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Sinners At The Angry Hands Of God Analysis

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Jonathan Edwards once said: “Resolution One: I will live for God. Resolution Two: If no one else does, I still will.” Since birth (October 5th, 1703), Jonathan has always been a devoted Puritan which explains why he began the Great Awakening, along with George Whitefield. Edwards started preaching and wanted people to reconvert to Puritanism. His work, “Sinners at the Angry Hands of God,” was written on July 8, 1741. Many of his works were directed to his movement, the Great Awakening. Unfortunately, Edwards died on March 22, 1758, due to smallpox, shortly after being nominated as president of Princeton University (Fickas). Born to a farming family, Edward Taylor was born in 1642 in Leicestershire, England (“Edward Taylor”). Taylor began preaching in 1671. He wrote one of the most popular works in Puritan literature, Huswifery. Regrettably, Edward died on June 24th 1729 (Schafer sec. 1). Despite Edward Taylor’s and Jonathan Edwards’ devotion for Puritanism, they differ in their perception of God, figurative language, and their incentive for writing.
Taylor portrays God as an understanding and forgiving worship spirit, while Edwards’ God is tyrannical and ruthless. Based on Taylor’s …show more content…

He continues this metaphor by showing how God makes them into dedicated Puritans. Taylor used metaphors and personification in these writings. Taylor’s use of figurative language consisted more of personification and similes. In “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God”, Edwards used personification: “there is Hell’s wide gaping mouth open” (87). Edwards uses personification to show God scary and unmerciful. Edwards states, “Your wickedness makes you as it were heavy as lead, and to tend downwards with great weight and pressure towards Hell” (88). Edward shows that the people’s sins can be costly and will lead them to Hell. Edwards and Taylor give more details in their writing through the use of figurative

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It is 1741. The Enlightenment is spreading worldwide. The puritan people are leaving God. Johnathan Edwards gives a sermon on July 8th , 1741, trying to convince his fellow Puritan people to come back to God. He is going to try and accomplish this by giving his famous sermon, "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God '.

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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.

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In the Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God, Jonathan Edwards delivers his ideas about the God’s rage and human sinfulness to his audience by using strong diction, imagery, similes. Edwards uses strong dictions such as the repetition of the word “wrath,” to emphasize the exceeding anger of God to alert his listeners of the dangers of sin. Diction is the choice of words an author uses. Different dictions can have diverse effects on the

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Jonathan Edwards delivered his famous sermon, “Sinners in the Hand of an Angry God”, in Enfield Connecticut on July 8, 1764. This was the period of the “Great Awakening.” Like other works by Edwards, this sermon combines powerful imagery of Hell with explanations of the underworld and continuous reference of the Bible. He goes into vivid details to try and scare the congregation to worship God. His tact is not the best but it did get his point across.

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