How The Igbo Culture In Things Fall Apart

In the novel Things Fall Apart, written by Chinua Achebe, there are three main instances which lead to the downfall of the Igbo culture—the destruction of the village of Abame, the conflict between Okonkwo and Nwoye in the motherland, and the conflict between the church and the clan in Umuofia. In the second year of Okonkwo’s exile in the motherland, Obierika, his friend, came to bring him the revenue his yam crops had earned him along with a story about the destruction of Abame. “During the last planting season a white man had appeared in their clan. He was not an albino. He was quite different. And he was riding an iron horse (bicycle). The first people who saw him ran away, but he stood beckoning to them. In the end the fearless ones
went near and even touched him. The elders consulted their Oracle and it told them that the strange man would break their clan and spread destruction among them. And so they killed the white man, Obierika explained” (Achebe ch. 15). Obierika resumes the story by telling Okonkwo about how three white men led by ordinary men entered the clan and when they saw the iron horse tied to the tree, they fled. Furthermore, Obierika tells Okonkwo of the day the village was destructed. “They have a big market in Abame on every other Afo day and, that was the day it happened. The three white men and a very large number of other men surrounded the market. And they began to shoot. Everybody was killed, except the old and the sick who were at home and a handful of women and children whose chi were wide awake and brought them out of the market” (Achebe ch.15). The European massacre of the village of Abame was the catalyst for things falling apart throughout the Ibo clan. Following the massacre of Abame, a plethora of missionaries began to inhabit Mbanta, the motherland.
“They spent the first four or five nights in the marketplace, and went into the village each morning to preach the gospel” (Achebe ch. 17). The missionaries desired a portion of land to build their church, and thus, the rulers of Mbanta gave them a portion of the Evil Forest. Eventually, they had built their church in the Evil Forest which flourished, attracting many conversions. Nwoye was one of them as he was “attracted to the new faith from the very first day” (Achebe ch.17). Despite this attraction to Christianity, he still dared not to go too near the missionaries in fear of his father’s wrath. However, as hard as he tried, Amikwu, Okonkwo’s cousin, spotted him among the Christians while he was passing by from a neighboring village. Amikwu relayed this information to Okonkwo, which greatly angered him. Once Nwoye had returned home in the late afternoon, “Okonkwo, overcome with fury, sprang to his feet and gripped him by the neck and said “Where have you been? (Achebe ch.17). After questioning Nwoye, Okonkwo seized a heavy stick that lay on the dwarf wall and hit him two or three savage blows. This broken relationship between Okonkwo and his son, Nwoye, is a significant instance which lead to things falling apart in the Ibo
clan. Once Okonkwo returned to Umuofia, he discovered many changes. “The church had come and led many astray. Not only the low-born and the outcast but sometimes a worthy man had joined it “(Achebe ch.20). However, despite this change the church and the clan seemed to be cooperating with one another until Enoch broke this peace. Enoch committed two crimes which were the catalysts for the great conflict between the church and the clan. The first was that he had killed and eaten the sacred python although this wasn’t that terrible compared to his second crime—unmasking the egwugwu at the ceremony of worship for the earth goddess. “The annual worship of the earth goddess fell on a Sunday, and the masked spirits were abroad. One of the greatest crimes one could commit was to unmask and egwuwu in public, or to say or do anything which might reduce its immortal prestige in the eyes of the uninitiated. And this is what Enoch did” (Achebe ch.20). This particular crime made the clan have to be cleansed, and is significant to things falling apart in the Ibo clan. The instances addressed in this essay that lead to things falling apart in the Ibo clan are the conflict between Okonkwo and Nwoye in the motherland, the destruction of the village of Abame, and the conflict between church and clan in Umuofia. Consequently, the climactic event that these and all the events in the novel are catalysts for is Okonkwo’s tragic suicide, which is regarded by some as him taking his revenge upon on the Europeans.