Forty years ago, on April 4, 1968, Martin Luther King was assasinated. He was just 39 years old. I was 15. To me, a Jewish kid from the Bronx who was a hippie wannabe, MLK was perhaps the bravest, most compassionate and loving man I had ever heard of. He still is. Here are some of his words:

Hatred paralyzes life; love releases it. Hatred confuses life; love harmonizes it. Hatred darkens life; love illuminates it.

Human salvation lies in the hands of the creatively maladjusted.

I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. That is why right, temporarily defeated, is stronger than evil triumphant.

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.

Let no man pull you low enough to hate him.

Like an unchecked cancer, hate corrodes the personality and eats away its vital unity. Hate destroys a man’s sense of values and his objectivity. It causes him to describe the beautiful as ugly and the ugly as beautiful, and to confuse the true with the false and the false with the true.

Man must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love.

Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars… Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.

Nonviolence is the answer to the crucial political and moral questions of our time; the need for mankind to overcome oppression and violence without resorting to oppression and violence. Mankind must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression, and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love.

Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.