The Great Awakening

The Great Awakening was a major religious revival that occurred mostly during the 1730s and 1740s. It all began with a pastor in Northampton, Massachusetts named Jonathan Edwards. He preached with passion about the fiery depths of hell using shocking metaphors and inspiring great spiritual fervor in his fellow Puritan parishioners in his most famous sermon, "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God". The Puritan people were amazed by this new type of emotion packed sermon. They were used to their "dead dog" pastors who tried in vain to explain the complex Calvinist doctrine to the confused, often bored by the dry language, people. Problems were already existing in the Puritan church. Not enough people were joining the church. The first problem was the complex Calvinist doctrine on predestination and other theological issues. People had begun to interpret these in their own ways and not necessarily in the way the Puritans agreed on. Second, was the fact that from the beginning the Puritan religion was exclusive. But as the so called "heresies" on the doctrine began to take hold and churches became so few they decided that spiritual conversion was no longer necessary for church membership.

Jonathan Edwards's style became popular and was sweeping through the colonies. But another pastor with his own unique sermon style emerged. George Whitefield was an amazing speaker and pastor. He was able to put enormous amounts of emotion into his sermons. He was different from Edwards in that he emphasized how great God was and how you were missing out on not being with him. Whitefield became so popular that he toured the colonies giving sermons. Soon, many other pastors across the colonies began to imitate his emotional appeals. But because it was something new and different there were people who opposed and preferred the old ways of the church, these were the "old lights". The "new lights" disagreed and said this new emotion-filled spirituality was the reason for the revitalizing American religion. But even these splits had good come out of them. Because of the new churches there were now more people attending them, it also encouraged a missionary wave as well as building of higher learning centers. The Great Awakening was significant because it was the first mass movement of the American people. They had a common, shared event that broke down boundaries and led to them as thinking of themselves as more of a single people.

The Great Awakening, although it may not seem like it, influenced the evolution of the ideal of separation of church and state. The people had become fired up about their religion. They knew from experience from the Catholic Church back in Europe that religion and politics was a nasty mess that could only lead to corruption. The people of America were focused on their religion being personal and private. They believed that if you were being forced to pay for a church or go to a church that bored you and you did not necessarily agree with then you really didn't have much of a spirituality. But if you chose to go and worship out of your own free will then your spirituality will be much more authentic and real. Real religion is not something you can make people do. They also hoped to keep religion sacred and have nothing to do with law, therefore making religion not be the business of the state. Also, they knew the government would then end up paying for the church and the people would pay through their taxes. So overall, many effects of the Great Awakening influenced the ideal of separation of church and state as well as Americans today.