Question

What is predestination? What role did this play in Puritan society?

Answer 1

Predestination is the belief that people have no control over events because these things are controlled by God or by fate. In the Puritan Society, this characteristic of their religious practices was the main difference between them and other Christian groups. They believed that salvation was not a choice, but a privilege provided by God alone.

Answer 2

The term prediction can refer to both "action and the effect of predicting" and "words that show what is predicted"; In this sense, predicting something is "announcing by revelation, science or conjecture something that has to happen"

The Puritans taught that conversion is necessary and that God has chosen to promote salvation through preaching, being the Holy Spirit, and not reason, the decisive engine in salvation. Instead of Anglican preaching, according to the calendar and ritual, the Puritans emphasized preaching based on the Scriptures. Because of the importance given to preaching, the Puritans put great interest in preparing the ministry. The conversion experience, combined with the doctrine of predestination inherited from Calvinism, produced a sense of choice for God to revolutionize history.