Today marks the start of the ancient Jewish festival of Purim, which begins at sunset and ends at nightfall tomorrow. It celebrates the deliverance of the Jewish people from genocide in Persia. The story is found in the Book of Esther in the Old Testament.
‘Ahasuerus’ (Xerxes I or Khshayarsha in Old Persian) was the Achaemenid king of Persia in the fifth century BCE. He was a Zoroastrian who did not impose his faith on his subjects. The Achaemenid empire extended from Ethiopia to the Indus Valley across twenty satrapies or provinces. In 2005, I got to see the carvings of coolies in loincloths carrying baskets of tribute on their heads, at the Apadana Palace in Persepolis. The Indian province was the eastern limit of the Achaemenid empire and is mentioned twice in the Book of Esther as Houd, from Honoud or Hindu, the Persian pronunciation of Sindhu.
One day, a Jew named Mordecai of the tribe of Benjamin unearthed a plot by two palace guards, Bigthan and Teresh, to assassinate the king. He informed the chief of police and the two conspirators were caught and hanged. Mordecai’s service was entered in the court records.
Khshayarsha, having quarrelled with his queen, Amastari (Vashti in the Bible), ordered the eligible girls in his capital, Susa, to appear before him so that he could select a new bride. Mordecai sent his beautiful orphan cousin Esther before the king, warning her not to disclose that she was Jewish. Esther was chosen and became queen. Mordecai had hoped to place her in that high position in case she could help the Jewish people someday, for trouble was brewing in Khshayarsha’s court.
In particular, the vizier Haman was an Amalekite from a tribe of nomadic raiders with ancestral enmity against Jews. He was offended when Mordecai, who was sitting at the palace gate, did not rise at once to greet him. So, Haman plotted to wipe out the entire Jewish community across the Persian empire—men, women and children—in one day. Having poisoned the king’s ear successfully, he obtained a royal order for the mass execution. He then cast lots in a fiendish lottery or draw for the date of the massacre. Purim means ‘lots’ from the old Akkadian word for dice ‘pur’. The date fell on the fourteenth of the month of Adar (February-March).
Mordecai came to know of this demonic plan and put on sackcloth and ashes to publicly lament. He sent word to Esther to somehow stop the king. Anyone who approached the king in his inner court without being explicitly summoned was instantly put to death as a tight security measure. Esther resolved to risk it for the sake of her people and informed her cousin through a trusted palace servant, Hatach, “If I perish, I perish”.
She fasted for three days, sending word to the Jewish community to fast with her in solidarity. She then dressed in her royal robes and courageously approached the inner court, determined to do or die. Fortunately, the king showed his favour by holding out his golden sceptre, allowing her to approach and touch the tip. She invited him and Haman to grace a banquet in her royal apartments.
Esther could have lived an easy, luxurious life without the king suspecting her identity. But she preferred risking an honourable death in the service of her frequently invaded, displaced and tormented people, whose temples were destroyed, even in Jerusalem in the second century BCE by the Seleucid Greeks. The re-conquest and rededication of that temple was the reason for the festival of Hanukkah.
Haman had, meanwhile, already had gallows built on which to hang Mordecai. The night before Esther’s banquet, the king had a bout of insomnia. His attendants fetched and read aloud from the court records to help him sleep. He learnt of Mordecai’s service in preventing his assassination, and asked if he had been rewarded. He was greatly displeased that no such thing had happened. The next morning, he sent for Haman and asked how a man who had rendered a great service to the king should be honoured. Assuming that the king meant to reward him, Haman eagerly replied that such a man should be dressed in royal robes and paraded in the city on the king’s own horse. To his chagrin and fury, the king ordered Mordecai to be so honoured.
That evening at the banquet, Esther revealed her identity and pleaded with the king to spare her and her people. Since a royal order couldn’t be rescinded, the king allowed the Jews to defend themselves. Thousands of Haman’s assassins were killed. Haman himself was hanged on the gallows he had built for Mordecai. Mordecai also killed Haman’s ten sons to prevent their revenge. The fourteenth of Adar, the day of deliverance, has been celebrated every year after that as Purim. Jews observe it by listening to the Book of Esther read aloud in a synagogue, sharing food, giving charity to the poor, putting on fancy dress and having a feast. Triangular, sweet-centred cookies are made, called ‘Haman’s ears’.
Hitler banned the observance of Purim. Nazi attacks on Jews were often timed for Jewish festivals, even ritually killing Jews on successive Purims to ‘avenge’ Haman’s sons. But Purim lives on as a joyous feast of remembrance and thanksgiving for yet another deliverance from annihilation. ‘Am Yisrael Chai’, meaning, ‘The people of Israel live’, affirming their survival against all odds.
Renuka Narayanan | FAITHLINE | Senior journalist
(Views are personal)
(shebaba09@gmail.com)