РефератыИностранный языкPuPuritanism Essay Research Paper English 208February 22

Puritanism Essay Research Paper English 208February 22

Puritanism Essay, Research Paper


English 208


February 22, 2000


Puritanism


The puritan religion is one that is hardly understood in today?s world of


never-ending excuses and finger pointing. This is human nature at it?s finest. Puritanism


probably couldn?t make it today. In fact, it probably wouldn?t have a chance. Today?s


society would not be willing to make the sacrifices of chosen hardships to make the cut.


One of the most demanding religions, puritan belief forced its followers to change their


life in accordance to God?s holy word, only to guess that he could possibly be one of the


elect. The puritan religion was based on five basic principles; supremacy of the divine


will, the depravity of man, election, free grace, and predestination. Each having a


distinct and overpowering effect on all who followed and basically scaring the living *censored*


out of people who did not. To live in the puritan society, a person had to play by the


puritan rules, or face banishment or even death.


The first major belief, and subject of great controversy, was the belief of the


supremacy of the divine will. Simply stated, everything that happened in the world was


because God wanted it that way. If God was pleased, good times came. If he wasn?t


hardship and famine followed. Another possible explanation to hardships, though, was


that since god was good, unexplainable negatively impacting phenomenon that seemed to


be unheralded must be the work of something outside of God?s realm. This is where not


only did the religion get tricky, but actually entered a sort of slippery slope. The Salem


witch trials are a prime example of this. Although the Bible states, ?Judge not, lest ye be


judged?, the puritans apparently did not believe this pertained to them, and if it did, they


felt they were justified in trying to preserve the ?city on the hill?. Although in theory this


ideal is harmless, it relied on the entire congregation buying it in good faith, taking it


home and swallowing it whole. What tends to happen, alternatively, is that


undereducated people when given a philosophical doctrine such as this seem to


misinterpret minute things, such as bum luck, as them being cursed, or out of god?s favor.


Since it would be harder to accept their own shortcomings, it would be much easier to


find a scapegoat. As Cotton Mather exemplified in his book The Wonders of the


Invisible World, trivial matters such as the death of cattle, personal disease, and infection


were attributed to witchcraft and sorcery. One such ?witch? Martha Carrier, due to her


passive

following of the religion, was prosecuted and sentenced to death over evidence


that was neither seen nor proven. All this was accepted in the faith that she was the


cause of everything wrong with the afflicted. (423)


The next most powerful ideal was that of predestination. This belief stated that


from the beginnings of time, God wrote the script, and man was to carry it out without


any ad-libs. Although this too can be seen as a scapegoat mechanism, this belief still


shines through in some religions today. The difference between most religions and the


puritan religion, though, is that while other religions believed man is predestined to hell


and through the grace of god may escape to heaven, the puritans believed that no matter


how hard a person tried, or how well and holy they lived their lives, they could do


nothing to change where God wanted them to end up.


Almost all Christian religions believed that man was destined to hell because of


his original sin. The depravity of man dates back to the Bibles story in Genesis of


Adam?s fall from grace due to his disobedience of God. Because of this, all men were


sentenced to eternal damnation. God though, sent Christ to Earth as a means of


consummating a new covenant with man. This ensured that at least some of mankind


would be saved. This number, though, according to the Puritans, was a very limited


amount. This was called the process of election.


This transcended to several important aspects of the puritan society, including the


notion of free grace. Free Grace was the belief that there was nothing a man could do


influence what God had in plan, being their final destination of heaven or hell. Grace


was given freely to his elect. Most people believed themselves to be part of the elect, and


lived their life as an example to others. This then created a society of self-righteous


people who believed themselves to be part of the elect and most everyone else to be


destined for hell. This created animosity with people of alternate faiths and led to an


extreme intolerance.


The puritan religion as a whole seemed to produce a God fearing society that


produced healthy Christians. Unfortunately, as bibles became more and more common,


church became less and less necessary. As the church lost some of its power, there was


an influx of immigrants, which helped dismantle the entire city. The religious


intolerance of the Puritans helped limit it?s growth to none at all and eventually the


religion died out. Much like the walls of Babylon were torn down, so too were the walls


of the ?city on the hill.?

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