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Summary

Story

• Esther was an orphaned Jewess brought up by her cousin Mordecai in ancient Persia. 

• The king of Persia, Ahasuerus, divorced his queen Vashti, and after a nation-wide beauty contest Esther was selected to be his new queen. She kept her Jewish identity secret. 

• Haman, the king's chief minister, planned a pogrom against all the Jewish people because he hated Mordecai. 

• Esther uncovered the plot and turned the tables on Mordecai. He was hanged on the very gibbet he had built for Mordecai, and the Jewish people in Persia were saved.

Themes 

• The Book of  Esther was written for Diaspora Jews, (Jews who lived outside Israel), to show them how to live in exile. If they encountered bigotry and prejudice, they must act with courage, wisdom and integrity. 

• The story was also a political satire, showing the danger of giving absolute power to a monarch who turned out to be a fool. Ahasuerus governed by whim rather than by wisdom, becoming the tool of anyone shrewd enough to exploit him. The lesson is clear: do not give too much power to any one person; in the long run God alone should rule us.  

• The story explained the origin of the feast of Purim, a major Jewish feast day.

• Christianity is sometimes accused of causing the terrible anti-Semitism that has shamed the modern world. This story shows it existed long before the birth of Jesus. 

Clever  queen,  foolish  king   

Names in the Bible  
Hadassah, Esther's Jewish name, comes from the word for 'myrtle', a tree whose leaves only release their fragrance when crushed.  Esther's heroism only appeared when she and her people were in danger.  'Esther' means 'hidden': Esther's real identity as a Jewess was hidden for many years.
Ahasuerus means 'ruler of heroes'; he is commonly thought to be based on the Persian emperor Xerxes, whom Leonidas fought with his famous '300'. 
Vashti means 'sweetheart' or 'beloved'  
The names Esther and Mordecai may be based on stories about the Persian deities Ishtar and Marduk.  Ishtar (stareh, a star) was the Babylonian goddess of love and war, daughter of the moon god Sin. She was called Astarte in Canaan. Marduk was the principal male god of Babylon. Haman and Vashti may correspond to the Elamite gods Humman and Mashti.  
These similarities suggest that the Book of Esther was based on an older Babylonian story that the Jewish people heard during the Babylonian exile.

The story of Esther contains three different episodes:

1  Vashti was banished, and Esther became Queen        Esther 1 & 2  
Queen Vashti refused to obey the orders of her husband King Ahasuerus, so he divorced her and sought a new queen. This new queen was to be the most beautiful woman in the land. A young Jewish girl, Esther, was chosen. Her uncle, Mordecai, overheard a plot against the king, and warned him through Esther.  

2  Esther saved Mordecai from Haman       Esther 3-8:14  
Mordecai offended a high court official, who decided to kill not only Mordecai but all the Jews in the Persian empire. Esther pleaded with the king at two banquets she gave. Mordecai was saved from death, and Haman was punished.

3  Esther saved the Jewish people        Esther 8:15-10  
Letters were sent throughout the kingdom repealing the decree of death for all Jews. There was great rejoicing, and an annual festival was celebrated to commemorate the courage of Esther and the deliverance of the Jews. This festival was called Purim.

For a short version of the story of Esther, see Bible People: Esther 

See Maps of Bible Lands  for the location of this story

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Vashti banished, Esther became Queen       Esther 1 & 2

The story of Esther began at a magnificent banquet at the court of the Persian king, Ahasuerus, usually thought to be the emperor Xerxes (486-465BC).   Susa, the ancient city where the story took place, contained the winter palace of the king.  

There were two separate banquets being held: one for the king, his councilors and all the men of Susa; the other given by Queen Vashti, for the women of the court and nobility. You read Herodotus' description of the great banquets of Xerxes in Herodotus Book 7, section 116-123 or Book 9, section 82-83.

Having drunk too much wine, King Ahasuerus sent for the Queen to appear before the men at his banquet. She was noted for her beauty, and he wished to show her off to the men of the city. 

But the Queen of the Persian Empire was chosen from among the seven most ancient and noble families of the empire, and Vashti was therefore of ancient and noble lineage.

She would not have enjoyed the prospect of being paraded in front of a room full of drunken men - it was not a suitable thing for a queen to do. Men and women often dined together in ancient Persia, but as the dinner progressed and more wine was drunk, the wives left the dining area, and were replaced by concubines.  

She refused to come.

On the seventh day, when the King was merry with wine, he commanded the seven eunuchs who attended him to bring Queen Vashti before the King, wearing the royal crown, in order to show the peoples and the officials her beauty; for she was fair to behold. But Queen Vashti refused to come. At this the King was enraged, and his anger burned within him.   Read Esther 1:1-22.  

Vashti may have thought she was being treated as a concubine, rather than as a wife and queen. She behaved with haughty dignity when she refused the king's command, but unfortunately her answer was given in front of the officers of the empire, and she paid the price for humiliating the king.

Ahasuerus, still half-drunk, acted hastily. On the advice of cowed and inept councilors, he made the situation worse by issuing a public decree that Vashti was to be banished. This drew even more attention to the fact that Vashti had flouted his command, and made him look a fool to all his subjects. 

At this stage in the story, it becomes obvious that this is not a traditional story about a good king. Ahasuerus was a despot who was also a fool. So a theme begins to emerge: unlimited power, exercised without wisdom, is a dangerous thing.  

After a while Ahasuerus found that without Vashti, 'the beloved one', he was lonely. He could not call her back because his word, once spoken, was law. So his courtiers suggested a solution: to find another queen, a young and beautiful woman who would take Vashti's place.

Then the King’s servants who attended him said 'Let beautiful young virgins be sought out for the King. Let the King appoint commissioners in all the province of his kingdom to gather all the beautiful young virgins to the harem in the citadel of Susa under custody of Hegai, the King’s eunuch, who is in charge of the women. Let their cosmetic treatments be given them. Let the girl who pleases the King be Queen instead of Vashti.' This pleased the King, and he did so.   Read Esther 2:1-23.

A nation-wide search for a new queen began – the first recorded beauty contest in the world. 

A young Jewess was among the candidates. Her beauty was so extraordinary that she 'pleased' even the chief eunuch Hegai, who had been castrated while still a young boy – there is a note of irony here. 

One wonders too at the background story to all this, whether Hegai played some part in deposing Vashti.

Esther with all the other young virgins was taken into the harem, and twelve months of careful preparation began. She was shrewd enough to seek the advice of Hegai, who knew the king's tastes. Eventually she went to the king, and pleased him so much that he set the royal crown on her head. She became queen in Vashti's place - with all the wealth and power of an Eastern queen now suddenly at her disposal.  

To get an idea of the magnificent surroundings in which she lived, see the ruins of ancient Persepolis at Bible Archaeology: Palaces

Esther was a symbol of Jews who lived successfully in an alien culture. As a woman, she was not in a position of power, just as Diaspora Jews were not members of the power elite. As an orphan, she was separated from her parents, as Diaspora Jews are separated from their mother-country. With both these handicaps, she had to use every skill and advantage she had, as Diaspora Jews did. They, like Esther, had to adapt themselves to the situation.

From the start, Esther had been helped by her uncle Mordecai, but nobody knew that they were related, or that Esther was a Jewess. Esther did not keep the dietary laws of Judaism, or retain the practices of an orthodox Jewess. God is never mentioned directly in the story. So the story is  not a 'religious' story as such, but a secular one, about pragmatism in the face of adversity.  

Not long after her installation as queen, Esther's uncle Mordecai found out about a plot to assassinate the king. He told Esther, who in turn warned the king. The plotters were hanged, and Mordecai's warning was recorded in the court annals. 

Esther Saves Mordecai     Esther 3-8:14

The story that follows in chapters 3-8 gives details of a personal conflict that escalates into a nation-wide pogrom against the Jewish people.

Mordecai refused to bow to the highest court official, Haman the Agagite. In a court with strict protocol, Mordecai's refusal to bow was a grave insult that naturally infuriated Haman, and a feud started between the two men.

When Haman saw that Mordecai did not bow down or do obeisance to him, Haman was infuriated. But he thought it beneath him to lay hands on Mordecai alone. So, having been told who Mordecai's people were, Haman plotted to destroy all the Jews.   Read Esther 3:1-15.

There is no reason given for Mordecai's refusal to bow. It was not against normal Jewish practice to bow to a ruler or his representative (see Joseph and his brothers in Egypt, Genesis 43:26). But Mordecai's ancestor Saul had been an enemy of Haman's ancestor Agag, king of the Amalekites (see 1 Samuel 15), and this may have been Mordecai's reason. In any case, he did not follow the accepted practice, and thereby placed himself and others in danger.

Haman's anger shifted. It had been focused on Mordecai, but finding that Mordecai was a Jew, his fury expanded to include the whole Jewish people. In a scene that formed a blueprint for anti-Semitic propaganda, Haman fed the mind of the king with ideas about a people who were different, who obeyed different laws, and who were a danger to the kingdom. 

As soon as the King saw Queen Esther standing in the court, she won his favor  and he held out to her the golden scepter that was in his hand.  

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