Esther 3

After these events, King Xerxes honored Haman son of Hammedatha, the Agagite, elevating him and giving him a seat of honor higher than that of all the other nobles. Esther 3:1

We can be sure of one thing, that the king did not talk it over with his wife before elevating Haman. It was obviously a very rash decision. The word “Agagite” was bad news to Mordecai and it would have been the same to Esther. It sprang from Agag, the king of the Amalekites whom King Saul captured (Exo. 17:8ff.; 1 Sam. 15:7ff.). [1] Had Saul obeyed the Lord and destroyed all the evil Amalekites, Haman would not have been around. Also, Saul himself would not have later been killed by an Amalekite (2 Sam. 1:1ff.). Mordecai was after all a relative of Kish, thus of Saul and of Benjamin (Est. 2:5).

God had sworn eternal vengeance against the Amalekite nation for attacking his child Israel as the latter toddled out of Egypt (Deut. 25:18). It is very strange and interesting that Haman would seek to destroy the whole nation of Israel (v. 6). That tells us that there is an ancient problem present. Amalek was an offspring of Esau (Gen. 36:12) who wanted to murder Jacob (Gen. 27:41). When God says a whole nation must be destroyed, we had best believe him.

Haman was elevated to vizier or prime minister of the vast kingdom. He was the man second in power to the king. Everyone in the kingdom would have to bow to him. It did not take this enemy of Israel long to begin plotting against the Jewish nation.

“All the royal officials at the king’s gate knelt down and paid honor to Haman, for the king had commanded this concerning him. But Mordecai would not kneel down or pay him honor” (3:2). Walter Savage Landor (1775-1864), the British essayist, wrote: “When little men cast long shadows, it is a sign that the sun is setting.” [2] Mordecai was not in the least fooled by the new fame of Haman. While everyone at the gate hit the dirt and prostrated themselves when Haman appeared, Mordecai did not bend even a knee.

The Jewish people did not have anything against bowing to important people. We see them doing that many places in scripture (cf. Gen. 18:2; 23:7; 33:3, 6-7; 42:6; 43:26; Exo. 18:7; 1 Sam. 24:8; 2 Sam. 14:4; 16:4; 18:28). The problem was that Mordecai was dealing with an ancient enemy of Israel. It was probably in that respect that he finally admitted his Judaism. One of the Jewish Targums (Aramaic paraphrase of the Hebrew Bible) had said that “no self-respecting Benjamite would show reverence to a descendant of the Amalekites.” [3] Apparently, Mordecai was taking that advice seriously.

“Then the royal officials at the king’s gate asked Mordecai, ‘Why do you disobey the king’s command?’ Day after day they spoke to him, but he refused to comply. Therefore, they told Haman about it to see whether Mordecai’s behavior would be tolerated, for he had told them he was a Jew” (3:3-4). Day after day Mordecai refused to bow to Haman. At first Haman did not seem to notice this insubordination. However, Mordecai’s “friends” at the gate eventually let him know about it. We can imagine that proud Haman “blew his stack” at the news. Utley says, “By willfully disobeying a royal command, he was putting his job and his life in jeopardy. By angering Haman, he was putting every Jew in the empire at risk!” [4] The fact that Haman did not immediately strike off Mordecai’s head illustrates that the latter may have had an important job in the king’s service.

“When Haman saw that Mordecai would not kneel down or pay him honor, he was enraged.” (3:5). We have been introduced to our heroes and now we get introduced to our villain. Utley says of Haman: “This is the first of several mood swings. Haman is depicted as rapidly moving from elation to fury!” [5] McGee ventures to put words in Haman’s mouth saying: “I’ve got everything in the world I want; I can have anything in the kingdom, but that little Jew won’t bow to me.” McGee continues: “We have only to turn back the pages of history to find that the Jew has attended the funeral of every one of the nations that tried to exterminate him.” [6]

“Yet having learned who Mordecai’s people were, he scorned the idea of killing only Mordecai. Instead, Haman looked for a way to destroy all Mordecai’s people, the Jews, throughout the whole kingdom of Xerxes” (3:6). Now we begin to see Haman’s ancient hatred emerging. Once he found out that Mordecai was a Jew his blood began to boil with antisemitism. He suddenly had a great desire to kill every Jew in the kingdom, from old men and women to small babies. Haman was only thinking of genocide. Edward Flannery notes that antisemitism is called, “…the longest and deepest hatred of human history.” [7] McGee says: “There never has been a time since Israel became a nation down in the land of Egypt to the present moment, that there has not been a movement somewhere to exterminate them.” [8] The Persian Empire was vast. It has been estimated by Keil that the empire from Ethiopia to India must have held at least a hundred million people. Of these masses, there were probably two to three million Jews. [9] The empire included all the Jewish exiles in Assyria, Babylon and Persia plus all the Jews living in Israel. He would have literally wiped out Judaism.

“In the twelfth year of King Xerxes, in the first month, the month of Nisan, the pur (that is, the lot) was cast in the presence of Haman to select a day and month. And the lot fell on the twelfth month, the month of Adar” (3:7). The twelfth year and first month of Xerxes, when the lot was cast, would have been the year 474 BC, which would have fallen in our months of March/April. The genocide would take place in about a year during the month of Adar.

The pur or lot is the Hebrew form of the Babylon word puru. This word can mean “lot” or “fate.” Belief in fate was very much part of the worldview that pervaded in ancient times, with the one exception of Israel. [10] The subsequent holiday of Purim is simply the Hebrew plural form of pur. We might think this practice is weird but numerous ancient occult practices are resurfacing today. Breneman says: “Many forms of a basically pagan worldview pervade our modern world and even Western culture. Thus, there is an increase of spiritism, horoscopes, magic, and various forms of Oriental religions that are based on a pantheism. …” [11] “The book shows the worthlessness of superstition as a guide to life. Haman never even lived to see his ‘lucky’ day…” [12]

The Evil Plot

Then Haman said to King Xerxes, “There is a certain people dispersed among the peoples in all the provinces of your kingdom who keep themselves separate. Their customs are different from those of all other people, and they do not obey the king’s laws; it is not in the king’s best interest to tolerate them.” Esther 3:8

Haman comes to the king with outright lies, inuendoes, exaggerations and slanders to back up his serious claims. “His vague description of the situation made the danger seem even worse.” [13] McConville sees the attack as “a masterly propaganda exercise.” [14] Unfortunately, he spewed his lies to a dull, credulous king whose mind was probably on his harem and not on the horrible content of Haman’s proposal. We wonder how many times in history antisemites have spewed their hatred and convinced other kings to destroy the Jewish people.

Haman was a poor example of humanity. He could have claimed several qualities that the Lord despises. Proverbs 6:16-19 says: “There are six things the LORD hates, seven that are detestable to him: haughty eyes, a lying tongue, hands that shed innocent blood, a heart that devises wicked schemes, feet that are quick to rush into evil, a false witness who pours out lies and a person who stirs up conflict in the community.” It seems that Haman was an expert in all these things.

“If it pleases the king, let a decree be issued to destroy them, and I will give ten thousand talents of silver to the king’s administrators for the royal treasury” (3:9). The thing that stands out here is the massive amount of money promised. Ten thousand talents of silver would be 375 tons according to the NIV notes on this verse. Even at very old silver prices the amount would have run into the millions of dollars. [15] With today’s silver prices it would easily run into a couple hundred million dollars in US currency.

It is difficult to believe that Haman had that kind of money. If he did, it is hard to believe that he could hate the Jews enough to give it all for their destruction. The historian Herodotus tells us that King Darius I received only about 15,000 talents of silver for a whole year’s revenue. [16] What seems more likely is that Haman was expecting to collect his money from the property of murdered Jews. That money he would transfer over to the king. In all likelihood, the king was still short on cash because of his disastrous defeat at the hands of the Greeks. The king, for some reason, turned down Haman’s offer.

“So the king took his signet ring from his finger and gave it to Haman son of Hammedatha, the Agagite, the enemy of the Jews” (3:10). Eastern potentates usually wore their personal seal upon their rings. To seal a matter, they would impress their rings in warm wax. For the king to give away his seal to Haman was a reckless act, since it conveyed to Haman unlimited authority. In one sense, the creep Haman for a brief time almost ruled the vast Persian Empire. Anders says of the king, “He represents the criminality of indifference.” [17] Breneman says, “both Vashti and Esther showed that they had much more respect for the dignity of life than did Xerxes and Haman.” [18]

“‘Keep the money,’ the king said to Haman, ‘and do with the people as you please’” (3:11). Utley thinks this sounds much like the beginning of an Oriental bargaining session. He thinks the king might have been allowing Haman to pay all his henchmen with the money collected. [19] The whole bargaining session was one of those extremely bleak and sad days for humanity.

Delivering The Dreadful Message

Then on the thirteenth day of the first month the royal secretaries were summoned. They wrote out in the script of each province and in the language of each people all Haman’s orders to the king’s satraps, the governors of the various provinces and the nobles of the various peoples. These were written in the name of King Xerxes himself and sealed with his own ring.” Esther 3:12

How strange! On this very day at sunset, the Jews would begin the celebration of Passover, their deliverance from the bondage and death of Egypt. Now Haman was busy preparing another great disaster from which they would also need deliverance. We have to agree with Coffman: “God’s people never faced a more terrible threat than this one.”

“Dispatches were sent by couriers to all the king’s provinces with the order to destroy, kill and annihilate all the Jews – young and old, women and children – on a single day, the thirteenth day of the twelfth month, the month of Adar, and to plunder their goods” (3:13). McConville describes the Persian delivery service as very similar to the Pony Express in the early American West. The Persian riders were stationed 24 hours apart and they could deliver a message across the vast Persian Empire in record time. [20] The decree was merciless and would include the young and the old. The only good thing about it was that the Jews were given a year to prepare for their death.

“A copy of the text of the edict was to be issued as law in every province and made known to the people of every nationality so they would be ready for that day” (3:14). There has hardly been a time when there was such uniform law over such an immense territory. The empire was so large that there was almost no place for the Jews to escape. Assuming that antisemitism raged in that time as it has raged ever since there were probably thousands and perhaps millions of people in the empire who could hardly wait for the day to kill Jews.

“The couriers went out, spurred on by the king’s command, and the edict was issued in the citadel of Susa. The king and Haman sat down to drink, but the city of Susa was bewildered” (3:15). Haman wasted no time sending the couriers out. The historian Herodotus wrote: “Nothing mortal travels so fast as these Persian messengers.” [21] Guthrie says: “The decree would reach even distant parts of the empire with months to spare before the thirteenth day of Adar…” [22] With that, the drinking buddies sat down together.

We can be assured that the decree was not good news for thinking Persians. Many of them probably had Jewish friends. If the Jews were as adept at intermarrying with Gentiles as they later were in the days of Ezra and Nehemiah, many Persians had Jewish spouses. There could also be much concern for the Persians, that once a mob tasted human blood they would continue with their theft and murder even of those who were not Jewish. [23]

Jamieson well describes this picture: “The completeness of the word-painting in this verse is exquisite. The historian, by a simple stroke, has drawn a graphic picture of an Oriental despot, wallowing with his favorite sensual enjoyments, while his tyrannical cruelties were rending the hearts and homes of thousands of his subjects.” [24] Helen Keller once said: “Science may have found a cure for most evils, but it has found no remedy for the worst of them all – the apathy of human beings.” [25]

Footnotes

1. Anders, g. ed. Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther, Holman Old Testament Commentary, p. 307.

2. Wiersbe, The Wiersbe Bible Commentary, OT, p. 803.

3. Breneman, Ezra, Nehemiah & Esther, The New American Commentary, p. 327.

4. Utley, Free Bible Commentary, Esther, vs. 3:3-4.

5. Ibid., v. 3:5.

6. McGee, History of Israel, Ezra Nehemiah, Esther, p. 201.

7. Edward H. Flannery, The Anguish of the Jews, Twenty-Three Centuries of Antisemitism (Mahway, New York: Paulist Press, 1985) p. 285.

8. McGee, History of Israel, Ezra Nehemiah, Esther, p. 198.

9. Breneman, Ezra, Nehemiah & Esther, The New American Commentary, pp. 283-284.

10. Ibid., pp. 328, 296.

11. Ibid., p. 329.

12. Guthrie, et. al., The New Bible Commentary, p. 414.

13. Wiersbe, The Wiersbe Bible Commentary, OT, p. 804.

14. McConville, Ezra, Nehemiah, and Esther, p. 167.

15. Pfeiffer & Harrison, The Wycliffe Bible Commentary, p. 451.

16. Ibid.

17. Anders, g. ed. Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther, Holman Old Testament Commentary, p. 310.

18. Breneman, Ezra, Nehemiah & Esther, The New American Commentary, p. 314.

19. Utley, Free Bible Commentary, Esther, v. 3:11.

20. McConville, Ezra, Nehemiah, and Esther, p. 168.

21. Quoted in Pfeiffer & Harrison, The Wycliffe Bible Commentary, p. 451.

22. Guthrie, et. al., The New Bible Commentary, p. 417.

23. Clarke, The Adam Clarke Commentary, Commentary on Esther, v. 3:15.

24. Jamieson, Fausset, & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible, Commentary on Esther, v. 3:15.

25. Quoted in Wiersbe, The Wiersbe Bible Commentary, OT, p. 805.