The Problem Of Missionaries Among The Igbo People

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The Problem of Missionaries among the Igbo People
Things Fall Apart presents the Igbo community of Nigeria and their initial reaction to the white missionaries arrival in their country. Through the language of the colonizers, Chinua shares his story from the opinion of the colonized. It is noteworthy that the Igbo people had a culture, informal education system, and even religious activities before the arrival of the missionaries. More than half of this novel describes explicitly the way of life, traditions, beliefs, cults and the socials rules of the Mbanta and Umuofia villages before the arrival of the white people as he calls them. The occurrences in the novella are purely creative.
Brown was the first to arrive in Mbanta with his interpreter who was an Igbo, Mr. Kiala. The importance of a translator was to help in penetrating the community as he tried to learn more about the Igbo community. Mr. Brown asserts that regardless of different skin colors, all were equal in Gods eyes as God considered all of them His sons and daughters. Mr. Brown and other missionaries brought quite some changes. The question that remained unanswered was whether things fell apart on the communities of Umuofia and Mbanta. Missionaries believed that it was their responsibility in a sense to improve the indigenous community of Igbo and they caused notable changes in the lives of the people. Evidently, missionaries challenged the Igbo belief system, made them condemn their gods, stop storytelling that was an essential part of that community. The community further rejected their values and customs to embrace the Christian beliefs. The significant impact of this the society split up as a result of their influence. In this regard, Okonkwo states
The white man is very clever. He came quietly and peaceably with his religion. We were amused at his foolishness and allowed him to stay. Now he has won our brothers, and our clan can no longer act like one. He has put a knife on the things that held us together, and we have fallen apart (Chapter 20 page
These foreigners were convinced that they need to erase the culture of the Igbo people and built it afresh on a Christian model that they thought was most appropriate. Actually, from Achebe’s point of view, the missionaries concluded that the Igbo traditions were evil and needed abolition without seeking to understand that culture. From the progression of missionary work to colonialization, it is doubtful that the missionaries had the pure motives and intentions they claimed to have. Things fall apart because foreigners and most missionaries want to eliminate ever fabric, belief, and ceremony that hold the ethnic group together. Their claim that all that is African is