Journal #10

Nika Bogoslovsky
10/12/07
Bradstreet

"Many times hath Satan troubled me concerning the verity of the Scriptures, many times by atheism how I could know whether there was a God; I never saw any miracles to confirm me, and those which I read of, how did I know but they were feigned?"

Summary:

This is a letter by Anne Bradstreet written to her children as a sort of remembrance of herself. I'd like to think of it as a kind of guide and answers book for them in a time when they will need her but she will no longer be with them. In this letter she discusses how she always had doubts in her beliefs of God and she lets her children know that such things and other mistakes are ok.

Response:

I think Anne Bradstreet is very brave for writing about her faulty beliefs in faith. I'm not exactly sure how much power women had in that time but I'd take the guess in that they didn't have much for her to be speaking like that against God, it was pretty gutsy. What makes it more gutsy is that not only were women "lesser" but she was speaking of her lack in faith as a puritan in such religious times then. The gossip that must have gone on about her! My favourite art, what made this letter so truthful and meaningful was right after she said the quote above, she says that what makes her faith solid are the wonders of everyday life. So she hasn't seen any miracles but she's lived through sunrise and sunset, summer and winter and has a comfortable home, the things that she can really appreciate and that's enough for her to believe in some sort of God. I say some sort of God because she questions him right after that wondering if he's really as wondrous as the trinity claims. The date at the end of the letter says 1867, if that is a publishing date, I wonder if it was published so late because she was a woman speaking about her uncertainties of God in such a "God" prominent society?