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Bible - OT - Esther: Notes on Esther

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A couple of notes on Esther, following up on suggestions made by student papers.

First, one student pointed to the chronology of Esther, which I’d never paid much attention to. The story takes place over a number of years, from the third-year feast (1:3) to the seventh-year exaltation of Esther (2:16) to the twelfth-year attack on the Jews (3:7) and victory at Purim, in the twelfth month (9:1). The fall in the third year is overcome in the Sabbatical enthronement of Esther, which leads to the victory of the Twelve Tribes in the twelfth month of the twelfth year.

Second, another student pointed to the rather jarring sequence from 2:21-23 to 3:1: Mordecai saves the king’s life and . . . Haman gets exalted! Mordecai deserves that honor, and so from the first Haman is an interloper, popping in between Mordecai and his reward. When the king tells Haman to exalt Mordecai, he’s turning things right side up again. Psychologically, the fact that Haman is exalted when Mordecai should have been is one of the reasons for Mordecai’s resentment and refusal to bow.

posted by Peter J. Leithart on Friday, November 12, 2010 at 2:49 pm

Bible - OT - Esther: Hidden Providence

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Luther was famously hostile to the book of Esther. Luther was also famously enamoured of the idea of the Deus absconditus, the hidden God. These positions are inconsistent: No book of the Bible better narrates the power and providence of the hidden God than Esther, which refrains even from naming Him.

posted by Peter J. Leithart on Tuesday, December 13, 2005 at 9:19 am

Bible - OT - Esther: The Book of Mordecai

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Grading several papers on Esther, it occurs to me that the book is more about Mordecai’s exalation than about Esther. Esther’s exalation to queen is part of the means by which Mordecai and the Jews are ultimately saved, and the story climaxes with Mordecai at the right hand of the king (like Joseph and Daniel – Esther 10:2). Further, the key moral transition in the book comes when Mordecai stops urging Esther to hide her identity. A disappointment for feminist interpreters perhaps, but the book is more the book of Mordecai than the book of Esther.

posted by Peter J. Leithart on Monday, December 5, 2005 at 11:25 am

Bible - OT - Esther: Esther and Jerusalem

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Gary Demar suggests in a study of Zechariah 12 that the prophecy describes the events that are recorded in the book of Esther. This is an interesting and plausiable thesis, but one particular point is especially stimulating: He suggests that the references to “Judah and Jerusalem” in Zechariah 12 are literal references to Haman’s attacks on the capital city of the Jews. Thus, though Jerusalem is never mentioned in Esther, the fact that Haman seeks to attack Jews “scattered and dispersed among the peoples in all the provinces of your kingdom” (Esth 3:8) suggests that he would be attacking Jerusalem as well.

This seems obvious once it is pointed out. By the time Esther takes place, after all, Jews have already been released to return to the land, and have been rebuilding the temple. This restoration inspires confidence among Jews, which takes a distorted form in Mordecai’s arrogant nationalistic Judaism. Haman would undoubtedly have seen that Jerusalem was the source of the problem, and would have wanted to strike at the head and not merely at the tail. This also strengthens Jim Jordan’s interpretation of Ezekiel 38-39, which he understands as a prophecy of the events of the book of Esther as well.

posted by Peter J. Leithart on Monday, March 22, 2004 at 7:54 am

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