Puritan Americans Selfish Or Selfish

Selfish or Selfless

By using the person that puritans relied so much on, anyone could take control. To the Puritans, God, was everything to them, every prayer they had, every food they ate, every morning they woke up alive, they counted on god. With needing power, holding “ Gods word” above them was an easy target. The Puritans knew two things, God, and Selfishness

As stated in John Winthrop's sermon given aboard the Arbella to settlers traveling to New England, he makes laws, and reinforces them by saying it's what “ God wants,” and by that it gave him control over the people. If they didn't follow those rules, he made sure to add some threatening words to frighten them. “ We must delight in each other; make others’ conditions our own; rejoice together, mourn together, labor and suffer together.” This statement of rules he created

followed by “ undertaken, and so cause Him to withdraw his present help from us.” This stating that if they don't follow all of his rules God will no longer be with them, making them fear the punishment of God. In case that wasn't enough for him to convince them, he follows through by saying “ We shall shame the faces of many of God’s worthy servants, and cause their prayers to be turned into curses upon us till we be consumed out of the good land.” Then he includes another one of his rules, “ We are commanded this day to love the Lord our God;”and his laws, and the articles of our Covenant.” Again this statement is followed by a threat “ But if our hearts shall turn away, so that we will not obey, but shall be seduced, and worship other Gods.” By now the people know they have one choice, or the answer in their religion would be hell, so it put fear into their eyes.This article being about how to survive using alliances to live, was a lot like William Bradford's say on the Pequot war.
In 1837, after the colonists attack on Pequot River village, Bradford uses sentences such as “ To see them thus frying in the fire, and the streams of blood the same; and horrible was the stink and scent thereof; but the victory seemed sweet sacrifice, and they gave the praise thereof to God.” In no bible does murder belong to God’s will.

Bradford trying to justify the war and gruesome murder of many by using God’s forgiveness and blessing upon the war. He goes on to say” thus to enclose their enemies in their hands, and give them so speedy a victory over so proud, insulting, and blasphemous and enemy.” Because the Pequot did not believe in the same God as the Puritans; he tries to convince everyone that it was what God wanted because they didn't believe in Him. This being the most selfish thing he could do. Bradford, not only using out of text phrases from the bible to justify murder, but using the fear that not believing in God, will cause death, making people more likely to stick with them than wonder on their own independence for the fear of death. William Bradford was not the only person to have this “threat of God”

idea.

In 1630, John Cotton gave a similar sermon to members of his congregation who were coming to America. “ I will appoint a place for my people” are the words he chooses to start with, showing that the rest of what he has to say will include his “Ownership” over them. “God makes room for people in 3 ways.” Giving a number for things God can do goes against what the bible says. The bible states the things he does are infinite. The ways he states are “ casts out the enemies of a people before them by lawful war with the inhabitants. In other words, if the people there aren't true believers in God, they will most likely die by God's will. “He gives a foreign people favor in the eyes of any native people to come and sit down with them.” By believing in God, it shows that the Natives will trust them, but the natives have completely different gods than the Europeans do, that line was a threat that if the Europeans don't believe in God, the natives would have no reason not to kill them. Lastly he states that “ when he makes a country, though not altogether void of inhabitants, yet void in the place where they reside. Where there is a vacant place, there is liberty for the sons of Adam or Noah to come and inhabit, though they neither buy it nor ask their leaves.” This last section, showing that wherever they end up, needs to be good enough that god's people would come there and help them out; Creating things non existent in the bible, but in his own personal version in his head, for the people to believe him and follow his rules.