Anne Hutchinson, a Radical Thinker and Activist - Assignment Example

Anne Hutchinson, a radical thinker and activist Anne Hutchinson, though rooted in Puritan tradition, grew up to denounce the unholy alliance of the Church and the Government which connived to downgrade the worth and inherent strength of women and to deny the civil rights of men and women to perpetuate their autocracy under the cover of false and misinterpreted sanctions of religion in a bid to succeed in their impious designs.  The puritan woman Anne Hutchinson was born in the year in the second half of the seventeenth century. When the Puritans held sway over religion and society and for most of the people it had come to stay as the accepted way of life. The status of women in society then was radically different from what it is today both in England and the new continent America (Paul P). It was a patriarchal society and women were treated as inferior to men in all spheres of life and this concept also enjoyed religious sanction in the laws framed by the Puritans in the colonies. The lawmakers had their own norms and culture. Women, they pleaded, were weak in body as well as in mind. They fell easy prey to the worldly passions of sex, money and power. They were perceived as the images of Eve and deserved punishment for violation, of the codes, if any, prepared by them A widow denying remarriage was seen by them as degrading God‘s will, who might as well be suspected of being a witch. Besides, a woman had no absolute right to property. If a woman inherited any property, it was transferred to her husband after her marriage A woman could not, they said, manage herself, let alone the property. It was really hard for women, who were eager to breathe in an atmosphere of freedom and equality, to stand against the prevailing law. Only a few enlightened ladies like Woolstoncraft, etc could gather strength to revolt against the church and the government to demand the rights on a footing of equality with men. . However, there was another group of women who followed the traditional conventions but not at the cost of their strength within home. Anne Hutchinson was one of that group who steadfastly stuck to her conviction with a strong mind-set to   oppose injustice and overthrow authority without being radical.  Biography Anne Hutchinson was born in England to a minister and was baptized as Anne Marbury in Alford Lincolnshire on July 2,1591.as a ministers daughter. Anne was fortunate to have a father who was not moved or guided by the prevailing codes of religion or its irrational sanctions to the prejudice of a section of the society, big or small. Much against the convention, her father inspired her to receive a fairly good education. He did not care for the social norms of marriage of a girl at a tender age and got his daughter married at the age of 21 (Paul P). Her father was a follower of John Cotton and harbored questions, like him, about the structure of the church‘s hierarchical configuration. Cotton was persecuted by the Church of England Authority and was forced to leave England. He left England for Massachusetts Bay Colony with his followers in 1633. Anne and her father also left for the same colony with another large group who believed in Cotton’s stand. Anne owes to a great extent her initiation into radical thinking unconsciouly though. However, Anne Hutchinson did not play a definitive role till then. The years to follow were of great moment in her life. She was faced with the horrible situation women had been put to by the laws and religious sanctions. It was too much for her to endure this sad plight of women. She raised her voice against the injustice illegally imposed upon the womenfolk by the church and the government and preached the true contents of the Bible to expose their evil designs. Hutchinson was prosecuted for her outspoken-ness and her challenge to their authority. She was banished from that island. She had to find out a new place to settle down, as she was not allowed shelter in any of the puritan settlements. She purchased land at almost an unknown island from the aborigines and founded a colony with 19 persons including her husband. The island was given the name of Pocasset. . Hutchinson fought for the rights of the inhabitants as well for her old-cherished principle of the separation of the church and the government. The government was also replaced. This was jubilation in the island and a new name was given to the island of Portsmouth, which still carries the same. Hutchinson lived there for the rest of her life. Hutchinsons trial Anne Hutchinson’s migration to the Massachusetts Bay Island led to one of the most tumultuous periods in her life (Winship 184). She found herself in a precarious position as the situation there was worse than what she had seen as a young lady in England. The government in league with the church framed laws extremely detrimental to the interests of women and they were direct assault on their rights as well. It is true the situation with regard to women ’s status was almost identical in the colonies in America because of the dominance of the Puritans but it was viciously repugnant   to a woman of strong conviction like Hutchinson who upheld the exalted human values of equality and justice to be a mute spectator to the atrocities perpetrated on the womenfolk.  Women were made to play a subservient role within the public and private spheres This was as a punishment that they had to suffer for being women, the veritable images of Eve and an atmosphere was deliberately built up   which looked upon them as personifications of frailty, sensuality and all the vile passions. Worse, they were even expected to accept their relegated position even as they were subjected to cruel punishment and harsh treatment. Hutchinson, though a believer in the traditional values, did not accept this subservience imposed by the church and the governing body. She raised her voice against the unbecoming close proximity of the two and challenged their traditional practices, policies and the codes. She held meetings in her home to discuss the Bible and its teachings, which attracted men as well as women in a fairly large number. Nowhere in the Bible, she said, was prescribed the intermediary role of the Church betwixt men/women and God. They could have direct communion, she stressed, and not through the church to plead on their behalf. Women as a powerless entity in society did not concur with the teachings in the Bible. She castigated the unholy alliance of the church and the government, which consistently tried to perpetrate atrocities on innocent women by misinterpretation of the dictates of religion   This was enough for her to become the eye-sore of the clergy and the patriarchal authorities were alarmed at the vigorous onslaughts on their hegemony by Hutchinson. They put pressure on her to accept their dictates relating to women and confess her guilt of making ’ malicious and false statement against them which she refused.. She retaliated with a shift from the Covenant of Works propounded by them to John Calvin‘s Covenant of Grace which was the foundation of the Protestant Reformation She said,” You have no power over my body, neither you can do me any harm, for I am in the hands of eternal Jehovah my Savior. I am at his appointment, the bounds of my habitation are cast in heaven, no further doe I esteem of any mortal man than creatures in his hand“’ She insisted on faith alone and not the specific tasks and atonement to obtain the grace of God. Her prosecution after this was a foregone conclusion.   The prosecution of Anne Hutchinson was executed in accordance with a well worked- out strategy. Sir Henry Vane, the Governor of Massachusetts and a supporter of Hutchison, was replaced in the summer of 1636 by Winthrop who was strongly opposed to her preaching, steadfast adherence to her revolutionary ideas and unyielding obdurateness. Two years later in the year 1638, her real trial began. Winthrop  "considered her a threat to his city set on a hill" and the meetings she held "a thing not tolerable nor comely in the sight of God, nor fitting for her sex" Heavy pressure was put on her to give up her role of a preacher against the church and the government and accept their authority as well as the traditional sanctions against women. She was then in an advanced stage of her 15th pregnancy and was made to stand for hours in the court but Hutchinson refused to oblige them and bounced back with greater vigor. This angered the accusers all the more.  One minister told her, " You have stepped out of your place, and you had rather been a husband than a wife, a preacher than a hearer and a magistrate rather than a subject." This led to her official banishment in 1637 saying,” She was not a woman fit for our society“. Apart from this trial in a court of law, another trial, the religious trial, was awaiting her. It concurred with the Court‘s views putting a final seal on her banishment. Hutchinsons impact in society and colony founding  Hutchinson finally left her home forever a year later. A large number of followers accompanied her. She was not permitted to settle in any of the Puritan colonies. She was thus forced to found a new colony. A colony was established on the island land of Aquidneck with 19 people including her husband. The Hutchinson called it Pocasset. The settlement, however, did not halt her fight against the church and the government. As the government of that colony, under male leadership, favored the traditional roles of the church and the government, which was a clear shift from Hutchinson’s original vision of separation of the two. In addition, she put in all her might to empower the inhabitants to veto actions of the Governor and also established a second branch of government. This success in the change of government in Pocasset was celebrated with an entirely new name “Portsmouth” Anne Hutchinson came to firmly believe that individual rather than state or the church was best suited for determining the proper course of action for a man/woman. She called it individual anarchism.   Conclusion: Anne Hutchinson was, by all means, far ahead of her time and the first lady to so in many respects.. She was decidedly the first of her kind who went to an alien land to find a society free from the patriarchal dominance and women’s biased subservience to males, which was not to be. However, her strong conviction of the real strength and worth of women nurtured by her undaunted courage to raise her voice against the Church and the government, the perpetrators of injustice, was something inconceivable in the first half of the 17tth Century under Puritan dominance when Anne Hutchinson lived and worked. She was herself a devout Christian and had deep respect for the traditional conventions and values It was against her temper to see scriptures and their contents misinterpreted to serve the interests of the religious lords or the governing authorities. She never felt shy of making her views known to the people However, it required the grit and iron will of Hutchinson to work undeterred in face of continual persecution with merciless severity She faced banishment for the bold assertion of her views and her strong disagreement with the prevailing dogmas. Even after her banishment she did never break down but worked with meticulous tenacity to correctly interpret the Bible and make her staunch adversaries know her views on religion, which attracted men and women alike in large numbers. Again, she was the first woman to found a colony and fight for the civil rights of individuals, even to veto the decisions of the governor.  The agitation under her leadership brought about a change in the government and she earned the distinction of being the first woman to effect a change of government and its separation from the church.     Works Cited Reuben, Paul P. "Chapter 1: Anne Hutchinson." PAL: Perspectives in American Literature- A Research and Reference Guide. WWW URL: http://www.csustan.edu/english/reuben/pal/chap1/hutchinson.html (17.12.2009). Winship, Michael P. "The Times and Trials of Anne Hutchinson ." University Press of Kansas 00-05-2005: 184. Web. 18 Dec 2009. . Read More