Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758) is widely recognized as one of America’s most profound Theologians. Some might even consider him the master of Puritan revival, since he was the leader of the Great Awakening. During his time he was a devout Calvinist who had the power of single-handedly keeping the Puritan faith strong for over twenty-five years, by using vivid imagery to provoke his audience. Edward's dialect was exquisitely influential and yet wielded with class and ease. This essay argues that Edwards was a prestigious theologian in his time that helped shape modern religious culture.
From an early stage Edwards was influenced by his family tremendously. “As the only boy, he was the center of attention. From early years his parents groomed him for college and the ministry, and his older sisters often oversaw his lessons. Throughout his life Jonathan especially admired female piety, which he first saw in his mother and sisters” . His father was very strict and had only the highest expectations for his son. He taught young Edwards how to read and write Latin and Greek, languages that were necessary to enter college. “Jonathan was born a student, and his remarkable aptitudes must have gratified his father” .
Edwards’s grandfather, Reverend Solomon Stoddard, also greatly influenced him. Solomon was often referred to as the “Pope of the Connecticut Valley” . While Solomon was preaching in Northampton, Connecticut he helped liberalize church policy by broadening “the standards for full church membership to all adults who professed the doctrines of the church, submitted to its discipline, and promised to attempt to live morally” . These extended standards meant that almost, if not all members of the community could and wo...
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...ogy, Edwards started with the premise that God was the primary actor in any relationship. God was always communicating his love and beauty” . In December 1734 the awakening took another electrifying growth and moved to a new level of intensity. By the spring the whole town seemed to be partaking in the awakening. .
In one of his more powerful sermons, Sinner’s in the Hand of an Angry God, Edwards used words of parallelism that moved his listeners. He described his view of a vengeful God and the consequences of sin with such strong emotions and vividness that it was sure to astonish most, if not all of those who had the privilege of hearing or reading it. Edwards clearly portrays an image of a fearful and powerful God in relation to a simple and weak man. Edward's words were potent and astonishing and he was sure to have shaken anyone who came across them.
The Great Awakening was a crucial movement to the decline of religious piety. In Jonathan Edward’s sermon, “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God”, he presents the danger of sin and the intense urgency for change. Similar to many speakers and writers, Edwards has a purpose in mind when delivering his sermon to his congregation. In Edwards's sermon, he appeals to emotion through the use of variation in tone and figurative language/diction with the purpose to instigate a religious fervor that rekindles the faith of the Puritan community.
The passages given from the Edwards' 'Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God'; and the opening sentence of the Declaration both include many points such as the tone, diction, and syntax. The points shown throughout each sentence aims for the intent of obtaining the attention of the audience. The way each sentence is arranged with its own syntax can very well appeal to listeners, depending on its structure and imagery.
Edwards states that it is shameful for individuals to resort to practices harsher than the clergy already do. Everyone is brethren when worshipping Christ, acting against one another is dishonoring the name of Christ. Edwards was not obligated to any earthly authority, whether it be government or religious hierarchy, such as the Anglican Church (Marsden, Jonathon Edwards, 181-182). Edwards felt God gave him the responsibility to lead people, believing that religion was necessary for the wellbeing of the self (Miller, Jonathon Edwards,
1) Jonathan Edwards delivered this sermon during the first Great Awakening, a time of religious revival in Europe and America. During the Great Awakening, christianity shifted its focus from ceremonies and rituals, and began to realign itself with introspection to encourage fostering a deep sense of morality and redemption. Edwards was a key preacher and minister that delivered many sermons preaching about revival and reformed theology.
Starting in his younger years, Edwards struggled with accepting the Calvinist sovereignty of God. Various circumstances throughout Edward’s own personal life led to him later believing in the sovereignty of God. Jonathan Edwards is known greatly as a key figure in what has come to be called the First Great Awakening of the 1730s and 1740s. Fleeing from his grandfather’s original perspective by not continuing his practice of open communion, there was a struggle to maintain that relationship. Edward’s believed that physical objects are only collections of sensible ideas, which gives good reasoning for his strong religious belief system.
For example, he quotes 1Timothy 1:17 and then declares “As I read the words, there came into my soul . . . a sense of the glory of the Divine Being; a new sense, quite different from anything I ever experienced before.” (313-314). This declaration shows that as he becomes more familiar with scripture, he is able to open his heart and grow more in love with God. Edwards later states how upset he is that he had not sought out a close relationship with God sooner because he deeply wishes he would have had more time to “grow in grace”(315); this statement comes after he quotes Psalms 119:28 “My soul breaketh for the longing it hath.” (315). It’s evident through the use of this verse how strongly he longs for a fuller and closer bond with God and Christ. Furthermore, he expresses that same sense of yearning when he states “I very often think . . . of being a little child, taking hold of Christ, to be led by him through the wilderness of this world.” (316) and follows it with the verse Matthew 18:3. Through quoting this verse, he once again reinforces how greatly affected by scripture his bond with God is, and how it leaves him seeking to be led even more by
In the first few weeks of class we have discussed the thought and religion of the early people that first began the development of our counrty. As we have looked at the literature in class the works of these writers seem to be simlar in that each one talks about a higher being that these people all worshipped. However, that is where the comparisons would end. One of the writings that I found interesting was that of Jonathan Edwards. Born in 1703 in East Windsor, Connecticut, Jonathan Edwards lived at a time when the Calvinistic Puritanism of the American colonies, particularly New England, was giving way to thoughts coming out of Europe. We had discussed in one of first classes the reason that so many of the laws and rights found here in the United States were the same as in Europe. The reason was for this is because that is where the people of early America came from. This is the reason for the large population of people believing in these thoughts and beliefs coming from Europe.
Religion was the foundation of the early Colonial American Puritan writings. Many of the early settlements were comprised of men and women who fled Europe in the face of persecution to come to a new land and worship according to their own will. Their beliefs were stalwartly rooted in the fact that God should be involved with all facets of their lives and constantly worshiped. These Puritans writings focused on their religious foundations related to their exodus from Europe and religions role in their life on the new continent. Their literature helped to proselytize the message of God and focused on hard work and strict adherence to religious principles, thus avoiding eternal damnation. These main themes are evident in the writings of Jonathan Edwards, Cotton Mathers, and John Winthrop. This paper will explore the writings of these three men and how their religious views shaped their literary works, styles, and their historical and political views.
O'Brien, Susan. 1986. “A Transatlantic Community of Saints: The Great Awakening and the First Evangelical Network, 1735-1755”. The American Historical Review 91 (4). [Oxford University Press, American Historical Association]: 811–32. doi:10.2307/1873323.
In The Sinners in the hands of an angry God, Jonathan Edwards main goal was to make the audience repent. He spoke of God’s wrath and how far away from the path the audience was. Vivid imagery in this includes, “You hang by a slender thread, with the flames of divine wrath flashing about it(69-70 pg 124)”. Edwards also spoke of God’s forgiveness and how the audience must turn away from the dark path and walk into the light to be saved. This scared many people, like people say the truth hurts. The actions of the people hurt God and in return he was going to make
Jonathan Edward's sermon "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God," was an example of a persuasive speech in which Edwards used scare tactics to persuade his audience. Jonathan Edwards' purpose was simply to convey a message to the people of the church with intentions of changing their moral and religious views. Edwards often appealed to reason and logic and highly emotional "fire and brimstone" techniques to convey his point.
Foreboding and dreadful describe the tone of “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God”. Edwards makes the tone very clear by saying “The God that holds you over the pit of Hell, much as one holds a spider or some loathsome insect over the fire” (154). He tries to convey the wrath of god that will come upon them if they do not devoted themselves to Christ by saying “Thus all you that never passed under a great change of heart, by the mighty power of the Spirit of God upon souls, all you that were never born again, and made new creatures, and raised from being dead in sin, to a state of new, and before altogether unexperienced light and life, are in the hands of an angry God.” (154).
Edwards, who also had Puritan beliefs, was a philosopher and theologian and his way of thinking was more in-depth and complex. He used repetition to drive his sermons home and convinced his congregations of the evils and wickedness of hell through the use of intense analogies. His “fire and brimstone” way of preaching frightened people and made them feel a deep need for salvation. Edwards believed that all humans were natural sinners and God was eagerly awaiting to judge them. He wrote "their foot shall slide in due time" meaning that mankind was full of inevitable sinners.
Jonathan Edwards was a man who could petrify any eighteenth century Puritan. He was born in East Windsor, Connecticut and was raised in a household with strict religious beliefs. In 1727 he began his preaching career as an assistant to his grandfather, Solomon Stoddard, the pastor at the church at Northampton, Massachusetts. When his grandfather died two years later, Edwards became the pastor of the Church at Northampton and began preaching all over New England. He then emerged as one of the leaders of the Great Awakening with his determination to return to the orthodoxy of the Puritan faith. That is when he adopted his “fire and brimstone” emotional style of sermon. Although people often ran out of the church in hysterics, most stayed in the church captivated by his speeches. He had always purposely chose to address his congregation with a sermon, using all of the elements of an oratory. In Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God, Jonathan Edwards displays all elements of an oratory by appealing to emotions, including expressive and rhythmic language, addressing the needs and concerns of his audience, and inspiring others to take action.
The image of God is typically thought of as being loving and kind. However, this image is not always true. All people in this world, have many different ways of looking at things. In this essay I will compare two completely different humankind. Much can be gathered when comparing the poems written by Anne Bradstreet and the sermon by Jonathan Edwards. I will also explain a few of their differences. In life, people need inspiration to know that living is worth it, and each writer has a different way of portraying that. In the 1700’s, Bradstreet and Edwards were well known authors who focused their mind set in on God. They were both Puritans who revolved their life around religious freedom, but had very distinct ways of showing their recognition