Journal Entry16, Title: My own Sermon

If you sin, you receive punishment. If you sin, god will not save you, you’ll go to Satan’s land and burn in the scorching hell for eternity. We are already sinners in the eyes of god because of Adam and Eve. We must not commit crime; one more crime will become the motive for god to ban us out of paradise. Sin is not tolerated by god. God tells us not to lie, not to kill and not to commit adultery. We are the creations of god, and god has the ability to destroy his creations, if some of us were to commit sin. Do not foolishly underestimate the power of god; do not be arrogant enough to cast disbelief on god. Those who cast doubt upon the powers of god end up dead, their bodies burn in black flame and cast a odor so foul it is surely the scent of Satan. God can create us with a flick of his hand, and he can destroy us with the same way. God keeps us from going to hell only to give us a chance to prove ourselves, if we sin, we lose the chance and we all die. So believe in god, and never commit sin!

 

Journal Entry 15: Title: Respond to Jonathan Edwards

Jonathan Edwards is a very religious and pious Puritan. In his speech “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God”, he stated that human are sinful in the eyes of god, and god have the power to destroy us if he ever wants to. I think Jonathan Edwards is not a very good choice if you want to live with somebody, as you can see; he is a very radical and extreme religious person. He says gods view us as something more disgusting than the evil serpents that we hate, and God has the power to “shoot an arrow” at as, as in killing us. I think his speech is trying to warn the people not to take things for granted, and we should be humble under the hands of god, and that god has the ability to take away everything we have, including our life. It is said that his speech made the crowds shriek and swoon. I think his speech won’t have the same effect on the modern religious people. Most people in our modern society don’t take the religion as serious as Jonathan Edwards does; they view the religion as only a way that can help them get through emotional hardships. 

Journal Entry14: Title: Sin

Sin is defined as “doing what is wrong, or not doing what is right according to God's rules”; this definition is clearly based on religion. The definition of “sin” in the modern society is probably defined as doing something that the majority of the society think is wrong. My definition is similar to the modern society’s definition because I do not have religious beliefs. In the religious realms, god decides what is considered a sin and what is not. If god tells you not to lie, and you lie, then you have sinned. The definition of sin is different for people with and without a religious belief. Many things done by religious people are considered a sin for themselves, but may not be considered a sin for others. For example, lying is not considered a sin by non-religious people because the law doesn’t say it’s a sin. Many religious people refer to the bible when it comes to the issue of sinning, and their lifestyles are often stricter than ours. When it comes to describing whether or not that you have done, or witnessed something considered as sin, I think I have not sinned, because various acts considered as sin in modern culture is written by the law, and up to today I have not broken the law yet. I am also not old enough to witness something truly described as sin. If I’m a religious person, the answer to the question above is probably both a “yes”, because it is almost impossible not to lie, and unlikely that you will never see someone else lie. 

Journal Entry 13: Fear as a motivation

Yes, I agree fear is often a motivation for people to do things. In most companies, the employees often do their work because their scared that they will get fired if they don’t do their work. Many students do their work because there are scared that they will be punished if they don’t do their homework. Another example is me and my mom. I usually do what she tells me because she’s going to get mad, and fear is what motivates me to do what she tells me. Because of fear, we are less likely to be injured, because we wear a helmet out of the fear of injuring themselves when do certain activities. Without fear, we might not remember to wear a helmet, because we are not thoughtful of the consequences. We may not enjoy the feeling of fear, but we must admit, without fear, we will be more likely to be injured.

Journal12: Church

I have never been to an actual church before; I have only gone to Chinese and Japanese temples. In the Chinese temples, there will always be a distinct smell. The smells come from a big metal pot in front of the temple, when people go to the temple; they take sticks covered with powders and light it up with fire, and they stick the incense stick into the pot. The powder on the stick is made of wood grounded into fine dust. Also, in almost every Chinese temple, there will be a little ceremony that people do to ask the god’s permission to do something that want to do. It’s called “Bua Buiy”, it is two pieces of banana shaped wood painted red. Both of the pieces has one side that is flat and the other side that is round, they determine whether the god approves what they are going to do by seeing which side of the two pieces is facing up when it falls on the ground. Japanese temples have similar looks as the Chinese temples, but the Japanese temples usually have black roofs instead of red roofs as Chinese temples do. Japanese temples don’t usually have incense pots, and they don’t have “Bua Buiy”. Japanese temples always have boxes in which you draw a piece of paper of bamboo stick with words indicating your luck for the day. 

Journal11: Motivation

In both the Scarlet Letter and the poem “Burning of our house”, the themes are strongly based on religious beliefs, and the characters in both of the books are all Puritans. In Scarlet Letter the characters often have similar appearances; they wear plain clothes and talk in a similar fashion. The villagers in Hester Prynne’s town were horrified when Hester committed adultery, and they punished her harshly. I think the punishments of Hester are strongly related to their religion. Anything not according to the Bible is often prohibited, and of course adultery is viewed as one of the most sinful crimes. Our society is based on justice legislation instead of religious beliefs, in our modern world, we won’t be punished in public if we commit adultery; our society gives us the right to keep our crime a secret. In the poem “burning of our house”, the writer blessed god for taking what she has, instead of getting upset about her unfortunate encounters. That is very different from our modern society, even now, religious believers won’t thank god for burning down their house, they will just be mad. The way the writer reacted about the burning of her house is strongly related to her religion. The Puritan religion believes god is the great architect, as mentioned in the poem, god made everything, and everything that the people have was given by god. Ann Bradstreet believes it is only right for god to take back what he gave, because it ultimately belongs to him. Our society is designed so we have to earn what we have, so when we lose our material possessions, we will be very upset. 

Compare and Contrast: Bradstreet vs. Sor Juana

The biggest difference of these two poems is the use of language. In Bradstreet’s poem, Burning of Our house many of the sentences are inversions, they have the subject behind the verb, for example: In silent night when rest I took, and most of the sentences rhyme with each other. The English version of Sor Juana’s poem World, in Hounding Me did not have any rhyming, it’s probably because it’s originally written in another language, and the English words for the original sentences don’t rhyme. Despite the very different things that the two poems are describing, the poem has the similar theme “vanity”, but it is described in a different way. In Ann Bradstreet’s poem, the author described her feeling of vanity when she had her material possessions, and after God took away what he gave, she felt contempt because she thinks she has enough, even after everything is gone. In Sor Juana’s poem, the author described the feeling of vanity that doesn’t come from material possessions. She feels the world values people of their outside appearances, and not their internal beauty. She thinks that the world is shallow in viewing people, as if judging a book by its cover, and she thinks pursuing outside beauty gives her the feeling of vanity, and she prefers to stock her mind with knowledge.