The book of Esther is a short one (about 9 pages) and can easily be read in one sitting. Please do.
Videos for children:
The two videos above are aimed at young children. They are “lived-happily-ever-after” retellings of the story and gloss over parts that are brutal and violent, like many other stories in the Old Testament. They also condense the approximately 10 years over which the story happens into just a few minutes.
For parents:
The essence of the story is that God has a special plan for each of us. “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” (Jeremiah 29:11) The plan for Esther was to save the entire Jewish nation from extermination. Through seemingly unrelated co-incidences her life is prepared for this plan. The story is also the origin of a Jewish festival called Purim.
Background reading:
After reading the summarised story below, if you are interested in more background info, here are some useful links.
Summarised story:
The forced exile of the Jews to Babylon ended after about 70 years when the Babylonian Empire was conquered by the vast Persian Empire. Although the Persians allowed the Jews to return to their homeland to rebuild the Temple and their destroyed cities, a significant portion of them chose to remain where they had established their new lives. They were still exiles, but this time under the Persians, the new ruling power. The story of Esther takes place about a 100 years after the Babylonian exile. The story is set in Susa, the capital of the Persian Empire.
These are the main characters in the story.
- The king. In the book of Esther he is referred to as Ahasuerus. The name refers to several rulers of Ancient Persia. It is a Hebrew spelling of Xerxes, which is what is used in the video link.
- The kingdom. The vast empire of Persia. Its 127 provinces extended from India to Ethiopia.
- The queen. Queen Vashti. The queen at the start of the story.
- Mordecai. A Jewish man. Uncle of Esther. His lineage, and thus Esther’s too, is traced back several generations to the tribe of Benjamin. He was taken into exile from Jerusalem. He lived in the capital city, Susa. Because of animosity towards Jews, he did not disclose that he was Jewish or that he was related to Esther. He advised Esther to do the same.
- Esther. Also called Hadassah. After her parents died, her uncle Mordecai adopted her as his daughter. She was a beautiful and charming girl.
- Haman. Haman was the most senior official of the king. He is described as an Agagite. This term connects him to Agag, the king of the Amalekites, an ancient enemy of the Israelites with a deep-seated hatred for the Jewish people. Haman wants to exterminate the Jews.
I will tell the story with the timeline highlighted as this is missing from the condensed versions in the children’s videos.
3rd year of king’s reign
The king gave a banquet for all his officers, officials, nobles and provincial governors with the purpose of showing off the wealth of his kingdom. It lasted 180 days and was followed by a banquet for everyone (“both high and low”) who were present in the capital city. At the banquet, which lasted 7 days, the king’s wine flowed freely. At the same time the queen gave a separate banquet for all the women.
On the last day of the banquet the king (now “merry with wine”) publically sent for the queen to show off her beauty to the people (both high and low) and the officers (also presumably merry with wine). “For she was indeed a beautiful woman.”[Esther 1:11] She refused! This really angered the king and also presented him with a political problem. “The great ladies of Persia and Media, who have heard of the queen’s conduct, will tell all the king’s officers about this day, and there will be endless disrespect and insolence! [Esther 1:18] On the advice of attendants (his legal advisors) the king banished her. A royal decree was issued saying that Queen Vashti would never again appear before the king and that her place would be given “to another woman who is more worthy of it than she is.” Letters to this effect were sent out “to every province [all 127 of them] in its own script and to every people in their own language.”
Later when the king’s anger had died down (and he had sobered up) he again took the advice of his attendants and appointed commissioners in each province to find beautiful young women as possible replacements for the banished queen. This was not a matter of requesting applications for an advertised vacant position. All women in all the provinces who were selected by the commissioners were forcibly brought to join the kings’ harem, from where he would use them at his leisure. Esther was one of the many girls brought to the king’s palace where they went through a preparation period of 1 year. On her uncle’s instructions, Esther did not disclose her race (Jewish) or her family.
7th year of king’s reign (About 4 years after this story starts)
Esther charmed all who saw her. The king loved her more than any of his other women and treated her with greater favour and kindness. In the 10th month of that year the king crowned her as queen in place of former Queen Vashti.
Mordecai had become an attendant in the court of the king. He still had not revealed that he was a Jew, nor that he was the foster father of Esther, the queen. After Mordecai overheard a plot to kill the king, he informed Esther who then informed the king, mentioning that Mordecai had told her. The story was investigated, confirmed, and the two plotters were hanged. The matter was recorded in official records and then forgotten until later in the story.
12th year of king’s reign (About 9 years after this story starts)
12th year 1st month.
Haman had become the most senior officer above all other officers, who, as per the king’s orders, bowed to Haman whenever they met. Although also an official, Mordecai never bowed to Haman, which infuriated him. Learning that Mordecai was Jewish, Haman planned to take revenge for this perceived insult not just on Mordecai but on every Jewish person throughout all 127 provinces of the kingdom. His accomplices cast lots [using a method called Pur] to decide on a date for this extreme revenge. The casting happened in the 1st month of the year and the date decided on was on the 13th day of the 12th month.
As the king’s 2nd in command, Haman told the king, ‘There is a certain people, dispersed among the many people in all the provinces of your kingdom, who keep themselves apart. Their laws are different from every other people; they do not keep your majesty’s laws. It does not befit your majesty to tolerate them. If it please your majesty, let an order be made in writing for their destruction; and I will pay ten thousand talents of silver to your majesty’s officials, to be deposited in the royal treasury.’ So the king took the signet-ring from his hand and gave it to Haman … and said to him, ‘Deal with them as you wish.’ [Esther 3:8-11]
Letters were duly prepared in the name of the king and signed with his ring although the king had no knowledge of what was being signed in his name. These official letters were sent to “the governor of every province and the officers over each separate people: for each province in its own script and for each people in their own language.” Their orders were “to destroy, slay, and exterminate all Jews, young and old, women and children, in one day, the 13th day of the 12th month and to plunder their possessions.” It was to be published “to all the people, so that they might be ready for that day. … In every province reached by the royal command and decree there was great mourning by the Jews, with fasting and weeping and beating of the breast.” [Esther 3:12 – 4:3]
When Esther found out from Mordechai what was being planned she decided to speak to the king to get him to revoke his order, even though she could be killed for just physically approacing him uninvited. Fortunately the king allowed her to approach him and promised to give her anything she requested “up to half of his kingdom.” Strangely, instead of asking him there and then for what she wanted, all she asked was that the king attend a banquet she had prepared for him that day, and “to bring Haman along as well.” [This wording is significant.] At the banquet, after wine (again) the king repeated his offer to give Esther anything she wanted. This time she asked that “the king and Haman” [Subtley different wording this time.] come to another banquet on the following day. I had wondered why Esther needed a 2nd banquet, or any banquet at all, to do what she does next, but the links at the start of these notes give fascinating reasons for this. Please read them.
Leaving the banquet, Haman was pretty sure that his standing with the king must have risen. After all, why else would he have been personally invited to private banquets with the king and queen? However, his mood was spoiled when he passed Mordecai who as usual did not bow to him. He was so infuriated that, at the suggestion of his wife and friends, he decided to erect a gallows and to recommend to the king that Mordecai be hanged from it. He would raise the matter with the king on the next day.
The king was also affected by the banquet. He worried about why Haman had been invited. Twice! Was there something going on between his wife and Haman? This suspicion (or perhaps something else) worried him so much that he had trouble sleeping that night. To address his suspicion (or just to fall asleep) he got someone to read to him from the official record of events. [Think of it as the boring minutes of all the meetings he had attended.] The record of how Mordecai had been instrumental in saving the king’s life reminded him that he had not honoured Mordecai in any way for this. At that point (late at night) Haman was noticed waiting in an outer room, possibly to speak to the king first thing in the morning about hanging Mordecai. The king asked Haman to enter and asked him, “What should be done for the man whom the king wishes to honour?” Haman was certain the king was referring to him and so mentioned several grandiose honours including “royal robes which the king himself wears, a horse which the king rides and a royal crown on his head.” All these “royal” references must have raised suspicions in the king’s mind about Haman’s aspirations. The king then ordered Haman to provide these and all the other suggested honours (except the royal crown) to Mordechai in the morning.
At the second banquet the king again asked Esther (“over the wine” as he had done at the first one), what he could do for her and promised to do whatever she asked. She replied, “My request and petition is that my own life and the lives of my people be spared. For we have been sold, I and my people, to be destroyed, slain and exterminated.” When asked who had dared to do such a thing, Esther pointed out Haman. In a rage, the king stormed out into the garden. When he returned, Haman had flung himself across the couch on which Esther was reclining. He was pleading for his life, but the king mistook the scene as Haman attacking his wife. [Had Esther staged this scene?] An attendant told the king that Haman had prepared a gallows for Mordecai. The king ordered that Haman be hanged from it.
Esther pleaded with the king to recall the letters sent by Haman regarding the extermination of the Jews but unfortunately, no order written and signed with the king’s seal could ever be recalled. Instead, Mordechai, who was promoted to take Haman’s former duties was authorised “to issue a writ concerning the Jews in my name, in whatever terms you see fit, and seal it with the royal signet.” [Some guys never learn.]
12th year 3rd month 23rd day (So about 2 or 2 and a half months after the banquets)
“A writ was issued to the Jews, exactly as Mordecai directed, and to the satraps (provincial governors), governors and the officers in the provinces from India to Ethiopia, 127 provinces, for each province in its own script, and for each people in their own language and also for the Jews in their own script and language.”
By these letters the king granted permission to the Jews in every city to unite and defend themselves, and to destroy, slay and exterminate the whole strength of any people or province which might attack them, women and children too, and to plunder their possessions, throughout all the provinces of King Ahasuerus, in one day, the 13th day of the 12th month. A copy of the writ was to be issued as a decree in every province and published to all people, and the Jews were “ready for that day, the day of vengeance on their enemies.”
12th year 12th month 13th day
The Jews had become feared by everyone. All the provincial officials had become fearful of Mordecai who had become very powerful in the royal palace. His fame had spread through all the provinces. On the appointed day all the provincial officers sided with the Jews. The day was one of great slaughter in numbers similar to those given elsewhere in the Old Testament. This is glossed over in the video prepared for children but even adults would find it horrific. 500 men were killed in Susa, the capital city, along with the 10 sons of Haman. In the other provinces the Jews killed 75,000 people. Imagine seeing that on the news.
When the king asked Esther what more she wanted, she asked that the edict be extended for one more day in Susa, the capital city, and that the dead bodies of Haman’s sons be hung up on gallows. This the king granted. The next day (the 14th day of the month) the Jews in Susa killed another 300 men. In the rest of the kingdom, the Jews stopped their slaughter and made that day, the 14th day, a day of feasting and joy. The Jews in Susa celebrated on the 15th day.
“Mordecai sent letters to all the Jews in all the provinces binding them to keep the 14th and 15th days of the 12th month annually as the days on which the Jews obtained relief from their enemies and as the month which was changed for them from sorrow into joy, from a time of mourning to a holiday. They were to keep them as days of feasting and joy, days for sending presents of food to one another and gifts to the poor.” Esther 9:20-22 These days were named Purim.
