Tradition vs. Modernity, Amy Kramer

He casually reveals the flaws in Nathan’s religious knowledge, while also pointing out that Nathan only follows select parts of the text. Nathan preaches and uses the parts of the Bible that benefit him and his values, while ignoring the parts that don’t suit him and his sins. When the men discuss the passage of Paul and Silas, Fowles points out that perhaps the men listened to the jailer about his conflicted feelings of this new religion that they had sprung upon him. If that is truly what the passage meant, ironically, Nathan does the exact opposite in his teachings. Nathan is offended by anyone that challenges his religion and immediately believes them to be condemned. During the battle of the verses, Fowles also highlights how Nathan believes himself to be better than the locals by quoting Romans 12:3, “For I say, through the grace given unto me, to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought for as we have many members in one body, and all members have not the same office, so we, being many, are one body in Christ and everyone, members one of another”. Fowles then goes on to quote Romans 12:10 that tells of how everyone has their own gift and they should use it humbly and respect other for their gift. Through those verses, Fowles is able to pick on Nathan's flaws without directly saying it, which gives hope to the women, because it is possible to stand up to Nathan and

She does so by detangling an ideology that has transformed and manipulated the human interaction and the construction of societies and nations, installing itself like an extremely dangerous disease, almost impossible to disappear.

The reason why Nathan and Leah have this conflict is because of Nathan’s narrow-mindedness and lack of self awareness. The main purpose of The Poisonwood Bible is to show how different people deal with guilt. Nathan however has no guilt, and this is the source of many conflicts with Leah. Nathan has no self-awareness. When he does something he never thinks of his family, he only thinks

explains what it was like before she stopped listening to Nathan: “Feared Him, loved Him,

Every time Nathan was present in the story I was immediately displeased and wanted him gone. His vulgar comments and actions anger the reader so much, and Kingsolver wanted that image to stay. She wanted the readers to hate him so they can sympathize with Orleanna and her daughters. If she included his narrations in the book, the reader could possibly see his “soft side,” and his anger. His frustration has to have a root somewhere (his horrific experience in the war), and with the exposure of his own thoughts and feelings, the reader would be able to witness them and have a new opinion of him. For the purpose of The Poisonwood Bible though, Nathan had to remain the antagonist and stay the “bad

Throughout the novel, Nathan exhibits cruelty towards his family and the villagers. Cruelty is a direct antonym of Love. Looking back to the Bible, Paul states in a letter to the: “And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love ( New International Version, 1 Corinthians 13:13).” While Nathan may be spreading faith and hope, because of his cruelty, he is certainly not showing love, which according to scripture is the most important. Instead of loving his wife Orleanna, Nathan rebukes her many times for no reason and even acts out in physical cruelty by roughly batting Orleanna away as she tried to nurse his wounds. Nathan’s actions are again hypocritical and go directly against the Bible says. Paul, in another letter, writes “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.” (Ephesians 5:25). Ultimately Nathan is not able to convince any of the villagers to be baptized because he has not showed love and therefore not God to them. John, another apostle, states to a church that is struggling with false prophets: “Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love”(1 John 4:8). One may conclude from these verses that even though Nathan Price may have some knowledge of the Bible, he truly does not know God,

Waters. Here, Nathan abandoned the feeling of having more academic promise than his brothers and instead, traded in better education for acceptance. This is the beginning of Nathan’s downfall.

With this in mind, it is odd that Leah concedes a fault in her father due to the garden. While she tries to justify all of his other actions, she realizes that “father has already bent his will to Africa by remaking his garden in mounds, the way they do here,” (78). This is the first instance where Leah realizes her father’s mortality and unawareness, that eventually manifests into her rejection of her father. It shows how Leah isn’t subject to an endless devotion towards her father who represented god. Instead she actively seeks out righteousness and justice, demonstrated by how she recognizes that bending to the will of the Africa is the right way to do things in the Congo, while Nathan tries to disregard this significance by viewing the situation as something that should be endured for god. He claimed that god “ doesn’t deliver us out of our hardships but through them.” (78). Nathan doesn’t see conforming to the Congo as practical and the right way to grow crops, he takes this situation as something he must tolerate while in the Congo. This not only shows how the two characters respond to change, it also demonstrates how Nathan believes he is tolerating the hardship of god, instead of being shaped by the Congo, which is another instance of his

As Nathan was treated poorly throughout the story I really saw him forgive his wife time and time again throughout the book. After the death of Nathan and Ruth’s daughter Ariel their relationship was tested to the max. Ruth would isolate herself from her husband and she almost despised him for not being upset with the Lord. Ruth could not accept how Nathan turned to God because she blamed God for all of this. While Nathan was being ignored, looked as bad, or just despised by his wife, he did not fold in and say whatever I give up. Nathan had an understanding and forgiving mindset he understood why his wife felt like this. Nathan forgave his wife while she was in the progress of despises him. Nathan never acted this way towards her, he simply turned the other cheek. Nathan showed a great will power by being able to forgive his wife so easily. This spoke volumes because he simply lived his life in a forgiving manner. As Nathan showed his faith and forgiveness through the story I saw a true man of God. Nathan lived in such a way where he could forgive people for the things they did and this was because of how strong he was in his faith. Living a life like Nathan means to live a life for God. A true man of God allowed for Nathan to live a very purposeful life.

Nathan Price struggles with survivor's guilt from WWII. This grief weighs him down, and it not only causes him to be hard on himself personally, it causes him to be hard on his wife and four daughters. He sees himself as a coward, however, in order to hide how he truly views himself, he shows himself off as brave and strong. In reality, Nathan is a coward for hiding himself behind God, and a selfish man for not letting himself commiserate with others. Along with trying to make himself seem like something he is not, he convinces himself that he is going to save the souls of the Congolese people using God’s power. In reality, he is just trying to save his spot in Heaven since he is so guilty about not dying in WWII. Nathan Price has a certain moral code and if anyone, including his family, disobeys it, he believes they should then be punished by God. He also thinks that God will frown upon any actions that are not centered on God. For example, Nathan does not even take the time to love his own wife and daughters. "Father would sooner watch us all perish one by one than listening to anybody but himself"

their happiness when she is forced to move to the Congo. She sacrifices Leah because she leaves

Kingsolver and Coleridge both create Nathan Price and The Mariner to do crazy things to help redeem them within the name of Jesus Christ. Nathan Price is a Southern Baptist Preacher who feels the need to redeem his name after abandoning his men in the army back in World War II. His yearning for his redemption caused him to lose all his family. Although Coleridge has the Mariner tell his story to redeem himself and to show the wrong he has done. The mariner is redeemed when accepted Christianity back in his

A person’s heritage and cultural identity may be lost when moving to a new country where the culture is different and other cultures are not easily accepted. In the short story “Hindus”, Bharati Mukherjee uses setting, characters and the plot to discuss what it is like to lose your cultural identity while being a visible minority in America. Mukherjee uses the plot to describe the events that take place in the main characters life that lead her to realize how different the culture and life is in the America’s. She also uses the characters as a way of demonstrating how moving away from one’s culture and heritage can change a person’s perspective and ways of thinking. Mukerjee also uses setting in her story to identity the physical differences in culture between living in India and America. Alike the setting and characters, the plot helps describe the loss of culture with a sequence of events.

After the riots, the Wakatsuki family moves to a nicer barracks by the hospital. They got to move because of Mama’s job as a dietician. Jeanne and her siblings attend school. Manzanar begins to resemble an American small town. Jeanne explores a variety of hobbies. She explores baton twirling, Japanese dance, ballet, and catechism. With her interest in “American” past times, Jeanne and her father drift farther apart.

But this thought did not last long. When only two of them were sitting together in the car, after Mr. Das and the kids left for trekking, at the hills at Udayagiri and khandagiri they had some private conversations. This conversation, all of a sudden changed the thoughts of Mr. Kapasi towards Mrs. Das. His thoughts changed from deserving her so much to doubting her behavior. When talking about Bobby Mrs. Das said, “he is not his.” This quotation brought abrupt change in him. He felt prickle on his skin. He reached into his shirt pocket for the small tin of lotus-oil balm he carried with him at all times, and applied it to three spots on his forehead. He was shocked by this news, totally shocked. She did not even hesitate to tell how she made silent love with one of the friend of Mr. Das and as a result of which Bobby was born. This was totally unacceptable to Mr. Kapasi. He had not expected a woman to disclose this