Not to Mention
Esther 7: 1 - 6, 9 - 10; 9: 20 - 22

September 27, 2009


It is not often that anyone talks about providence, even in church. No, this is not a more subtle form of “God’s plan” for your life; it is not fate or predestination, but being guided and led by God. The idea has frequently been abused by those who want to loudly legitimize the path their life has taken and do so by saying God has led them here, end of argument. God’s providence is not finished.

Every three years we are allowed to live on the 14th day of the month Adar. That’s when Esther makes her only appearance in the Lectionary readings and by necessity the Old Testament book of ten chapters is edited down to ten verses.

By necessity, of course, is only a euphemism for we clock-watching mainline Protestant worshippers. The 14th of Adar is the beginning of the feast of Purim in Judaism, February 28th in 2010, a time of great frivolity, practical jokes and rejoicing. And in every synagogue, the Book of Esther is read in its entirety and it is not a passive reading. Every time the name of the villain Haman is mentioned, noisemakers and boos loudly accent the recitation.

Not to mention God in this lengthy tale is not an issue for most readers of Esther. How many times yesterday or in the past week have you mentioned the name of God? The readers of Esther keep hearing God rustling about in the background, a presence not foreboding, but encouraging.

Historically, however, not all readers have been happy about the silence of God in Esther. The book was not accepted in some Jewish circles until the fourth century A.D. and many Christians balked at including it in the canon of their Old Testament. It’s really not the lack of God, but the open vengeance and gory violence show a lack of grace and forgiveness has been perceived both as non-Jewish and non-Christian.

The modern dilemma of “how do we speak of God in a secular age?” has not gone away. There are times when using religious language is a barrier to faith and truth because God and Jesus Christ are overcrowded with too many possible meanings and connotations. Human beings have a tendency to use religious God language as a shortcut and a conversation-ender. You’ve experienced someone browbeating you with God and Jesus and being blessed and faithful all over the place, and you don’t know how to rebut God and Jesus. Our secular parables have to spell it out long-hand.

The long-running TV series MASH situated in a Korean War US military field hospital did just that. Always a dark comedy with war as the ultimate butt of the jokes, the doctors specializing in “meatball surgery,” there is the odd character of the Catholic chaplain, Father Mulcahy, whose attempts at religious interpretation of what is swirling around him are typically inane and irrelevant, yet occasionally the very words that need to be heard. In the worst situation in the world, the quick decisions made, the compassion displayed, illuminate how one lives a Christ-life like. It was a non-fiction world, but the stories were faithful fiction.

Esther’s world was the Seleucid Persian empire possibly in the second century B.C., a real world who details are precise, although the story is fiction, a composite of several previous tales. Read the book from start to finish and will be overwhelmed by the decadent wealth and lavishness of court life. There is never any mention of the poor or of poverty, but those hearing this story would have known that there is “limited good” in this universe, so if there are that many rich people, mathematically there have to be many more people impoverished.

This Persian world is fiercely patriarchal, rigidly hierarchical, efficient in its delivery of cruelty. The Jews who live within the empire have had their identity compromised right down to their names. The two principal characters, Mordecai and Esther, good Jewish names since then, are almost certainly renderings of the names of two primary Persian gods, Marduk and Ishtar. For people of the One God, Creator of the universe, to be called daily by names that betrayed their understanding of the world was an obscenity.

In such an unreal world of wealth, privilege and power, life and death hangs in the balance of a gesture of disrespect. Queen Vashti refuses the summons of her husband King Ahasuerus (Xerxes) and is promptly banished, or worse. A kind of beauty pageant is then conducted by the king’s men, recruiting women from all over the empire to come to Susa the capital and be properly fed and adorned with the best cosmetics. Esther is discovered by the talent scouts and brought to the capital, her cousin and foster father, Mordecai, keeps a close watch on her progress. She disdains all but the basic necessities and when her time comes to audition before the king her simplicity attracts him deeply and he makes her queen. She never mentions to him that she is a Jew. Was it irrelevant, and did it matter? Don’t spoil a good story. Haman is promoted to be the prime minister of the empire, but Mordecai will never bow to him as he should. The two come from historically antagonistic tribes and Mordecai does not feel he has to budge an inch. Haman, however, is incensed and decides the ultimate insult would be to take his vengeance upon the entire Jewish nation, and craftily organizes an empire-wide pogrom intended to wipe out the Jews, and fools the King into approving it. Haman decides the fateful day by casting lots. The word for “lots” is “Pur” and the plural Purim - the name of the joyous festival held by the Jews on the 14th of Adar - a twisted sense of humour included in the mix. In the end the lot fell on Haman.

When Esther is told about this terrible plot by Mordecai and challenged to reveal it all to the King. However, a queen cannot just walk in on the king, she has to be specifically invited. If she appears uninvited the king could have her put to death. She decides she has to take the risk, for as Mordecai said to her, “Who knows whether you have come to the kingdom for such a time as this?” She goes and in such a time as this reverses ironically the sin of Vashti and is warmly received by Ahasuerus. She doesn’t blurt out the problem right away, but invites the king and Haman to eat at her place and eventually reveals Haman’s diabolical plot. The gallows intended for Mordecai become Haman’s final post in life.

No God was used in the making of this tale of valiant courage, but there are several things here that could only arise from the presence of God. Fasting - no Persian fasts; instead he eats well - and prayer, can only be perceived as practices of those who are faithful to the God of Israel. We put down the patriarchal nature of the Old Testament, but nobody else told stories about women as heroes like the Jews. Perhaps not enough stories, but Rahab, Tamar, Ruth, Bathsheba, Esther, and Mary were always considered to be reasons the Jews survived. Jesus continued to pick up the pace as he paid attention to women like no rabbi should.

But the thread that divinely sews the story together is an idea we seldom speak of today - the providence of God. We don’t know where God is going, it isn’t planned out in advance, and even God cannot predict where you will be guided, but perhaps for a time such as this you were placed here. Is there anybody here who has not felt the power of providence in your life? There, but for the grace of God, go I wallowing in despair and failure, and moreover, I would not have accomplished the best things in my life if I had not so casually taken on what I did before I knew where I was going, or had not accidentally shown up at the right time in the right place, but did not know where I was until now. All too many of us throw away those opportunities because God doesn’t speak out loud to us as often as some want us to think. But there’s an itch telling you to do it now.

You don’t have to say God guided me, but even if you don’t others will know that that is the way God works anonymously in the world. Like Esther, the hard part is to have the courage to be what you are in the place you are standing.

Preached by Robert Kitchen
Knox-Metropolitan United Church
Regina, Saskatchewan