The Nature of Sin

When I was younger, I had stolen a pack of Lifesaver gummies from Target in Boulder. My mom didn’t notice until we got home. My punishment was to go to the store and return it and apologize which as a young kid was a terrifying thing to do. In the situation where I stole the pack of lifesavers, I got caught and had to face the consequences. I had to deal with it publicly, but when some people don’t get caught, they have to deal with the sin inside them. In the novel The Scarlet Letter written by Nathaniel Hawthorne, you see both of these examples. An occurring theme in the novel is sin and there are many ways it is represented and dealt with. Hester is a representation of sin because she is someone who committed adultery and how she deals with it publicly. Dimmesdale represents sin as he also committed adultery, but he deals with it internally. Pearl represents Hester’s sin, as she is the outcome of what can happen when one sins. The novel gives examples of these many ways sin is represented through the character’s way of dealing with it.

In the novel, Hester is abashed from being publicly humiliated and forced to deal with the pain caused by her sin externally. In the scene where Hester is with her daughter Pearl stepping up on the scaffold as punishment and her sin is announced to the townspeople, Governor Bellingham states,“‘At the very least, they should have put the brand of a hot iron on Hester Prynne’s forehead. Madame Hester would have winced at that I warrant me. But she--the naughty baggage--little will she care what they put upon the bodice of her gown!’” (Hawthorne 49). This shows that Hester is publically facing her sin, and is dealing with the torture and embarrassment of it. She knows that she will forever live in i...

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...awthorne 174) When Pearl is in public, she is constantly being made fun of and discriminated against by the townspeople and children. This shows that even though she didn’t do anything wrong, she is still punished for being an outcome of sin. When Pearl is dressed as the Scarlet Letter when she goes to the Governor's house is an obvious example that she is a direct correlation of her mom’s wrongdoing, showing that she truly is Hester’s sin. All of these characters show sin in their own way-concealed, revealed, and an outcome.

There are many characters in the novel that all represent sin, but each in a different way.

The different ways sin was represented were Hester’s revealed sin, Dimmesdale’s concealed sin, and Pearl being the outcome of a sin and how she deals with it. Sin is dealt with in many different ways, and The Scarlet Letter helps us to understand that.