It is soon to be Purim. This means it’s time for me to dust off my Old Testament and read Esther. In the Jewish Bible, the book of Esther comes as the last of the five scrolls that are read at the great festivals of the Jewish year. Its historical context is post-Babylonian exile, about the mid fifth century BC. In Esther, the story is told how Jews throughout the Achaemenid empire were saved from a subtly planned murderous anti-Semitic pogrom that reminds one of the Holocaust. This was thanks to the wisdom of a Jewish exile, Mordecai, and the courageous efforts of his cousin and stepdaughter Hadassah (Myrtle) who had become Queen Esther, wife of the Persian King Ahasuerus (probably Xerxes I). The result of this miraculous salvation is that from that time on, all Jews must celebrate their deliverance on the 14 and 15 of the month of Adar on the Jewish calendar (Esther 9:21). This is the festival of Purim and for those of us whose day-timers are not based on the lunar Jewish calendar, it takes place this year from sundown Feb. 28 to sundown March 1. A fast is usually observed the day before. (Incidentally, if you are an incorrigible fishing fanatic like me, you really ought to be basing your life on the lunar calendar anyway. It helps with Bible study too).
The book of Esther is a fascinating story. And yet, no other book of the Hebrew Bible has received such mixed reviews, from both Jew and Christian. Some have criticized the book for what it does contain and others for what it doesn’t contain. For instance, the Persian King Ahasuerus is mentioned about 190 times in the book but the God of Israel doesn’t get one line. Holy Scripture is not mentioned once, not even Torah. Neither is there any mention of the basic tenants of Old Testament religion. The book of Esther has also been raked over the coals for its moral tone, or perhaps better put, the lack of one. Such basic Judaic-Christian values as kindness, mercy and forgiveness are notably lacking. Intrigue, deceit and hatred abound, regardless of whether the spotlight is on the evil protagonist Haman or on the heroes Esther and Mordecai. The book begins with an all out national drunk hosted by the good King Ahasuerus that results in an extremely anti-feminist royal decree meant to declare, “that every man should be master in his own house.” (Esther 1:22) The story proceeds with Ahasuerus’ prime minister, Haman, hatching an anti-Semitic plot that, through intrigue and deceit, Mordecai and Esther succeed in defeating. Haman ends up skewered on his own pointy gallows, which he had built for skewering Mordecai. And with Haman’s exposure and execution, the Jews are given full reign to slaughter all of their enemies in the kingdom.
What are you supposed to do with a story like that? It seems like such a non-religious story, some have even called it profane. I read somewhere that during the reading of Esther at Purim, Jews are supposed to boo whenever Haman’s name is read and cheer whenever Esther or Mordecai’s names are read. That doesn’t seem right to me. And yet, the book of Esther remains in our Bibles as Holy Scripture and as Paul says to Timothy, “All scripture is inspired by God and is useful for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, so that everyone who belongs to God may be proficient, equipped for every good work.” (2 Timothy 3:16)
Besides all the side issues mentioned above, the main issue with the book of Esther is the apparent absence of God. This bothers me some, but when I reflect upon it a bit more, from the perspective of my own life, it seems to me that often God’s presence is not as intriguing as His absence. Often God’s voice is not as eloquent as His silence. Many times I have longed for a word from God, searched for a glimpse of His power, or yearned for the reassurance of His presence only to feel that God seems absent from the moment, distant, preoccupied, and maybe even unconcerned. I know this experience is a common faith experience. It seems like we all live just one phone call from being driven to our knees, times when we are left wondering, where is God? The apparent absence of God is a profound experience.
And this brings us back to the book of Esther. God is not mentioned in the whole of the book. In fact, according to my computer search, it is the only book of the 66 books of the Bible where God is not named. Not even a prayer is offered in the name of God in Esther. No one says, “God is here!” God remains invisible in the book of Esther, apparently absent.
Many years ago, in 1706, the biblical scholar Matthew Henry wrote about the book of Esther: “But, though the name of God be not in it, the finger of God is, directing many minute events for the bringing about of His people’s deliverance.”
God definitely does not sit for someone to whip out a camera in the book of Esther. He is seemingly invisible. But the powerful implication is that God’s will and power are working in concert on every page. God is behind the scenes, so to speak, behind every non-religious scene. It is perhaps the best book in the Bible to get a feel for the invisible God at work in the lives and through the lives and for the lives of God’s people, people whose lives are completely engaged in the secular and at times even profane world. One day, the king of Persia, King Ahasuerus, throws a drinking bash and unbeknownst to him kicks off the events that eventually liberate the whole people of God living in exile in the Persian Empire. In the midst of these events, there is a plot to put all of the Jews in the Persian Empire to death. But God uses this very plot to destroy all their enemies and liberate the Jews instead. God is working behind the scenes, apparently absent.
So here’s the thing, here is the blessing and lesson in Purim and in the reading of Esther, at least for me. I tend to hopelessly compartmentalize life. The worst example of this is how I compartmentalize the God-present and the God-absent times, the religious and the non-religious, the holy and the horrible. God powerfully at work behind the scenes in the very secular, non-religious, at times even profane, tale of Esther hauls me up short on this. It challenges me to reexamine all of life, particularly the apparent God-absent parts. It challenges me to look at what appears to me as impossible circumstances where God cannot possibly be present or active, circumstances that could lead to my certain demise perhaps; to look at all of the apparent God-absent times in life through the lens of Esther and to deliberately pause and discover, or maybe rediscover, that God is God. To discover that there is no compartment of life where God is not God. And in this discovery, to stop groping into my own coffers of security, stop trying to pull strings, stop trying to manipulate people and situations, to stop all of the stuff I rush to do when I think God is not present or up to the job. The story of Esther causes me to be still and to be quiet and to be observant. This seems profound for me at a whole bunch of different levels, from trying to plumb the depths of my own Job-like experiences to the more esoteric debates of theodicy.
