The
city of Susa was bewildered. (Esther 3:15)The first Jews were exiled to Babylon in 605 BC. After things settled down, life was actually pretty good. They bought property, raised families, and when allowed to return to Jerusalem 70 years later, many elected to stay in their new home.
The story of Esther falls many years after the return to Jerusalem among Jewish people remaining in Persia. Susa, the empire’s winter capital, has a large and prosperous Jewish population, well thought of by their non-Jewish neighbors.
In an ancient Persian version of The Bachelor, Esther, a Jewish orphan raised by her cousin Mordecai, is selected from all the young ladies of the empire to be the new queen. When Mordecai offends Haman, a rising star in Persian society, he makes an arch-enemy of comic book proportions. Haman is a descendant of Agag – King of the Amalekites – killed by the prophet Samuel in the days of King Saul. Agag’s descendants have nursed a grudge against Israel for 600 years.
Haman sees his favor with the king as an opportunity to wreak vengeance on not only Mordecai, but on the entire Jewish people. He convinces the king to have the Jews killed (genocide). The day, chosen by chance, is eleven months away. As the news spreads throughout the empire, the Jews are in disbelief and their neighbors scratch their heads at this order, of which they cannot make sense.
How does faith help when you don’t understand the circumstances of life?
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