In which another interpretation of the story of Esther is offered.
Esther
Review of the previous post
The previous post, post number 3 of 6, presented a summary of the story.
Preview of this post
This post, post number 4 of 6, identifies several oddities in the story which do not seem to make sense if the story is read as a story of deliverance of the Jews from annihilation through Esther’s bravery.
A Story of Intrigue
- Oddities in the story
There are too many oddities in this story that must be ignored if one is to simply view it as a farce or as a justification for the holiday of Purim: the odd way the King removes Queen Vashti; once she is removed, we never hear any more of Vashti or her fate, the odd way Esther gets elevated to queen even though she is a Jew; the odd placement of Mordecai to see and hear what is going on in the palace; the regicide plot that pops up in the middle of the story and is attributed only to two eunuchs (Esther 2:21); the coincidence that Mordecai happened to overhear the eunuchs discussing their plot; the oddity of Mordecai refusing to bow down to Haman; the oddity of Haman trying to “buy” the Jews; the oddity of the king being willing to turn over so many of his subjects to Haman; the oddity of how one person could amass such a fortune large enough to purchase a large part of a kingdom (three hundred tons of silver!);the oddity of the King’s sleeplessness on the very eve of Esther’s dinner party to which only the king and Haman are invited (odd) (Esther 5:12-6:11); Haman’s actions in trying to obtain the trappings of the king; the odd way Ahasuerus thwarts those particular actions; the odd way Esther tells the king of the plot to kill the Jews – made odder because the king had to know he “sold” the Jews to Haman; the odd fact that Mordecai got his messages (both of the original plot of the two eunuchs and his instructions to her to contact the king about Haman’s order to kill the Jews) to Esther so easily and so directly; the odd concept of a private party attended only by Ahasuerus; Esther and Haman; the odd actions of Ahasuerus leaving the room and then suddenly barging back in to discover Haman on Esther’s couch; the odd edict that allowed the Jews to defend themselves; the odd manner of communicating this edict of using the kings horses, and the oddest of all – that seventy-five thousand people were killed by the Jews; the quick disappearance of Esther after she issued a letter of Purim in Esther 9:29 with Mordecai seemingly displacing her. It does not seem probable in the Bible that Jews would kill that many people without a direct order from God, and no such order is reported in the book of Esther. The Jews killing some 75,000 people is a very difficult act for most Jews to accept. Jews simply do not kill that many of their fellow countrymen. Some (see, “Mordecai’s challenge: An Essay on War, Leadership, and Purim” by Yoram Hazony, in Commentary Magazine March 2016, Vol. 141: No. 3 pages 28-38) have tried to rationalize this characterizing Mordecai’s action as a wartime decision of political leadership. However, this is not a comfortable view. Another reason must be found for this act.
Preview of the next post
The next post, post number 5 of 6, presents a discussion which attempts to make sense of the oddities by viewing the story as a story of an attempted coup d’tét and how Esther figured into the foiling of that attempted coup.