Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart

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The way certain people acknowledge certain things depend on how they are raised, their beliefs, or simply their religion. In the novel Things Fall apart by Chinua Achebe, the author demonstrates how Okonkwo, one of the greatest man in the village of Umuofia is the major reason of his downfall. How the invasion of missionaries change Umuofia completely. The novel can be interpreted differently by atheist and Christians due to their opinion on the Ibo culture, and their point of view. In the novel, religion played a major role in the Ibo community. The Ibo community believed strongly in oracles. For example, Chielo plays an important role representing the role of the priestess of the oracle of Agbala, “The oracle was called Agbala, and people …show more content…

The villagers of Umuofia are accustomed to their gods, and their beliefs. When missionaries began to invade umuofia and and their religion, things began to completely change. For instance, “The missionaries had come to Umuofia. They had built their church there, won a handful of converts and were already sending evangelists to the surrounding towns and villages” (Achebe 143). Christians would interpret this as the salvation of Umuofia, they would agree with the missionaries on trying to lead these villagers to god’s path. Although this might be true to Christians, atheist would view this as enforcing a religion upon the villagers. Christianity is said to be a religion where nothing is forced upon you, and what the missionaries are doing contradicts this statement. The missionary known as Mr. Brown expresses his opinion on the beliefs of the villagers, “He told them that they worshipped false gods, gods of wood and stone” (Achebe 145). Atheist would feel aggravated by this, Christians are not supposed to enforce the religion on people, specially offend their religion. Christians on the other hand would see this as knowledge being shared with the

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