to give his consent, which insults the Templar. When he finds out from Recha's companion Daja, a Christian, that Recha is not Nathan's biological daughter, but is only adopted, and that her biological parents were Christians, he turns to the patriarch of Jerusalem for advice. Although the Templar frames his request as a hypothetical case, the fanatical head of the church guesses what this is about and wants to search for "this Jew" immediately and have him burned at the stake for temptation to apostasy. He does not consider Nathan's noble motives and the fact that Nathan did not raise the Christian child as a Jew, but on the contrary in no belief, does not soften the patriarch's stance, but aggravates him: "That’s nothing! Still the Jew is to be burnt— / And for this very reason would deserve / To be thrice burnt." Records of the friar who once brought Recha to Nathan as a toddler finally reveal that the Christian Templar and Recha are not only brother and sister – hence Nathan's reservations about marriage – but also the children of Saladin's brother Assad. These connections are revealed to everyone in the final scene at Saladin's palace, which ends with all main characters repeatedly embracing each other in silence. Ring Parable The centerpiece of the work is the "Ring Parable", narrated by Nathan when asked by Saladin which religion is true: an heirloom ring with the magical ability to render its owner pleasing in the eyes of God and mankind had been passed down from father to son. For generations, each father had bequeathed the ring to the son he loved most. When it came to a father with three sons whom he loved equally, he promised it (in "pious weakness") to each of them. Looking for a way to keep his promise, he had two replicas made, which were indistinguishable from the original, and gave on his deathbed a ring to each of them. The brothers quarreled over who owned the real ring. A wise judge admonished them that it was impossible to tell at that time – that it even could not be discounted that all three rings were replicas, the original one having been lost at some point in the past; that to find out whether one of them had the real ring it was up to them to live in such a way that