Preview

Puritan Hypocrisy in the Scarlet Letter

Powerful Essays
Open Document
Open Document
1855 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Puritan Hypocrisy in the Scarlet Letter
Hypocrisy of the Puritans “When you fast, do not look gloomy like the hypocrites. They neglect their appearance, so that they may appear to others to be fasting. Amen I say to you, they have received their reward (New American Bible Matthew 6:16).” The Puritans that settled into Massachusetts in the seventeenth century were some of the most religious people to be seen throughout History. Prior to landing in America they had already abandoned two countries in order to “purify,” their Puritan religion and find a place where they could be guided by faith alone. The basis of Puritanism was predestination, the belief that one was already predestined to go to heaven or hell. The Bible clearly states that hypocrites have already received their reward, meaning they will most likely go to hell. Certainly the Puritans in Massachusetts would look down upon such people, who appear gloomy to display their sacrifices to others, yet the most holy Puritans in Massachusetts were the biggest hypocrites of them all. A person looking to critically analyze literature has many different options and angles he or she could take. One of these is historical, in which the critic attempts to explain or analyze the novel through the events of the time period of the book or the time period of the novel. Influenced by stories of the Salem Witch Trials and Anne Hutchinson, Nathaniel Hawthorne presented his ideas of religion in the time period the novel was written. In The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Puritan hypocrisy is a theme that prominently seen throughout the novel through actions and beliefs of the Puritan community. One of the best examples of Puritan hypocrisy occurs in the very last line of the novel, the message engraved into Hester and Dimmesdale’s gravestone, “On a field, sable, the letter A, gules,” (Hawthorne 203). On a black field, the letter “A” is boldly red. The irony is in the fact that the Puritan’s describe their community as a field of black. The


Cited: Bloom, Harold. "The Scarlet Letter." Quoted as "The Scarlet Letter" in Bloom, Harold, ed. The Scarlet Letter, New Edition, Bloom 's Guides. New York: Chelsea House Publishing, 2010. Bloom 's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. (accessed November 7, 2012). Gillis, Chester. "Roman Catholic Church." World Book Advanced. World Book, 2012. Web.  7 Nov. 2012. Hall, Timothy L. "The City on a Hill and Its Detractors and Alternatives: 1621–1659." Religion in America, American Experience. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2007. American History Online. Facts On File, Inc. (accessed November 8, 2012) Hawthorne, Nathaniel. The Scarlet Letter. USA: Prentice Hall, 1850. Print. New American Bible. Ed. Joseph Mindling, Rev and J. Edward Owens, Rev. Rev ed. Wichita: Devore & Sons, 2010. Print. New American Bible. Wilson, John F. "Puritans." World Book Advanced. World Book, 2012. Web.  14 Nov. 2012.

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Better Essays

    TheHoly Bible New Living Translation. Carol Stream, Ill: Tyndale House Publishers , 2007. (accessed February 28, 2014).…

    • 1506 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Better Essays

    Spheres in Scarlet Letter

    • 1616 Words
    • 7 Pages

    It was once said that “the only living societies are those which are animated by inequality and injustice.” A man named Paul Claudel wrote this in his work, Conversations dans le Loir-et-Cher, and he criticizes the ability to have a functional society. Societies are meant to organize the values of people into a system with uniform laws and expectations; however, societies can never fully achieve this. Claudel only sees societies with dysfunctional characteristics like inequality and injustice. There are always exceptions to the social order because all people are individuals with different life experiences that help define who they are. Nathaniel Hawthorne also criticizes the Utopian ideals that societies often hold in his novel, The Scarlet Letter. The main character, Hester goes astray from the rules of her Puritan town and must wear a scarlet letter on her chest to declare her sin. The scarlet letter isolates Hester from the pressures to conform to society, giving her the opportunity to find her individualistic moral perspective in life and she shares this revelation with Dimmesdale. Hawthorne conveys this concept of individualism through the motif of spheres.…

    • 1616 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Ygbquestions

    • 268 Words
    • 1 Page

    a. Hawthorne is revealing the hypocrisy of Puritanism by highlighting the fact that even those who appear to be pious and noble are actually sinners.…

    • 268 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Sin is considered to be a morally bad act in the Christian faith. In The Scarlet Letter, the Puritans’ views on human nature were affected by their belief in original sin. Nathaniel Hawthorne allows the reader to see the significant role that sin plays in human experience and in the Puritan society in which Hester Prynne lived in through the use of symbols in his novel. The symbols that are present convey messages about how humans should deal with their flawed nature and the negative effects that sin has on the body, mind, and soul.…

    • 539 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Nathaniel Hawthorne’s representation of the Puritan’s strict religious ways in his novel, The Scarlet Letter, wasn’t just an observation of the problematic religious society, but, rather, a criticism of their extremist beliefs. The Scarlet Letter forces its audience to realize how sins are severely punished, and how religion is an enormous contributor to historical conflicts and the part it has played in the most recent wave of terrorism and religious controversy.…

    • 456 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    The Puritans, a very religious group of people, thrived in the northern British colonies in the 17th century. Religion governed the way these people lived at the time. “[…] The Puritans were concerned, perhaps even obsessed, with establishing a system wherein religion would flourish and their values and beliefs would penetrate every aspect of life, both sacred and secular” (Friedman). Famous for their incorporation of religion in laws and the famous witch trials which they held, the Puritans found their way into literature. In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter and Arthur Miller’s The Crucible, the Puritans play a significant role as most of the characters in both pieces of literature are Puritans themselves. The Puritans believed in the ideas of sin, defined as “An immoral act considered to be a transgression against divine law” (Oxford 773), redemption, defined as “The action of saving or being saved from sin, error, or evil” (Oxford 700), and justice, defined as “Just behavior or treatment” (Oxford 452). Within the Puritan societies set in The Scarlet Letter and The Crucible, the characters also believed in and acted upon these ideas, to a certain extent.…

    • 1761 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    The puritan era was designed to be a utopia but when there are sinners being judged by there one mistake and leaders who are hypocrites the puritan era turned out to be anything but a perfect society. If sinners weren’t judged by hypocrites then the puritan era would have been more successful in creating a utopia. Hypocrites were hidden throughout the puritan era. In the novel The Scarlet Letter many of the great leaders were unknown hypocrites. The puritans may not have known it but their own governor was a hypocrite.…

    • 649 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Dimmesdale's Guilt

    • 890 Words
    • 4 Pages

    During the early settlement of New England, there was a period where a strict society-based religious group, called the Puritans, dictated law. In this religion, they followed extremely harsh laws for punishment such as sinning, as found in The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne. In his novel, Hawthorne uses the symbolism of Dimmesdale, the leech, and the punishment scaffold to contribute to his overall theme of guilt.…

    • 890 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Nathaniel Hawthorne, author of The Scarlet Letter, felt that the Puritans were people who believed that the world was a place where the battle between good and evil was a never-ending one. Throughout the novel, Hawthorne uses the symbols of light and dark to depict this battle among the characters Hester Prynne, Pearl, and Roger Chillingworth.…

    • 644 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Spencer Yee

    • 491 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Throughout history, people have assembled mixed attitudes towards the Puritan community. However, after analyzing a passage from Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, I have realized Hawthorne’s attitude towards the Puritans. The author cleverly portrayed his perspective through his syntax, diction, and imagery. Based on the authors writing style, I have concluded that Hawthorne finds the Puritans “severe”, “grim”, “rigid”, “awful”, and “cold”.…

    • 491 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Scarlet Letter Hypocrisy

    • 714 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Imagine a world without love. A world with nothing but sinful, hypocritical, revenge seeking citizens. In the puritan society this dream world, if you could call it, was a dream come true. Thier society was obsessed with the idea of being pure. Any sin that was committed had an over exaggerated punishment. Many of the puritans were hypocritical. This idea is expressed greatly in The Scarlet Letter. Nathaniel Hawthorne wrote The Scarlet Letter as a story of revenge, sin and hypocrisy because the narration does not really show love between people, but shows all the sinful acts people would do to one another.…

    • 714 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Nathaniel Hawthorne finds in colonial New England a compelling setting for his dramatization of the paradox of individualism—America was founded on the principle that to be an individual is to be separate from the state, thus creating a community, or country in the United States’ case, formed completely of separatists. The Scarlet Letter dramatizes the individualistic dimensions as this tendency of democracy that “relieve(s) the darkening close of a tale of human frailty and sorrow” (Hawthorne 29). The Puritans were a group of dissident voluntary exiles who sought to strengthen and reform the Christian community in England by leaving it—setting out across the sea for a New World, a New England that would furnish a model for reconstructing the old one. “The Scarlet Letter agrees with the doctrines of the Puritans” and envisions this moral and political paradox in terms of individual…

    • 513 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s Scarlet Letter, Pearl undergoes a dramatic transformation from a devilish infant to a sagely child. Born into a society full of judgment and hypocrisy, Pearl, a bastard child, is unable to escape her predetermined role. Pearl lacks a traditional family; her mother is the sole provider, a direct attack on Puritan standards designating this young family as outsiders. Furthermore, Pearl, unlike her peers, establishes a reputation for being strange because she does not adhere to conventional norms. Despite her apparent shortcomings, Pearl is more perceptive and compassionate than members of her community. Predestined by stringent, oppressive Puritan standards, Pearl is outwardly…

    • 935 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Better Essays

    Scarlet Letter Essay

    • 1326 Words
    • 6 Pages

    One could say that Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale is poisoned, or that he merely died of guilty conscience. In the Scarlet Letter, by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Reverend Dimmesdale commits adultery with Hester Prynne, and so she bears a child. Dimmesdale does not admit his sin to the people in the community. Keeping the sin a secret for as long as he does creates guilt and suffering which manifests in him until his death. Chillingworth is Hester’s husband who is symbolic of a leech because he lives off of Dimmesdale for a “host” making Dimmesdale’s life miserable in order to retaliate. Dr. Kahn suggests that Chillingworth poisoned Dimmesdale over a long period of time; there were references to Deadly Nightshade, and shows symptoms of the use of Atropine. Atropine is a drug that comes from a plant called Deadly Nightshade, or Belladonna (Fair-weather). Poisonous plants and symptoms are arguable reasons for Dimmesdale’s death by Dr. Kahn. However, Dr. Kahn’s theory that Dimmesdale is poisoned by atropine is false, and Dimmesdale’s death is caused by a prolonged depression brought on by guilt.…

    • 1326 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    Strictness Vs Puritan

    • 93 Words
    • 1 Page

    Overall, “The Scarlet Letter,” a fictional tale, depicts and satirizes the strictness of Puritan beliefs in adultery, sin, and redemption. However, in today’s society, it continues to be an engaging story even when social norms have developed. Despite difference in traditional beliefs and strictness, are modern people and Puritan people drastically different? No. If we recognize that both are still people that sin, both are still people that redempt, and both are still people that forgives, then certainly, we must realize that Hawthorne's depiction of Puritan beliefs continues to be influential and…

    • 93 Words
    • 1 Page
    Good Essays