Religion And Society In Nathaniel Hawthorne's Scarlet Letter

Religion and Society- A Complicated Relationship

Throughout his novel, Nathaniel Hawthorne continuously illustrates the strong connection between religion and society in 1642. From the makeup of the government to the laws it enforced, this time period was essentially built around religion. Today, our state of affairs is a bit more complex. We do still have our connections to religion, but some aspects of this have been lost to time.

During 1642, especially in Puritan Boston as portrayed in The Scarlet Letter, society was built on religion. In this time, the community’s common religion was held above everything. For example, religious leaders such as Reverend Dimmesdale and Revered Wilson were put in positions of political power, and in the

novel these people are even placed up on a balcony with the other political figures to show their status above the townspeople. People in this time period treated the bible as we treat the constitution today. This was embodied in Hawthorne’s novel when Hester was punished for breaking the commandment of “Thou shalt not commit adultery.” Religious leaders at the time also had the power to actually punish people outside of the modern day penance, because in that time committing a sin was the same as breaking the law.
Throughout his work, Hawthorne also illustrates the idea that the Puritan community he created was entirely constructed around religion. For example, unlike today everyone had the same religion. They would all go to church together, and readers saw priests like Reverend Wilson preaching in his pulpit for the townspeople many times. This dependence on religion reaches extreme levels, because as happened with Hester, those who disagreed or commit a severe enough sin were pushed out of the community. She and her daughter were sent out to live their own isolated life, offering insight into the way that offenses against religion were handled in this time period. This also opens the door to discussion on corruption and hypocrisy in religious communities, because these people who said they believed so deeply in their religion and the teachings of acceptance and forgiveness that came with it thought it was okay to shun a woman for making one mistake.
Today, the connection between religion and society is far more complex.

In some areas, the two are still closely linked. One of these areas is politics. In modern society, we may say we have a “separation of church and state”, but prayers are still said at inaugurations. People still have to swear on the bible in a courtroom setting. Is this really separation? On a more controversial level, marriage equality was put off far longer than it could have been. Why? Because religious groups such as the Westboro Baptist Church opposed those fighting for equality because of their own religious reasons. We as citizens of the 21st century also see individuals fighting against abortion using religious arguments, namely quoting the commandment “Thou shalt not kill”. A country legitimately following an idea of the separation of church and state would not allow these things to continue, seeing as how they are highly contradictory to this ideal. From a social standpoint, weddings are still majorly religion based. An overwhelming majority of weddings (even those between non-religious people) revolve around a priest and prayers. Most are in churches. Again, if our political society today is claiming to be truly separated from religion, none of these occurrences should be

happening.
On the other hand, there are some major differences between the connection now and the connection in 1642. For example, religion is more of an option now. People have freedom of religion. This means they can practice what they want, unlike in 1642 when everyone had to follow the same religion or face punishment and banishment. It also doesn’t consume people’s lives as much as it did then. In Hawthorne’s novel, the people’s daily lives were dominated by their religion and church. From listening to priests in the market place to constantly worrying about following the bible or facing penalties, the people lived and breathed their religious views. On the contrary, now the most time many people spend worrying about church is the couple hours they spend there on Sunday. While some may claim this is a bad development, it also allows more time for people to focus on their own morals instead of the morals someone else tells them they should support. Unlike in Puritan Boston c.1642, religious leaders also don’t have much power now. In the novel, reverends are placed in positions of power so strong that they can essentially account for all branches of government. They make the laws, they approve them, and when someone breaks one they judge and punish. On the contrary, today the most well known religious leader is the pope. While he has power in the religious community, he cannot punish anybody past the voluntary sacrament of penance. For this reason, he is more of a social figure than anything else, which serves to emphasize the lowered priority level religious views are placed on in today’s society.
Furthermore, religion is paired with hypocrisy just as it was in 1642, but this deceit has reached new heights. In Hawthorne’s writing, we see a society of people who follow a religion promising acceptance push out Hester because of a mistake she made. Likewise, today radically devout families can be sometimes seen disowning members that, say, come out as homosexual or decide they have different religious views than they’ve been told to follow throughout their lives. Unfortunately, this mentality also escalates to people like the previously mentioned Westboro Baptist Church verbally abusing those with different views, and can even extend to legitimate hate crimes against people who do something which a religious group disagrees with. Why? Because it’s what they believe, so it has to be okay. Right? Wrong. People should not be allowed to get away with such hypocritical acts of discrimination and hate under the pretense of their religions, religions that also happen to preach love, acceptance and forgiveness for everybody.
At the end of the day, religion is still tightly woven into society today. It is not as openly shown as it was in 1642, but the same mentalities and corruptions are seen today as were seen then. While we today are making strides in some areas of our daily lives to get away from the entirely religiously consumed lifestyle that people living in the 17th century dealt with, we still have work to do if we wish to truly adopt a “separation of church and state”. Of course, some changes have been made as far as removing religious officials from political power, but what does that accomplish if those still in power still make decisions based on religion? These changes really do nothing to improve society if some of our fellow citizens still choose to bring their religions into other issues instead of just letting them be separate in the spirit of getting things done with a reasonable, unbiased mentality as a nation.