THE BOOK OF ESTHER
Lesson 1
Introduction, the Preliminaries, and Chapter 1
Almighty Lord,
The young and beautiful Jewish girl named Hadassah who
received the Persian name Esther and the Virgin Mary are symbols for us of the
triumph of the meek and humble having the courage to move forward Your divine
plan. Mary was a young woman without power or influence, and Hadassah/Esther
was a prisoner in a golden cage. Despite their fears, they submitted
themselves to Your divine will and changed the course of salvation history.
Send Your Holy Spirit to guide us, Lord, in our study of this account of an
amazing woman who risked her life to save her people. We pray in the name of
God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, Amen.
+ + +
Through the
prophets, God forms his people in the hope of salvation, in the expectation of
a new and everlasting Covenant intended for all, to be written on their
hearts. The prophets proclaim a radical redemption of the People of God,
purification from all their infidelities, a salvation which will include all
the nations. Above all, the poor and humble of the Lord will bear this hope.
Such holy women as Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel, Miriam, Deborah, Hannah, Judith, and
Esther kept alive the hope of Israel's salvation. The purest figure among them
is Mary.
Catechism of the Catholic Church 64
The Book of Esther is a vivid tale of political intrigue and racial prejudice that illustrates the theme of God's protection of His people and the punishment of their opponents. It reveals both Jewish nationalism and the unpopularity of the Jews as an alien people living among Gentile nations. The only character known to history is Persian King Ahasuerus, more familiarly known to history by his Greek name, Xerxes. Traditionally, Mordecai, Esther's cousin and a central character in the story is believed to be the inspired writer of the Book of Esther.
Catholic canon places the Book of Esther among the Historical Books of the Old Testament between Judith and 1 Maccabees. Most of the codices of the Greek Septuagint placed Esther at the end of the Historical Books before Tobit and Judith. In the Jewish Tanakh, it is in the section of the "Writings" and is one of the five scrolls read during certain Jewish feast days with Esther read in Synagogues on the Feast of Purim.
There are two versions of the book: the version in Hebrew and the version in the Greek Septuagint. According to an appendix to the Septuagint text at the very end of the Book of Esther (LXX 10:3 "l"), a Jewish priest named Dositheus received the Book of Esther from a Jewish community in Persia and delivered it to Egypt for translation into Greek by a man named Lysimachus, a resident of Jerusalem versed in the Greek language. He testifies that he did this during the reign of King Ptolemy and his wife Cleopatra. Since five Ptolemies had wives named Cleopatra, it is difficult to identify which Ptolemy, but the most likely candidates are Ptolemy VII (ruled 146-116 BC), Ptolemy VIII (ruled 116-107 BC), or Ptolemy XII (ruled 80-58 BC).
The Greek Septuagint Old Testament version of Esther (abbreviated as LXX) has six passages (107 verses) not included in the Jewish or Protestant Bibles which refer to them as "the Additions." These verses are believed by Catholic scholars to be the survivals or witnesses to a longer extant original Semitic text. The Jewish Masoretic texts, the Jewish Talmud (composed in the 3rd century AD), the Jewish Targums, nor the Syriac translations have these passages, and the Book of Esther is the only Bible book missing from the collection of documents known as the Dead Sea Scrolls. However, Hebrew fragments of Mordecai's dream and the prayers of Mordecai and Esther appear in the Sefer Yosippon. It is a tenth-century copy of a chronicle of Jewish history from Adam to the fall of the first Temple in 587/6 BC and the Babylonian captivity to the destruction of the Second Temple in AD 70 carried out by Roman General Titus. Some scholars believe it was written by Jewish priest/historian Flavius Josephus (AD 37-100).1
Christian scholar, Origen (185-254), head of the Christian School of Scripture and Theology in Alexandria, Egypt, noted that the prayers of Mordecai and Esther and the royal letters dictated by Haman and Mordecai did not appear in the Hebrew texts in his day (Epistle of Africanus, ii.1), but he did not write that the other parts were missing. St. Jerome (340-420), in his Latin translation of Esther, placed those passages only found in the Greek Septuagint at the end of his Latin Vulgate version. First century AD Hellenistic Jewish scholars Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion who translated the Hebrew Bible into a new Greek translation not only left out the additional passages from Esther in the Greek Septuagint but also other passages that were canonically accepted portions. Most of the text of Esther only found in the Greek Septuagint, however, give internal evidence of having an original Semitic/Jewish source while two parts appear to have been composed in Greek (Anchor Bible Commentary, page 155).
Disagreement concerning the canonical status of the additional Greek passages has existed among Christians in the West only since the days of the Protestant Reformation following Martin Luther's rejection of those passages and other Bible books not included in the Jewish Old Testament. He termed those verses "apocryphal," and other Protestants followed his lead. Some Protestants, however, placed the disputed parts of books like Esther, Jeremiah, and Daniel between the two Testaments. Roman Catholics adhere to the decree of the Council of Trent (AD 1546) affirming the canonicity of the Book of Esther and print all the disputed passages either within the text or at the end of the book.
Scholars of the Catholic Church support the disputed passages of Esther as canonical and make these arguments for including them:
The Greek text of Esther corrects several of the weaknesses in the Hebrew text, significantly changing the emphasis of the story. For example, God, or the word Lord (referring to the God of Israel) occurs over 50 times in the Greek version of the Book of Esther and includes these elements missing in the Hebrew text:
The Hebrew text is primarily interested in providing the historical background for establishing the Feast of Purim, but the Greek version concentrates on the religious themes of God's concern for His people and their deliverance by Him even while living in pagan lands. Esther and Mordecai are the heroes in the Hebrew version, but in the Greek, God is the hero.
The study identifies all the passages from the Septuagint translation by numbered Chapters but with lettered verses and designated as LXX followed by the Chapter and verses found in translations that place the Greek text at the end of Esther instead of inserting those passages within the narrative; for example LXX:1:a-l (11:1-12).
| BIBLICAL PERIOD | # 9 THE RETURN FROM EXILE | ||||
| FOCUS | Jewish Community in Jeopardy | The salvation of the Jewish Community | |||
| COVENANT | THE SINAI COVENANT | ||||
| SCRIPTURE | LXX 1:a-----------2:21---------------------5:1--------------------8:4-----------------10:3-LXX 3-l | ||||
| DIVISION | Introduction: Mordecai's dream, the disgrace of Vashti, Esther becomes queen of Persia | Haman plots to kill the Jews and the decree of the King | Vindication and salvation of Mordecai and Haman's death | Esther warns the Jews and the victory of the Jewish community | |
| TOPIC | Feasts of the King | Feasts of Esther | |||
| Danger from enemies | Deliverance by God | ||||
| LOCATION | Susa, the Persian royal capital | ||||
| TIME | About 11 years [484-473 BC] | ||||
| 538 | 516 | 479 | 458 | 445 | 332 | 323 | 250 | 166 |
| 1st return of exiles to Judah |
Temple in Jerusalem rebuilt |
Esther Queen of Persia |
#2 Return lead by Ezra |
#3 Return lead by Nehemiah |
Conquest of Alexander The Great |
Death of Alexander |
Greek Translation of Old Testament Septuagint |
Revolt of the Maccabees against Greek Seleucids |
Historical Background
Persian Kings of the Achaemenid Dynasty (dates may vary according to the source)
Most rulers in the ancient world (and often today) assume a "throne name" soon after becoming king. It is believed that Bardiva and Sogdianus did not live long enough to take a throne name.
Other significant dates:
(all dates are approximate and may vary according to source)
Persian King Cyrus the Great conquered the nation of Babylon in 539 BC. He immediately issued an Edict of Return allowing all peoples sent into exile by the Babylonians to return to their national homelands, including the citizen of the Southern Kingdom of Judah that became a Persian province after Cyrus's victory over the Babylonian Empire. In about 538 BC, Davidic princes Sheshbazzar and his nephew Zerubbabel led the first group of returning exiles to Judah and serving as royal governors. Cyrus generously provided the necessary resources for their journey, returned the Temple treasures confiscated by the Babylonians, and gave them the funds to rebuild the Temple in Jerusalem (Ezra Chapters 1-2).
Cyrus's kinsman and successor, Darius I, supported the rebuilding of the Jerusalem Temple (Ezra Chapter 6), and his grandson, King Artaxerxes I, sponsored the second return of exiles led by a Jewish governor, the priest-scribe Ezra in 458 BC. After Ezra's death, Artaxerxes also funded a third return led by his former cupbearer and newly appointed Jewish governor, Nehemiah, in 445 BC to rebuild the ruined walls of Jerusalem and to stabilize the population of Judah. To their sorrow, the Jews did not return to the Promised Land as a free and independent people but as a vassal people ruled by the Persian Empire. The events in the story of Esther took place between Chapters 6 and 7 in the Book of Ezra.
After the completion of the Jerusalem Temple in 517/16 BC, the Biblical record is silent until 484 BC. The setting of the Book of Esther is the Persian homeland were the ruler is the son of Darius I and Queen Atossa (a daughter of Cyrus the Great). His name in Persian annals is Khshayarsha ("ruler over heroes"), Ahasuerus in the Bible, and known to Greek historians as Xerxes I. It is the Greek form for his name by which he is commonly identified in history.
The Book of Esther begins with a dream experienced by a Jew of the tribe of Benjamin named Mordechai (Chapter LXX 1:a-r) followed by the description of a lavish banquet (Esth 1:3-9). King Ahasuerus' (Xerxes) reason for the banquet may have been to celebrate the beginning of a campaign against Greece by bringing together his ministers, provincial governors, and the commanders of the Persian army. He spent his first years as king by regaining Egypt (which revolted after his father's (Darius I, ruled 522-486 BC) defeat by the Athenians on the plains of Marathon in 490 BC) and also by punishing the Babylonian provinces for an uprising. After successfully put down those rebellions, he turned his attention to seeking to avenge the Battle of Marathon and Persia's defeat in the First Greco-Persian War.
In revenge for the rebellion of the Greek cities on the Aegean coast and Cyprus, Ahasuerus/Xerxes' father decided to invade mainland Greece but was defeated at the Battle of Marathon. Avenging his father's defeat became a primary goal of Ahasuerus. There is about a three-year interval between Esther Chapter 1 and Chapter 2 (four years between LXX Chapter 1 and Chapter 2 of the Hebrew text), during which Ahasuerus was absent, carrying out his campaign to conquer Greece (see Esth 1:3 and 2:16). It was probably at about the time he was planning his invasion of Greece that the Samaritan and Ammonite governors who were the enemies of the exiles who had returned to Judah wrote a letter to the king accusing the citizens of Judah of treason in Ezra 4:6; they did not receive a reply.
In about 480 BC, the Persian army marched across Persian occupied territory in Asia Minor (modern day Turkey) and crossed into Macedonia while a naval fleet sailed west along the coastline to meet the army in Greece. It was the beginning of the Second Greco-Persian War (480-479 BC) as Ahasuerus/Xerxes tried to conquer all of mainland Greece in retaliation for the defeat of the first Persian invasion of Greece (492-490 BC) that ended his father's attempts to subjugate the Greek city-states.
The Greeks met the Persians at Thermopylae where there was a fifty feet wide pass, bordered by the sea on one side and mountains on the other. The Greeks, with the aid of the Spartans, successfully held off the Persian army until a traitor revealed a path leading up into the mountains and then down behind the Greek defenders' positions. The result was the heroic story of the three hundred Spartans sacrificing themselves by holding off the entire Persian army at the Pass of Thermopylae to give the Athenians enough time to evacuate the city.
After massacring the Spartans, the Persians pushed past Thermopylae and marched on Athens, capturing the city, but the Greeks had regrouped and were waiting to launch a counter-attack. The Persian navy sailed into a trap where the ships were forced into shallow waters where they could not maneuver. As King Xerxes/Ahasuerus watched, sitting on his gold throne on top of a hill, his fleet was decimated. He was defeated disastrously by Themistocles at Salamis in 480 BC, forcing the Persians to retreat from Greece with most of the army to winter at Sardis in Asia Minor. While in Sardis, ruled by Xerxes/Ahasuerus' brother, he suffered another defeat when his attempts to seduce his sister-in-law failed. The Persian general left in Greece with the rest of the army died in battle the next year, and the Greek campaign completely collapsed. Xerxes/Ahasuerus is said to have invaded Greece with an army of more than two million soldiers, but only five thousand returned with him to Persia. One can only imagine King Ahasuerus' mood when he returned to his royal capital at Susa for the beauty contest that would end in the selection of a beautiful Jewish girl named Hadassah as Queen Esther of Persia.
The setting for Esther's story is the Persian capital of Susa, a city about 200 miles east of Babylon where Nehemiah later served as cupbearer to Ahasuerus' son and successor, Artaxerxes I (Neh 1:1) and the city in Daniel's vision of the ram and the he-goat (Dan 8:2).2 The Persians had four main capitals: Ecbatana (where Cyrus wrote his decree of return in 539 BC), Persepolis (the treasure city), Babylon (capital of the conquered Babylonian Empire), and Susa (former capital of the Elamites), the winter capital rebuilt by Darius I. Xerxes spent the remaining years of his reign moving from one capital to another, amusing himself with building projects and adding women to his harem.
In St. Jerome's fifth century Latin Vulgate translation, he placed what he called the "Greek Additions" at the end of the Book of Esther; it is a pattern some other Catholic Bibles followed. The New Jerusalem Bible and New American Bible wisely place the Greek passages where they move forward the story and fill in the narrative within the Book of Esther. In our lessons, the chapters and verses in parentheses are where those passages appear in other versions of Catholic Bibles. For our study, we will use the New Jerusalem Bible translation, the most widely read Catholic version of the Bible in the world outside the United States. The letter designations for verses from the LXX follows the NJB.
The main characters in the Book of Esther:
The summary of the story of Esther in the LXX is in the account of Mordecai's symbolic dream in Catholic versions of Esther and finds its fulfillment at the end of the story. The divisions of the Book of Esther in our study:
The themes of the Book of Esther: God listens to the prayers of His people and intervenes in human history by coming to their aid. However, He also expects, when possible, for His people to take the initiative in cooperating with Him to work to resolve their problems. The book is also a summary of the virtues necessary for gaining God's favor that includes humility and fidelity to God's commandments epitomized by Esther. The liturgy of the Church views Esther as a figure of the Virgin Mary because of her royal dignity, the sweetness of her soul, and the courage of her intercession with the king. The liturgical memorial of Our Lady of Lourdes applies to the Virgin Mary words taken from the Book of Esther.
Prologue: Chapter LXX-1 (Greek Septuagint)
Dates in LXX Chapter 1 and Chapter 1 in the Hebrew version:
484 BC = the second year of King Ahasuerus/Xerxes' reign (LXX 1:a)
483 BC = the third year of King Ahasuerus/Xerxes' reign (1:3)
The ancients did not count days, weeks, months, or years with the concept of a zero place-value. It is the reason Scripture records that Jesus was in the tomb for a period of three days from Friday to Sunday instead of two days as we would count the time. As for the ruling years of kings, the Egyptians and the Northern Kingdom of Israel began counting the years of a king's reign from when he succeeded to the throne. However, the Assyrians, Babylonians, Southern Kingdom of Judah, and the Persians designated the year a king began ruling as his accession year. When the year changed to the new year (for the Persians at the spring equinox) that new year became his first ruling year. As the Persians counted the reigns of their kings, the year Ahasuerus/Xerxes succeeded his father as king in 485 BC was designated his Accession Year. The change of the Persian year on the spring equinox began the count of the first year of his reign in 485 BC.
Esther LXX 1:a-l (11:1-12) ~ Mordecai's Dream
a In
the second year of the reign of the Great King, Ahasuerus, on the first day of
Nisan, a dream came to Mordecai son of Jair, son of Shimei, son of Kish, of the
tribe of Benjamin, b a Jew
living at Susa and holding high office at the royal court. c He was one of the captives whom Nebuchadnezzar
king of Babylon had deported from Jerusalem with Jeconiah king of Judah. d This was his dream. There were cries
and noise, thunder and earthquakes, and disorder over the whole earth. e Then
two great dragons came forward, each ready for the fray, and set up a great
roar. f At the sound of them every nation made
ready to wage war against the nation of the just. g> A
day of darkness and gloom, of affliction and distress, oppression and great
disturbance on earth! h The entire upright nation was thrown
into consternation at the fear of the evils awaiting it and prepared for death,
crying out to God. i Then from
its cry, as from a little spring, there grew a great river, a flood of water
[many waters]. k Light came as the sun rose, and the
humble were raised up and devoured the mighty.
l On awakening from this dream and vision of God's designs,
Mordecai thought deeply about the matter, trying his best all day to discover
what its meaning might be.
"Many waters" in verse "i" is the literal Greek and a symbolically significant phrase in Scripture (see commentary on verse "i" below). The NJB inadvertently does not designate a verse "j"; however, no words are missing from the text. The second year of the reign of King Ahasuerus was 484 BC.
Question: Verse "a" tells the reader that Mordecai
was from the tribe of Benjamin. Can you name two other influential men from
the tribe of Benjamin, one from the Old Testament and the other from the New? One
was a king, and the other shared the Gospel of Jesus Christ with kings. See 1
Sam 9:1-2; 10:1; Acts 13:21 and Rom 11:1; Phil 3:5.
Answer: Israel's first king, Saul, was from the tribe
of Benjamin and so was St. Paul whose Hebrew name was Saul.
Question: What was the name of King Saul's father
in 1 Samuel 9:1? What does this name have to do with Mordecai's Benjaminite
clan affiliation?
Answer: King Saul's father was a Benjaminite named
Kish, and Mordecai was a descendant of Kish.
c He was
one of the captives whom Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon had deported from
Jerusalem with Jeconiah king of Judah.
The Babylonians took some of the population of Judah and their young king away into exile in 598 BC (2 Kng 24:4-17).
It is unlikely Mordecai was even a baby at the time of the exile because that would make him over a hundred years old at the time of his dream.
It is more likely that his parents or grandparents were among the deported exiles,
and he was born in Babylon since his name is not Hebrew but is a theophoric name containing the name of the pagan god Marduk.
Just as Joseph son of Jacob-Israel had dreams that provided him with hints about his future success (Gen 37:7, 9), Mordecai's dream foretells events in advance. Mordecai's dream takes place on the first of Nisan in the second year of the reign of King Ahasuerus/Xerxes.3 Nisan is the post-exilic equivalent of the pre-exilic Hebrew month of Abib and the first month in the Israelite Liturgical calendar and (see Ex 13:4; 23:15; 34:18; Dt 16:1; Neh 2:1; Esth 3:7). See a chart on Israel's Liturgical and Civil calendars.
As the Persians counted the reigns of their kings, Ahasuerus' the second year was 484 BC, 102 years after the Babylonian exile in 586 BC. The dream in LXX Chapter 1 takes place one year earlier than the first scene in Chapter 1 (to follow) and seven years before Esther became queen as the ancients counted (c.f., 1:3; 2:16-17).
The Greek version of the Book of Esther begins with Mordecai's dream foretelling future events that come to pass in the unfolding of the narrative. Verses d, e, and g in the Greek text are each introduced by the words kai idou ("and behold!"). The elements in the dream include:
The elements of the dream symbolize:
The symbolic meaning of the dream becomes clear at the end of the narrative.
g A day of
darkness and gloom, of affliction and distress, oppression and great
disturbance on earth!
In contrast to the imagery in verse d, this description
recalls the eschatological imagery of the prophets Joel 2:2, 10-11; Zephaniah 1:15; and Jesus the Supreme Prophet in Matthew 24:29.
h The entire
upright nation was thrown into consternation at the fear of the evils awaiting
it and prepared for death, crying out to God.
"The entire upright nation" refers to the Jews who are Yahweh's
nation in exile. The explicit mention of the God of Israel here in verse h, in
verse l, and other times in the LXX version constitutes the most conspicuous theological
difference between the Greek and Hebrew Esther.
i Then from its cry, as from a little
spring, there grew a great river, a flood of water [many waters]. k Light
came as the sun rose, and the humble were raised up and devoured the mighty.
The little spring represents Esther's humble role, and the
"many waters" symbolize the irresistible power and grace of God as He exerts
His will on salvation history. "Many waters" (or "abundant waters") is a key
Biblical phrase found in the Old and New Testaments (e.g., Num 24:6/7;
2 Sam 22:17;
Ps 18:16; 29:3; 93:4;
Son 8:7;
Is 17:13; Jer 51:13;
Ez 19:10; 43:2;
Rev 1:15; 14:2; and 19:6). The light and sun are symbols of divine revelation and the happiness
of God's deliverance (see Wis 5:6;
Ps 30:5/6; 46:5/6; 112:4;
Is 33:2).
l On awakening
from this dream and vision of God's designs, Mordecai thought deeply about the
matter, trying his best all day to discover what its meaning might be.
That Mordecai "thought deeply about the matter," is
literally "held it in his heart until evening;" evening was the end of one day
and the beginning of the next for the Jews. He puzzled over what the dream
meant and what God intended to do. He was confident that God was behind the
vision, and he understood the general importance of it that the Jews would be threatened
by their enemies and God, in some mysterious way, would deliver them. Less
than 24 hours would separate his dream from a frightening discovery.
Esther LXX 1:m-r (12:1-4) ~ The Plot Against the King
m Mordecai was lodging at court with Bigthan and
Teresh, two of the king's eunuchs who guarded the palace. n Having
got wind of their plotting and gained knowledge of their designs, he discovered
that they were preparing to assassinate King Ahasuerus, and he warned the king
against them. o The king gave
orders for the two eunuchs to be tortured; they confessed and were executed. p He
then had these events entered in his Record Book, while Mordecai himself also
wrote an account of them. q The king then appointed Mordecai to an office at
court and rewarded him with presents. r But
Haman son of Hammedatha, the Agagite, who enjoyed high favor with the king, determined
to injure Mordecai in revenge for the affair of the king's two eunuchs.
Since Mordecai was a royal official, he had rooms at the court that he shared with two eunuchs who were also in royal service. He overheard an assassination plot and warned the king. Not only were the events of the plot recorded in the official annals of the Persians, but Mordechai wrote an account that probably became the full narrative of the Book of Esther.
r But Haman son
of Hammedatha, the Agagite, who enjoyed high favor with the king, determined to
injure Mordecai in revenge for the affair of the king's two eunuchs.
For reporting the plot against the king, Mordecai earned
the enmity of Haman the Agagite who was a high-ranking royal minister and
favorite of the king. It is not clear why Haman wanted to injure Mordecai. Was
he in league with the men plotting the king's death, or were those men his kinsmen,
or did the event simply bring Mordecai the Jew to Haman's attention? It is
significant that verse r identifies Haman as an Agagite and not a Persian (LXX
8:12k refers to him as a Macedonian). His hatred for Mordecai may have been
more than what concerned the plot against the king since Haman's ancestor Agag,
king of the Amalekites, had a history with Mordecai's ancestors and his hatred
extended to all Jews/Israelites (also see 3:5-6). The Amalekites were the perennial
enemies of the covenant people (i.e., Ex 17:8-13;
Num 13:29; 14:25, 43-45; 24:20;
Dt 25:17-19;
Judg 3:13; 5:14; 6:3-33; 7:12; 10:12; 12:15;
1 Sam 1:48; 15:2-32; 27:8; 30:1-18;
2 Sam 1:1; 1 Chron 4:41-43).
Question: Who was Haman's ancestor, Agag, and what
happened to him? See 1 Sam 15:4-33.
Answer: Haman was a descendant of King Agag. Saul,
a Benjaminite son of Kish and the King of Israel who was an ancestor of Mordecai
went to war against King Agag whose people Israel's God had placed under the
curse of total destruction. Saul had initially spared King Agag, but the
prophet Samuel made Saul execute King Agag.
The destruction of the Agagites by the Israelites would have caused their survivors to migrate. Haman's hatred of Mordecai and his people was probably because of a generational feud against the Israelites/Jews by the descendants of the Agagites.
Chapter 1: King Ahasuerus and Queen Vashti
Esther 1:1-8 ~ The King's Banquet
1 It was in the days
of Ahasuerus, the Ahasuerus whose empire stretched from India to Ethiopia and
comprised one hundred and twenty-seven provinces. 2 In those days, when King Ahasuerus was sitting
on his royal throne in the citadel of Susa, 3 in the third year of his reign, he gave a banquet
at his court for all his officers-of-state and ministers, Persian and Median
army-commanders, nobles and provincial governors. 4 Thus, he displayed the riches and splendor of
his empire and the pomp and glory of his majesty; the festivities went on for a
long time, a hundred and eighty days. 5 When
this period was over, for seven days the king gave a banquet for all the people
living in the citadel of Susa, to high and low alike, on the esplanade in the gardens
of the royal palace. 6 There were
white and violet hangings fastened with cords of fine linen and purple thread
to silver rings on marble columns, couches of gold and silver on a pavement of porphyry,
marble, mother-of-pearl and precious stones. 7 For drinking there were golden cups of various design and plenty
of wine provided by the king with royal liberality. 8 The royal edict did not, however, make
drinking obligatory, the king having instructed the officials of his household to
treat each guest according to the guest's own wishes.
Ahasuerus, like his father Darius I, ruled at the height of the Medo-Persian Empire over provinces stretching from India to Asia Minor, the Levant, and Upper Egypt. The number of 127 may be symbolic. At its fullest extent, the Persian Empire comprised thirty-one satrapies, each composed of several provinces, and Xerxes had twenty according to the Greek historian Herodotus (History, 3.89). 127 is a combination of the numbers ten times twelve, plus seven with each number symbolizing fullness and completion in the symbolic significance of numbers in Scripture. See the document, "The Significance of Numbers in Scripture."
2 In those days,
when King Ahasuerus was sitting on his royal throne in the citadel of Susa, 3 in the third year of his reign,
Susa (Shushan), located in what is today southwestern
Iran, was the Persian winter capital where Ahasuerus's father built a magnificent
palace. It was one of four Persian capitals that included Ecbatana (Ezra 6:2),
Babylon, and Persepolis. One of the visions of the prophet Daniel was set in
Susa (Dan 8:2), and Nehemiah served King Ahasuerus's son Artaxerxes there (Neh 1:1).
3 in the third
year of his reign, he gave a banquet at his court for all his officers-of-state
and ministers, Persian and Median army-commanders, nobles and provincial governors.
The third year of the king's reign was 483 BC; it was the
year he will beginning planning to make a second Persian invasion of Greece. Feasting
and drinking mark many of the critical events in the Book of Esther (Esth 2:18;
3:15; 5:5-8; 7:1-10; 9:22).
For 108 days, Ahasuerus feasted and celebrated lavishly with his royal ministers, nobles, military commanders, and provincial governors. Royal banquets like this were not uncommon (see Gen 40:20; 1 Kng 3:15; Dan 5:1; Mk 6:21). When the 108 days were over, he gave another banquet lasting seven days in luxurious surroundings in an outside area for all the people living in Susa, the high born and the low. Porphyry (verse 6) that paved the floor of the open-air space is an igneous rock composed of large crystals (the term refers to the texture and not its chemical, physical, or mineralogical composition).
8 The royal edict
did not, however, make drinking obligatory, the king having instructed the
officials of his household to treat each guest according to the guest's own wishes.
A Persian royal edict or decree could not be altered when
once issued by the king (Dan 6:16). This comment in verse 8 prepares the reader
for what will take place later in the narrative when a royal decree that was
going to bring about a disaster could not be withdrawn (also see Esth 1:19).
Esther 1:9-15 ~ Queen Vashti Defies the King
9 Queen Vashti,
for her part, gave a banquet for the women in the royal palace of King Ahasuerus.
10 On the
seventh day, when the king was merry with wine, he commanded Mehuman, Biztha,
Harbona, Bigtha, Abagatha, Zethar and Carkas, the seven eunuchs in attendance
on the person of King Ahasuerus, 11 to
bring Queen Vashti before the king, crowned with her royal diadem, in order to
display her beauty to the people and the officers-of-state, since she was very
beautiful. 12 But Queen
Vashti refused to come at the king's command delivered by the eunuchs. The
king was very angry at this and his rage grew hot. 13 Addressing himself to the wise men who were
versed in the law, it being the practice to refer matters affecting the king to
expert lawyers and jurists, 14 he
summoned Carshena, Shethar, Admatha, Tarshish, Meres, Marsena and Memucan,
seven Persian and Median officers-of-state who had privileged access to the
royal presence and occupied the leading positions in the kingdom. 15 "According to the law," he said, "what is to be
done to Queen Vashti for not obeying the command of King Ahasuerus delivered by
the eunuchs?"
While the men were banqueting, Queen Vashti entertained the women with her own royal supper with the wives of the men attending the king's banquet. Vashti, like Esther, is, thus far, unknown in the historical record. Herodotus only names Amestris, a woman from a noble Persian family, as Ahasuerus/Xerxes' queen, but that was probably because she was the mother of his heir who became Artaxerxes I. Persian kings were known to have several wives. Women could dine with men in Persia, but since the king was banqueting only with men, she held a separate banquet for the women.
10 On the seventh
day, when the king was merry with wine, he commanded Mehuman, Biztha, Harbona,
Bigtha, Abagatha, Zethar and Carkas, the seven eunuchs in attendance on the
person of King Ahasuerus, 11 to
bring Queen Vashti before the king, crowned with her royal diadem, in order to
display her beauty to the people and the officers-of-state, since she was very
beautiful.
Eunuchs, males who were castrated when they were boys,
served as functionaries in the Persian court. At the height of the feast, when
the king is "merry," meaning drunk with wine, he decides to parade his queen's beauty
in front of his drunken guests. Some ancient commentators suggest the command that
Vashti was to wear her royal diadem means she was to wear only her crown and to
appear in her naked beauty. The king is both embarrassed and outraged to have
his command denied by Vashti. This scene introduces one of the elements of
Mordecai's dream in the powerful but disordered kingdom (LXX 1:d).
Persian queens were usually chosen from influential noble families or were the daughters of vassal kings in other provinces. There is no mention of Vashti in surviving Persian annals, but the absence of evidence is not necessarily evidence of absence, and a Persian king often had several queens and many concubines.
Question: Why do you think Vashti chose to disobey
the king's command? What does her decision say about her?
Answer: Vashti couldn't have found being ogled by
a large gathering of drunken men appealing; it was an insult to her dignity. She
dared to refuse to submit to what was a demeaning command despite what her
defiance might cost her.
To soothe his wounded pride, the king sought advice on how to punish his queen by consulting seven counselors of his kingdom. The Greek historian, Herodotus, wrote that seven men functioned as advisors to the Persian kings (History, 3.31; also see Ezra 7:14).
Esther 1:16-22 ~ The King's Ministers Present a Solution
to the Problem
16 In the
presence of the king and the officers-of-state, Memucan replied "Queen Vashti
has wronged not only the king but also all the officers-of-state and all the peoples
inhabiting the provinces of King Ahasuerus. 17 The queen's conduct will soon become known to all the women, who
will adopt a contemptuous attitude towards their own husbands, They will say, King
Ahasuerus himself commanded Queen Vashti to appear before him and she did not
come' 18 Before the day is out,
the wives of the Persian and Median officers-of-state will be telling every one
of the king's officers-of-state what they have heard about the queen's
behavior, and that will mean contempt and anger all round. 19 If it is the king's pleasure, let him issue a
royal edict, to be irrevocably incorporated into the laws o the Persians and
Medes, to the effect that Vashti is never to appear again before King Ahasuerus,
and let the king confer her royal dignity on a worthier woman. 20 Let this edict issued by the king be proclaimed
throughout his empire which is great, and all the women will henceforth bow to
the authority of their husbands, both high and low alike." 21 This speech pleased the king and the
officers-of-state, and the king did as Memucan advised. 22 He sent letters
to all the provinces of the kingdom, to each province in its own script and to
each nation in its own language, ensuring that every husband should be master
in his own house.
Curiously, the king's ministers appear to be more concerned about how Queen Vashti's defiance of the king's command might influence their wives and other women of the kingdom who might be encouraged to also to defy their husbands. They do not seem to take into consideration how the king's command was an affront to the dignity of a queen.
Verse 19 touches on the Persian custom that once a Persian king issued an edict, it could not be revoked. It was a problem Daniel's Persian king faced when he issued a command that for thirty days everyone in the kingdom was to only to pray to the king or face the death penalty and therefore could not revoke it to save Daniel (Dan 6:7-9). However, God saved Daniel, and the result was the Persian king made a profession of faith in Daniel's God (Dan 6:17-29).
20 Let this edict
issued by the king be proclaimed throughout his empire which is great, and all
the women will henceforth bow to the authority of their husbands, both high and
low alike."
Queen Vashti's loss of her queenship was to be a warning
to all wives in the empire that any similar action on their part could result
in their husband's divorcing them.
In verse 20, the words Let this edict [issued by the king] be proclaimed, in the Hebrew text, appears to contain a reverse acrostic of the Tetragrammaton YHWH, the Divine Name: Hi'Wekhol-Hannashim Yitenu. It is an anomaly that appears four times in the Hebrew version of the Book of Esther including 5:4, 13 and 7:5. There is also an acrostic formed from the phrase "that there was evil determined against him" in the Hebrew text (translated in the NJB as "was determined on his ruin") in 7:7, spelling EHYHE, which is the same backward and forwards for "I AM sent" in Hebrew, which suggests the Divine Name YHWH in Exodus 3:14-15 (Paul Swan, YHWH is Missing Here, Too, Biblical Archaeology Review, Jan/Feb, 2012, page 13). Called a Notarikon, it is an acronym or acrostic taking the first or last letters of the words of a phrase and joining them to make a new word or expanding the word into a phrase, like the Hebrew word emn (amen) that is an acrostic for "God is a trustworthy king;" in Hebrew "El Melech Ne'eman."
22 He sent
letters to all the provinces of the kingdom, to each province in its own script
and to each nation in its own language, ensuring that every husband should be
master in his own house.
Letters were dispatched to all the provinces and written
in their various dialects so every husband could understand the message and
report the fate of Vashti, the disobedient spouse, to his wife as a warning, lest
she is tempted to act in the same disrespectful way to him.
Questions for discussion or
reflection:
Women, even queens, had little if any power or influence
in the ancient world unless they were rulers in their own right or mothers of
the king. The marriage of Israelites/Jews to pagans who were not converts was
strictly forbidden under the laws of the Sinai covenant (Dt 7:3-4, 6; Ezra 9:1-2). Why was it that God's divine plan called for placing a pretty Jewish maiden
in a marriage to a pagan? How many other women in the Bible can you name who accepted
a role in God's divine plan that shaped salvation history? What two things do four
of the five women named in Matthew's genealogy in 1:1-16 have in common?
Endnotes:
1. This tenth-century document is believed by some to be
a copy of a lost work by the first century AD priest-historian Flavius Josephus
who wrote four other books about the history of his people or defending the
Jewish religion.
2. Ancient Susa, also called Shushan, is modern Shush in Iran, located on the Karun River at the foot of the Zagros Mountains. It was formerly the capital of the Kingdom of Elam before the Persian conquest. Concerning Susa in the Book of Esther see Esther 1:2, 5; 2:3; 3:15. The city was identified as ancient Susa in an excavation that began in 1851 and continued into the 20th century, uncovering such treasures as the famous basalt column inscribed with the Code of Hammurabi. See Esther 1:2, 5; 2:3, 5, 8; 3:15 twice; 4:8, 16; 8:14, 15; 9:6, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15 twice, 18, and Esth LXX 1:b; 8:12r).
3. In Hebrew, the king's name is "Ashwerosh," Ahasuerus is a Latin/English transcription of the king's Persian name, Khshayarsha. However, the Greek has Artaxerxes, possible an error by a scribe who was not familiar with the name Ashwerosh. The NJB corrects the name of the king.
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