Imagery in Edward's Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God Essay

In "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" Johnathan Edwards is trying to use scare tactics to scare people back into faith. At the time, most people went away with faith; during this sermon he's letting people know what will/is going to happen when they drift farther from God. He preaches to them in an urgent, persuasive tone by using strong language, metaphors, and powerful diction.

First, Jonathan Edwards uses imagery in order to show those who have not yet accepted Him what awaits them “The devil is waiting for them, hell is gaping for them, the flames gather and flash about them, and would fain lay hold on them, and swallow them up.”(Edwards 48)

Jonathan Edwards appears to believe in the same God. He approaches his views on God in a different manner and begins to exhibit more gothic ideas than those of Bradstreet. Edwards’s concentration on God is more towards the dark, angry God. He focuses on the individual as sinner and on the dark, sinister things that will happen to the sinner if he does not repent. The sinner becomes more associated with the fall and slippery places that reek of dark places and pits (200). Edwards is beginning to make a transition towards the gothic. He views religion and the God of his religion as angry and powerful. He will cast all of the sinners down into a hell of blackness and shadow, devoid of light. They become God’s enemies and Edwards conveys an image of a dark army of people down in the bowels of the earth.

In the 1730's there were people breaking away from the church and abandoning the Christian lifestyle. Church leaders were aware of this problem and decided to turn to the young Jonathan Edwards to recapture the hearts and minds of those who have left the church. In his most famous sermon, "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God", Edwards uses a variety of techniques to frighten his congregation to return to Christ. One technique that stood out from the others was imagery. Four of the most powerful images that he uses was the hanging by a thread, being overwhelmed by water, an arrow ready to destroy, and the fiery pit.

Respected Puritan minister, Jonathan Edwards, in his sermon, Sinners In The Hands of an Angry God (1741), warns the unrepentant sinners of his congregation that they will be damned to hell if they do not confess. Edwards’s intent is to manifest terror in the people of his congregation about the consequences of their sinful behavior. He adapts a condemning tone in order to convey a strong message in his congregation. Although Edwards’s use of extreme imagery was the strongest in the sermon, he also uses vivid metaphors and logos to convey his message.

“His listeners are said to have groaned and screamed in terror and Edwards stopped several times to ask for silence.” Jonathan Edwards wrote “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” as a way to express how Puritans were not living the way God wanted them to. They were not going to church daily and those who were, thought that, that was all they had to do to get into Heaven. Edwards gave very detailed views on how easy it would be to be cast down into a pit of eternal damnation as well as how you should pray for God’s mercy so you can have a glorious salvation. Edward’s ferocious use of extended metaphor and pathos swayed his audience into fearing what the afterlife held for them if they were to not repent their sins.

It is year 1741, in Enfield, Connecticut, and Puritan Pastor Jonathan Edwards gives one of his best sermons- Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God. Reverend Edwards was a religious leader during “The Great Awakening”, a time of spiritual revival, and desperately wanted all of his congregation to have faith, and be saved in the Heavenly Father. As a result, Edwards crafted a sermon rich in figurative language. By constructing a sermon that relied heavily on imagery and repetition Edwards created an enduring image of hell and how one can be saved from its wretched realities.

In “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God”, Jonathan Edwards tries to oblige people to be born again. He was too radical in communicating his message to the congregation getting to cause fear and hysteria in the Connecticut church in which he preached. He only describes hell and emphasizes too much in the consequences of not been born again instead of speaking about heaven and all the good things that will happen if you accept Christ. “This is the case of every one of you that are out of Christ: That world of misery, that lake of burning brimstone, is extended abroad under you.” God should be represented as loving and compassionate instead of an evil being that is just playing with us for fun. Edwards is mistaken by portraying God as an evil

Edwards and Bradstreet both used figurative language in their own ways. Edwards uses several metaphors such as, “holds a spider, or loathsome insect over the fire” ...“The bow of God’s wrath is bent.”... “Hell is gaping for them”... “ The flames gather… and would swallow them up.” All of these quotes are being compared to how easy it is for God to cast us down to Hell. Edwards also includes

The purpose of Jonathan Edwards in delivering this famous sermon, “Sinners in the hands of an Angry God” is to persuade his listeners to turn to Christ before it was too late. He used fear to appeal his audience by showing them the image of hell and how God was angry at them. In the beginning of the sermon, Jonathan Edwards depicted an image of hell by using loaded words, such as “glowing flame of the wrath of God” and “Hell’s wide gaping mouth open”, in order to throw fear into his audience. He also told his audience how God was angry at them and how they were deserved to go to hell by using repetition to emphasize the wrath of God and also using simile to compare the wrath of God to “the fiery floods.” He also describes the sinners as “a

In his sermon, “Sinners In The Hands of the Angry God,” Jonathan Edwards, uses figurative language and dictation to bring about an emotional reaction from his Puritan audience. He successfully manipulated his audience by the use of imagery.

Edwards' incorporation of imagery is done in order to convince the audience of potential agony they could face in hell. For example, Edwards writes, "There is dreadful pit of the glowing flames of the wrath of the wrath of God, there is hell's wide gaping mouth and you have nothing to sand on." Edwards describes hell to them in order to scare them. His uses "flames" so they imagine themselves burning within an endless pit. Edwards knows what it is that scares them, he deliberately does this so they get so scared of never ending pain

He preaches that the wickedness of the congregation was as “heavy as lead” (para. 27). Therefore, Edwards compares their chances of saving themselves from Hell to the likelihood that “a spider’s web would have to stop a fallen rock” (para. 27). This analogy shows the depth and magnitude of the peoples’ sin and their complete dependence on God. In order to make people turn from their sinful ways, he compares God’s wrath to many striking images. Edwards creates fear with metaphors by comparing an abstract concept like God holding sinners over the pit of Hell to a person who “holds a spider, or some loathsome insect, over the fire” (para. 32). The use of metaphor is effective because frightening images remind the Puritan congregation that Hell is real. Another powerfully delivered image is the “bow of God’s wrath” (para. 29) that is bent, whose arrow is ready and pointed to pierce the heart of the sinner. The bow is interpreted as God’s anger at sin, and the arrow is the punishment. This metaphor conveys the power of God by revealing how only God has the power to keep the arrow “from being made drunk with your blood” (para. 29). Through the use of metaphors, Edwards stresses God’s mercy and frightens the congregation in order for them to return to

“...their foot shall slide in due time…” (156.4) This line symbolizes the punishment that God has prepared for the wicked Israelites. Not only will they slip into the punishment, but it will happen very soon and when they least expect it. This is very important in persuading the audience that God is near and his wrath would fall upon them at any given moment. Edwards does a good job at explaining this line in a multitude of views during his sermon. “...to come to that place of torment…” (159.26) That place of torment represents Hell. Throughout the entirety of the sermon, Hell seems to mean torment, wrath, and destruction. To use the word torment gives off the sense that God’s wrath is ultimately horrible and the symbolization shows that. “...eternal death…” (160.1) This line showcases the results of eternal damnation and tells the audience that the sinner may never again live and may not die happily. This is a powerful aspect in Edwards sermon because it serves the purpose to scare unbelievers into the fact that God’s wrath will never turn out good in the end. The symbols in this essay do good to explain certain aspects of God’s wrath without having to actually state the

Edwards’ story is very descriptive to say the least. As someone may have read the first section he or she might get the feeling that this is going to be a very straight-forward sermon and that it will get better at the end. Imagery is something that he uses a lot and it helps get his message across. One example is when he says,” the arrows of death fly unseen at noonday; the sharpest sight cannot discern them. God has so many different unsearchable ways of taking the