Jonathan Edwards’ “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” captures the intensity of the Great Awakening. He implies during the sermon that if “natural men” don’t change their ways, they will undoubtedly endure the “wrath of God”. The ultimate goal of the sermon is to make us understand our situation and persuade the audience that all men are dependent on God for salvation through vivid imagery and by using accusatory diction and different rhetorical appeals.
The quick pace of the address, tied together with the detailed imagery, plays a key role in persuading the audience. Edwards is able to evoke the emotion of fear by using imagery to persuade his audience. He uses imagery and figurative language so the …show more content…
They are “hanging” by a thread and it is easy for God to simply “cast his enemies down to hell”, and once in hell they will “burn and singe” in the “fiery pits” while having no hope for “deliverance” or “mitigation.” His many adjectives consist of negative connotations while describing the sufferings the unsaved will endure. They will be “miserable” in the “hot” flames of the “fiery pit.” He uses many object complements to indicate how abominable mankind is, and always concludes with how grateful they should be to God. He claims they are like “worms” easily crushed; he also starts many sentences with the conjunction “so that”, because he wants to make it clear that he is telling the people this is the effect of your sins of not converting. Edward’s complex sentence structure emphasizes hell during their “everlasting destruction.” He describes this “bottomless pit” with many details separated by semicolons. The flames are “ready to receive them; the flames? Do now rage and glow.” Nothing they can do will