More than a biography, To the Mountaintop is the history of a turbulent epoch that changed the course of American and world history. Moral warrior and nonviolent apostle; man of God rocked by fury, fear, and guilt; rational thinker driven by emotional and spiritual truth -- Martin Luther King Jr. struggled to reconcile these divisions in his soul. Here is an intimate narrative of his intellectual and spiritual journey from cautious liberal, to reluctant radical, to righteous revolutionary. Stewart Burns draws not only on King's speeches, letters, writings, and well-reported strategizing and activities, but also on previously underutilized oral histories of key meetings and events, which present a dramatic account of King and the movement in the crucial years from 1955 to 1968.
In a striking departure from earlier books on Martin Luther King Jr. and the civil rights movement, Burns focuses on King's biblical faith and spiritual vision as fundamental to his political leadership and shows how these threads wove together a "single garment of destiny," making King the most important social prophet of the twentieth century. King is not portrayed as a lone exalted hero, butas the heart of a fabric of principled leadershipthat stretched from his closest colleagues to the movement's foot soldiers on the streets. This book stresses his shaping by other leaders -- heroic figures such as Bayard Rustin, Ella Baker, James Bevel, Bob Moses, and Marian Wright Edelman -- and his conflicted relationships with John and Robert Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson.
To the Mountaintop is uniquely powerful in presenting actual conversations between King and others, and in showing how King's public words often revealed his private torment. Burns provides a uniquely realist portrait of King and the civil rights movement by revealing the vital but neglected religious character of the story, and by demonstrating how King profoundly experienced the movement as a sacred mission following a path of liberation and sacrifice pioneered by Moses and Jesus.

To the Mountaintop: Martin Luther King Jr.'s Sacred Mission to Save America: 1955-1968

Biographies & Memoirs

Burns, Stewart

Community & Culture

HarperOne

To the Mountaintop: Martin Luther King Jr.'s Mission to Save America: 1955-1968

History

Americas

Examines the student-oriented New Left, the anti-Vietnam War protests, and the feminist and black freedom movements

Social Movements of the 1960's: Searching for Democracy (SOCIAL MOVEMENTS PAST AND PRESENT)

Twayne Pub

The Montgomery bus boycott was a formative moment in twentieth-century history: a harbinger of the African American freedom movement, a springboard for the leadership of Martin Luther King Jr., and a crucial step in the struggle to realize the American dream of liberty and equality for all. In Daybreak of Freedom, Stewart Burns presents a groundbreaking documentary history of the boycott. Using an extraordinary array of more than one hundred original documents, he crafts a compelling and comprehensive account of this celebrated year-long protest of racial segregation. Daybreak of Freedom reverberates with the voices of those closest to the bus boycott, ranging from King and his inner circle, to Jo Ann Robinson and other women leaders who started the protest, to the maids, cooks, and other 'foot soldiers' who carried out the struggle. With a deft narrative hand and editorial touch, Burns weaves their testimony into a riveting story that shows how events in Montgomery pushed the entire nation to keep faith with its stated principles.

Daybreak of Freedom: The Montgomery Bus Boycott

The University of North Carolina Press

Praise from Rev. Jim Wallis:"This book is the best treatment of Martin Luther King's faith that I have seen, and an incredibly thorough exploration of the ways faith was fundamentally central to Dr. King's vision, action, and perspective on mission and civil rights. In this book we see the full extent of what it means to form a spiritual commitment to justice, activism, and equality, and are reminded of what we are called to do for others, our society, and ourselves. This edition presents a strikingly nuanced and human vision of the civil rights leader and reverend we are all familiar with."-Jim Wallis, New York Times bestselling author of America's Original Sin: Racism, White Privilege, and the Bridge to a New America, president of Sojourners, and editor-in-chief of Sojourners magazineIn this intimate portrait of the Civil Rights Movement and its greatest leader, historian Stewart Burns weaves the spiritual and political dimensions of Dr. King's life and the movement for freedom into a single garment. The spiritual and political dimensions illuminate each other. Told with a vivid narrative, mining unmined sources, To the Mountaintop shows how his Christian faith and his self-conception as chosen but unworthy messiah, facing death daily, became his guiding forces in his life and leadership.Praise for the first edition:"Thoroughly researched and gracefully written, To the Mountaintop is a brilliant interpretation of Martin Luther King Jr.'s vocation to save America. Anyone who wishes to understand King and the civil rights movement cannot afford to miss this book." Rev. Dr. James H. Cone, Union Theological Seminary, founder of Black liberation theology, author of God of the Oppressed and Martin and Malcolm and America"For those of us who knew Martin Luther King Jr. and were involved in the Southern movement, but also for all Americans, Stewart Burns brings wonderfully alive both the man himself and those exciting, inspiring times." Howard Zinn, activist historian, author, A People's History of the United StatesHighly regarded historian of the Black freedom movement, author or editor of eight books, Professor Burns is renowned for his 2004 biography of Dr. King, To the Mountaintop (HarperCollins), winner of the prestigious Wilbur Award for conveying religious ideas to secular readers. Clergy and lay people of various faiths praised his lucid portrayal of King's spiritual journey and its impact on his leadership in civil rights, human rights, and world peace. The new edition, a penetrating spiritual biography, is enriched by twelve years of the author's further research and theological exploration.

To the Mountaintop: Martin Luther King's Mission and its Meaning for America

CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform

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