Law And Grace In Pilgrim's Progress

Lutheran theology echoes throughout the Pilgrim’s Progress, particularly through John Bunyan’s representations of law and grace. These are two critical ideas that Bunyan presents through his allegory. The ideas are detailed mostly in the beginning of Christian’s journey, as the beginning of one’s faith, where it is easiest to become confused on the nature of salvation. To fully grasp Bunyan’s meaning is to understand what law and grace mean, and how they relate to each other. The concepts, like every other idea in this story, are defined through metaphor. Unlike every other idea, these concepts are not directly converted into metaphors. Instead, we have to examine other concepts to understand law and grace.
Each situation that Christian and …show more content…
The guilt comes from the conviction brought about by divine law. Our sin nature generates so much filth that the steps out of the slough are obscured with our own muck. Help describes the slough as a bog fed by the convictions of sins. “...This miry slough,” he says, “is such a place as cannot be mended: it is the descent whither the scum and filth that attends conviction for sin doth continually run, and therefore it was called the Slough of Despond” …show more content…
These help further explain Bunyan’s meaning. Understanding these terms is important because each of these words have connotations that influence the analysis of grace and law. Divine grace cannot be fully understood without first understanding what it is not. It is not righteousness, religion, or morality. Grace is not achieved through any of these concepts, rather, grace engenders these ideals in our behavior. This seems obvious on paper, but becomes wildly confused in