Sexual Sin within Puritanical Community
The issues of sexual sin within colonial culture are examined in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, Documents 1. and 3. of Chapter 3 in Major Problems in the History of American Sexuality, and in Richard Godbeer’s essay Sodomy in Colonial New England. What stands out in the study of said documents is the focus on certain acts deemed punishable by death.
What really bothers me while reading the Scarlet letter is how the people isolate Hester and label her as a sinner. If the Puritan people claim to stand for the God of the Bible then what happened to forgiveness? According to the Bible every person is a sinner covered by the grace of God. It seems ridiculous that the sin of one person should be pointed out and put on a pedestal for her whole life and even remembered on her gravestone. Are not the other members of Hester’s community guilty of sin? Lying, for one. It surprises me that her community does not conduct a more thorough investigation of the father of her child. The fact that no one knows who he is means that (at this point) it could be anyone’s husband or brother or son. Someone in the community is lying to the rest of them. Yet Hester’s crime of adultery is what is brought into the light, perhaps because it is easy to do so. Hester obviously committed adultery. A married woman without her husband becomes pregnant and bears a child: The truth of the situation is undeniable. Whereas other sins are unable to be proven therefore do not make their way to the list of sins punishable by law.
Godbeer speaks of some ministers who did equate sexual sins with sins of other nature. “Even those who remained innocent of particular sinful acts were guilty in their hearts if not in deed. Shepard reminded his congregation that they were all guilty of ‘heart whoredom, heart sodomy, heart blasphemy, heart drunkenness, heart buggery, heart oppression [and] heart idolatry.’ ” (Peiss p.96) Things would be much different if the community described in The Scarlet Letter took this into consideration. Perhaps it would be fitting for everyone to wear a flaming A on his chest. In fact, I would argue that of all people to be forced to wear a symbol of her sin, Hester should be the last. She has a visual reminder of her decision: Pearl. Even as she tried to clutch Pearl to her chest and hide the letter A on the scaffold her first day in the public eye, even then she realized it was no use because her daughter was a living reminder of the wrong she committed. Hester is humbly aware of her sin based on the fact that it literally produced a reminder. It is the rest of her community who should be subject to wear reminders of sin. The proud woman, the lazy worker, the man who is looked up to by everyone but harbors hatred in his heart. Should not these be the people to wear a token reminding others that they have sinned in the eyes of God?
It is interesting to look into the changes in what is seen as punishable by God or by law. Oftentimes there was little distinction between the two in Puritan society. Document 1 lays down the law that bestiality, adultery, and homosexuality are punishable by law. It will be eye-opening to see how this shifts and changes as American culture develops throughout history.
March 2nd, 2010 at 12:27 pm
“Whereas other sins are unable to be proven therefore do not make their way to the list of sins punishable by law.”
This reminds me of another part of Godbeer’s essay, in which he discerns between what was punishable by law and what the community took into their own hands. I am mostly thinking of the two witness rule and how improbable that made people, such as Nicholas Sension, to be found guilty. This, of course, brings us back to power-relations and what Godbeer says regarding people thinking some things were just not worth the scandal or not worth losing the individual in question (the idea of the act not directly associated with identity). These power-relations seem very prevalent in Hawthorne’s world…