William Arthur Ward once said, "Real religion is a way of life, not a white cloak to be wrapped around us on the Sabbath and then cast aside into the six-day closet of unconcern." Religion is the one thing that people can usually tolerate but never agree upon. Each faith seems to have an ordained assumption that they have the correct thoughts on how to life one's life or how to think about things or the way to act in certain situations. Still, each religion has its own "sub-religions." If someone refers to Christianity, there are several different religions that are blanketed under that umbrella: Catholic, Baptist, Lutheran, Pentecostal, and Presbyterian are just a handful. The inconsistencies that are associated with everyone's belief about religion run into deeper ruts of confusion. This confusion leads people to have distorted views as to what they believe and what their religion is all about. This is no different from the feelings about slavery by Christians in Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin. Throughout the novel, Christianity presents itself in a few different lights; as a twisted and deformed glimmer of what religion is supposed to be with undertones of bigotry and prejudice, an innocent yet naive child that brings joy to everyone he or she meets, and as Uncle Tom himself, the standard for what a Christian is supposed to be. These different portrayals of Christian living come from Stowe's own beliefs about Christians and brings them into the light.
Many people during the time of Harriet Beecher Stowe and even now regard religion as a means of getting out of the requirement of having to go to Hell by being a part of a religion. What these people do not realize is that there is more to just being able to say that they are Christians and getting out of the punishment for their sins. They must be examples of what it is like to be religious and practice it with fervency and commitment. Miss Ophelia was Stowe's embodiment of these people that are trying to cheat their way out of spiritual punishment. She admits to having feelings of bigotry toward blacks. "I've always had a prejudice against negroes [
] and it's a fact, I never could bear to have that child touch me; but, I didn't think she knew it" (246). Miss Ophelia's aversion toward African Americans shows that to be human is to be flawed; however, it is still unchristian to be so.
Both Stowe and Douglass expressed their concern for those ignorant of the true meaning of slavery. In their writings, they both exhibit their frustration for people who call themselves Christian and continue to engage in slavery practices. Stowe brought to life the reality of the humanity of slaves, which may or may not have been realized by the majority of slaveholders. Eliza, the main character in chapter five, was a slave to Mr. and Mrs. Shelby. Mr. Shelby sold Eliza's only son to save his property. Mr. Shelby is depicted as a businessman who happens to own slaves and Eliza's son is apart of a business deal. Mr. Shelby, like many slaveholders, was thought of as a good man who generally treated his slaves well....
Minstrelsy's response to Uncle Tom's Cabin is characteristic of plantation influence at the time. Tom acts generally came to displace other plantation accounts, especially in the third act. These portrayals some of the time upheld Stowe's novel, however generally as frequently they turned it on its head or attacked the creator. Whatever the expected message, it was normally lost in the cheerful, amusing enviornment of the piece. Characters, for example, Simon Legree occasionally vanished, and the title was much of the time changed to something more energetic like "Happy Uncle Tom" or "Uncle Dad's Cabin". Uncle Tom himself was often depicted as a safe bootlicker to be mocked. Groups known as Tommer organizations spent significant time in such
“As it is, we have the wolf by the ear, and we can neither hold him, nor safely let him go. Justice is on one scale, and self-preservation in the other.” This quote said by Thomas Jefferson accurately depicted the political, economic, and social issues that were presented in the 1800s. The novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin written by Harriet Beecher Stowe created a massive awareness politically and socially for the abolitionist movement. Throughout Uncle Tom’s Cabin Stowe paints the picture of the cruel and unjust treatment of slaves on large plantations in the 1850s. Although Uncle Tom’s Cabin shows that large scale plantations showed empathy towards their slaves after the 1830s; however, Uncle Tom’s Cabin accurately depicts the lives of slaves after
While lying on her death bed, in Chapter 26 of Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin, little Eva says to the servants in her house who have gathered around her, "You must remember that each one of you can become angels" (418). In this chapter and the one before it, Eva has actively worked to make the people surrounding her into "angels," taken here to mean one who is saved by God. In chapters 33 and 34 of Stowe's book, Tom similarly works, though more quietly, to turn the other slaves at Simon Legree's plantation into "angels." Both of these scenes, and particularly the evangelical characters within them, reveal Stowe's Methodist theology, a theology that rejects the predestination of earlier American Christianity. In Stowe's theology "each one" of the people can be saved; God's love is universal. Original sin still exists, but now an individual is given control to escape this sin by embracing God's love. At the heart of the theology and the resultant morality that Tom and Eva evince, is a warm, knowable God, who is knowable through love, and the heart.
Uncle Tom’s Cabin, by Harriet Beecher Stowe is a classic novel that some people claimed evoked the American Civil War. Stowe motivated people to take sides over the issue of slavery by discussing the issue and showing the cruel aspects of it. The main focus of the novel was to show whites that African American’s have souls and feelings like any other human; it was common for whites at the time to view blacks as cattle. Families were separated, and the white people’s reasoning was that blacks did not feel the loss the same way a white person would. Stowe’s basic argument is that it is wrong to mistreat blacks because they suffer just as much as whites.
Harriet Beecher Stowe’s novel, Uncle Tom’s Cabin, has had a tremendous impact on American culture, both then and now. It is still considered a controversial novel, and many secondary schools have banned it from their libraries. What makes it such a controversial novel? One reason would have been that the novel is full of melodrama, and many people considered it a caricature of the truth. Others said that she did not show the horror of slavery enough, that she showed the softer side of it throughout most of her novel. Regardless of the varying opinions of its readers, it is obvious that its impact was large.
Since the 17th century when African slaves were brought over by Dutch slavers, Christianity has been used to justify the act of enslavment. Missionaries sailed with slavers and tried to convert the Africans sold into slavery many times. During the 19th century Christianity was a great factor in helping institutionalize and even justify the suffering of the slaves. Slaves were made to believe through verses of the Bible that if they suffered in their current lives, they would have a better existence after they passed on. Uncle Tom’s Cabin, by Harriet Beecher Stowe, puts forth the lives of many different slaves and their masters in a way that was one of the contributing factors to igniting the civil war. The book focuses on the tension between the morality of religion and how religion was used to institutionalize slavery, particularly for the main character, Tom. Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin presents the interpretative tension between religion and how it was used by the white slaveholders to rationalize Tom’s bondage and servitude for him and themselves.
In this time frame, many people believed that God would forgive their actions against African Americans and that no effort as necessary to change the system of slavery. Miss Ophelia assumes that God will forgive her for her bigotry even though she makes no effort to become a better person or change her opinions on race. Many also believed that African Americans were not their equals, and therefore saw no issue with their treatment of slaves. Despite this, many still feared an organized revolt of the slaves against them, so maintaining power over them was important. Simon Legree uses Christianity against his slaves in order to maintain control over them, hoping that punishment for practicing the Christian faith will prevent his slaves from developing ideas of freedom. On the other hand, religion also creates hope for many people during this period. Evangeline is portrayed as the perfect Christian, and shows how the Christian faith can create hope for people and inspire them to lead good Christian lives, setting an almost unreachable standard. Uncle Tom also portrays hope that can be gained from the Christian faith. As a Christ figure, Uncle Tom is able to inspire many others to become better Christians and hope for a better life in the future. Religion had a very large range of meaning to people
The novel centers around a pious slave, Uncle Tom, and how he is sold over and over again. It shows the different attitudes that Tom’s masters share about slavery, and how their slaves should be treat. It also teaches Christian values as well as family values. At the time of its publication, Uncle Tom’s Cabin was an immediate success and one of biggest sellers of all time. Despite the fact that Stowe induces her own personal opinions, with the very little experience she has had with slaves, she delivers a magnificent novel which is still enjoyed by many modern readers today. The time of her novel’s publication was very important. It was published at the peak of the abolitionist movement, in the 1850’s. It proved to be very effective propaganda for the abolitionist cause, which Stowe openly supported.
Even today, with literature constantly crossing more lines and becoming more shocking, Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin remains one of the most scandalous, controversial, and powerful literary works ever spilled onto a set of blank pages. Not only does this novel examine the attitudes of white nineteenth-century society toward slavery, but it introduces us to the hearts, minds and souls of several remarkable and unprecedented characters.
Life is viewed differently by everyone. Some see the positive and optimistic life full of wonder, while others see the negative and pessimistic life of dead ends. The perceptions are based on the experiences that molds the good and the bad. We see what our past has been and what our future would most likely be. Our beliefs of life cannot be changed by another’s perspectives. In Harriet Beecher Stowe’s anti-slavery novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin, Eliza and George are two slaves that live in different environments to influence how they react and think in different situations.
...lture. Most twenty-first century readers are annoyed by the novel’s sentimentality, the religious undertones, and the martyr figures, among other things, but these same qualities that we dislike are what appealed to the novel’s original audience. Being outsiders, it is hard for us to accept Stowe’s message that love must conquer social injustices. However, one must wonder if her own contemporaries accepted this message, since Stowe would have seen the Civil War as forcing change within society without eliminating the prejudices that produced it.
In the novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin written by Harriet Beecher Stowe, one of the main themes is religious faith; specifically Christian faith. Stowe’s characterization of this was that Christian faith is a strong force of love that has the ability to invalidate slavery. This was shown in many characters like Uncle Tom and Eliza. As a result of their strong Christian faith and values, Uncle Tom and Eliza were able to
Harriet Beecher Stowe, in her work Uncle Tom's Cabin, portrayed slaves as being the most morally correct beings, often times un-humanistically so, while also portraying many whites and slave-owners to be morally wrong in most situations. Stowe created a definite distinction between the morality of slaves and their sympathizers, and those opposed to the abolitionist movement.
Stowe, Harriet B, and Ann Douglas. Uncle Tom's Cabin: Or, Life Among the Lowly. New York, N.Y: