Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God Literary Devices

Definition of Metaphor

A metaphor is a figure of speech that compares two different things by saying that one thing is the other. The comparison in a metaphor can be stated explicitly, as... read full definition

A metaphor is a figure of speech that compares two different things by saying that one thing is the other. The comparison in a metaphor... read full definition

A metaphor is a figure of speech that compares two different things by saying that one thing is the other... read full definition

Explanation and Analysis—No Fortress:

Edwards uses the metaphor of a prince who cannot get rid of rebels because they have a fortress or some other strong position from which to fight:

Sometimes an earthly prince meets with a great deal of difficulty in subduing a rebel, who has found means to fortify himself, and has made himself strong by the numbers of his followers. But it is not so with God. There is no fortress that is any defence from the power of God.

Explanation and Analysis—Over the Flames:

Although dramatic irony is most often employed in a narrative, it also operates in this sermon, within the metaphor about the sinner suspended over the fire.

You hang by a slender thread, with the flames of divine wrath flashing about it, and ready every moment to singe it, and burn it asunder; and you have no interest in any Mediator, and nothing to lay hold of to save yourself, nothing to keep off the flames of wrath, nothing of your own, nothing that you ever have done, nothing that you can do, to induce God to spare you one moment.

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Explanation and Analysis—Bow and Arrow:

Edwards not only emphasizes that hell is horrible, but also that it is imminent. In other words, sinners must turn to Jesus with haste, because any day they could die unsaved and go to hell. His choice of metaphor, a bow and arrow, is vividly expounded in the following passage:

The bow of God’s wrath is bent, and the arrow made ready on the string, and justice bends the arrow at your heart, and strains the bow, and it is nothing but the meer pleasure of God, and that of an angry God, without any promise or obligation at all, that keeps the arrow one moment from being made drunk with your blood.

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Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God: Metaphors 3 key examples

Definition of Metaphor