Mary Rowlandson's perception of her captors reflects a very puritan sense of predestination and subsequent entitlement to her disdain for the American Indian. Throughout the twenty removes, Rowlandson consistently describes the Indians as some sort of subhuman manifestation of the devil. For her, they are not people, but a representation of everything that is wrong with the world. The Third Remove is a good example of this perception because while it is one of the mildest accounts, Rowlandson maintains her opinion that these are demon savages rather than people. For instance, "I cannot but take notice of the wonderful mercy of God to me in those afflictions, in sending me a Bible. One of the Indians that came from Medfield fight, had brought some plunder, came to me, and asked me, if I would have a Bible, he had got one in his basket." Here, Rowlandson is attributing her acquiring of a Bible directly to God rather than to the Indian who actually gave it to her. This is because she cannot see an Indian giving her a Bible as an act of kindness. In fact, she cannot see anything that any Indian does as an act of kindness, as all Indian's are a representation of evil for her. Therefore, she must rationalize this occurrence as an act of God. She does, after all, see God as superior to the devil and therefore capable of temporarily overriding any manifestation of the devil. There is also Rowlandson's belief in predestination to consider here. She clearly sees this Bible as a mechanism for her survival, which was preordained to her by God. She demonstrates this through her constant allusion to Biblical passages and the magnitude with which they apply to her situation. She writes of Deuteronomy: "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"
The Seventeenth Remove also depicts Rowlandson's rationalization of the snippets we are given of Indians' kindness to her. In this remove, she asks an Indian for a bit of broth. He not only gives her what she has asked for, but also tells her to take as much as she would like. While this is somewhat unusual behavior on the Indian's part (considering the fact that she is a prisoner/slave), Rowlandson continues to attribute it solely to God. "and now may I say with Jonathan, "See, I pray you, how mine eyes have been enlightened, because I tasted a little of this honey" (1 Samuel 14.29)." Again, we have this application of Biblical text as a mechanism for attribution. Rowlandson feels that she was meant to be given the broth just as she was meant to be given the Bible. It is her firm opinion that God's plan for her salvation transcends the Indians' agenda. Therefore, all positive occurrences are directly attributable to God, who will inevitably defeat the Indian manifestation of the devil. Rowlandson sees herself as a mechanism for this, specifically in that she identifies herself within the passages of the Bible.
I think you’re right to emphasize Rowlandson’s perception of her captors as “subhuman” and representing the depravity of human nature. Perhaps Rowlandson constructs her identity from precisely what these people are not. In this way, her captors are constantly threatening her Puritan identity, in which case Rowlandson turns to her God, as you suggest she rationalizes the kindness as an act of God. The Amerindians cannot act in the manner of benevolence that she herself identifies with, because she refuses to identify with those she views as immoral and corrupt by nature. Her belief in predestination furthers this train of thought, convincing Rowlandson that a higher power has dictated all of these notions, and they are not her own. She acts but faithfully in accordance with the plan she believes God has constructed for her.
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