Langston Hughes's 'Salvation'

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Thomas Thompson 8/25/12 AP English IV G/T Schmidt “Salvation” Essay In Langston Hughes’s “Salvation,” he describes himself being “saved from sin… But not really saved.” He was young, and he wanted to please the adults he respected, so he pretended to be saved. In reality, though, the adults he looked up to were the ones responsible for his loss of faith, and unwillingness to be saved. Hughes’s Aunt Reed told him that, “when you were saved you saw a light… you could see and hear and feel Jesus in your soul,” but that was not what he experienced. He had heard others describe “being saved” like that as well, so he assumed Jesus was not coming. He had been fed information about what to perceive in an intensely personal situation, but he wasn’t feeling it. “[He] sat there calmly in the hot, crowded church, waiting for Jesus to come,” but Jesus never came to him in a bright flash of omnipresent light. Eventually Hughes was the only child left unsaved, and the congregation began kneeling around him; praying, wailing, and waiting. Hughes was also waiting, “waiting serenely for Jesus… but he didn’t come.”…show more content…
At this point it was late and Hughes, “began to feel ashamed of [himself], holding everything up so long.” Hughes felt pressured by the questioning of the minister, and the depiction of hell he was given. He felt pressured by the presence of the congregation around him, and the incessant wails and prayers. He felt pressured by the lateness of the hour, and the other children looking down at him from the platform. So he lied to save the congregation, not himself. He stood up, and with him a shout was raised by the congregation; obligating him to continue in the

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