Rhetorical Analysis Of Sinners In The Hand Of An Angry God

In the sermon "Sinners In The Hands Of An Angry God" Jonathon Edwards uses various rhetorical devices to persuade his audience. The sermon was made on July 8, 1741 at a time were everyone believed in God and everything revolved around the bible. In his sermon, Edwards used allusions, similes, and personification to show God's anger towards humans. In the 17th century people's beliefs were all based on the bible. Everyone could refer to the bible as one of the only books they knew.

Rhetorical Analysis: Sinners A Puritan pastor in the early 1700s and philosopher, Jonathan Edwards, in his sermon, “Sinners in the Hand of an Angry God”, describes how angry God is towards sinners. Edward’s purpose was to scare sinners and unconverted men with the realities of hell so that they would seek a relationship with God. He adopts an aggravated tone to express to the sinners in his congregation that they should seek redemption because God can send them down to hell at any moment, but instead He gives them another chance. The metaphors and imagery that Edwards use in his sermon for the Great Awakening helps him to describe God’s wrath against sinners to make unsaved people convert back to the original ways of Puritans.

Literary analysis of “The sinners in the hands of an angry god” 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.

At this point Edwards has grasped the attention of his listeners by using pathos to pertain to their emotions and feelings. Towards the end of the sermon his tone switches to one of reason in terms of not neglecting his words. He asks a series of rhetorical questions such as those who are unconverted and do not teach their children of Christ that they too will have to witness the wrath of God. As for literary devices such as metaphors, similes, and allegories, Edwards does not disappoint for his use of them most likely whipped a lot of Puritans back into their faith.

Johnathan Edwards throughout his life time was able to captivate the attention and hearts of his audience with impactful speeches that boasted clever rhetorical devices. Using rhetorical devices to evoke emotional responses from his audience, Johnathan Edwards was able to maintain a potent role in his society throughout the early 1700’s. In “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God.” Edward’s displayed the potential of rhetorical devices as he delivered his message of fear to the audience in an effective manner. Throughout the sermon Edwards utilized several forms of rhetorical devices including, similes and metaphors, repetition and alliteration, and parallelism.

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 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.

In “The Black Veil” by Nathaniel Hawthorne and “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” by Jonathan Edwards both have a similar yet different style of writing and delivery.however Edwards gave more detail to make to his sermon which made it more effective than Hawthorne were his was of an inference to the theme. Edwards and Hawthorne diction was archaic, the themes of the texts was that everyone is a sinner whether a black veil is upon a face or hanging from the hand of God. In the same fashion way, the themes from “The Minister’s Black Veil” and Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” are similar. For example, both themes centers on sinners/sins.

In sinners in the hands of an angry God Jonathan Edward’s most effectively appeals to the people who have yet to convert to a puritan's by using rhetorical analysis. One of the first metaphors he uses was when he was describing the fire that God holds you over and if provoked (when you sin) he will drop you down to hell. He uses a great analogy when he talks about it because he says”The God that holds you over the pit of hell much as one holds a spider or some loathsome insect over the fire”, and that is a real interpretation of what we are to God in Edward’s eyes. All these metaphors can also be used as imagery too because the author uses such good words and phrases it good that you can imagine what he is saying.

Imagine everyone’s life was judged every second of everyday. By a greater power, God. And that greater power would hold someone over a pit of fire, because they committed a sin, would you commit a sin? Jonathan Edwards was a powerful fire-and-brimstone preacher during the Great Awakening and author of the sermon “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God”. Edwards uses a variety of metaphors in his writing, all metaphors have a strong effect on what Edwards experience during the Great Awakening.

n the “Sinners…” passage, which was written by Jonathan Edwards, had a more effective style. His style was more effective by the diction he used. He used many descriptive words, and gave more details throughout the passage. Jonathan Edwards theme was if you don't repent your sins, then you will go to hell,Edwards stated that in lines 47-51 when he said “The wrath of God is like great waters that are damned for the present.” The Author of “Black Veil” Nathaniel Hawthorne, had a theme that people will judge you if you change your appearance.

Often in sermon minister persuade their audience to believe in a spiritual or morel fashion. Such is the case in Jonathan Edward, where he describes sinner future. Edwards wanted to persuade his audience by appealing to their fears, pity and vanity. Edwards’s use of admonishing tone, “The bow of god wrath is bent,” is imagery and Wrath had an astonishing impact on his puritan audience.