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The Rabin-King Initiative at Morehouse College
“We must think differently, look at things a different way. Peace requires a world of new concepts, new definitions.” – Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin
About The Rabin-King Initiative at Morehouse College
The Rabin-King Initiative is a cooperative effort by the Consulate General of Israel to the Southeast, the Martin Luther King Jr. International Chapel at Morehouse College, the Temple and the Atlanta chapter of the American Jewish Committee. Our aim is to celebrate the rich history of African American and Jewish collaborations and encourage
a new generation in combined service through a series of events and academic programs that draw upon the legacies of Nobel Prize laureates Yitzhak Rabin, former Prime Minister of Israel, and Martin Luther King, Jr., minister and civil rights activist.
Launched amid the momentum created by the election of President Barack Obama - who delivered his groundbreaking speech at the Democratic National Convention exactly 45 years to the day after King’s “I Have a Dream” speech in 1963 - the Rabin-King Initiative offers new avenues of cooperation for today’s students and faculty through interdisciplinary approaches to the history of the struggle for freedom and justice.
A Bold Vision
The Rabin-King Initiative at Morehouse College seeks to:
• Bolster the Morehouse curriculum on African American-Jewish relations by initiating a course on the “Roots of Religion and the Black Experience;”
• Establish a bi-directional exchange program with the University of Haifa in Israel for students and faculty;
• Sponsor collaborative community service projects with Jewish and African American students;
• Develop an oral history project of black and Jewish student civil rights activist leaders, such as the Freedom Riders, of the sixties:
• Commission a series of oil portraits to commemorate the lives and contributions of Jewish leaders in civil and human rights; and
• Establish an endowed Rabin-King professorship as part of the Marin Luther King Jr. International Chapel.
A Fresh Start
African American-Jewish collaboration and activism, from the early years of the NAACP to the nonviolent 1960s movements of CORE and SNCC and the Freedom Riders, left an indelible legacy. But it was not until 1989, that new life was breathed into this historic partnership of humanitarian effort when “The Black-Jewish Alliance: Reunion and Renewal,” organized by the Marjorie Kovler Institute for Black Jewish Relations, the Marin Luther King Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change and the Carter Presidential Center, was held in Atlanta.
Today, in a time of parallel challenges, the spirit of cooperation has never been more of an imperative. The Rabin-King Initiative seeks to take the next step in the collaborative journey toward establishing world peace and reconciliation.
To View a Press Release about the Opening Event
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