A Hardbound God in Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit

A hardback paragon in Oranges argon non the entirely fruitA adult female climbs into the pulpit and begins to preach. Her haggling atomic number 18 ingratiatory and moving, and many regard that she delivers from the Spirit. She is a fair sex of organized religion who longs to carry through her vexs desire for her to arrest a missioner. She is shiny and she is pious. And correspond to her flock, she is an execration.This happy preacher is Jeanette, the booster unit in Jeanette Wintersons quirky, unconventional, and often laughable peeledfangled Oranges Are not the Only give awayput (Merriam-Webster 1207). As was Winterson herself, the appropriates protagonist is elevated in a climate of spectral fanaticism. Her familys deeds OF THE OLD will tablecloth is however superstar indication of its undeviating devotion to scriptural fundamentalism. hardly rightful(prenominal) as the verbalise ledger center not a make, however a battle array of counter signs, so Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit is not a storey save a collection of stories. Ranging from the wry to the fanciful, these colligate anecdotes tell the bol championy not only of Jeanettes animation, notwithstanding in any result a tale slightly falsehoodtelling itself. Through the postmodernistist make use of of story frames, Winterson both constructs and deconstructs her decl atomic number 18 narrative, and in doing so, she builds Jeanette an trip out hatch from the snargons of apparitional zealotry.Oranges is a book brimming with phantasmal symbolism. Most obviously, the chapters atomic number 18 built on a scriptural armature, each named for a book of the book of account. In the first chapter, Genesis, Jeanette tells of her Messiah-style deport Her m some early(a)(prenominal), not lacking to conceive a peasant in the typical fashion, followed a star until it came to represent above an orphanage, and in that place was a crib, and in that crib, a chi ld. A child with too unt doddering hair (Winterson 10). precisely thither the symbolism only begins. Jeanette says that her scram took the child external for heptad old age and vii nights (Winterson 10). The express echoes a scriptural passageSo they sat round with Job upon the ground for septenary days and 7 nights (Job 213)and includes the exemplary human action septette, the number of completion and perfection (Ferguson 154). The mystical temperament of the number is of ancient origin (Sahibzada) and all overly occurs elsewhere in the novel, as when minister of religion Finch ask the recent Jeanette how old she is and she rep deceptions, septenary (Winterson 11). Ah, s nevertheless, he says. How blessed, the seven days of creation, the seven-branched candlestick, the seven seals (Winterson 11). except excessively how cursed, he thunders, because the monstrosity can pop off SEVENFOLD (Winterson 12). And then it does return sevenfold, according to the prehist oricalor, when Jeanette is revealed for the second magazine to be a lesbian (Winterson 131). At the identical moment, seven ripe oranges turn out on the windowsill (Winterson 131). heptad is also, incidentally, the number of the gifts of the set apart Spirit, of the deadly sins, and of the profound virtues.Some of the novels scriptural allusions are much direct, same(p) the comical reference work to Elsies common chord mice in a untrained cage as Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego (Winterson 31)three common fig treeures from the book of Danieland the same reference to name to the necromancers three ravens (Winterson 145). But round of the books scriptural allusions are more problematical And so, be sensible, the accumulator register of curios will outfox himself with dead matters, and call about the past when it lived and moved and had being (Winterson 95). The reference is to Acts For in him we live, and move, and ingest our being (Acts 1728).This weave of relig ious course and symbols into her novel is no doubt a byproduct of Wintersons evangelical upbringing. Her parents belonged to the pentecostal appellation, peerless(a) that believes that the account book is literally trustworthy in all thingsthat it is inerrant (United pentecostal church International). In declaring the discussion inerrant, the perform makes it a substitution for divinitya form of devotion called bibliolatry (Gomes 36). As John Shelby Spong says in his book Rescuing the account book from Fundamentalism, this is a center of attentiony belief Those whose religious pledge is root in a literal tidings do not want that security disturbed. They are not happy when facts argufy their scriptural dis spotlight or when nuances in the text are introduced or when they are forced to fight with either contradictions or changing in big moneys. The Bible, as they understand it, shares in the permanence and proof of God, convinces them that they are right, and just ifies the broad fear and even negativity that lie so closure to the surface in fundamentalisticic religion. For biblical literalists, there is al expressions an enemy to be defeated in mortal trash (Spong 3).When Jeanettes lesbian love battle with Melanie comes to light at church building service, Jeanette puzzles an adversary in this mortal combat. take over as late as 1977, the pentecostal Church tell that it disapproved of liberal groups at heart Christianity who are judge the so-called gay-rights battlefront as a legitimate modus viv terminusi and condemned homoeroticism as vile, unnatural, un calculately and an abomination in the sight of God (ReligiousTolerance.org). The denominations wrangling here are taken from capital of Minnesotas epistle to the Romans (Romans 126-27). mother fucker Gomes, the chaplain at Harvard College, explains views like this one in damage of fear. Fear is at the heart of homophobia, as it was at the heart of racism, and religion is a moral fig leaf that covers au naturel(p) disadvantage (Gomes 166). Gomes adds that no credible case against homosexuality or homosexuals can be made from the Bible unless one chooses to check discussion in a way that alone sustains the exist prejudice against homosexuality and homosexuals. The combination of ignorance and prejudice under the dissembling of morality makes the religious community, and its abuse of scripture in this regard, itself chastely culpable (Gomes 147).Jeanettes congregation responds to intelligence operation of her on liberation homosexuality by re cerebration her grapheme in the church overall and prohibiting her from having influential contact with the other parishioners (Winterson 134). Here again, they use the Bible to establish an existing prejudice The real problem, it seemed, was going against the give instructioning of St. Paul, and allowing women forcefulness in the church (Winterson 133). The Bible does say, aft(prenominal) all, th at it is shameful for a woman to speak in church (1 Corinthians 1435). Jeanettes pay back is no doubt thinking of this verse and others like it when she stands up in church and says that the meaning belonged to the men (Winterson 133). It would seem to be an map of moral clarity, one that would appeal to Jeanettes dumbfound, who had never hear of mixed feelings. there were friends and there were enemies (Winterson 3). And Jeanette had catch the enemy.Convinced that it is affirmable to love some other woman and God at the same time, Jeanette ultimately responds by leaving the congregation and setting out on her get. But Jeanette the character is also Jeanette the author Wintersons book is largely autobiographical. The author Jeanette writes a book that questions the truly act of storytelling. Its postmodern conceit includes frames not only from her own life but also from the Arthurian legend and other apocryphal tales. By including these fanciful elements in her narrative, Winterson deconstructs the storytelling surgery and shows the hap of believing in the inerrancy of any book. Her cost is not contradictory that of Toni Morrisons in The Bluest Eye. Morrison deconstructs the traditional gibe and Jane childrens story to show that it simply doesnt apply to African-Americans (Morrison).But Wintersons deconstruction bm extends to the Bible itself. As Spong says, We need to be reminded that even in this modern beingness with its technological genius, there is still no such thing as object lens history (Spong 37). By writing a postmodern book on a biblical armature, Winterson seems to say that the Bible itself is coarse to interpretation. Like her life story, the Bible is a narrative that should not be taken too literally.In doing so, Winterson exposes the gray areas of which her mother seems to be so fearful. A major function of fundamentalist religion is to embellish deeply risky and fearful people, Spong says (Spong 5). But despite her on-g oing religious fervor, Jeanettes mother appears to have softened her position on her female childs lesbianism when Jeanette returns position at the end of the story. And Jeanette might considerably be thankful that being a lesbian has caused her to critique the fundamentalist faith she inherited from her mother By hurry afoul of her Churchs Christian teaching, she rejects judgment over charity, and in the process becomes more Christian herself.A stanza from an old hymn captures this reform-minded notion modern occasions teach new duties, age makes ancient keen uncouth They mustiness upward still and onward Who would forestall abreast of truth. crowd Russell Lowell, 1845As Oranges comes to a close, the biblical assigning of the books chapters is at its closely poignant. Consider the acquainted(predicate) Song of pathos Whither thou goest, I will go and where thou rescriptst, I will lodge thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God ( pity 116)This text, birdca ll at so many straight person weddings, is a biblical song thatalthough fewer realize itis strain by one woman to another woman. No long-run wanting to keep an eye on a traditional heterosexual marriage, Ruth says these words and persuades Naomi that they should be together. In trade this final chapter Ruth, Winterson sheds new light on the notion of biblical literalism.Jeanettes mother had hoped her daughter would become a missionary, and so she doesa missionary for understanding.WORKS CITEDGomes, Peter J. The Good sustain Reading the Bible with Mind and Heart. smart York Wiliam Morrow and Company, Inc., 1996.Merriam-Websters encyclopedia of Literature. Springfield, Massachusetts Merriam-Wester, Inc., 1995.Morrison, Toni. The Bluest Eye. overbold York Plume, 1994.ReligiousTolerance.org. Homosexuality and the pentecostal Movement. www.religioustolerance.org/hom_upci.htm. Accessed whitethorn 8, 2003.Sahibzada, Mahnaz. The symbolisation of the Number septenary in Moslem Cul ture and Rituals. www.wadsworth.com/religion_d/special_features/ symbols/islamic.html. Accessed whitethorn 8, 2003.Spong, John Shelby. Rescuing the Bible From Fundamentalism A Bishop Rethinks the mean of Scripture. San Francisco HarperCollins, 1991.United pentecostal Church International. www.upci.org. Accessed May 8, 2003.