Sinners in The Hands of an Angry God: Johnathan Edwards' Most Influential Speech

Born in East Windsor, Connecticut, Johnathan Edwards was a graduate from Yale and a Prime Minister in his later years at a church in Massachusetts. Edwards soon became a powerful preacher, delivering sermons resulting in numerous conversions and help sparking the Great Awakening, a religious revival in New England from 1734-1750. As he saw people distancing from the church at the peak of the Great Awakening, he delivered his most influential sermon “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God”. In an effort to restore faith in the Purtian people, Edwards incorporates imagery and repetition into his speech.

In the Purtian belief system, God was seen as angry, filled with fury. At any given moment he could cast a person into hell or decide when they go to heaven. Edwards exaggerates these fears through imagery, in hopes of returning to a strict Puritan lifestyle. The fate of the people is “held in the hands of God over the pits of hell,'' with “the devil waiting for them, hell gaping for them” and “the flames father and flash about them”(122). Used as a type of scare tactic, Edwards pictorial words depict how close hell was in reach to someone. No sins go unknown, in the eyes of God there “abominable” and would have consequences (122). Hell was described as torture, seen as torment, “unconverted men walk over the pits of hell on a rotten covering so weak they will not bear their weight and these places are not seen” (121). Edward conveys the fragility of the shameful lives his congregations lives. He ingrains the image of hell in the congregations heads, instilling the fear of eternal damnation.

Used as a reference to the passage of time, repetition is seen through Edwards word choice in relaying his message to the congregation. Edward emphasizes the importance of the moment, the “extraordinary opportunity, a day wherein Chris has thrown the door of mercy wide open” (123). He asks “how awful it is to be left behind on such at such a day! To see others feasting while you are pining and perishing!” (123). These phrases draw attention to time and wasting ones chance to be with God each fleeting day. Edwards presses the point that while others will be rejoiceful, they will yearn. Repetition is also used as an emotional appeal when Edwards consistently states the same fearful words. Hell is “everlasting wrath”, “it is a great furnace of wrath, a wide and bottomless pit filled with the fire of wrath” (122). Because the people tempered God they will now face the “wrath of God” (121). The word wrath is used countless times making it clear how angry God is with his people. Stressing certain words and phrases, shows the congregation in the sight of God they are sinful and if they want to live they must repent now.

Edwards sermon on the anger of God is bent on the focus of persuading people to live the Puritan way. Done through techniques of imagery and repetition, Edwards sermon was successful in reviving belief into the people. Imagery burned the idea of hell and its proximity to any given person at any given time. It created the dread of being damned where sinners go. While, reiterating a select few words and phrases kept the importance of them fresh in the congregations minds. Through, creating mental images and pressing key points, Edwards sermon “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” kindled the hope of repent and the hope of returning to God.