Worldview Analysis

What is Janie’s Worldview?

It seems that Janie’s worldview can be seen in her interaction with both the analogy/imagery of sitting under the pear tree and thinking along with her constant pursuit of the “horizon.” The narrator throughout the story gives clues as to when Janie’s worldview is changing. The first example of this I think is when Janie’s grandmother catches her kissing Justin Taylor, and her grandmother’s suggestion of Logan Killicks who “was desecrating the pear tree.” Janie really did not like Logan nor was she attracted to hi, yet she felt that her grandmother new best about relationships and what a woman wants so she agreed eventually to marry Logan. Janie in this period of her life that Janie begins to asks questions about marriage, “did marriage end the cosmic loneliness of the unmatched? Did marriage compel love like the sun day? With these questions it can be seen that Janie is feeling lonely due to her feelings about being matched poorly with Logan and that here understanding of marriage is beginning to shift. From a Christians’ perspective, Janie reveals her need her for someone to fill this feeling of loneliness. Janie begins to think well maybe Logan will fill this need of being matched, and maybe marriage brings love rather than loving leading to marriage. This loneliness is a human characteristic, one designed by God in order that he might fill these desires completely and no other person can. Janie, here, is realizing her need to be in relationship, something else God designed, as He Himself is in fellowship with the Father Son and Holy Spirit.

As Janies first marriage begins to deteriorate, at the end of chapter 3, Janie reveals another truth, that marriage “did not make love.” It seems as though the worldview of Americans today is marriage does make love, a reason for the high divorce rate. Getting marriage does not cause one to fall in love. Getting married does not even force one to love. The biblical ground to contrast this worldview can be found in 1 John 4:19, “We love because he first loved us.” I do not think Janie understands this aspect about love, which is why she has trouble with all of her intimate relationships with men. Marriage does not make love, economic satisfaction does not make love. Too things that Janie seems to going after in her first two marriages. The reference to Janie letting her hair down has many sinful tendencies I think. The letting her hair down while drawing water for Joe, while in the store, while sitting under the pear tree reveals something bigger going on inside Janie. She wants to feel independent, she wants to relieve herself of the pain that she is in, she wants to change her situation, and I think most sinfully she just wants to be noticed by her husband, but also others. Now, wanted to be noticed is not sinful in and of itself, but it seems as though the neglect her first two husbands has caused her too look else where for satisfaction. It seems as though the hair being let down is a reference to Janie really saying, “I am not satisfied where I am at now, I need a change, I want someone to notice me.” In which God would say, “I died for you, you are sinner in my eyes, but Christ is willing to take that burden of sin from you if you would just believe in me, do not settle for these other men, do not settle for money, do not settle for comfortability, you will need be satisfied in these things and I made it this way in order that I (God) would be made much of not you.” Only by giving herself to Jesus would Janie be able to comfortably keep her hair up, which would reveal her dependence on God and her satisfaction in him is the thing that makes everything else have satisfaction.

So, where is Janie’s worldview consistent with the Christian worldview? Janie recognizes the hurricane as God “mocking” the weakness of man. It is after the realization that danger is coming and Tea Cake and Janie are going to having to leave that Janie reveals her feelings for Tea Cake, “Ah wuz fumblin’ round and God opened the door,” which seems to be that Janie recognizes the relationship she had with Tea Cake as a gift from God, and only through this could she “so satisfied” with Tea Cake. I also think that is it with the treat of losing Tea Cake that she truly sees the blessings that Tea Cake had been in her life. It is through the hurricane that Janie beings to see the bigger picture of life and also the futility of life. This is often times how God works in peoples lives ordains certain things to happen, that might even cause pain, in order that people might recognize the work of God and believe in the salvation that he has provide through Jesus. There are those that search and search and search and never seem to find satisfaction, the opening lines to the novel illuminate this fact, and it is after the death of Tea Cake and her better understanding of life that she is able to share her growth with her friends. I am not suggesting that Janie came to know the Jesus through these events, but it does seem that Janie got a taste of death, satisfaction, and comfort only for it all to be taken away through on event and Janie has a much bigger picture of what it means to truly live.

Completed by: Grant Bostrom