The Jewish feast of Purim פּוּרִים (pronounced in Hebrew Poo Reem) commemorates the deliverance by Esther of all the Jews from annihilation. It has been glamorized recently in the movie called, “One Night With the King.” It is also celebrated among the Jewish people annually. But, the book of Esther has always been problematic for the rabbis. It is totally secular in that God is never mentioned nor any aspects of the Jewish faith or ritual. This is one reason why the book of Esther nea...
The Jewish feast of Purim פּוּרִים (pronounced in Hebrew Poo Reem) commemorates the deliverance by Esther of all the Jews from annihilation. It has been glamorized recently in the movie called, “One Night With the King.” It is also celebrated among the Jewish people annually. But, the book of Esther has always been problematic for the rabbis. It is totally secular in that God is never mentioned nor any aspects of the Jewish faith or ritual. This is one reason why the book of Esther nearly didn’t make it into the Jewish canon, the accepted books of the Hebrew Scriptures. It is also possibly why no portions of the book of Esther were found among the Dead Sea Scrolls.
The other issues in the book of Esther, her being in the pagan harem of king Ahasuerus, better known as Xerxes, or spending one night with the king sexually, were also very problematic with the rabbis and they tried to make up new made up interpretations to make Esther the Bible’s Cinderella; to make Esther a pure, devout, Godly, young lady. These rabbinic views have affected the way both Jews and Christians understand the story to such an extent that the real meaning of these events has been lost amidst Jewish tradition and legend.
In this podcast we will put the book of Esther into its historical context. We will not ignore the difficult aspects that are presented in The Very Words Of God. And as we do we will come to see and understand the bigger picture of the book and what it means. For me after studying these events in their historical context, I have been overwhelmed by the glory of the Lord in this book. For me I will not be surprised to one day see Esther (she’ll probably being using her Hebrew name then, Hadassah) in the wedding party on the day of the wedding feast of the Lamb.
In this podcast I mentioned a paper detailed the harems of ancient Persia. The link is shown below.
Link – https://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/harem-i
Also, some of you may like to see the archaeological site of ancient Susa. Check out this short video on ancient Susa and the remains of the palace of Darius the king before Ahasuerus or Xerxes, the king in the book of Esther.
Link - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bwkTCPELkvI
Rev. Ferret - who is this guy? What's his background? Why should I listen to him? Check his background at this link - https://www.dropbox.com/s/ortnret3oxcicu4/BackgrndTeacher%20mar%2025%202020.pdf?dl=0
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