BACKGROUND
Nathaniel Hawthorne 1804-1864
• Born in Salem, Massachusetts
• His ancestors were wealthy, influential people. One, William Hathorne, became a judge who persecuted Quakers; another, John Hathorne, sentenced many Salem women to death for witchcraft. Hawthorne was obsessed with the sins of these ancestors who reflected the religious intolerance of the
Puritan society.
• The death of Hawthorne’s father when Nathaniel was four resulted in a series of unfortunate circumstances that created a lonely childhood for the boy.
• Hawthorne graduated from Bowden College, Maine, and spent the next twelve years in seclusion as he struggled to become a writer.
• In 1837 he published Twice Told Tales and earned great national fame. His stories won the admiration of Edgar Allan Poe, who considered Hawthorne a genius.
• Another contemporary of Hawthorne, Herman Melville, who wrote
Moby
Dick, became Hawthorne’s close friend. They both reacted to the
Transcendental philosophers of the nineteenth century. Many critics refer to this reaction as “Anti-Transcendentalism.”
• During his life, Hawthorne was friendly with Transcendentalists Ralph
Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau; however, Hawthorne struggled with what he considered the overly optimistic ideas of the
Transcendentalists. Evidence of this struggle between a belief in the perfectability of humanity by following one’s individual conscience and the essentially evil nature of humankind is seen in the ambiguity of The Scarlet
Letter.

 absolute sovereignty of God. Bible was the literal word of God.
 the total depravity of man. Original Sin (Man was born a sinner).
 predestination(It was decided at birth by God whether you were going to heaven or hell.)
 belief in the complete dependence of human beings on divine grace for salvation
 stressed the importance of personal religious experience.
TULIP : o T otal depravity of man (original sin) o U nconditional election (God in his mercy has redeemed some men) o L imited atonement (Jesus did not die to save all men) o I rresistible grace (one of the elect cannot resist grace) o P erseverance of the Saints (the elect alone shall lead)

Theocracy -- insisted that they, as God's elect, had the duty to direct national affairs according to God's will as revealed in the Bible This union of church and state to form a holy commonwealth gave Puritanism direct and exclusive control over most colonial activity until commercial and political changes forced them to relinquish it at the end of the 17th century.


No entertainment, recreation as we know it today
Sexual repression
Valued:
 education for both men and women (everyone needed to know how to read
Scripture) Literacy.

Hard work – work ethic

Potential for upward mobility—no class structure like in England—people could move up the social and economic ladder of socieyt
 freedom—personal, political, economic

Piousness. Righteousness. The need for moral justification for private, public, and governmental acts. f by developing a theology to substantiate it.

John Calvin took Agustine’s theory and developed it into a system of five cardinal points that is defined by the word TULIP. There is no connection with the flower, but all five points are contrary and contradictory to God’s plan of salvation in the Bible. Calvin’s five cardinal points are: T= Total Depravity, U= Unconditional Election, L= Limited
Atonement, I= Irresistible Grace, P= Perseverance Of The Saints. All five points of
Calvin’s theory either stand or fall together.
T= TOTAL DEPRAVITY OR INABILITY
Sin is in every part of man, in the mind, the will, the heart and the soul so that man cannot save himself.
Man is fallen and everyone is born spiritually dead, helpless, and passive; indeed, everyone is worse than volitionally dead or unable to desire spiritual good but is actually enslaved to sin, positively and actively hostile to the things of the
Spirit (Calvinists cite, e.g., John. 1:13; 8:43, 47; 10:26; 12:37-40; 18:37; Romans. 7:18;
8:5-8; 1 Corinthians. 2:9-14).
U= UNCONDITIONAL ELECTION
God chooses to save people unconditionally; that is they are not chosen on the basis of their own merit.
This second point inescapably follows from the first: since one is born totally depraved and enslaved to sin, one's
ELECTION cannot be dependent or CONTINGENT on any spiritually worthy actions one commits.
According to this point, God predestines or chooses to soften the hard, sinenslaved hearts of certain fallen individuals and liberate them from their

death not because of any merit they have but despite their demerits--i.e., He
ELECTS to change their hearts (and thereby join them to Christ and His saving work) DESPITE the fact that they hate God and oppose Him and have hard hearts, not soft hearts, and have sin-enslaved wills, not free wills.
Thus, believers have no reason to boast about themselves or their own actions: the only thing that differentiates them from Judas, Esau, or others who never respond in faith is that God gave them grace that He withheld from such reprobates (Calvinists cite, e.g., Ezek. 11:19-20; 36:26-27; Rom. 9:11-18; 1
Cor. 4:7; Eph. 2:8-10; cf. Jn. 1:13; 15:16; Acts 13:48; 16:14; 18:27; Phil. 2:13).
L= LIMITED ATONEMENT or Particular Redemption
The Sacrifice of Christ on the cross was for the purpose of saving only the “elect.”
This point says that while Christ's blood--indeed, His entire life, death, and resurrection-is infinitely INTENSIVE in saving power and thus unlimited in one sense, it is not infinitely EXTENSIVE and is thus limited, not universal, in the extent of its application; for while everyone CONDITIONALLY or "provisionally" shares in Christ's life, death, and resurrection (thus, if everyone believed, everyone would be joined or married to
Christ), only members of Christ's body or bride or flock (ELECT believers) actually share in His blood (Calvinists cite, e.g., Jn. 10:11, 15, 26; 17:9; cf. 6:37, 39; 17:2, 6, 24).
I= IRRESISTIBLE (SUFFICIENT) GRACE
When God has chosen to save someone, He will.
This is virtually a synonym for
Luther's slogan "grace alone" (sola gratia) and is logically implied by points "T" and "U" above. It teaches that God's INWARD CALL is perfectly EFFECTUAL or
SUFFICIENT--a hard, fleshly, sinful heart need not add anything to God's grace, such as
"co-operation," for this special call or grace is invincible, overpowering all hatred and melting all opposition (Calvinists cite, e.g., Jn. 3:6-8). Here Calvinists distinguish God's inward, effectual call--i.e., IRRESISTIBLE GRACE or sufficient, effective grace--from
His outward call, which is simply His commandments written on tablets of stone. The latter is eminently resistible, insufficient, and ineffective to give life to a dead soul or liberate a sin-enslaved heart (e.g., Acts 7:51; 13:39; Rom. 8:3).
P= PERSEVERANCE OF THE SAINTS or Eternal Security
Those people God chooses cannot lose their salvation.
This is not the idea that no matter what a believer does he or she cannot lose his or her salvation but the idea that
"…He who began a good work in you will perfect it…" (Phil. 1:6 [NASB]; cf., e.g., Jn.
6:37, 39; 10:28-29; Rom. 8:31-39)-- i.e., the idea that whenever God creates faith in our hearts and thereby joins us to Christ and His saving work, He will sustain that faith, that saving relationship with Christ, causing us, by His grace, to persevere in faith.

How did the Puritans influence our values and ideals?
A. The Puritan Work Ethic became and remains a model of American hard work ethic and led to our place as a modern industrial giant.
B. We remain a relatively Protestant nation with a very conservative bias.
C. We look at ourselves a special nation and our foreign policy of intervention and getting involved shows this. This is a direct result of the idea of being a "city upon a hill."

John Smith from the General History of Virginia –textbook p. 42

William Bradford from Of Plymouth Plantation p. 50 textbook
 Jonathan Edwards, "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” textbook
 Anne Bradstreet “To My Dear and Loving Husband” textbook “Cotton Mathers from
The Wonders of the Invisible World p. 75 textbook

Nathaniel Hawthorne: The Scarlet Letter written in 1850
"The Minister's Black Veil,"(in the textbook) "Young Goodman Brown," (handout)
Miller: The Crucible (written about Puritanism and McCarthyism of the 1950’s)
Setting of The Scarlet Letter: Puritanism in the Massachusetts Bay Colony,
1642
1. Accurate historical references are made to the actual governors, ministers, and practices of the Massachusetts Bay Colony of 1642-1650. Hawthorne selected specific details only to develop the mood and the ideas.
Students should be reminded that Hawthorne did not live during that time and was not a Puritan. Hawthorne wants the reader to react to these attitudes.
2. Puritan ideas that are alluded to in the novel are as follows: a. Puritanism emerged as a powerful religious and political force in sixteenth-century England. Following Martin Luther’s posting of his ninetyfive theses on the door to the church in Wittenberg, the Protestant
Reformation spread quickly through Europe.
In England, there were Protestants who felt that Henry VIII’s break with
Rome over his divorce from Katherine of Aragon did not result in sufficient reform of church doctrine and religious practices in general.
These “Puritans,” as they came to be called wanted to return the Church to its “pure” state as the earliest Christians had established it in the first century
C.E.

The New England Puritans were a radical group who felt that even the
English Puritan reforms did not cut deep enough. These were the
“pilgrims” who first went to the Netherlands and later sailed to the New
World to establish a colony where they could worship as they chose.
They did not seek religious freedom as they still persecuted and banished individuals whose beliefs and practices were different from their own. b. The role of both the ministers and the magistrates was to enforce the laws of God.
The church and state cooperated in serving God. In fact, the people of the Massachusetts Bay Colony felt they had a covenant with
God to establish a community, a “New Jerusalem,” under His laws. c. As a result, all members of this community of God were judges of the faith and works of every other member.
They insisted on a lifestyle of self-discipline, which zealously avoided the temptations of the devil and followed the will of God, as expressed in the
Ten Commandments and the Bible.
The people were completely intolerant of sin. Puritans believed that any sin committed in the community would cause God’s wrath to be visited on them. An illness or misfortune would show God’s disapproval. Puritans looked for sins that had been committed so that the sin could be brought out in the open and the members of the community could express their scorn for that sin.
These solemn people lived simple lives, dressed in brown, gray, or black, and avoided worldly pleasures.
Some historians explain that the cults of witchcraft in this area were a rebellion against this obsession with sin and rigid lifestyle. One practice used to secure the proper discipline of children was to “put out” or transfer children from one family to another. That way, a child could not be spoiled by natural parents. d. Puritan theology valued hard work. Idleness was an invitation to sin
(“ Idle hands are the devil’s playthings” ). In Elizabethan England
(Shakespearean times--established early in The Scarlet Letter as not too far in the past at the opening of the book) the Puritans were responsible for

several closings of the theaters, basing their objections on the notion that the performance of plays in the afternoon attracted people away from doing their work.
Puritan societies had very few holidays for this same reason. Even
Christmas Day had been outlawed in England and the New England
Colonies because it encouraged idleness, encouraged licentious behavior, and was—they believed—a remnant of the Catholicism they hoped to abolish.
3. The Puritans felt, however, that humans were too sinful to earn salvation by performing good works or avoiding sin. People could go to Heaven only if they received God’s grace in the process of conversion.
During conversion, saving grace enters people’s hearts, and they are released from sin.
On the other hand, many Puritans—including the New England
Puritans—accepted the Calvinist doctrine of predetermination . This meant that the “saved” (those destined to spend eternity in Heaven) had already been determined.
One knew whether one was a member of “God’s elect” by being able to avoid sin.
Thus, characters in The Scarlet Letter are concerned that they may be damned—not because of their sin per se , but because the fact that they sinned indicated that they’d already been damned.
Again, the uncertainty as to characters are damned or can be redeemed is the source of much of the book’s rich ambiguity.
:

Direct experience is the only way to grasp spiritual truths or to experience the holy. The ultimate source of truth lies within ourselves.
 Man should explore the interior of himself.

Man can transcend beyond the limits of reason and of the material world to grasp spiritual and personal truths. Intuition is as valuable as, if not more valuable, than reason and leads to transcendent experiences.

Each one of us participates in the Ultimate or the Divine. Each one of us, through our intuition and a heightened sense of openness and wonder, can perceive our own understanding of ultimate value. That understanding of ultimate value, of

ultimate truth, even though we may understand it differently next week, has got to be our compass - not popular opinion and not our own imposed will.

Man is essentially good.
 L eft in a state of nature, human beings seek the good.
 Nature is the embodiment of the Divine. Nature is an inspiring and healing force that allows man to transcend the limits of the material world and reconnect with the
Divine.

Every natural fact is an emblem of some spiritual fact. Nature (and seasons) can reflect spiritual rebirth and human emotions.

Eastern Philosopshy: (Hinduism/Buddhism): Belief in the interconnectedness of all
 things
Society is to blame for the corruption that mankind endures.
Thoreau: --Discovering the essential through a life of simplicity.
--The destructive force of industrial progress.
--Man as part of nature.
--The need for man to wake up out of a spiritual slumber and
-be reborn.
The state as unjust and corrupt controller of men's thoughts and actions.
 Ralph Waldo Emerson, Excerpts from "Self Reliance,”(Self reliance does not mean rugged individualism) “Nature”
“The Snow Storm”” in the textbook

Henry David Thoreau, Walden, Civil Disobedience excerpts in the textbook
 Walt Whitman, “Song of Myself” excerpts in the textbook and “I Saw in Louisiana a
Live Oak Growing” textbook