Lauren Simcic
25 October 2012
Exploring evil is his
hobby
– Varied approaches
Studying him is my
hobby
Little guesswork
– Kept journals
Born in Salem, 1804
Changed “Hathorne” to
“Hawthorne”
Momma’s boy
Little interest in school
Married Sophia Peabody
Experienced success in his lifetime
– With friends’ help!
The Scarlet Letter published 1850
– Mother’s death
– Earlier works: Fanshawe and Twice
Told Tales
Died 1864
Powerful connections
– Emerson, Holmes,
Longfellow
– Brook Farm
Political involvement
– Taylor and Pierce
Interest in family
history
– “Custom House”
confession
“Each work is meant to instruct
readers on the nature of sin, its
role in human nature, and its
function in personal salvation.”
Jason Courtmanche
Plot: Narrator describes massive
bonfire, meant to extinguish evil
on earth
Source of evil: the human heart
Important element: regeneration
of social ills
Plot: A man enters a poisonous
garden because of love for the
woman inside. His attempts to cure
her lead to her death.
Important element: Woman as
(unintentional) temptress
Companion work: “The Birthmark”
Plot: A minister alarms his
entire community by wearing a
veil for decades
Source of evil: Concealed sin
Important element: Effect of sin
on society
Companion work: “Young
Goodman Brown”
Hawthorne’s Eve,
Dimmesdale’s
self-mutilation,
Chillingworth’s
obsession
Calvinist
undertones, sin
inescapable
Puritan legalism,
the Black Man,
festering secret
Plot…
Evil and sin NOT EQUIVALENT
– “The fortunate fall”
– Stigma remains
Important element: Religious
allegory
– Adam and Eve, Mary and Christ
Known as “Felix culpa” (happy
fault)
Sin allows God to enter the
world and redeem us, thus
creating a greater good
Adopted by Augustine, Aquinas,
and Ambrose
“Was that very sin, into which Adam
precipitated himself and all his race,
was it the destined means by which,
over a long pathway of toil and
sorrow, we are to attain a higher,
brighter, and profounder happiness,
than our lost birthright gave? Will
not this idea account for the
permitted existence of sin, as no
other theory can?”
From The Marble Faun
Pearl
If I suffer enough in isolation for
my sin, I’ll be saved. (Hester and
Arthur)
“Is there no reality in the penitence
thus sealed and witnessed by good
works?” “Of penance, I have had
enough. Of penintance, there has
been none! Hester, that wear the
scarlet letter openly… Mine burns
in secret!”
“Surely, surely we have ransomed
one another, with all this woe!”
“Wilt thou stand here with mother
and me, to-morrow noontide?”
“Not then Pearl, but another
time… At the great judgement
day… But the daylight of this
world shall not see our meeting.”
He who conceals his transgressions
will not prosper, but if they confess
and turn from them they will
receive mercy. -Proverbs 28:13
Whatever, you have said in the dark
shall be heard in the light, and
what you have whispered in the
inner rooms shall be proclaimed
upon the housetops. -Luke 12:2-3
I am beyond God’s reach
“I fear! I fear! That when we
forgot our God… it was
thenceforth vain to hope that we
could meet hereafter, in an
everlasting and pure reunion.”
Romans 10:9
Chillingworth is spurned Satan
figure
“Hast thou enticed me into a bond
that will prove the ruin of my
soul?” “Not thy soul. No not
thine!”
“That old man’s revenge has been
blacker than my sin!”
“The Unpardonable Sin might
consist in a want of love and
reverence for the Human Soul; in
consequence of which, the
investigator pried into its dark
depths, not with a hope or
purpose of making it better, but
from a cold philosophical
curiosity… Would not this, in
other words, be a separation of
the intellect from the heart?"
You, therefore, have no excuse, you
who pass judgment on someone
else, for at whatever point you
judge another, you are condemning
yourself, because you who pass
judgment do the same things… So
when you, a mere human being,
pass judgment on them and yet do
the same things, do you think you
will escape God’s judgment?
Romans 2:1,3
Sin and repentance can lead to
character development
Hester’s sixth sense,
Dimmesdale’s incredible sermon
“all things together”
David and BathshebaSolomon
Interesting contradiction
there…
– Pearl’s unusual behavior
What saves you?
– Acknowledging sin and confessing
it (scaffold scene)
*Social effects (Pearl again)
If we confess our sins, he is
faithful and just and will
forgives our sins and purify us
from all unrighteousness.
-1 John 1:9
But you were washed, you were
sanctified, you were justified in
the name of the Lord Jesus
Christ and by the Spirit of our
God.
-1 Corinthians 6:11
The problem of underestimating
God’s grace
Separation of head and heart is
an impediment to the Christian
walk
Can the good of Christ’s
sacrifice be viewed as
outweighing human corruption?