On July 8, 1741, Jonathan Edwards preached the sermon, Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God, in Enfield, Connecticut.
Seeking to stir the hearts of a congregation that had yet to experience the Great Awakening,
On July 8, 1741, Jonathan Edwards preached the sermon, Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God, in Enfield, Connecticut.
Seeking to stir the hearts of a congregation that had yet to experience the Great Awakening, Edwards' series of images of the wrath of God prompted cries from his listeners so loud that it prevented him from finishing the sermon. The most memorable part of this famous sermon was Edward's analogy of the spider:
The God that holds you over the pit of hell, much as one holds a spider, or some loathsome insect over the fire, abhors you, and is dreadfully provoked: his wrath towards you burns like fire; he looks upon you as worthy of nothing else, but to be cast into the fire; he is of purer eyes than to bear to have you in his sight; you are ten thousand times more abominable in his eyes, than the most hateful venomous serpent is in ours. You have offended him infinitely more than ever a stubborn rebel did his prince; and yet it is nothing but his hand that holds you from falling into the fire every moment. It is to be ascribed to nothing else, that you did not go to hell the last night; that you were suffered to awake again in this world, after you closed your eyes to sleep. A