Esther is a book that has enjoyed it\u2019s share of controversy.\u00a0 Scholars have a special word for the collection of writings we call the Bible.\u00a0 They call it the canon.\u00a0 When they discuss why certain writings are included in the Bible they talk about canonicity.\u00a0 Over the years scholars and religious leaders have questioned the canonicity of Esther.\u00a0 The main reason is because it doesn\u2019t directly mention God.\u00a0 Some Jewish leaders didn\u2019t like Esther because of what it is about.\u00a0 Esther tells the story of the origin of a Jewish festival called Purim.\u00a0 Purim is not one of the original religious festivals included in the Law which God gave to Moses so \u201cconservative\u201d Jewish leaders did not like the book.\u00a0 Other scholars question the events in Esther and doubt whether or not they are historical.\u00a0 Many see it as a work of fiction.<\/p>\n
A Jewish historical book written about 126 BC, 2 Macabees, mentions \u201cthe feast or Mordecai\u201d.\u00a0 Mordecai, the cousin of Esther, is a major character (by that I do not mean fictional) in the story.\u00a0 So we know that at least by that time the feast was celebrated by at least some Jewish people and that it was associated with a person named Mordecai.\u00a0 Mordecai is also mentioned in the books of Ezra and Nehemiah, Historical accounts of the return of the Jewish people from captivity in Babylon.\u00a0 Esther claims to be about events in Susa (a real place) during the reign of Xerxes (sometimes called Ahasuerus) king of Persia from 486-465 BC.\u00a0 Susa was a capital city with a very expensive palace.\u00a0 From history we know that the palace was started by Xerxes\u2019 father Darius and finished by Xerxes.\u00a0 Although some skeptical scholars want us to believe that Esther was written in the 200\u2019s BC and is completely fictional, the parts of the book that can be verified by other sources show us that story fits the real life world of the mid-400\u2019s BC in Susa.\u00a0 The book claims to be a history and there is no reason to doubt that it is.\u00a0 Some scholars like point out that a famous ancient historian named Herodotus doesn\u2019t mention the events in his history, but he also never mentioned Belshazzar, king of the Babylonian empire that was taken over by the Persian empire, Daniel 5.\u00a0 That caused scholars to think that Daniel was made up also, but later archaeological evidence confirmed the existence of Belshazzar (The Nabonidus Cylinder discovered in 1881).\u00a0 Obviously there have been way more people and leaders in history that we have evidence for and to discredit a book of the Bible based on such a lack of evidence shows an unprofessional bias on the part of the scholar.<\/p>\n
There is some possible archaeological evidence for the existence of Mordecai on some tablets fro the time of Xerxes.\u00a0 The story of Esther contains other information that has been confirmed as being correct, like details about the palace in Susa which have only been confirmed by archaeological digs done since the 1850\u2019s.<\/p>\n
The Book of Esther, then, should be taken at face value as a historic account.\u00a0 The book tells us how the festival of Purim began.\u00a0 Although God is not specifically mentioned in the book of Esther his presence is still there, protecting and providing for the family he chose to be an example to the world.\u00a0 As we will see the Jewish people, in exile in the ever changing world empire, in danger of extinction by a egotistical mad man, were still under the watchful care of the God who had banished them there in the first place.\u00a0 His intention had been discipline not extinction and he moved the events toward that goal.\u00a0 It is only fitting then that the Jewish people took the time to remember, and set up an annual day for that purpose.<\/p>\n
Two last pieces of information may be helpful as we look at the book of Esther.\u00a0 First \u201cPurim\u201d, the name given to the annual festival, comes from an Akkadian word, \u201cpuru\u201d.\u00a0 Akkadian was a dominant language in the region until the 700\u2019s BC when it was replaced by Aramaic.\u00a0 Eventually Greek would become the dominant language in the region as Alexander the Great conquered much of that region of the world around 333 BC.\u00a0 The word would have been unknown to Jewish people by that time and is one argument for the historical nature of the book.\u00a0 The word means \u201clot\u201d.\u00a0 A \u201clot\u201d was something like a dice.\u00a0 The Hebrew word used to decribe \u201clots\u201d was \u201cgoral\u201d which means stones. \u00a0Historically stones, bones, and several types of manmade objects, including some that look very similar to modern dice, were used to understand the will of the gods and make important decisions.\u00a0 Archaeologist have found a \u201cpur\u201d (singular of purim) that belonged to an Assyrian official who lived around 840 BC.\u00a0 Other archaeological evidence indicates that \u201clots were cast\u201d at the beginning of a year to decide when important event would take place during the year.<\/p>\n
The other piece of information which might be helpful is a little more background on Xerxes.\u00a0 Xerxes was the son of Darius (as I mentioned before).\u00a0 He was raised in the palace of his father and seems to have been a spoiled self indulgent prince.\u00a0 He had an ego that wouldn\u2019t quit.\u00a0 He inherited the kingdom from his father, but took a great deal of credit for himself.\u00a0 A foundation stone of the palace (which his father began to build in Susa) was found with the following words, \u201cI am Xerxes the great king, the only king, the king of all countries which speak all kinds of languages, the king of this whole big and far reaching world\u2026\u201d\u00a0 Early in his reign he conquered Egypt and put down a rebellion by Babylon.\u00a0 In 480 BC he embarked on a military campaign to avenge a defeat of his father by the Greeks.\u00a0 His army was large and he had early success but eventually lost a major naval battle at Salamis in 479 BC.\u00a0 At that point Xerxes left his troops in charge of one of his generals, Mardonis, and went home.\u00a0 Mardonis was completely defeated later that year.\u00a0 In the book of Esther there is a gap in the timing of the events that may be due to Xerxes being in Greece fighting this war.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Esther is a book that has enjoyed it\u2019s share of controversy.\u00a0 Scholars have a special word for the collection of writings we call the Bible.\u00a0 They call it the canon.\u00a0 When they discuss why certain writings are included in the Bible they talk about canonicity.\u00a0 Over the years scholars and religious leaders have questioned the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"parent":50,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-1132","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/deltaforcedaily.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1132","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/deltaforcedaily.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/deltaforcedaily.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/deltaforcedaily.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/deltaforcedaily.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1132"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/deltaforcedaily.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1132\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1138,"href":"http:\/\/deltaforcedaily.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1132\/revisions\/1138"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/deltaforcedaily.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/50"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/deltaforcedaily.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1132"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}