Jonathan Edwards wrote this lecture, “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God,” to preach to the congregation of his church during the period of Great Awakening, a time of religious revival. He knows how to persuade and uses numerous techniques to do so. In his sermons, Edward’s expressive, informative, and argumentative writing style and his use of simile, metaphor, personification, imagery, and tone creates a fearful, emotional image in the minds of his readers.…
In the sermon, “Sinners In The Hands of An Angry God,” Jonathan Edwards utilizes imagery as one of the rhetorical devices in order to scare his audience back to the pious ways of the first generation Puritans. Edwards’ vivid descriptions of hell and eternal torment are examples of the emotional appeal pathos. He uses figurative language including metaphors, similes, and personification to illustrate this unfortunate scenario in the minds of his listeners. For example, Edwards’ states, “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…” (8-10). In this example the audience can clearly imagine the horrors of hell, which encourages them to look to God for salvation, thus also making use of logos as the audience rationalizes and considers the situation. Hell is described as a “world of misery, that lake of burning brimstone…” (19-10), among many other things. The speaker/writer’s depictions of hell work to keep the audience members on their toes so they remember what they are doomed for if they dare to stray further from the Church or anger God even more than they have already done so. The rich imagery in this sermon is significant to the uniqueness of the piece because Edwards’ uses this literary device to scare the audience into compliance, and it serves as a main support for the author’s overall purpose, which is to get people to solidify ties to the…
Have you ever heard a motivational speech and while it was going on you felt so motivated, but when it was over you did not know what to do with yourself? In Beyond Scared Straight, "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God," and "Can Kids Be Scared Straight?" all three authors try to persuade people to do the right things in a forceful tone, but there are reasons why appeals to fear is not the best motivational force. Some reasons why appeals to fear is not the best motivational force are that people might not get scared, are not afraid of the negative consequences, and do not want to nor know how to change.…
In "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God," Jonothan Edwards makes use of similes, hyperboles, and repetition to strike fear into his audience in order to persuade them. By utilizing the sense of fear along with the rhetorical devices he manages to prove his point.…
“Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” by Jonathon Edwards is an important piece of early American literature. The purpose of this sermon, written in 1741, was to persuade congregations to devote themselves fully to Puritan beliefs. It is characterized by the author’s use of emotional language, strong imagery and intense metaphors to paint a horrifying picture of eternal damnation for unsaved individuals. Through these techniques, Edwards effectively creates a vivid picture for the audience, depicting Hell and God’s wrath if they do not repent. In the writing, three strong metaphors in particular exemplify the sharp tone of the author.…
In Puritan America, colonists were constantly fearful of what would happen when they died. Since death at a young age was altogether too common in those times, early Americans wanted to be sure that they were right with God. Puritan preacher Jonathan Edwards understood these fears within his congregation and took advantage of them to make an argument for salvation, putting “the fear of God” in his audience through his distinctive speaking style. In his popular sermon “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God”, Edwards utilized appeals to pathos vivid imagery, and a powerful closing argument to reach his audience.…
In the excerpt Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God by Jonathan Edwards, he demonstrates many different Puritan ideas. Edward feels just as the thoughts that are changing later on were based upon. He believes God as a deity who longs for his people to lead great, generous lives. Rather than talk gently about sinful behavior, Edwards considered it most effective to discuss God’s wrath. Rather than believing in the idea of predestination, he believed people had the power to save themselves by living a good life. His relationship with God was very strong, which encouraged him to to create better individuals by writing his sermons. The purpose is to aware of people of their behavior and conduct here on earth is for more significant more essential…
When first reading Jonathan Edwards’ sermon, “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God,” shocked readers how it started right in about the wrath of God and Hell. His diction and images create a tone of alarming immediacy – act now for your own good.…
“Sinners in the hands of an angry God” was preached by Jonathan Edwards during a time when the people were relying on science more than their saviour in heaven, a time when people were lacking in their spiritual needs. This speech opened the eyes of many, and was so powerful it may very well have been the trigger of the great awakening. But why was this speech so powerful? Why did this speech change the lives of thousands? As we can see he used plenty of persuasive techniques, he is very descriptive in his imagery and uses simple metaphors to persuade thousands to repent of their sinful ways and turn to Christ. He planted fear and guilt into their hearts. This sermon is a sermon full of anger and fright, a sermon powerful enough to make the strongest man cry and weep. But the true purpose of this sermon was to bring hope to a nation in need. It ultimately was a message of redemption, a message that Jonathan Edwards believed people needed to hear.…
"Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" is a sermon written by Christian theoligian Jonathan Edwards. Like his other works it combines vivd imagery of hell with observations of the world and citations of scripture. It provides a glimpse into the theology of the Great Awakening.…
I found "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" written by Jonathan Edwards as a terrible misconception. From the things I've learned through my own faith and Theology classes I've taken God is nothing like the god that Edwards portrays. Edwards's god is one of destruction and hatred. Where as the true God is full of love and compassion for his children. This sermon suggests that God is ready at any moment to condemn man to Hell. In Theology however we learned that God does not choose to send anyone to Hell, rather it is our sin that condemn us to this destiny. Edwards fills his sermon with scripture in an attempt to solidify his beliefs. However upon closer examination these quotes are bits and pieces of the complete text. These instances…
Damned or not Damned! A unique look at “Sinners In The Hands Of An Angry God”…
In the text Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God, Edwards uses a real sermon that he wrote a long time ago. He uses a very angry and scary approach to get his point across. He basically scares the reader by saying that if you’ve ever sinned you will go straight to hell.…
Fear can change people from bad to good. And sometimes the people are so worried about being cool they don’t even act like fear is not even a tragically developing change. The fear that teens have seeing their family hurts and their friends shot sometime shows them that they shouldn’t be on the streets to be cool. The main goal of being on the streets is to show that you are man enough to be friends with everyone.…
As once a founding father of the United States, Benjamin Franklin once stated, “do not fear mistakes. You will know failure. Continue to reach out.” Though this quote might have been years later than 1741 during the time of the Great Awakening. Jonathan Edwards gave the inspiring speech “Sinners in The Hands of an Angry God” to puritans who left the church and left Edwards feeling that puritanism was in danger. He uses fear as a tactic to get the unfaithful puritans to rededicate their lives to God and gives them hope to repent for the mistakes they have made. Edwards uses frightful imagery, and violent then hopeful metaphors to get puritans who strayed away from strict religion to come back and have a second chance at a pure life.…