1. New England Puritanism
English 215
Spring 2010

2. “I have seen the extreme vanity of this World”
Kidnapped from her home during King Philip’s War, Mary Rowlandson was held captive for several months.
Her narrative reveals her sense of God’s involvement in her life, whether He is testing, punishing, or sustaining her.

3. “the Lord brought that precious Scripture to me”
The Narrative shows MR’s deep familiarity with Scripture.
Throughout her captivity, the Bible served as MR’s guide, enabling her to understand what was happening to her.

4. Calvinism
Fundamental idea is that no one deserves salvation. In His mercy and for reasons of His own not known to us, God reaches out to some people.
To become a member of a Puritan congregation, one needed to undergo a conversion experience.
The key emotion for those who have been saved is gratitude. This gratitude should be obvious in everything the community does. If it is not, then God will express his displeasure.

5. English context
1620, 1630, 1649, 1660, 1688
New England had seen itself as the center of an experiment in godly living. Events in Britain took New England off the front page.
How can the religious community sustain itself?

6. God’s controversy with New England
John Winthrop had said that their community would be the city on the hill, the godly community that would exemplify Christian life in the world.
Pastors would remind their congregations of this high ideal. But many in their flock were drawn to worldly ambitions.
“Jeremiads” were sermons delivered to call the people back to God.

7. The Half-way Covenant
Congregationalists practiced infant baptism. But whose child should be baptized?
Originally, baptism was for the children of the members of the church.
But what about the grandchildren? If the baby’s grandparents were full members but the parents were not, should the baby be baptized?
The half-way covenant was a way of holding the congregations together, but many Puritans felt that it was too much of a compromise with the world.

8. Jonathan Edwards
The most brilliant in a long line of brilliant spiritual leaders, Edwards led an extraordinary revival of spiritual feeling in his congregation in Northampton, Massachusetts.
Edwards’s work was influential throughout English-speaking world.

9. “Will you be content to be the children of the devil?"
Preached at a revival in Enfield, Connecticut, “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” captures the intense emotionalism of Edwards’s spirituality.
Life is uncertain. Humans are weak. Death can come at any time. “Men’s own wisdom is no security to them from death.”
All that a person can do is to fall before God and beg for mercy.

10. “New Lights” vs. “Old Lights”
Great Awakening of the 1730’s and 1740’s led to a divide between those who supported revivals and those who were suspicious of such extreme religious emotionalism
Shattering of old congregational structure, where there had been a fusion between church and community