The Story Behind the Story of Esther

 Note: The images used in today's post are taken from one of my favorite movies,
One Night With the King

“The king loved Esther more than all the women, and she won grace and favor in his sight more than all the virgins, so that he set the royal crown on her head and made her queen instead of Vashti.”  Esther 2:17

 When we read stories in the Bible, it’s easy to lose track of the scope of the timing involved. In one sentence, Esther is an orphaned Jewess living with her cousin and a few sentences later, she is Queen of Persia. That’s not how it happened for her though. We read in Esther 1:3 that Xerxes’ banquet took place in the third year of his reign and that Esther’s banquet was held in the seventh year. That means four years passed between the two. How long did it take for Xerxes to bemoan the loss of his wife? Days? Weeks? His advisors quickly came up with an idea to appease him, and I’m sure it took time to gather the virgins from every province of Xerxes’ realm (Esther2:3), but likely all this took only a few months. That means Esther was a part of the harem of virgins for years before she came to the king. The story tells us that she participated in at least 12 months of beauty treatments while waiting her turn (Esther 2:12). And then what? What do you suppose this harem was like? Did she make friends? Did they lay around? Exercise to stay fit? Play games?

 I can only imagine this was a place of drama and intrigue. Most of the women there were vying for the opportunity to become the next queen. The “gathering” (Esther 2:3) doesn’t give the impression that the girls were given any choice in the matter. I picture it happening very much like it did in the veggie tales version, or the Hollywood one. This would result in a harem full of women of different backgrounds, girls who had been ripped from their homes and all they had known and plopped down into a contest. There could only be one winner, only one queen. The rest would fade into obscurity as concubines never again remembered. They would never be married, never have children, never know love. It’s almost like the hunger games! Did they plot to undermine and subvert other’s chances? Did they form alliances? Surely there were bullies, leaders of groups, underlings who did their bidding. All of this is encompassed in a few short sentences in the Bible. We are not given any insight into the details of the situation, but we can surmise a few things.

 We read in Esther 2:7 that Mordecai, a Jew of the tribe of Benjamin who had been carried into exile from Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar (Esther 2:5-6), took into his home and raised his cousin Hadassah, also named Esther. He had to do this because both of Esther’s parents had died. How they died is not shared, but that they both perished is notable. Was it a disease? Did they defy their oppressors? Was it a tragic chariot accident? Who knows, but Esther was spared by God’s grace and according to His plan. Still, she must have been horribly traumatized by this. To lose both of her parents, presumably at a young age as the verse says that Mordecai had brought her up and she wasn’t likely old enough to be married, which was pretty young in those days, would significantly impact a child. So, she has lost both of her parents and then, in some way, was compelled to move to the harem of the king, again losing the only parental figure she had, Mordecai. He counsels her to not share her heritage, not telling people that she was a Jew. This was clearly for her benefit as Jews were looked down upon and not treated well, but it steals from her yet another piece of who she is, a way in which she could connect with and identify with others around her. She is well and truly alone. Esther had lived a life of tragedy and could easily have seen herself as cursed, forgotten by God.

 She came to live in the harem and participated in at least 12 months of beauty treatments according to Esther 2:12. Based on the timeline I walked through above, she was here for years. Lots of people read these verses and think about leisurely milk baths and soothing massages. I have a feeling that’s not what these beauty treatments were like. Odds are there was discomfort involved in many ways, through plucking, popping, and poking. She had to learn a whole new way of presenting herself through perfumes and cosmetics, almost like a cosmetology course. If it took six months, it must have been intense, not like sitting down with your girlfriend one afternoon and learning how to do your eyebrows. So here she is amongst a gaggle of women, all seeking to be the new queen. She’s got to keep her history a secret, so she can’t get too close to anyone. She may or may not be interested in becoming queen herself, but she has no choice in the matter of whether or not she will go before the king. That’s got to be intimidating. He doesn’t give the impression of being a careful and gentle lover who seeks to honor the one he’s with. Not to be too coarse, but this sounds more like a form of forced prostitution, akin to sex trafficking. Esther was a virgin who knew little of what it was to be with a man. She had no mother during her developmental years, just a crusty old cousin who she could never go to with questions about such things. And here she was, surrounded by women whose thoughts and desires were focused on how to best please the king and become the next queen. I can’t begin to imagine the conversations that took place!

 What I’m saying is that Ester led a life full of trauma. Both of her parents died. She was raised by a cousin and then taken from him and all she knew again to be placed in the harem. Here she had to learn once again how to survive, how to interact, how to keep herself safe. She participated in beauty treatments and lived amongst her peers until one day, her turn came, and she went before the king. This was probably traumatic to some degree as well, and then, once again, she is uprooted from all she knows and placed into yet another environment with yet another set of people to learn to interact with. Yes, she is queen, but she holds little power or influence. She can’t even visit her own husband without fear of death. Do you think she felt sorry for herself for all the things she had endured? How do you think she saw herself? Do you think she suffered from imposter syndrome as she had been hiding her heritage all this time? Do you think she feared being found out and deposed as Vashti had been? While she may have been surrounded by creature comforts as queen, I doubt she felt comfortable.

 Take away the queen part and look at her story. She is orphaned and then sold into sex trafficking. Trained in how to please a man and then given to one, with no choice or decision on her part, essentially forced into another form of slavery. It puts a whole different spin on the “orphan girl who became queen” story, doesn’t it? This was real, hard stuff! She had a hard life! I was struck by what the devotional said today though:

“One powerful truth from Esther’s story is that God never works without a purpose. Even when life seems confusing, and the road ahead feels uncertain, we can trust that God is always moving for His glory and our good.”

 Esther’s life must have felt confusing, and I’m sure the road ahead of her always felt uncertain. Did she trust in God? Clearly she had some background of faith because of her choices as this story goes on, but she was a young person who had been ripped from her home and faith family, and caused to deny it and hide it as well. How far had she slipped from her walk with God? She was surrounded by the luxuries and vanities of the harem. She had to regularly act in ways that were opposite of her faith training. Remember how Daniel and his friends didn’t eat the food from the king’s table (Daniel 1:8-16)? Esther didn’t have that option as she was hiding her heritage, so every day she ate what everyone else did, even though it would have, at least initially, been abhorrent to her. Each day she was probably presented with one more way she was doing things that were not how she had been raised. Did she wonder if God still loved her? Did she wonder if she could be forgiven for all her infractions? Did she wonder if all the things that had happened to her were a punishment from God? I wouldn’t have blamed her if she had struggled with all this and much more.

 But from our 20/20 hindsight view of the situation, we can see that God did, indeed still care for her and was putting things in motion to use her for His glory and her good. Today, I am reflecting though on how Esther must have felt in the midst of it. Before God used her to save everyone. Before God’s perfect purposes were revealed. While everything was still dark and scary and uncertain.

 So much of the time, that’s where we live too. We don’t get to read our life story from the perspective of history. We don’t get to see, while we’re living through them, how all of our challenges will come together to glorify God and bless us. We just live in the midst of the challenges. I write this today with a raging migraine and a painful infection in my jaw. My body aches. My mind is foggy and it’s like swimming through Jello to try to capture and share my thoughts. Perhaps that’s why this is so long and drawn-out today! I am in the midst of my middle act, that part of the movie or play where the protagonist goes through some form of trial or challenge in order to advance the plot and bring them to a place where a catalyst or triumph can resolve their story later. You’ve got to have something hard happen in order to need or experience the good, at least that what all my reading history has taught me! Like Esther, I could struggle with the reason behind all that I’m experiencing. Is it a punishment? Do I or my struggles even really matter? Am I forgotten by God? Have I gone too far, done too much to ever be forgiven? I think it would be valid for anyone to wonder these things, to struggle through their middle act.

Here's the Thing: I am, thankfully, blessed to have been introduced to Jesus and His perfect care and salvation for me before I had to walk through all this. I know without a doubt that He has forgiven me and loves me (Romans 10:9). I know that He has a plan for me, and His plan is good (Jeremiah 29:11). I know that His thoughts are higher than my thoughts and His ways higher than my ways (Isaiah 55:8-9). I know that while I don’t understand why I have to go through what I am, I can trust that he has a purpose for it all and it won’t be wasted. He sees me. He knows my tears. He cares. He will never leave me nor forsake me (Hebrews 13:5). Even when she didn’t know it, God had not left Esther. His perfect plan for her would be worked out in time. We get to see that for her, and I hope you all get to see it for me too!