Esther (Heb. ‘Estêr; perhaps derived from a Persian word meaning “star”). Jewish queen of King Ahasuerus, or Xerxes, and heroine of the book of the same name (see Ahasuerus 2). Esther’s original Hebrew name was Hadassâh, “myrtle.” She probably adopted the name Esther upon entering the Persian court. She was the daughter of Abihail, apparently a Benjamite, and the adopted daughter of her cousin Mordecai, * a member of Ahasuerus’s court (Est 2:5, 7, 15). Both Esther and Mordecai were descendants of Hebrew exiles who had been transported to Babylon by Nebuchadnezzar more than 100 years earlier, but were among those who had chosen to remain in the land of their exile when Cyrus gave them permission to return to Judea. Both were residents of Susa,* the ancient capital of Elam (but at the time one of several capitals of Persia), located about 200 miles east of Babylon (Map XII, D-8). Esther was a remarkably beautiful young woman whose tact and sympathy won her royal favor and the title of queen after her predecessor, Vashti, fell from grace. Ahasuerus gave her that rank in her 7th year (c January 478 BC). This would have happened shortly after the disastrous war against Greece, marked by the battles of Salamis and Plataea. Four years later, in April 474 BC, the royal favourite, Haman, casts lots and gets the king to sign a royal decree authorizing the death of all Jews within the Persian Empire and the confiscation of their property (Esther 3:7 -fifteen). By this decree he seeks revenge on Mordecai, who, when the favorite went in and out of the palace gate, continually refused to bow down to him (vs 2-6). Naturally, among the Jews the decree causes great consternation, and Mordecai informs Esther of the problem (4:1-7) with the warning that God has directed things so that she can be queen in this hour of crisis and save her son. people (vs 8-17). In a supreme act of courage matched only by her infinite tact, Esther intervenes on behalf of her nation, apparently revealing for the first time that she herself is a Jew (scs 6-7). After the execution of Haman, the king elevates Mordecai to the previous position of the enemy, and in the month of June he signs a decree prepared by Mordecai that neutralizes the previous one (cp 8). As a joyous reminder of her miraculous providence, the Jews decree a holiday period known as Purim, * “lots,” after the lot Haman cast (3:7; 9:17-32). Since then, the Jews celebrate it in honor of Esther for her spirit of courage and devotion, whom God used for the liberation of her people (figs 212,337). 212. Tomb in Hamadan (ancient Ecbatana) where, according to tradition, Queen Esther is buried. Esther, Book of. Historical report of the acute crisis that the Jewish people endured in 474/473 BC -when a decree of the Persian king Xerxes ordered their extermination-, and of divine providence for its solution. In the Hebrew Bible Esther is the last of a group of 5 books that have the common title of Megillôth (the other 4 are Ruth, Songs, Ecclesiastes and Lamentations). Since the Hebrew text of Esther begins with the word “and,” some have suggested that it was originally attached to some other historical book, possibly Nehemiah, the book it follows in the LXX and in the English translations. Although nowhere in the book does God’s name appear, the Jews assigned him a place in the sacred canon. Certain Christian writers omitted it from their canonical lists, and Martin Luther openly objected to the book. I.Author. The identity of the author of Esther is unknown. However, everything points to someone who lived in Susa around that time: the historical accuracy of the narrative (i.e., the implicit claim that the book is an actual account of historical events), the many significant details that archeology confirmed ( especially those of the royal palace in Susa), certain words and forms characteristic of the book, access to the official texts and the royal archives of the various decrees mentioned and cited (copies of Persian royal decrees found in Egypt are similar in form and style to the decrees cited in the narrative), and familiarity with the palace grounds and its buildings (the vivid and exact descriptions of Persian manners and customs correspond to what we know from other sources; Gr., aster, star).
Jewish orphan in the city of Susa who became queen of Persia. Her name Heb. hers was Hadassah (myrtle). Her cousin Mordecai, who was a minor palace official, raised her as her own daughter. Xerxes (Ahasuerus), the Persian king, had divorced his wife. When he searched for a new queen from among the maidens of the kingdom, he chose Esther. When the Jews were in danger of being destroyed, she was able to save them. The book named after her is read in her honor every year on the holiday of Purim.
Source: Hispanic World Bible Dictionary
(star).
The “Book of Esther” in the Bible tells that Esther was a young Jewish woman, Mordecai’s cousin, who became Queen of King Ahasuerus. She saved Mordecai and the race from his destruction.
Christian Bible Dictionary
Dr. J. Dominguez
http://bible.com/dictionary/
Source: Christian Bible Dictionary
A young Jewish woman †œbeautiful in figure and handsome† (Esther 2:7), whose family had been taken to Persia when †¢Nebuchadnezzar exiled the Jews. She e.she was born in Persia, her parents died and she was raised by her uncle † ¢ Mordecai. She is the heroine of the Bible book named after her, which recounts how she was brought to the royal palace, her selection as queen, and her bravery in defending the people from she from the machinations of † ¢ Haman. Hadassah’s name was changed to E., which may have been taken from a Persian word meaning “star”, although some think she is related to the name of the goddess Ishtar.
There is no news of E. in the secular literature. What is known is that the Persian kings had many wives, which is confirmed in E’s account. Historians record that King Ahasuerus (Xerxes I), on his expedition against Greece, took with him one of his queens, named Amestris. She was surely a member of one of the seven main families of Persia, because it was mandatory for the king to take a wife from one of them. Some suppose that Amestris is the same one known in the Bible as †¢Vasti.
Source: Christian Bible Dictionary
(-> Judith, Purim). Biblical book and Israelite woman, the only one who bears the name of queen in the Bible. She appears as the favorite of the pagan king of Persia (of the whole world) and as the savior of his people. Everything allows us to suppose that her figure belongs to the folklore and religious-political imagination of a people that has passionately sought survival in adverse situations.
(1. Introduction. Esther and Judith. The very name Ester/Esther alludes to the goddess Queen of Heaven (Ishtar-Ashtartu*) that Jeremiah had condemned (Jr 44,17-25). It is possible that the Jews of the Babylonian diaspora invented the figure of her, in the second century BC, making her the queen of the empire, being a faithful Israelite and savior of the Jews. Within the story, Esther’s function is parallel (structurally similar) to that of Judith*, but the same names evoke different paths. Judit was just a Jew (for that is what her name means): a woman who is free from all risk of contamination, a fighter who cuts off the head of the enemy general and maintains the purity of the Israelite people. On the contrary, Esther is the Jewish woman of the diaspora who makes a pact with the empire, marrying the great Ahasuerus, accepting the system to transform it, putting it at the service of the identity of her people. Judit, the fighter, killed the representative of the evil king. Ester, the pactist, advised by her uncle Mordecai (again a name related to Marduk *, God of Babylon, in pairs with Ester / Isthar, the goddess), prefers to marry the king, to put him at the service of the cause bean.
(2) Plot. A history of women. Strictly speaking, she is not a Jewish queen (the Jews did not know such a figure), but a simple believer who accepts to be queen of the empire, for the good of her people. The plot of her story, linked to Purim, to God’s “lots” and to the liberation of the people, begins with her coronation. King Ahasuerus has rejected Vashti, former queen, because she has refused to dance (naked?) before the dignitaries of his court. These dignitaries look for a new wife (favorite queen) for the king, beautiful/desirable and obedient to his mandates, among all the women of the empire, looking only at her external beauty: “In the seventh year of the reign of Ahasuerus…, they took Esther to the royal palace, to King Ahasuerus, and the king loved her above all women and she obtained before him more grace and favor than all the maidens and he placed the royal crown on her head and proclaimed her queen instead of Vashti” ( Esther 2.17). Esther does not act as a gebira mother* (she is not blessed by the fruit of her womb), nor as a warrior (she does not seduce and kill the enemy like Yael* and Judith), but as a lover, who excites the king’s desire in the service of her village. They have sought for the monarch a queen who is beautiful in body and obedient in spirit, an example for all the subject women of the empire, unlike Vashti, a “bad” queen who dares to be autonomous, rejecting the sexual submission that the king king asks in the eyes of the whole court. Well, Ester begins as a submissive woman, perhaps for her own benefit (to rise as queen). But then, channeled by her “uncle of hers” Mordecai, the good Jew, she transforms submission into risky audacity, putting her feminine charm at the service of the salvation of her people. The story seems to be written with strong irony, to show Esther’s metamorphosis. The truth is that she manages to transform the will of the king, making him save the Jews and kill, without external war, by internal persecution and extermination campaign, the enemies of the people.
(3) Esther, seductress in favor of her people. We are facing a new type of war: the audacity of Yael* who wields the peg, nor the cunning of Judit who cuts the throat of Holofernes drunk is not necessary. Esther intervenes and decides this war through strong affective pressure, getting the king to pronounce, strictly legally, a death sentence against all anti-Jews in the empire (Est 7-8). Ester is a seductive, alluring woman who is capable of achieving anything to the extent that she fascinates the Great King with his bodily charms and the graduated, cunning display of his requests. She can’t do anything by herself, but she can do everything and she achieves it by using the attraction that the king feels for her. They are going to exterminate the Jews, “enemies of the human race”, because they follow their own laws, not the laws of all peoples. The edict that fixes her slaughter is written, but Esther intervenes before the king, offering him a banquet: “And the king asked Esther…, in the drink: What do you ask, queen…