Poor Esther | Imamother

Karnash

Fri, Mar 02 2018, 2:23 am

Although it seems that Mordechai is the hero of the Megilla, he is the mover, the doer, the initiator, the megilla is called Megillat Esther. Esther is the heroine here. She undergoes a transformation and takes control of her life and by doing so, saves Am Yisrael.

At the beginning of the Megilla, Esther is completely passive. She is orphaned as an infant, never knew her parents, is adopted and raised by her cousin Mordechai, taken to the court of the king, married to him, has no say in anything that has happened to her. Mordechai is her only support and connection and he sits in Shaar Hamelech so she is still connected to him and has contact with him but when he dons "שק ועפר" and has to leave the court, her only connection is severed. She sends him clothes which he rejects them and then tells her what she must do- Go to the king - at first she tries to refuse but when Mordechai admonishes her and tells her if she refuses, Hashem will save Am Yisrael in a different way, but this may be the reason she was brought to Malchut. Here Esther transforms herself. She takes control, she commands, she directs, she comes into the role she was destined for. This is not someone you can feel sorry for, she becomes a powerful, awe-inspiring heroine and becomes worthy of being Hashem's shaliach to save Am Yisrael.

amother

Aqua

Fri, Mar 02 2018, 2:27 am

Karnash wrote:

And yet Chazal do their best to neutralize her active role by having us repeat pesukim about Mordechai's power.

etky

Fri, Mar 02 2018, 3:11 am

Karnash wrote:

Very true. Still, understanding the tragic dimension to her story underscores and certainly does not detract from an appreciation of the personal sacrifice that being a shaliach hashem entailed for her.
BTW Esther is not alone in this respect: there were other figures who paid a high personal price to fulfill the missions with which they were charged by Hashem. Yirmiyahu - who was told by Hashem not to marry comes to minds as does Yechezkel whose wife dies in the framework of the symbolic acts that accompanied his nevuah and whom he was not even allowed to mourn.

etky

Fri, Mar 02 2018, 3:18 am

amother wrote:

And yet Chazal do their best to neutralize her active role by having us repeat pesukim about Mordechai's power.

This struck me too this year as we were reading the Megilla.
I'm sure there are many answers - some of which will be more apologetic than others....
But one thing that occurred to me is that Mordechai, in the Purim story, is the blatant, public Jew while Esther is the hidden, crypto-Jew (as her name implies). Therefore when Mordechai is honored, it is as a declared Jew - a national symbol - and maybe that is why we emphasize the psukim which concern Mordechai. They represent the national story:first the exile from Yehuda and then the reversal -the deliverance and rise to glory.

DrMom

Fri, Mar 02 2018, 3:37 am

seeker wrote:

Maybe it's blasphemous of me to take this liberty, but I imagine it might have been somewhat of an exaggeration to say that he collected literally every single girl in the empire. Maybe every single girl had to show up for screening and then there was some pre-selection process? I don't know but it doesn't seem feasible to take it literally.

I tend to agree.

Raisin

Fri, Mar 02 2018, 6:42 am

seeker wrote:

Yes, he spent one night with each girl. 1000 girls would take 3 years to screen. 10,000 girls - 30 years - by which point the girls would be middle aged! I doubt he took more then a few hundred, or maybe a thousand, girls for his contest.

imasinger

Fri, Mar 02 2018, 7:21 am

In terms of what young children learn, it's appropriate for their ages.

My three year old granddaughter said that Vashti got put into the garbage and thrown away.

Most preschools I teach in don't say much about the last makka, just that it happened when Paroh was in pajamas.

They focus more on Antiochus making the beis hamikdash all messy, and on finding the oil, and don't touch on Channa and her seven sons.

At the time of the megillah, the events of the Churban were recent enough to be relevant. After all, Haman's connection to Agag was known, and Agag died a lot earlier.

Frankly, though Esther's life both before and after the events in the megillah was no picnic, it still was better than many suffer. Both in our stories, and today.

We have no evidence that she felt sorry for herself. She was adroit at handling her lout of a husband, and getting what she needed from him. She used what she had to make life better for others. Truly a role model.

SuperWify

Fri, Mar 02 2018, 8:32 am

The we learned about Esther’s sacrifice in a BY HS:

Esther was married woman (to Mordechai) at the time she was forcibly taken to the king. As long as she herself didn’t approach the king but rather only went when she was called by him- she was still permitted to Mordechai. (In addition- I later learned that the gemarah says Esther was like “karkah aretz” that during relations she was as still as the land). She would still go to the Mikva and visit Mordechai in secret.

What was her major sacrifice? Did she really care about dieing when her whole nation was about to be wiped out?
This was the first time that SHE would willingly approach Achashvierosh on her own. Hence, she would never be permitted to Mordechai again in her life.
Her true sacrifice was that she would be stuck with the boorish king for the rest of her life and never be permitted to Mordechai again.

momnaturally

Fri, Mar 02 2018, 8:43 am

Raisin wrote:

The megila says they only took virgins that were pretty. I imagine the Jewish girls tried to make themselves look ugly so they wouldn't be chosen for the selection.

leah233

Fri, Mar 02 2018, 9:31 am

crust wrote:

To be honest, I don't know if I'm that selfless. To live for a full day with a vicious unpredictable Nazi? I would be petrified!!
Think about a week? A full month? A year?
Maybe if I would completely understand why I'm doing what I'm doing and that I'm not just a mabid atzmo l'daas.

But even then, to be trapped for life?!! I honestly don't know if I'd survive.

When six million lives are at stake I would like to think I would make the sacrifice. Anyway I don't think that is what Esther's life with Achasvorosh was like. She barely knew him. If she wasn't called to him for thirty days and was scared to approach she couldn't have had any real relationship with him.

To make your analogy more actual. Would you agree to be what Eva Braun was to Hitler YMS to prevent the holocaust? I don't think being physically scared of him is part of the question. It is alleged that she attempted suicide twice but that was because of loneliness not because Hitler beat her.

Last edited by leah233 on Fri, Mar 02 2018, 9:34 am; edited 1 time in total

amother

Saddlebrown

Fri, Mar 02 2018, 9:33 am

leah233 wrote:

When six million lives are at stake I would like to think I would make the sacrifice. Anyway I don't think that is what Esther's life with Achasvorosh was like. She barely knew him. If she wasn't called to him for thirty days and was scared to approach she couldn't have had any real relationship with him.

To make your analogy more actual. Would you agree to be what Eva Braun was to Hitler YMS to prevent the holocaust? I don't think she had any reason to be physically scared of him.

It is alleged that she attempted suicide twice but that was because of loneliness not because Hitler beat her.

Was Hitler so paranoid that he killed his first wife? Imagine being the second one.

leah233

Fri, Mar 02 2018, 9:41 am

amother wrote:

Was Hitler so paranoid that he killed his first wife? Imagine being the second one.

Achosvarosh didn't just capriciously kill his first wife because he was paranoid. And he didn't do it without getting advice from others first.

Of course Eshters life was at risk. (What would she have done had he asked of her what he asked of Vashti?) But not on a day to basis.

Last edited by leah233 on Fri, Mar 02 2018, 9:44 am; edited 1 time in total