Rowlandson Paragraph Response

Directions: Finish the rest of these paragraphs in a student essay arguing that biblical typology was used as a survival strategy by Rowlandson throughout her captivity.  The topic sentence has been underlined.

Rowlandson uses typology to keep hoping for deliverance from her captivity.  She views her actions as not merely personal, but as re-creations of the tests in the Old Testament.  For instance, in “The third Remove,” she notes:

So I took the Bible, and in that melancholy time, it came to my mind to read first the 28. Chap. Of Deuteronomy, which I did, and when I had read it, my dark heart wrought on this manner, That there was no mercy for me, that the blessings were gone, and the curses come in their room, and that I had lost my opportunity.  But the Lord helped me still to go on reading till I came to Chap. 30 the seven first verses, where I found, There was mercy promised again, if we would return to him by repentance [. . .] (225)

Such specific references to the verses suggest that her audience would both know and agree with these, that their acceptance of the covenant meant that they expected to be delivered.  Through the next several Removes, Rowlandson grieves the loss of her child, clothing, and food.  These basic motifs form the reason for including most of the other biblical quotations.  In “The ninth Remove,” she notes the following verse from Psalms: “                                                                                                                                                                                                                             ” (      ).  This quote shows _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________.  The typology continues throughout the various Removes, each time operating to humanize Rowlandson and her grief.

Unlike Rowlandson, we can put away her book and her grief with it.  She seems to suffer from lingering trauma, describing on 250 her inability to find restful sleep.  She ends with a last bit of typology from Psalms 6.6: “I watered my Couch with my tears.  Oh! the wonderfull power of God that mine eyes have seen, affording matter enough for my thoughts to run in, that when others are sleeping mine eyes are weeping” (251).  Here we have a complication of simple typology because________________________________________________________          ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________.