My Particular Friend footnotes: The Affair of the Reluctant Bachelor 5
Beginning with Stirring the Pot:
I stood and asked him, ‘Did Daniel lose his courage in the lion’s den? Did Shadrach, Meshach or even Abednego quail in the fiery furnace? No they did not, for they had their faith to support them, as you have the image of Miss Stilton to support you.’
Daniel: Daniel, an Old Testament figure, was a Jew captured by the Babylonians. Refusing to refrain from praying to God, he is thrown into a den full of lions, who miraculously do not harm him.Shadrach, Meshach or even Abednego: fellow captives of Daniel, who refuse to bow to an idol. They insist their God will prove their refusal is just and ask to be thrown into a fiery furnace.
Daniel 3-16: Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, answered and said to the king, O Nebuchadnezzar, we [are] not careful to answer thee in this matter.
If it be [so], our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver [us] out of thine hand, O king.