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Chapter 13
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Bronze Bow, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Love vs. Vengeance
Trust, Dependence, and Friendship
Leadership: Power vs. Service
Earthly Hopes vs. Heavenly Values
Summary
Analysis
One morning, Leah and Daniel sit together over a late breakfast. Daniel was up late celebrating Nathan’s wedding, and he’s feeling tired and foggy. Abruptly, Leah asks Daniel what a wedding is. Daniel realizes that his sister knows so little of the outside world. Awkwardly, he tries to describe the modest feast and the bride’s dress. When Leah asks if Daniel will someday bring a bride home, Daniel snaps at her that he's taken an oath to rid the Jews of their Roman overlords. He doesn’t have time for anything else. But he's not sure who he’s yelling at.
When Leah innocently asks Daniel to tell her more about the wedding, he feels guilty about Leah’s isolation. More than that, however, Daniel’s annoyance suggests that deep down, he does want to bring a wife home. He thinks his anti-Roman oath will interfere with that—suggesting that, deep down, Daniel suspects that vengeance gets in the way of love.
Themes
Leah seems puzzled by Daniel’s words. Eventually, she says it’s silly to call the Romans the masters of the Jews—after all, the nice Roman soldier who visits the shop is just a boy, and he’s homesick at that. Daniel is furious. He blames the Romans for Leah’s condition. He doesn’t know where Leah would have learned the word “homesick.” That day he fights to keep his mind on his work, thinking often of the mountain. At the end of the day, he tells Leah to bar the door, and he heads up the mountain.
Leah seems to know something about the Roman soldier that Daniel doesn’t. Her innocence causes her to look at the Romans differently than Daniel does—as human beings with needs and sorrows, instead of as abstract enemies. Because of what her parents’ deaths did to Leah—contributing to her weak and needy condition—Daniel can only see the Romans as oppressors.
Themes
At first, the men of Rosh’s camp welcome Daniel with glad shouts. But the feeling of homecoming fades quickly, and people soon ignore him. When he talks with Joktan, he learns that Rosh’s men have had trouble stealing food from the shepherds. Daniel feels uncomfortable. He used to assume that he was entitled to whatever he could steal. Now he knows the village shepherds personally, and he knows they aren’t wealthy.
Daniel feels caught between worlds. In the village, he feels caged and unable to fight as he’s vowed to do. Yet, on the mountain, he’s beginning to grow uncomfortable with some of Rosh’s methods. He has a stake in village life nowadays; he can identify with the struggles of the shepherds he knows personally. Before, he thought of them as faceless victims.
Themes
When Samson strides into camp with a large sheep, he and Daniel greet each other joyfully. Later Joktan tells Daniel that Samson sensed he was coming back—he just seems to know these things. When Daniel goes to sleep beside his old comrades that night, he feels content at first. But soon he’s tossing and turning, thinking about Leah, Joel, and Thacia. He also thinks of Simon and the leader Simon has found in Jesus. Among Jesus’s followers, there seems to be a close fellowship. But among Rosh’s men, only Samson really cared that Daniel came back. He also thinks about Leah and her goat. He wonders if a village child will go hungry because of the mutton feast.
Daniel continues to feel caught between different worlds. Rosh’s camp only briefly feels like home, as part of his heart is now focused on the village and his new friends. He also realizes that Rosh’s men, with the exception of Samson, don’t really care about him as a person, which is not like the way Jesus’s followers regard one another. Daniel also knows that someone—perhaps somebody like Leah—has suffered because of the theft of the sheep. Before he had a stake in village life, he never thought about such things.
Themes
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The next morning, Daniel wishes he could take Samson back to the village with him, but he can’t see Samson fitting into village life—he belongs up here on the mountain. But Daniel isn’t sure where he belongs. When he gets back to the shop, he finds the fire has gone out. Leah is sitting there with hair uncombed, not having bothered to get water from the well or make breakfast. Daniel irritably picks up the water jar, feeling caged once again.
Daniel can see that Samson wouldn’t thrive in the constricting life of the village. As for himself, Daniel doesn’t fit neatly into either the village or the mountain camp. When he gets home, he feels burdened anew by Leah’s dependence. He even has to take on traditionally feminine jobs like fetching water since Leah can’t handle them.
Themes
