Mamer’s betrayal at the hand of his best friend, William Dane, reminds one of the Biblical story of David and Bathsheba. King David is so enamored of Bathsheba that he causes her husband, Uriah, to fight on the front lines of battle in a hopeless cause. When Uriah is killed as expected, David marries Bathsheba. Similarly, William sets Marner up for his expulsion from the church in order to marry his friend’s betrothed. Marner interprets William’s first act of two-facedness toward him as merely an execution of William’s “brotherly office.” Brothers tend to fight for patrimony. In the novel, however, Silas Mamer survives and is the one who goes into exile, not the betrayer William. Marner is the one who becomes an outsider. This upending of the traditional story suggests the injustice of Lantern Yard, where the innocent are banished and the guilty thrive.