In Ben Hur, by Lew Wallace, there are many conflicts occurring throughout the story. A conflict can be a disagreement or a disharmony between several characters and ideas or even within a single character.

For example, Iras the (outwardly) attractive Egyptian had a conflict with her father Balthasar about his religion. She did not respect her father and his beliefs about the Christ even though he had been one of the three wise men to bring gifts to our Savior at his birth! The author gives us a taste of her character in book eight:

"Simonides went on: "Balthasar is a wise man who has been wonderfully favored for a Gentile, and his faith becomes him; yet she (Iras) makes a jest of it. I heard her say speaking of him yesterday, `the follies of youth are excusable; nothing is admired in age except wisdom, and when that...