The Scarlet Letter : The Puritan Society

English Protestants created a large group of people in the 16th and 17th centuries called the Puritans. These people advocated strict religious discipline along with a strong beliefs and worshipping. The Scarlet Letter reflected on Puritan Society in several ways, from religion to discipline and punishment. Religion seemed to control everyone, the reverend was the person that everyone looked up to, and the community, as a whole, believed in fate and destiny. Puritan relationships were very restricted, therefore making adultery a terrible sin in the eyes of the community. In the 17th century, Boston was extremely strict and the laws were strongly enforced, making Hester’s sin a great

Undoubtedly, religion causes tension between characters in The Scarlet Letter. Notably, tensions arise between Hester and the townspeople due to her infidelity to her husband. The novel takes place in the 17th century in a Puritan community in Boston. The Puritans left England in order to practice their faith but also despised The Church of England for including similar practices as those of Catholicism. During this time it was also commonly known that if one does not conform to the thoughts and beliefs of the Puritans then they are not welcomed in their community. This was most definitely the case for Hester Prynne. In fact, a few of the towns women believe that the magistrates "should have put the brand of a hot iron on Hester Prynne's forehead"

Throughout, “The Scarlet Letter,” Hawthorne is able to enhance the plot by intricately incorporating symbols which represent a deeper meaning. One of which, is the infamous, and ambiguous, scarlet letter that lays upon the bosom of Hester Prynne. In the beginning of the book, the audience is immediately introduced to the scarlet letter as a symbol of shame and adultery. The narrator describes the Puritan society as very judgemental and harsh. Comments like, “This woman has brought shame upon us all, and ought to die,” creates this negative and unwelcoming atmosphere which surrounds Hester for a majority of the book. From then on, the Puritans constantly refer to the

The novel opens with the people of the town gathering outside the jailhouse with “grim rigidity” (Hawthorne 47) waiting for Hester to appear. As she proceeds to exit the jail, Hester encounters snide remarks from people around her. She describes leaving the jailhouse as agonizing: “Haughty as her demeanor was, she perchance underwent an agony from every footstep of those that thronged to see her, as if her heart had been flung in the street for them all to spurn and trample upon” (Hawthorne 52). Her society makes Hester feel inferior and unwelcome after she commits a sin, reflecting their lack of compassion and sympathy for each other. When she is given her punishment to wear the scarlet letter on her chest for as long as she lives, the townspeople react negatively and demand a harsher punishment. A woman in the crowd asserts “At the very least, they should have put the brand of a hot iron on Hester Prynne’s forehead” (Hawthorne 49). Yet another yells, “This woman has brought shame upon us all, and ought to die. Is there not law for it” (Hawthorne 49). In saying this, they allude to the idea that Hester should have faced a more severe punishment, preferably one that involved physical pain. From Hester’s treatment, it is clear that Puritans are “a grim and gloomy race, impatient with

The women of the town don’t believe that Hester Prynne is being punished enough for her crime, “ ‘The magistrates are God-fearing gentlemen, but merciful over much - that is a truth,’... ‘At the very least, they should have put the brand of a hot iron on Hester Prynne’s forehead. Madam Hester would have winced at that, I warrant me. But she - the naughty baggage - little will she care what they put upon the bodice of her gown!’ ” (44-45). This quote proves the idea that the Puritans are an unforgiving people. At this point in the text, Hester Prynne’s suffering is only just beginning. She at first doesn’t realize the severity of what she will endure in living through her situation. Adultery was a sin punishable by death and Hester was just mindful that it hadn’t come to that. The first step of Hester’s suffering was accepting the fact that her sin was about to change her life. “Could it be true? She clutched the child so fiercely to her breast, that it set forth a cry; she turned her eyes downward at the scarlet letter, and even touched it with her finger, to assure herself that the infant and the shame were real. Yes! - these were her realities, - all else had vanished!” (51) This is one example of the sin, knowledge and human condition in the sense that, like Adam and Eve, Hester Prynne was expelled from having an easy life. The Scarlet Letter that Hester Prynne was destined

he harshness of the Puritan religion is captured in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter. This novel’s protagonist, Hester Prynne, commits adultery in New England during the colonial times. She gives birth to an illegitimate child, Pearl, with Reverend Dimmesdale. Punished with a scarlet letter “A” that she wears on her breast, she is an outcast to society. This leaves her lonely; her only companion is her Pearl. Hester is skilled with uniquely embroidering elaborate designs; thus she supports herself and Pearl through her needlework. Pearl is often described as impish throughout the novel, disobeying the standard expectations of children. The Puritans government threatens to take away Pearl from Hester because they think Hester unfit to teach Pearl correctly. In comparison to Hawthorne’s view of a strict education system for Puritans, the Puritan community had a very effective education system. The Puritans’ strong and strict view on religion greatly influenced education in Colonial America.

"Those who before had known her, and had expected to behold her dimmed and obscured by a disastrous cloud, were astonished, and even startled, to perceive how her beauty shone out, and made a halo of the misfortune and ignominy in which she was enveloped" (39).  Hester, who is being openly condemned for her sins, Hawthorne describes ironically.  To the Puritans, Hester should be dim and obscure, surrounded by darkness and evil.  However, Hawthorne instead describes her shining beauty and the godliness she makes out of her sin and shame by exposing it to the public.  The Puritans condemn Hester for her sin and look towards her as evil, yet she is exposing her sin to the sunshine, to the public, something that Hawthorne praises in the novel.  "A blessing on the righteous Colony of the Massachusetts, where iniquity is dragged out into the sunshine!  Come along, Madame Hester, and show your scarlet letter in the market-place!" (40).  The Puritans feel that they are hurting Hester Prynne by exposing her sin, yet it is only making her stronger and making her grow.

In the Scarlet Letter, written by Nathaniel Hawthorne, he explored the distress of going against law and order in Puritan society. Hawthorne showed how the actions one does affects the rest of their life. This could be seen through one of the characters in this novel, Arthur Dimmesdale, a preacher, eaten away by his sin. Hawthorne shows how Dimmesdale is the one to go against Puritan ideals through the symbols in this novel, style and literary techniques.

The Puritanical society is still known today for it’s strict religious views and gender roles. They had traditional conservative beliefs, their goal being to break away from the corrupt Anglican church and “purify” theirs to be “as a City upon a Hill”, a model for other communities (Winthrop 1). Their gender roles were as conservative as their beliefs, men being superior over women. Women had specific jobs and roles within the community, such as housework, parenting, and things of a similar nature. If one failed to fall within these standards and beliefs, they were considered an outcast. In The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Hester is outcast for committing adultery. However, she uses her punishment to her advantage, and completely

Hypocrisy is not only prevalent in present day but is also shown during the age of the Puritans. The Puritans may have given the impression of having lived a righteous and holy pure life, but in the end, they all fall victims to sin because of human nature and free will. The Scarlet Letter written by Nathaniel Hawthorne does an outstanding job of portraying the Puritans and their many struggles within their religious beliefs throughout their community. The society in which these main characters, Hester Prynne, Rodger Chillingworth who is Hester’s husband, and the minister, Arthur Dimmesdale, all live within the tight-knit of the Puritan community. Hester Prynne commits an act in which she is publicly embarrassed for and is forced to wear

It is difficult to draw parallels between the staunch beliefs of Puritan society in colonial America and the freedom experienced in the country today. The Puritans lived strict lives based on a literal interpretation in the Bible, and constantly emphasized a fear of God and a fear of sin. Modern society looks at this negative view of humanity as a whole as an out-dated opinion from the past, believing that, "Now people know better than that." However, faults in human nature can not be completely erased by the passing of time and the modernization of society. People still have emotions of love, compassion, envy, and pride; and many types of interpersonal relationships within their community. Puritan literature

Through out the course of history, those who were considered sinners were often out casted from the society. This is much the case with Hester Prynne in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter. After a public trial, Hester is considered a sinner due to her birthing of a so called “devil child”. Hester is convicted to the life long bearing of a scarlet letter on her chest. The Scarlet Letter that Hester Prynne wears symbolizes the change in perception of sin through out the novel. Due to the revelations of the governor Winthrop and the reverend Dimmesdale, the way sin is perceived changes from one of shame to the idea that every one is a sinner in their own right.

Because of the nature of the Puritan culture outside of the novel, Hawthorne chooses an aspect of Puritan extremism that does not necessarily typify itself with every Puritan; that aspect would be mindless following. Throughout the work, Hawthorne effectively paints the “picture” that is the Puritan mindlessness. There are two ways that Hawthorne depicts this – the first focusing on the Puritans’ response to sin and the second focusing on the view of their leaders. Illustrating the first example, if someone commits adultery, they are either to be branded or killed; the latter happening much more frequently than the former. In a much broader sense, the Puritans are not in the least bit forgiving, and this can be seen with how the community treats Hester throughout the entire story; even though she was not killed or branded, they still constantly abuse her emotionally and mentally whenever they see the Scarlet Letter on her clothes. Shifting focus from the Puritans’ response to sin to the way that they view their religious leaders, Hawthorne illustrates this aspect of the Puritan community by using ambiguity and constant implications whenever the community is mentioned. An example of this is seen in how the community treats Arthur Dimmesdale. The community is seen idolizing Dimmesdale at points, even when he is clearly in the wrong; the community even took

The Scarlet Letter is a modern classic of American literature written about controversy and published with controversy. The main topic of the book, adultery, is written in a dark and sad way, as Hawthorne describes injustice, fate or predetermination and conscience ( Van Doren, 1998) . No other American novel of the time has such a controversial theme as Hawthorne's, The Scarlet Letter. The setting of Nathanial Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter is the seventeenth century Puritan New England. But Hawthorne's writing for this book is heavily influenced by his own nineteenth century culture. Hawthorne strongly believed in Providence. Hawthorne was descended from the Puritan