Caitlin's Praxis Journal Main Menu Ethnic Studies 250B Praxis Journal Praxis Journal for Ethnic Studies 250B, American Slave Narratives Praxis Journal Entry 1 -- 8/29/16 Analyzing two passages from the Narrative Praxis Journal Entry 2 -- 9/5/16 Frederick Douglass -- Literacy as Rebellion Praxis Journal Entry 3 -- 9/11/16 Praxis Journal Entry 4 -- 9/20/16 Praxis Journal Entry 5 -- 9/25/16 Analyzing a passage from the reader and the film Praxis Journal Entry 6 -- 10/9/16 Praxis Journal Entry 7 -- 10/17/16 Praxis Journal Entry 8 -- 10/24/16 Praxis Journal Entry 9 -- 10/31/16 Praxis Journal Entry 11 -- 11/20/16

Praxis Journal Entry 12 -- 11/27/16

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Uncle Tom’s Cabin is over. Thank goodness. It was only three weeks but it felt much longer. I didn’t believe my sister when she told me, but Tom dies at the end, beaten to death by Legree. Tom knew he was going to die long before he actually did. The morning after Legree beat him for refusing to whip Cassy, Tom was awakened by light streaming into the shed where he lay, and with the light “came the solemn words, ‘I am the root and offspring of David, and the bright and morning star’” (p.345). Cassy had warned Tom that there was no way off of Legree’s plantation except through death, but this warning didn’t scare Tom; it was actually calming and reassuring. Tom knew that when he died he would finally be free of his earthly suffering, united with God in heaven. He would just have to be patient and bide his remaining time on earth. Tom felt the strength to endure any and all abuse Legree meted out; Legree wouldn’t have his body much longer and he could never possess Tom’s soul.

Sometime after this initial revelation, Tom had a vision of Jesus on the cross. He “sat, like one stunned, at the fire. Suddenly everything around him seemed to fade, and a vision rose before him of one crowned with thorns, buffeted and bleeding. Tom gazed, in awe and wonder, at the majestic patience of the face; the deep, pathetic eyes thrilled him to his inmost heart; his soul woke, as with floods of emotion, he stretched out his hands and fell upon his knees—when gradually, the vision changed; the sharp thorns became rays of glory; and, in splendor inconceivable, he saw that same face bending compassionately towards him, and a voice said, ‘He that overcometh shall sit down with me on my throne, even as I also overcame, and am set down with my Father on his throne’” (p.357).

What interested me about Tom’s vision wasn’t the vision itself but Stowe’s reaction to it. Unlike Thomas Gray in The Confessions of Nat Turner, Stowe doesn’t treat Tom’s vision as a symptom of mental illness or a fanciful story. She addresses that her readers may feel that way, saying “the psychologist tells us of a state, in which the affections and images of the mind become so dominant and overpowering, that they press into their service the outward senses, and make them give tangible shape to the inward imagining” (p.358). Instead Stowe treats Tom’s vision as a manifestation of the Holy Spirit, and asks her readers why they would contradict a slave asserting they had a vision of God, when “his mission, in all ages, was to bind up the broken-hearted, and set at liberty them that are bruised?” (p.358). Stowe’s portrayal of Tom’s vision caught my attention because it differs so greatly from Nat Turner’s visions in The Confessions of Nat Turner and Nat Turner (the graphic novel). Gray in the Confessions uses Turner’s visions as “proof” that Turner was both mentally unstable and unintelligent. Baker uses them to show motivation for Turner’s rebellion and illustrate Turner’s character. Stowe, a highly religious woman herself, used Tom’s vision to show his deep and unflinching faith in God even in the face of adversity—a theme that isn’t as visible in the other slave narratives we’ve read this semester. 

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