Using the noble obligations to give, receive, and repay, the Gawain poet makes Pharisaism real. In the gift, prestige is at stake; likewise, those who would submit themselves to the Law would glory before God. The poet links two exchanges to end reciprocity itself. The one in the middle of the poem, where Gawain plays courtesy matches with Bertilak's wife and where hunters make return gifts to the forest, involves Bertilak's and Gawain's presenting each other with whatever wealth each acquires during the day. In this exchange, Gawain finally declines to repay—to trump the fox skin. The other exchange, at the ends of the poem, is the submission to blows. Gawain's failure and his beheading of the Green Knight, each exchanged for the “tappe,” are exchanged for each other. Thus, Gawain owes the Green Knight a death, which the Green Knight pays. Forgiveness absorbs the subtle self-assertion of the gift.