“Their foot shall slide in due time.” This biblical verse is core to Jonathan Edwards’ speech to the congregation in several churches. Edwards preaches against nonbelievers, warning them of their imminent retribution from God. He highlights that God’s wrath is upon them and will annihilate their entire being to the highest degree. Through a complex incorporation of various descriptive imagery tools, Edward invokes fear and despondence to his audience; his audience are bullied into believing in his God. Edward provides requisite imagery through well structured arguments, use of relevant evidence, and appeal to fear.
Referring to the phrase, “Their foot shall slide in due time,” Edwards creates a sermon that exhaustively explains this verse: he exposes who “their” (his subject) is, then he explains why they haven’t fallen yet, and then he gives reasons to why their fall will be transcendental. By providing a chronological argument the listeners are able to not only grasp his viewpoint but also observe the soundness of his argument. For instance, in pages 7-9, when Edwards describes why God’s wrath is transcendental, he breaks his argument into bits: one leading to the other, creating separate strands that are intertwined into a weave to achieve his argument. In this manner the audience is introduce to an argument, and then another which builds on the first. The style ensures that one idea is fully comprehended before another idea is delved into. It also ties all arguments together in supporting the main thesis.
At the time of Edwards’ sermon, the height of the great awakening to Christianity had peaked (Farley ). Considering this period and his audience, Edwards use of the Bible as evidence for his arguments is practical. His cla...
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...nonbelievers. The listeners are able to conjure images of nature’s disdain for the nonbeliever and through this comparison, can only imagine how much worse God’s wrath is. Consequently Edwards effectively uses imagery to urge his audience to believe in God rather than face dire punishment.
Edwards is able to deliver a persuasive speech by invoking fear to his audience through the provision of concrete imagery using various sentence structure, comparisons, and tone; by relevant evidence; and by structured argument. His effective use of these techniques creates a compelling argument to the congregation, and bullies them into believing in a supreme being.
Works Cited
Farley, W. n. page. .
Edwards, J.. N.p.. Web. 21 Sep 2013. .
Jonathan Edwards creates a more effective argument for the intended audience in “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” than “The Speech in the Virginia Convention” written by Patrick Henry, by utilizing various techniques. Patrick Henry makes a strong argument however in the end, Edwards’ sermon grows to be more effective. Edwards creates the argument by strengthening the writing through tone, structure, fallacies and knowledge of the congregation that became his audience. Henry’s piece uses methods of oratory persuasion but the actual topic of “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” has an advantage from the start by appealing to fear, a fallacy of logic. Even with the strong basis “The Speech in the Virginia Convention” by Patrick Henry, Edwards’ “Sinners in the hands of an Angry God” proves the more effective piece in the end.
Imagery is one of the components that were used by Edwards to make his story more persuasive. As the short story begins, the first sentence was an example of imagery. Edwards wrote when men are on Gods hands and they could fall to hell. natural men are held in the hands of God, over the pit of hell Knowing that you might fall into hell at any moment should scare you. God decided to save you until he wants to let you fall into an eternity of burning flames. Another example of imagery is when he talks abo...
Edwards immediately begins with a harsh, almost cruel, tone with the use of abrasive diction. His first moments of preaching the sermon had the use of words such as, “over the pit of hell;..deserved the fiery pit… wrath in hell… devil is waiting for them,” (1). Edwards
Edwards applied masses of descriptive imagery in his sermon to persuade the Puritans back to their congregation. For example, he gave fear to the Puritans through this quote, “We find it easy to tread on and crush a worm that we see crawling on the earth, so it is easy for us to cut a singe a slender thread that any thing hangs by, thus easy is it for God when he pleases to cast his enemies down to hell…” (pg. 153) In this quotation, he utilized vivid imagery because he wanted the Puritans to visibly imagine what he was saying through his sermon, on how angry God is with them, which made them convert back to Puritanism. Through the use of vivid imagery such as “crush a w...
In these text, “The Minister’s Black Veil” and “The Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” the preachers are teaching their congregations a lesson.
On July 8th 1741, Jonathan Edwards preached the sermon “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” in Enfield, Connecticut. Edwards states to his listeners that God does not lack in power, and that people have yet not fallen to destruction because his mercy. God is so forgiving that he gives his people an opportunity to repent and change their ways before it was too late. Edwards urges that the possibility of damnation is immanent. Also that it urgently requires the considerations of the sinner before time runs out. He does not only preach about the ways that make God so omnipotent, but the ways that he is more superior to us. In his sermon, Edwards uses strong, powerful, and influential words to clearly point out his message that we must amend our ways or else destruction invincible. Edwards appeals to the spectators though the various usages of rhetorical devices. This includes diction, imagery, language/tone and syntax. Through the use of these rhetoric devices, Edwards‘s purpose is to remind the speculators that life is given by God and so they must live according to him. This include...
Figurative language is used in a lot of writings to pull you more into the words. Figurative language uses the five senses to place a deep picture in your mind of what is actually happening. Metaphors, similes, personification, hyperbole, etc. are all figurative devices used in writing. Without using any of these things writing would be straight forward and not so complicated to understand. When figurative language is used it makes the reader really think about what is being said by the author and what point the author is trying to make. Both "The Iroquois Constitution” and "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” use figurative language but for different reasons.
In the story “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” the author Jonathan Edwards uses
The themes present throughout the sermon are interconnected and intertwined to create a more convincing sermon. Edwards links the themes of God’s grace and strength with the theme of inevitable death to evoke fear in the audience. He tells the audience that only God’s grace can save believers, showing that death is inevitable. These themes are seen throughout the sermon to evoke fear and keep the audience attentive to his sermon. By being connected, the themes create a more persuasive piece of work, because they are able to link together throughout the sermon so that Edwards remains on topic and the audience continues to listen.
In 1741, Jonathan Edwards, a Puritan preacher of that time, had one thing on his mind: to convert sinners, on the road to hell, to salvation. It just so happened to be, that his way of doing that was to preach the reality to them and scare them to the point of conversion. Sermons of this time were preached to persuade people to be converted and to me it seemed that Edwards just had a special way of doing it. Just as people are being influenced by rhetoric appeals today Edwards used the same method on his congregation. In “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” Jonathan Edwards positively affected his readers using pathos, logos, and ethos, while trying to convince the unconverted members of his sermon to be born again.
As many religious leaders before and after him, Edwards's source of inspiration and guidance is the Bible. His understanding of this cornerstone of New England society enables him to reinforce a persuasive dissertation with biblical quotes and passages; however, not all the quotes cited by Edwards support his interpretations exclusively. Often Edwards uses parts or sections of biblical verse rather than complete text because too much information might diminish the importance of his primary intent. These instances of manipulation occur in the doctrinal section where Edwards attempts to prove the basis of his application. "Cut it down, why cumbereth it in the ground?", Luke 13:7, is used by Edwards to illustrate God's justifiably immediate destruction of those guilty of sin. Absent from his selection is any mention of the moderation and patience that continues in Luke 13:8-9: "let it alone this year also, until I dig around it and fertilize it. And if it bears fruit, well." By omitting these verses of scripture, Edwards hopes to move his audience by his calling rather than at their own leisure. Another example of manipulation occurs as Edwards proposes that sinners are already Satan's property. In section five he states that Satan "stands ready to fall upon them and seize them...
In order to understand Edwards use of language however, one must look at his early life and formative influences. His family undoubtedly shaped his religious career because “[H]e was the only son among the eleven children of Rev. Timothy Edwards and Esther Edwards, the daughter of influential puritan clergymen Solomon Stoddard” (Wachal 1). Growing up in a religious family must have influenced his career path. Then “Edwards attended Yale School of theology at 13 years of age” (Paposian 1). This is important because at Yale, Edwards would create his own “unique style of preaching” (“Jonathan Edwards” Dictionary 1). Here “his theology which soon came to be known as Edwardseanism had developed in hi...
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 chosen 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. Jonathan Edwards used three key emotions to appeal to his audience: fear, pity, and guilt.
In the sermon "sinners in the hands of an angry God" Jonathan Edwards is speaking to the puritans during a time of religious revival. Edward indicates that God is an angry God and his hand is the only thing keeping the puritans from departing to hell. Jonathan views each individual human as a group of humans he visions them as one, if one individual sins, all humans are now sinners. All humans were already destined to go to hell there was no say or doing that would provoke the angry God from releasing you to the pits of hell. According to Edwards sermon God gave an remarkable opportunity to escape this fate "therefore let everyone that is out of Christ, now awake and fly from the wrath to come…"
Using this method, he successfully engages the congregation through descriptive narratives and relating ideas to current times. As part of the narratives he includes descriptive biblical stories beginning with the story in his text, claiming it as a “scary story”. He further re-enforces this scary story concept by sharing two more biblical passages where a scary story exists. These biblical narratives are the beginning of what Wilson would call the second page of the sermon where the trouble in the text is given. This of course was preceded by his first page that discussed the idea of having scary stories in our lives today (trouble in the world) by using a vivid personal illustration. He continues to use vivid illustrations to hammer in his focus on the church needing to be friends to the downtrodden because God responds that way. He designs the third page to share the Gospel in the text reminding us that God responds to continual injustice by sending his son to be the friend that everyone needs. The one who stands up for injustice and never leaves your side. Finally, he concludes with the fourth page by demonstrating how churches can live the gospel in the world today. They do this through friendships with people in their surrounding community whose stories might be