important in terms of leadership these days. He was a humble man, he was a loving man and, most importantly, he understood that, if he really was gonna pick up the cross - and that's what's at the center of his life, you see.
Looking at the world through the lens of the cross and putting a primacy on the catastrophic, the horrendous, the calamitous, the scandalous, the monstrous circumstances of the wretched of the earth, and then picking up his cross and knowing he was gonna be wounded, scarred, bruised and marked by that cross, including Black people, white people, across the board, especially the powers that be. Then he knew he was gonna die on the cross and hoping that his death somehow would keep alive this tradition of love and service to others.
That to me is the focus because there's a lot of talk about a speech here, a snippet of a speech here or controversy in present day there. No, he was a special kind of brother who loved enough, who loved me and you and Black people and America and humanity enough to die knowing he was flawed.
He knew he wasn't Jesus, though he was a follower of Jesus, but saying, "I understand that justice is what love looks like in public and deep democracy is what justice looks like in practice. I'm gonna die with my cross out of love connected to justice trying to democratize not just America, but American imperialism in Vietnam. I'm with the children. I'm with the victims of this criminal slaughter of these precious people."
Poor people, sanitation workers? Martin would want to say let us not forget Echo Cole. Let us not forget Robert Walker. Those are the two brothers who died whose death constituted the catalyst for the strike itself. Let us not forget T.O. Jones. He's the leader. I'm just a servant in this struggle. Why? Because I got my cross, brother, I got my cross.
Tavis: Since you've raised this conversation about the cross, you speak often about people who put the flag above the cross. That is, of course, contrary to Martin's life, putting the flag above the cross. Talk to me about that.
West: Well, Martin Luther King, Jr., as a cross-centered Christian and as a Democrat who focused on the catastrophic in ordinary peoples' lives, he knew that, when you talk about empires, you're talking about a golden calf of wealth which is enveloped around a blood-soaked flag that elites use in order to sustain their power.
So from the very beginning, he's a patriot because he loves America, but he doesn't confuse dissent with disloyalty. I'm gonna critique America. He even says, very much like Brother Jeremiah Wright who I have unconditional love for, "God condemns injustice in America."
You know the last sermon that Brother Martin was gonna preach? You know what the name of it was? "Why America May Go To Hell." That's what he called in for the last sermon at Ebenezer. He never got a chance to preach it. Why? Because he knows any nation stands under the judgment of the cross. What kind of unconditional love do you have? What kind of unarmed truth are you willing to confront?
If you're treating the least of these - echoes of the 25th chapter of Matthew - in an unjust way and, if I love them and anytime you love somebody, you hate the fact that they're treated unjustly and unfairly, then sooner or later, your empire will fall. That's why he talked about America connected to barbarity in Vietnam. That's why he talked about America in terms of the arrogance that you and others have talked about, but he did it out of love.
Everybody knew he loved Black people. He loved America. He loved humanity, but the cross says, watch, every flag, every nation, every culture, must bow before unarmed truth and unconditional love. He was willing to live that and, when you live that kind of life, brother, you usually end up on the cross as that martyr.
Tavis: In this sacred and consecrated space, as you refer to it, how do you process the fact that Martin has now been dead longer than he lived?
West: Well, it may just show the degree to which his love still envelops all of us and sustains us in this way. It's a beautiful thing. I think we have to keep track, though, of that love in its transgressive form. It's easy to sanitize and sterilize and deodorize the love and make it into a kind of superficial Kool-Aid-like liking. Well, we liked him while he's now in the grave.
No, no. Those of us who love him know we got to pick up our cross and be transgressive, tell some truths America and the world doesn't want to hear and we ourselves don't want to hear. We got to tell some truths Black people don't want to hear. What does it mean to love a people who've been taught to hate themselves? That's Martin's lesson too.
Because if you're not used to loving yourself, you haven't cultivated the capacity to love. When you are embraced with that depth of love, you don't know what to do. It's like falling in love with a sister. She hasn't cultivated the capacity to love. Or a sister loving us. We haven't cultivated the capacity to love. We in trouble. We in over our head. We need somebody praying for us, but I know that's just a footnote, brother (laughter).
Tavis: (Laughter) To your point about love, we've talked many times, you and me and Mr. B, Mr. Belafonte, talked many times about this love and service at the center of King's life. Do you think that we as everyday people, as humans, really grasp, I mean, truly grasp, understand, appreciate the depth of his love or will it take us forever and a day to figure how deep that love really was?
West: That's one of the reasons why your show here in this place at this particular moment is crucial because, in the end, if you're willing to pay the ultimate price and bear the ultimate burden which is not just to die, but to live your life so that your death is an extension of your life, so that death and the life become tied into that unconditional love, but also that quest - though we never possess it - of unarmed truth.
Martin understood the condition of truth is to allow suffering to speak. He comes out of a people that says, "Lift your voice." That's the anthem of we blues people. "Lift your voice." That true in Africa, it's true in Asia, it's true in Latin America, it's true for white brothers and sisters in Appalachia.
I want you to straighten your back up and lift your voice because, when you lift your voice, lo and behold, you might be able to shape your destiny, and if you do that, you're not going to have disgraceful school systems, you're not going to have unavailable health care and child care, you're not going to have corporate elites and corporate greed running amok and you're not going to have these jobs that don't provide a living wage. That's the kind of Democratic energy, but it's deeply a spiritual energy because Martin is inseparable from Mahalia Jackson.
You're not gonna fully understand Martin unless you hear Mahalia sing "Calvary," unless you hear Mahalia sing "Move On Up a Little Higher" because there's no way that that kind of human being, that kind of Christian, that kind of free Black man, that kind of Negro, can sustain himself without spirituality and especially music. "Please, Lord, Take My Hand." Martin needs that music. Why? Because he got to preserve his sanity and his dignity. Now, of course, it's true of Coretta and the kids and the family, but we're all in it together.
That's why Martin would always want us to talk about him as a moment in the collective struggle, a wave in an ocean, not an isolated icon in a museum. And thank God that we get a chance to reflect on his death so that his afterlife is manifested in the life we choose in space and time to sacrifice and serve and love in the way that he tried to do.
Tavis: What a way to close the week. Dr., thank you for coming down to see us.
West: Love you, brother. We love Martin too.
Tavis: Indeed we do.
West: And, brother, we dedicate ourselves to Martin's legacy until we die.
Tavis: Love and service, got to be faithful until death.
West: Faithful until death.
Tavis: And not just us, but all of you.
West: And find joy in serving others.
Tavis: That's true for us and all of you watching as well.
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