Theocracy has been around for many centuries. India was once a Buddhist theocracy under the great leader Ashoka. Currently, many Middle Eastern countries are Islamic theocracies, such as Afghanistan and Saudi Arabia. But what about a theocracy in the United States? Colonial Massachusetts is a great example of this. The Puritans used their religious principles to create a new colony in America. In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s classic novel, The Scarlet Letter, the cloth scarlet “A” that Hester Prynne is condemned to wear on her chest to display her sin is a reflection of the strict Puritan standards and beliefs in colonial Boston. Religion was the driving force behind Hester’s actions and punishments because Puritan beliefs ruled the town. A theocracy…show more content… These were seen as a threat to the social order (Dunklee, Hinter, Pollack, Voss, Williams). Without the social order, the utopia the Puritans wanted to create after escaping to America from England would fall apart. In order to keep this from happening, they outlawed “every. . . sexual practice that inched off the line of straight sex as approved by the Bible” (Cox). Obviously, Hester’s crime fell into this category of things not approved by the Bible. The punishment for adultery was specifically to wear the letters “AD” on an outer piece of clothing, which was used for the base of The Scarlet Letter (Dunklee, Hinter, Pollack, Voss, Williams). The many references to the Black Man, also known as the Devil, in The Scarlet Letter also demonstrates how Hester’s mark on her chest comes from the strict beliefs of Puritanism. The Puritans believed that Satan was just as real as God, so the mentioning of the Black Man while Hester and Pearl are in the forest is not just Hester being superstitious. While they are walking through the forest, Pearl and Hester have this conversation:
“‘But, Mother, tell me now! Is there such a Black Man? And didst thou ever meet him? And is this his
