Jonathan Edwards Use Of Imagery In The Great Awakening

Jonathan Edwards uses fear in this sermon to terrorize his audience into thinking of God as someone to be feared, not someone to be loved. Throughout the sermon, Edwards uses figurative language along with imagery to frighten the audience. He does this by comparing God to a pack of “greedy hungry lions that see their prey” using imagery in this simile to portray Him as a hunter, hunting for the sinners in our world (Edwards, 1741, pg. 211).

The sermon “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” was written with many purposes. The main concept that Jonathan Edwards, the minister who wrote the sermon, wanted to get across is that God does not give any pity to those who do not believe in him and his gospel. He casts all of the sinners into the pits of hell and lets those who have been good live for eternity. This sermon was written after many reports of witchcraft came about in the New England colonies. These reports caused the Salem Witch Trials to occur and many people to become non-believers. Since these things started to occur Puritan ministers, such as Jonathan Edwards, had to make a change.

this point Edwards has grasped the attention of his listeners by using pathos to pertain to their

If you were to ask someone why is it that they stop at a red light, they’re response would most likely be “I don’t want to break the law and go to jail.” The reality is that we must obey the law not because of the fear of going to jail, but to create order in preventing a harmful outcome. Our government instills fear in our society to follow the law because that is the most effective way to dominate our behavior. “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry G-d”, delivered by Jonathan Edwards, a strict Puritan priest, is remembered as the most famous sermon ever preached on American soil. Today it appears in almost every anthology American Literature and stands alone as the only sermon included. It is an amazing text to the modern air even those who absorbed

In 1741, Jonathan Edwards delivered a sermon called “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” to a congregation in Enfield, Connecticut. This sermon was so influential and poignant that today it has transformed into a piece of literature that many study in classes. This bit of literature is so utterly jam-packed with the use of rhetorical appeals, often referred to as ethos, pathos, and logos. These three appeals are derived from ancient Greece, or more precisely, the Greek philosopher Aristotle. Ethos appeals to the audience’s sense of trust, pathos, to their sense of emotion, and logos, to their sense of logic. The use of ethos, pathos, and logos in any type of writing or speaking can create a commanding and arresting effect on the reader/listener.

“Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” was written with the sole purpose of scaring and intimidating the people that purtinans believed to be sinners. Edwards’s work contributed to a movement called “The Great Awakening”. It’s objective was to make the so-called ‘sinners’ aware of their wrongdoings and compel them to repent. The most important feature of a sermon is the application of a scripture text to the personal experience of the listener. Especially this last part is what reduced many of Edwards’s listeners to tears. In Edwards’s sermon the scripture text is “Their foot shall slide in due time”. This meant that eventually, all sinners would be punished by God, which could be at any time. Edwards speaks of a wrathfull God, a God who by Puritan standards is considered forgiving for not letting all of humanity fall into the deepest pits of hell. Edwards reminds people that mankind is nothing compared to God and that that all of humankind is guilty and deserves to be punished.

During Edwards Sermon he uses metaphor when describing God. In his sermon he states that God is a higher being who's hand is holding us, the sinners, above the fiery pits of hell. He also states it is only God's pleasure that we are not falling into the fire and brimstone tht is hell, Edwards then goes on to compare God's wrath to swirling waters ready to devour sinners in its fiery floods. So strong that even the strongest devil would be no match against the flood that is God's wrath. The comparison shows that God

This interpretation of God becomes the reference point for the rest of the sermon. All of the commands and accusations in the sermon rely on Edwards' portrait of God as an angry, all-powerful being that has no obligation to have mercy upon his creations. By convincing his congregation of God's wrathful character, Edwards is then able to convince the congregation that they are in danger of damnation and severe punishment at the hand of this wrathful God. Edwards characterizes God as a being that "abhors" mortal men and "looks upon [them] as worthy of nothing else but to be cast into the fire" (200). Edwards then uses scriptural references to support his claims about the nature of God. He says, "We often read of the fury of God" (Edwards 201), "How awful are those words, Isaiah 63:3, which are the words of the great God" (Edwards 202), and quotes other scriptures in order to illustrate his point. Once again, he justifies his arguments by relying upon the word of God (scripture) and his own authority to interpret those

Another metaphor in the sermon is, “The wrath of God is like great waters that are dammed for the present; they increase more and more, and rise higher and higher, till an outlet is given, and the longer the stream is stopped, the more rapid and mighty is its course, when once it is let loose… the waters are continually rising and waxing more and more mighty; and there is nothing but the mere pleasure of God that holds the waters back that are unwilling to be stopped…” (Bedford 352). The whole point of what he is saying in this quote is just to stress the importance that only God’s grace can keep people from a loss from hate. The losses can include things like floods and burning flames. This quote talks about how the waves of water keep getting

The great awakening was a religious revival that occurred in the 1730s and 1740s. It started in England and then gradually made its way over to the American colonies. During this time, many different preachers and religious speakers went around and gave speeches to the people. Jonathan Edwards was one of Americas most important and original philosophical theologians who also went around and gave speeches about God and hell. One of his well-known sermon is “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God,” preached at the meeting house in the village of Enfield, Connecticut, on Sunday, July 8, 1741, at the height of the great awakening. In this sermon, Edwards focused on the consequences of leading a sinful life, the power of God and repenting of ones sins, in order to be saved from hell. The purpose behind this piece of writing was not to terrorize or dismay the hearers, but to make them repent and believe in God again. This piece was aimed at those who lacked belief in God as well as churches. In “sinners in the hands of an angry God”, Jonathan Edwards uses different types of literary techniques, such as, imagery, metaphor, similes, repetition, and rhetorical questions to emphasize his point. His point is to scare the people and make them want to repent, which is the theme of the sermon.

Jonathan edwards, is known as one of the most important religious figures of the great awakening, edwards became known for his zealous sermon “sinners at the hand of an angry god”. During his sermon he implies that if his congregation does not repent to christ they are in “danger of great wrath and infinite misery”. Throughout this sermon edwards uses literary devices such as strong diction, powerful syntax and juxtaposition to save his congregation from eternal damnation.

Well known reverend and writer, Jonathan Edwards, in his sermon, Sinners in the hands of an Angry God, describes the dramatic fate of those who haven 't accepted Jesus Christ. Edwards purpose is to persuade members of his congregation to be “born again”. To be born again means to accept Jesus Christ. He creates a frightening tone in order to frighten unconverted men to believe in Jesus. Throughout his sermon he continuously reminds the reader of hell. Using vivid imagery and morbid diction he scares them into becoming “born again”.

A lot of Edwards writing is meant for a more mature audience and mostly Puritans. Edwards uses fear to persuade the audience into being a servant of God. He was very strict in his morals and if you did not obey God you would go to hell, and if you were a good servant you would go to heaven. As a pastor he believed everyone should go to heaven and he would do anything to make sure of that, in one of Edwards writings “From Sinners in the Hands of God” he would use words like “his wrath in hell” (Edwards 79). He would use a lot of imagery and detail in his writing to scare the audience even more, for example, ‘hell is gaping for them, the flames gather and flash about them, and would fain lay hold on them…” (Edwards

On antor note, Edwards development in “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” has a frightful and archaic language usage which help his sermon develop. To explain, Edwards usage of imagery/symbolism help develop the mode. “... hell is gaping for them…”(Edwards) this shows the way the author used his words to make the mood frightening. Also Edwards used second point of view which made it as if he was personally speaking to the readers. Edwards delivery was forceful and firm as if wanting the readers to comprehend every word he was

In these stories, fear is shown a lot there is two stories, the first one is called “Sinner in the hand of a angry god” and the other one “The Crucible”. The fear is very different from one story to the other, but there must be some similarity’s. In “The Crucible” Abigail Williams was caught dancing naked in the woods which raises some question. Everyone is claiming it is witch craft and Abigail doesn’t want anything to come out so she threatens all the girls that were with her at the time of getting caught and tells them she will kill them if they say anything. There is fear in going both ways because even though Abby threaten to kill the girls Abby is also scared because of what could happen to her family because if there is witch craft in her family they could get