ESTHER
550
ESTHER
people to which she belonged, and pleaded that they
should be spared. The king ordered that Aman
should be hanged on the gibbet prepared for Mardo-
chai, and, confiscating his property, bestowed it upon
the intended victim. He charged Manlochai to ad-
dress to all the governors of Persia letters authorizing
the Jews to defend themselves and to kill all those
who, by virtue of the previous decree, should attack
them. During two days the Jews took a bloody re-
venge on their enemies in Susan and other cities.
Mardochai then instituted tlie feast of Purim (lots)
which he exhorted the Jews to celebrate in memory of
the day which Aman had determined for their de-
struction, but which had been turned by Esther into a
day of triumph. The foregoing story of Esther is
taken from the Book of Esther as found in the \'ulgate.
Jewish traditions place the tomb of Esther at Hama-
dan (Ecbatana). The Fathers of the Church consitl-
ered Esther as a type of the Blessed Virgin Mary. In
her poets have found a favourite subject. (R.
Schwartz, Esther im deutschen u. neulateinischen
Drama des Reformationszeitalters, Oldenburg, 1894.)
Book of Esther. — In the Hebrew Bible and the Septuagint the Book of Esther bears only the word "Esther" as title. But the Jewish rabbis called it also the "volume of Esther", or simply "the volume" (jnegillah) to distinguish it from the other four vol- umes (megilloth), written on separate rolls, which were read in the sjnaagogues on certain feast days. As this one was read on the feast of Purim and consisted largely of epistles (cf. Esth., ix, 20, 29), it was called by the Jews of Alexandria the "Epistle of Purim". In the Hebrew canon the book was among the Hagio- grapha and placed after Ecclesiastes. In the Latin Vulgate it has always been classed with Tobias and Judith, after which it is placed. The Hebrew text that has come down to us varies considerably from those of the Septuagint and the N'ulgate. The Septu- agint, besides showing many unimportant divergen- cies, contains several additions in the body of the book or at the end. The additions are the portion of the Vulgate te.xt after ch. x, 3. Although no trace of these fragments is found in the Hebrew Bible, they are most probably translations from an original Hebrew or Chaldaic text. Origen tells us that they existed in Theodotion's version, and that they were used by Josephus in his "Antiquities" (XVI). St. Jerome, finding them in the Septuagint and the Old Latin ver- sion, placed them at the end of his almost literal translation of the existing Hebrew text, and indicated the place they occupied in the Septuagint. The chapters being thus rearranged, the book may be divided into two parts: the first relating the events which preceded ami led up to the decree authorizing theexterminationof the Jews (i-iii, 15; xi, 2; xiii, 7); the second showing how the Jews escaped from their enemies and avenged themselves (iv-v, 8; xiii-xv).
The Book of Esther, thus taken in part from the Hebrew Canon and in part from the Septuagint, found a place in the Christian Canon of the O. T. The chap- ters taken from the Septuagint were considered deutcrocanonical, and, after St. Jerome, were sepa- rated from the ten chapters taken from the Hebrew which were called protocanonical (see C.\non of the Holy Scriptures). A great many of the early Fathers clearly considered the entire work as in- spired, although no one among them found it to his purpose to write a commentary on it. Its omission m some of the early catalogues of the Scriptures was accidental or unimportant. The first to reject the hook was Luther, who declared that he so hated it that he wished that it did not exist (Table Talk, .W). His first followers wished only to reject the deutcro- canonical parts, whereupon these, as well as other deutcrocanonical parts of the Scriptures, were de- clared by the Council of Trent (Sess. IV, de Can. Scrlptura)) to be canonical and inspired. With the
rise of rationalism the opinion of Luther found many
supporters. When modern rationalists argue that the
Book of Esther is irreligious in character, unlike the
other books of the O. T., and therefore to be re-
jected, they have in mind only the first or proto-
canonical part, not the entire book, which is mani-
festly religious. But, although the first part is not
explicitly religious, it contains nothing unworthy of a
place in the Sacred Scriptures. And any way, as
Driver points out (Introduc. to the Lit. of the O. T.),
there is no reason why every part of the Biblical
record should show the " same degree of subordination
of human interests to the spirit of God".
As to the authorship of the Book of Esther there is nothing but conjecture. The Talmud (Baba Bathra 15*) assigns it to the Great Synagogue; St. Clement of .Alexandria ascribes it to Mardochai; St. Augustine suggests Esdras as the author. Many, noting the writer's familiarity with Persian customs and institu- tions and with the character of .A.ssuerus, hold that he was a contemporary of Mardochai, whose memoirs he used. But such memoirs and other contemporary documents showing this familiar knowledge could have been used by a writer at a later period. And, although the absence in the text of allusion to Jerusa- lem seems to lead to the conclusion that the book was WTitten and published in Persia at the end of the reign of Xerxes I (4S5-465 b. c.) or during the reign of his son Artaxer.xes I (465-425 B. c), the text seems to offer several facts which may be adduced with some show of reason in favour of a later date. They are: (1) an implied statement that Susan had ceased to be the capital of Persia, and a vague description of the extent of the kingdom (i, 1); (2) an explanation of Persian usages that implies unfamiliarity with them on the part of the readers (i, 1.3, 19; iv, 11; viii, 8); (3) the revengeful attitude of the Jews towards the Gentiles, by whom they felt they had been wronged, and with whom they wished to have little to do (iii, 8 sqq.) ; (4) a diction showing many late words and a deterioration in syntax; (5) references to "the Macedonians" and to the plot of .\man as an attempt to transfer "the kingdom of the Persians to the Macedonians" (xvi, 10, 14). On the strength of these passages various modern critics have assigned late dates for the authorship of the book, as, 135 B. c, 167 B. c, 2:38 b. c, the beginning of the third century B. c, or the early years of the tireek period which began 332 B. c. The majority accept the last opinion.
Some of the modern critics who have fixed upon late dates for the composition of the book deny that it has any historical value whatever, and declare it to be a work of the imagination, wTitten for the purpose of popularizing the feast of Purim. In sup])ort of their contention they point out in the text what appear to be historical improbabilities, and attempt to show that the narrative has all the characteristics of a romance, the various incidents being artfully arranged so as to form a series of contrasts and to develop into a climax. But what seem to be historical improba- bilities are in many cases trivial. Even ailvanced critics do not agree as to those which seem quite seri- ous. While some, for instance, consider it wholly improbable that Assuerus and Aman should have been ignorant of the nationality of Esther, who was in frequent communication with Mardochai, a well- known Jew, others maintain that it was quite possible and probable that a young woman, known to be a Jewess, should be taken into the harem of a Persian king, and that with the assistance of a relative she shoidil avert the ruin of her people, which a high offi- cial had endeavoured to effect. The seeming im- probability of other pas.sages, if not entirely ex- plained, can be sufficiently explained to destroy the conclu.sion, on this ground, that the book is not his- torical. As to artful contrasts and climax to which appeal is made as evidences that the book is the wprk
