Missing Promise of Mount Pisgah

The pilgrims were a very religious group, and their accounts of history often contained Biblical illusions to describe and explain their experiences. In one passage detailing his impression of the New World, William Bradford stated that the pilgrims could not simply go up onto Mount Pisgah to see a more goodly country in order to receive encouragement. Bradford used this Biblical illusion to illustrate his belief that there was no pre-existing perfect land for which these pilgrims were destined or anything to give them hope of finding one.

In Deuteronomy, Mount Pisgah is the mountain which Moses climbed to see into the holy land, which was the land prepared for the Israelites by God. In William Bradford's passage, he stated that the pilgrims lacked the ability to see a "promised land" such as Moses was able to see from the top of Mount Pisgah. The New World through which the pilgrims were traveling, and their journey there were full of hardships and danger, much like what the Israelites experienced in their flight through the desert. The pilgrims, however, did not have the comfort of knowing a promised land awaited them like the Israelites did.

The bleak conditions that the pilgrims faced in the New World were not eased by the hopes of reaching a land of plenty. They faced savage conditions, harsh winters, and unknown perils all without the comfort that the Israelites had of knowing a better land awaited them.