What Is The Difference Between The Puritans And The Pilgrims

Puritans and Pilgrims

The Puritans and the Pilgrims, both previous members of the Church of England, desired to make changes by purifying the church by establishing their own colonies and religious ideas in terms of worship. While both of these groups set out to accomplish the same goal, they still had their own individual ideas about how to do so. Their differences led to the Puritans being called non-Separatists and the Pilgrims being called Separatists. Even though they had different ideas, both groups are responsible for laying the groundwork on how we live today. We will discuss the differences between the Puritans and the Pilgrims focusing on religion, politics, and geographical location.

Religion

Both the Puritans and the Pilgrims felt that there needed to be changes made to the Church of England, but each group had different viewpoints. Puritans, which are known as non-Separatists, still remained

very loyal to the Church of England, however they wanted to have freedom with the way they worshipped and thought the Church of England would be able to be made pure from within. “Their desire was to “rid the Church of England of all evidences of its historic Catholic connection, and to let the New Testament determine church order and worship” (Gaustad, 1994, p. 1). They wanted to be viewed as the “city upon the hill”, which meant they wanted to be the religion that others looked up to as a model for how they should live their lives (Schweikart & Allen, 2007, p. 29). To accomplish this, the Puritans sought out highly educated and wealthy members of the church to facilitate that ideal and to bolster the continuation of support of the religion. Some members of the Puritans still were unhappy with the progress and beliefs of the non-Separatists in establishing the new colonies and religious beliefs in worship. Pilgrims, known as Separatists, also broke free from the Puritans to start their own colony founded on their religious beliefs that differed somewhat from the Puritans. Different from the Puritans, the Pilgrims felt that the Church of England could not be made pure by reform at all no matter how hard they tried. The Pilgrims wanted their belief system to be solely based on the New Testament without any loyalty to the Church of England (Gaustad, 1994, p. 1). The Pilgrims believed in an individual relationship with God, not based on an affiliation with a certain group. The fact that both groups believed so differently as to the approach to reform the Church of England, this is the main reason that caused them split up into Separatists and non-Separatists.
Politics
The political beliefs of the Puritans were that “clergymen were not allowed to hold public office” (Schweikart & Allen, 2007, p. 30), however they did maintain quite a bit of influence over because of their voting power. This voting practice was later changed due to the abundance of church members that wanted to have a say in decisions being made. The belief system of the Pilgrims in the political area was that they wanted to be governed by “just and equal laws for the furtherance of the glory of God (Schweikart & Allen, 2007, p. 28). The Pilgrims set forth an agreement, which can be easily considered the basis of what became our constitution, began as the Mayflower Compact. An important statement from the compact, which was an agreement from the original Pilgrims on the Mayflower, was the groundwork for their political beliefs. They intended “…. to enact, constitute, and frame such just and equal laws, ordinances, acts, constitutions, and offices, from time to time, as shall be thought most meet and convenient for the general good of the colony, unto which we promise all due submission and obedience” (Mayflower Compact, 1620). The Pilgrims stayed on their boat and did not touch foot on the ground until the Mayflower compact was drafted and agreed upon by all members present. The fact that the basis for this agreement was to make decisions based on what was best for the colony shows that they strived to be both righteous and individuals but unified as a group.
Geographical Location
Both the Puritans and the Pilgrims left England on their journey of religious freedom, however they landed in different geographical locations and decided to establish their colonies there.

The Puritans, who established their colony in Massachusetts Bay in 1629, were many in number and quickly made use of their environment to achieve their goals. They became a very powerful force in the merchant world as well, very much due to being near the Boston harbor (Schweikart & Allen, 2007, p. 28). The Pilgrims, on the other hand, landed in a much poorer location, Plymouth Rock, Massachusetts, in December of 1620, and because of the time of year were unable to plant any food for survival, and many perished (Pilgrims, 2015). Once they were able to barely overcome this setback, they still were unable to really get a foothold to be a real competitor for the Puritans. Even though the Puritans landed in American almost ten years later then the Pilgrims, they were in much better condition to establish their colony by being both more educated and financially

sound.
Conclusion
The Puritans and the Pilgrims, who both were originally members of the Church of England, desired to worship God in their own ways. Although they started out with the same intent they did not end up with the same ideas. Both groups helped to establish the views and ideas for many generations to come about religion and politics. Both the Puritans and the Pilgrims agreed that changes needed to be made to the Church of England, they set about making those changes by establishing their own colonies that differed in religion, politics, and geographical locations, all while in their pursuit of religious freedom.